Journal Farmer D. Singh's journal

[Kwyet 449]

It’s been a year since his last post, but he has a journal here.

S

Journal Thread 'sudiorca's non-CO2 supplemented softwater tanks'

Dec 17, 2022

Thank you @GreggZ for the invite.
I have been maintaining several non-CO2 supplemented softwater tanks for some time and one of them was setup little over 3.5 years ago. Although I do have a pressurized CO2 injected high-tech tank, I love growing several problematic stem palnts including many members of Lythraceae family in my non-CO2 supplemented tanks.
Below are some old pictures of my tanks along with some closeup shots of some of my favorite plants.
My tanks are currently recovering from sevearl weeks of negligence due to my absence and I will post more pictures as they...

• sudiorca
• high light non-co2 softwater zero dkh
• Replies: 79
• Forum: Journals

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[mrmoss 7]

Tank 4
Emmersed plants storage tank



Apt feast soil
Ceran wrapped (greenhouse effect) (no holes)
Pure rodi (small layer above substrate-allows for easy transition from submersed to emmersed)
Beamswork led full blast

 

[mrmoss 7]

Tank 2 water change shot

 

[mrmoss 7]

Changes
Got x4 new light fixtures using sunlike leds
The goals or already current:
Tank 1 - vichada dominant along with syng mixture
Tank 2 - uaupes/la lindosa dominant
Tank 5 - tonina dominant, aiming for pedra dominant as well (be a little bit after the melt)
Tank 6 - lago grande/giant dominant
Tank 7 - pure eriocaulon tank

Having one eriocaulon tank however is unacceptable to me. Uaupes and tonina dominated tanks are non negotiable to me. They stay. So tank 1 and tank 6 are the changeables. Lucky though, there is time. Time is needed to grow, propagate, sell and whatever is needed to accomplish two erio tanks, uaupes tank, tonina/pedra tank and tank 1(vichada dominated plus mix) and 6 (lago and giant). There just seems not enough room in which the backup moss tank (tank 8) may need to convert into the second erio tank. Emmersed tank (tank 4) is also so far non negotiable, there's no room for co2 as well as electricity plug room so filling it is not an option. Only option is keeping it emmersed or complete tear down (which is what im leaning towards) however it is a no maintenance tank.

These are my goals.
And the goal is simple. Become syng erio tonina king. Which can summarize as "soft water king" i know the summary is tacky. Hehe haha, hehe f-ing haha
Hehe f-ing haha to all i do...the ego and maturity level haha
Maybe just "algae king"
As far as an aquascaper, I failed

 

[mrmoss 7]

Tank 1
The vichada will cover a good amount of area i believe. With the amount of sideshoots I'll pull off. Growth will be faster too once separated from the mother. This tank is on my last to do list and the hardest for me to reorganize. Ive got too many species here that mostly I just want to throw away as I feel they dont belong in this tank. One of those is a giant erio richardianum which im trying to get seeds from before I toss it. Others include uaupes and lago grande which I already have en masse in their dedicated tanks. Pogostemon hieldeberg id like to get rid of too and a erio fluviatillis which i want to transfer to another tank. I have thought turning tank 1 to pure erio but dont have the heart to rid the vichada as well dont have the erio plant mass to fill the tank. So my focus is vichada and then I have no idea where I'll go from there. This is why I've gone so long without doing anything but top offs for this tank. Current plants in this tank are syng pedra, syng lago grande, syng giant, syng uaupes, syng vichada saved (x1 or so syng belem x1 or so syng manaus) - just so they dont dissappear, erio fluviatillis, erio richardianum and pogostemon hieldeberg. The soil is old (mastersoil next) and a lot is powder. I have spare new soil but wont use it unless I convert to a all erio tank. The plants I have in there now dont seem bothered by it so no hurry no hassle. As well there have been root tabs placed in there awhile ago. Anyways enough useless ramblings.

As you can see the empty space used to be all macrocaulon. I did a sale where the buyer backed out last minute so theyre sealed in a bag and just withering away. I dont care to put them back in and away they go...


Most everything has reached the top of water column even the uaupes

 

[mrmoss 7]

Tank 1 continuation
Here are vichadas. They have over exerted themselves over the surface with sideshoots ready to be extracted with all plants ready to be pulled and replanted. As you see the roots are pretty clean white

 

[mrmoss 7]

Tank 2
After removing most of the erios and all the toninas all i did was move plants la lindosa and caulescens to the front, trim the 3 or 4 pedra in there and topped all uaupes' and filled in the gaps with their tops. But with this species along with many stems you can even cut the long stems multiple times and each stem/bottom/mid-section all will root and produce sideshoots. It doesnt need to be just top & bottom. Its very fast and easy to propagate(uaupes). Everything will fill in and full. I raised the par up in hoping to get fuller/shorter plants over the lenghty internodes they've been growing.

 

[mrmoss 7]

Tank 2 continuation
So this algae is some sort free floating green algae. I dont think any of it is diatoms just soft algae with a lot of the dirt/soil/root tab powder(from uprooting erios that transferred into tank 7 and tonina transferred into tank5) caught in the algae itself. Some of it is attached so i couldnt remove it. I can rub the plants and net it out however I need the plants to root first (which is slower with the algae there) because it is very energy draining manual removing and accidently uprooting the plant. If they root well I can also use an airline tube siphon and manually suck it up that way. The easy way as well is to wait for the plants to establish a bit and then use api algaefix. No matter which choice there is no panic and waiting a week or more.

 

[mrmoss 7]

Tank 2 continuation

So instead of waiting a week i siphoned up most of the algae with an airline tube (today Sept 25, [2 days lqter]) and got most of it. There is some minor that attached itself that I may have to use api algaefix to rid the remainder. This time i am going to wait a week before making a decision. The siphoning went really well (after 2 days, Sept 23) and I only uprooted one uaupes plantlet in the process so in turn the procedure was pretty therapeutic.

 

[mrmoss 7]

Tank 2 continuation

The 5g jug here shows the glob of algae removed.



I guess about 2 weeks of growth itll all be full(tank 2).