We bid on what we thought was a AR980 on 'that site' and when we won it we realized that it was almost 100ltrs bigger again, so that was a bonus.

But we want to do something special now that we have the time to do it right, and not just have boring old stuff that the average Joe has.

Panaque? whiptail? fire eel? glass cat fish? Hatchets? flag tail catfish....any of those OK for 285ltrs.....big enough for some silver dollars?

like the idea of heavily planted, Java fern, crypts, anubis...stuff like that.

But if those ideas are *crap* any of your ideas or combination's would be cool hear as well.

Cool bananas

silver dollars are out unfortunately if you want plants. there is a similar species whos name escapes me at the moment which might be more suitable. whiptails will be more than fine in a tank that size (they only get about 10cm) hatchets will be fine, they stay pretty small (pricey though!), glass cats again will be fine. not sure about the rest.

Africans

so many options!

You'd want plants of-course :lol: so maybe lots of wood and javaferns and anubias?

That would be a cool tank with only a few fish in it.

Maybe some neon dwarf rainbows and a male apisto agasizzi because it has a red tail and that would stand out among a lot of brown and green!

typical p44 suggesting plants :roll: , but after seeing a proper planted tank of dbden tank i would have to agree

so many options!

You'd want plants of-course :lol: so maybe lots of wood and javaferns and anubias?

That would be a cool tank with only a few fish in it.

Maybe some neon dwarf rainbows and a male apisto agasizzi because it has a red tail and that would stand out among a lot of brown and green!

I love those really heavily planted leafy bushy tanks, but to be honest my aquascaping abilities are very limited.

Would you come up and plant it for us for a box of tui's 44???? :lol:

eww beer. :lol:

You just need loads of green plants at the back with some red splashes here and there. The wider the tank the better. I really struggle with my tank as it is not 2 ft wide.

I think you need to be offering Timtams or hair product, Carlos

hey phoenix - on your way up north can you swing by and scape the big tank? I've got tim tams and bryl creme

Brylcreeme - now there is a name I have not heard for a while!

and brylcream

Now I have 4 tanks to plant-up if I go up north! :lol:

Ok, so I've decided my aquascaping abilities just aren't that good and I prolly do better natural looking boitopes that the fancy garden ones.

Looking at our wish list we decided that a Amazon biotope was the way to go, though a combined biotope rather than from a specific area.

Will ditch the carbon in the filter and replace it with peat or teabags or something.

Had a wee fiddle with our cool Macro driftwood and finally managed to fix it to a heavy slab of slate, though the only problem with that I've discovered is I can't move it about or change the angle to get it looking just right. We're gonna get as many 'legal' Amazon plants as we can get.

Our fish list is,

1 x Royal Plec

1 x Royal Whiptail

3 x Otos

5 Marble Hatchets (expensive :roll: )

12 x Cories (hopefully mosaics)

1 x Black Ghost knife

We want a shoaler but want to stay away from neons or the same old stuff, does anyone know anything about the Conchu Blue Tetra?, pretty big fish yeah?

Their colours look stunning when young but do they lose them when older?

Anyways, here's a few different looks, the last one is my fav, the others just look too crowded, as Siran said, less is more, what do you think, any different ideas will be much appreciated, as I want to take my time a get it just right.

As a SA biotope will we need leaf litter around as well?, Brazilian trees are fairly scarce around here but we have a maple tree, would that work?

If you have after market lights, and do not use the stock hood + lights, I'd stick those stumps up vertically so they pop out of the water.

Then do as you please. Hatchets would probably jump out though

Conchu blues are a pretty awesome fish. Black phantoms are really neat too; but if you want colour serpaes are a nice red.

Nice wood

Do you think the cochu's will become a midnight snack for the ghost knife?

just the lighter wood I reckon. is that a twisted root piece i see in there? try a different spot for that, could look cool

Amazon biotopes are getting a little boring :lol:

I think you should do a Congo biotope, with lots of Anubias and Congo Fern, and although it's not from Africa, Java Fern

For fish, well, something a little different would be nicer than boring old Congo Tetras. There is a very nice fish that I've kept before called the Yellow-tailed Congo Tetra, Hemigrammopetersius (Alestopetersius) caudalis. Also you should get some Wild Kribs, Pelvicachromis taeniatus.

BTW, I don't like the second, darker piece of bogwood resting on top of the horizontal piece. I think it should be removed, otherwise everything looks too cluttered.

Amazon biotopes are getting a little boring :lol:

I think you should do a Congo biotope, with lots of Anubias and Congo Fern, and although it's not from Africa, Java Fern

For fish, well, something a little different would be nicer than boring old Congo Tetras. There is a very nice fish that I've kept before called the Yellow-tailed Congo Tetra, Hemigrammopetersius (Alestopetersius) caudalis. Also you should get some Wild Kribs, Pelvicachromis taeniatus.

BTW, I don't like the second, darker piece of bogwood resting on top of the horizontal piece. I think it should be removed, otherwise everything looks too cluttered.

yeah we've removed it, just have the pale wood now.

, sor right, we gonna do a east Asian biotope with the other tank, Java fern, crypts, vallisneria, Rotala rotundifolia,tiger lillies, rocks, pokey branches, black water, yoyos, clown loaches, zodiac loaches, skunk loaches, zebra loaches, maybe a peacock eel.

looking forward to that one.

Just wondering, do you think finely crushed scoria would be an OK aquarium substrate? as they say the substrate for east Asian biotope needs to be red, seems like a cheap alternative...

So long as it's not too harsh on the fish and it's pH neutral.

Awesome! An Asian biotope sounds like an excellent idea.

For shoaling fish (if you are having them in the tank) I think 25 Trigonopoma pauciperforatum will look fabulous!

I love those loaches you have mentioned. They're all very cool. You could also add some Khuli Loaches too.

Also I think you should have some Banded Gouramis and/or Pearl Gouramis.

Use the search function for scoria, there are a few posts about it from the past.

Scoria can be toxic to the fish. It's made by volcanic activity where molten rock, minerals, heavy metals and gas all spurt out in a rush. The small holes in the scoria are formed by the gas. The toxic minerals and metals get trapped inside the rock. In saying that, I did try scoria as a bacteria filter media once but it didn't work too well because it blocked up all the time. Before using it I soaked it in a 10% hydrochloric acid solution to try to strip any of the toxic material out in case it was going to cause a problem. I don't know for sure if scoria can cause a problem, I just did a lot of reading about it before using it - I found several articles all saying it can be toxic.

Scoria is also very sharp and can be a problem for fish that dig in the gravel.

I personally wouldn't use it as a substrate as it's too sharp and will block up in time.