oh thats awesome freshwest, always nice to find babies, even better when ur not trying . Cant wait to see those pics

any updated pics yet??

that tank is AWESOME!!!!

**EVIL**

How have you got these plants to grow so well? what lighting are you using? I have a new 2'x2'x2' tank that I have just planted (no fish in it yet) but in the past I have not had much success with plants.

Also does anyone know what I can do about really soft water, The tap water I use (from town supply) is very soft then stays that way when in the aquarium, this I think will be fine for the discus I will eventually put in there and for the amazon type environment I'm trying to create but I worry that it will get even softer, I don't know much about hardness only how to test for it.

you want your kh above 3 for general keeping at least i think, we have no buffering in our water (kh of 1, same for gh). i have bird grit, the stuff they eat, in my filters and that ups the kh over time which keeps your ph stable, adding teeny tiny amounts of baking soda can also help but that alters it pretty drastically so watch for that if you want to go that way. the kh and gh come in one kit, i got the AP test kit for about 20 bucks. its a useful thing to have if you suspect your water is soft im not too sure what role gh plays in a tank, its just gereral hardness, obviously fish that like hard water wont like soft water but im not sure if it has any effect on plants, ph etc.

at the moment i have my tank with discus running on a ph of 7.4 (getting it to about 7 as we speak as baking soda was added for a bit), kh and gh both 5.

Thanks for your reply, Well i'm off to the pet shop to get water tested now and will find out what the pH/nitrite/nitrate/amonia is, that way i'll no which way to go, My water may already be slightly acidic so i wouldnt want to add baking soda if that was the case but if it could do with being more acidic then baking soda sounds like it would be the go (making water slightly harder for the plants and water more acid for the fish).

If you are wondering why I dont have my own testers(I have kh/gh tester).

I havent kept tropical fish for 5 years and before that I had a community aquarium. So really just getting back into it. I will need to buy a pH tester but in the mean time pet shop down the road tests for pH,nitite and nitate and amonia for free. I bypass petshop daily on the way to work so I will pop in with my water sample every day to see whats happening to it.

Finally got around to taking some pics of the tank tonight.

As you can see there has been quite a bit of growth.

As far as water parameters go Temp 28 c , pH 7 (pH maintained by pH controller), kH 2 , KNO3 5 to 10 , P 0.5, 2x400 watt M/H lights on for 10 hours, Fertiliser PMDD dosed once a week, 1/3 water change every 2 weeks.

Wow! all that growth in under three weeks!

absolutely stunning any dos and dont from ur experience for someone like me who one day hopes to attack a beast assignment like this.

whats the carpeting plant? pygmy chain sword?

Fantastic freshwest and thanks for the updated photo. Most people have trouble growing plants i think you will have trouble slowing them down. Love to see the odd red cplour plant against the greenery as well. What fish are you using to keep back any algae that may be growing.

Amazon - a spelling mistake I think. Should be Amazin'

Since there isn't a slack-jawed drooling icon, all that I have left to say is .

I'd be interested in knowing which plants you used too - most of the time I still can't tell by looking at them :oops: .

Thanks for the comments

fishboi

whats the carpeting plant? pygmy chain sword?

Echinodurus quadricostatus var. Madalengensis.

Mark

What fish are you using to keep back any algae that may be growing.

I have 5 Siamese algae eaters, which take care of any thread algae, and 3 ottos, which work on the green spot algae.

Im planning to get some fancy plecos to help control the green spot algae.

At this stage not sure what to get from what I have read some can be hard on the plants.

Any ideas

Oh my...oh my...OH MY..AMAZING :bounce: :bounce: :bounce: :bounce:

Freshwest, you continue to amaze us all! That is quite the forest you have going there. You are my inspiration

When you have plants that cover the bottom, the ones with the long name, do you still vaccum?

Been meaning to post on this thread for ages. I was one of the helpers early on - what fun that was building the stand and getting the tank into place

If you're interested in why Freshwest checkout the little bags of Chillies in your local supermarket sometime... He does a mean Capsicum as well

Anyway enough of the free plugs.... That last lot of photos are rubbish The tank is looking stunning and I'll have a go and getting some better shots this weekend. I'm afraid Freshwest has got a bad dose of fish fever judging by his ever expanding fish room.

I just have the one tank a 4 footer - currently empty (just moved from Holland back to NZ). But when it had water and fish it looked like this - in one of its many reincarnations . OK but not in the same league as Freshwest's.

Grabbed a few pics over the weekend of Freshwests Tank.

Also shot a bit of video of the tank. The video is about 5 mins long and includes some footage of a pair of Discus spawning. In addition I also grabbed some backroom stuff along with some footage of his other tanks. I've compressed the file down as much as possible, quality is still OK. You can see it here - Clicky The link works if you can't see it you probably need to download the Divx codec

Again I say Fantastic Ian. You guys have set the bar very high that tank is out of this world. The CO2 and extra light have boosted the plant growth immensely

And the tank looks like a piece of the Amazon for sure. Actually photo taking ability is pretty good as well

just beautiful, two pairs of discus going at once too is very impressive.

OH WOW is all i can say!

stunning shots on the video. it felt like watching an documentary on sky.

Oh my gosh...thanks for the videos...WOWIE :bounce: :bounce:

we have a mini Amano in the house people!! :lol:

Wow!! Awesome tank!! :bounce: Nice video Ian, with soundtrack and everything. :lol:

Thanks everyone. Not a great effort with the video just threw it together and the quality is nothing like the raw footage, first time I've tried to film a fish tank and there's a lot of room for improvement. The tank unforturnately is going through a cloudy period at the moment, part of the cycling process I guess and the sump is going to need some major revisions at some point.

I'll do a proper video at some point when the tank has settled down and Freshwest decides to clean the front glass