That is not to say that mushroom compost, potting soil, kitty litter, etc,
etc, etc, won't work. There's many ways to skin a cat.
And Todd, you are right, skeptical is a better word than critical. My
apologies.
Nick Zarlinga
"If we ignore nature.....maybe it'll go away."
----- Original Message -----
From: "John Bongiovanni" <bongi_at_cox-internet.com>
To: <nanfa_at_aquaria.net>
Sent: Sunday, February 02, 2003 5:12 PM
Subject: re: NANFA-- That whole sandbed thing.
> Nick,
>
> I would think that a layer of potting clay would wind up going anaerobic
> at some point. I don't think that exotic
> materials are necessary for planted tanks. Diana Walstad states that
> there is sufficient Fe and other micro
> nutrients in soils that exotic materials such as Laterite, flourite,
> potting clays etc are unnecessary. You
> should be able to use the soil in your back yard! Or your neighbor's :-)
>
> My personal experience has been using two different sand stratas found
> near my home. One is white sand and the
> other is a sandy clay. These are from ancient beaches (you can even see
> bivalve imprints in the undisturbed
> sand!). These sands are considered nutrient poor but seem to provide
> sufficient micronurients for my experimental
> 10 gal planted tank. I initially had problems with green water, but
> water changes eventually took care of that.
> Really, not much different than any other tank, just normal cycling.
> The sand provides a nice substrate for
> plants with fine roots, like some of the aquatic grasses like Eleocharis
> spp. Since I added several shiners
> including on large Golden Shiner the tank has been a little out of
> balance. I have a low level of BBA growing but
> I have ignored it. I'm trying to see if I can find a way to achieve
> balance without having to resort to CO2
> injection etc because that is just too much work. 15 watts per 10 gal.
> http://briefcase.yahoo.com/bc/maxx8/
> lst?.dir=/Aquarium+Photos&.view=l click on the DCP_077 image. The top
> tank.
>
> My 55 has the CO2 inj, laterite, flourish suppliments, 3+ watts/gal
> florescent, etc. This tank requires weekly
> triming, I probably dump 5 lbs of plants a month.
>
>
>
>
>
>
> On Sun, 2 Feb 2003 12:25:58 -0500, Nick Zarlinga
> <njz_at_clevelandmetroparks.com> wrote:
>
> Todd, what's your lighting like in these tanks. How about turbulence from
> filters etc? What kind of filtration, if any?
>
> I thought the purpose of the flourite was to provide nutrients to the
roots
> of the plants? With your set up, where will the nutrients come from if
the
> roots are below the flourite into the sand?
>
> I like your experimenting, but I am critical. Sounds like you have a
bunch
> of things going on and it might be hard to tell what is causing what. But
> then again, if the tank looks good, then I suppose it works?
>
> Keep up the experimenting, and let us know what you find.
>
> My interest is trying to get things going without the Flourite. I plan on
> playing with red art clay to be used as a gravel additive. I also am
> interested in getting some "live sand" from a stream and seeing what kind
of
> creepy crawlies a system can support. Then I would be curious to see how
> well fishes such as hog suckers do. It may be two different set ups but I
> will reason all that out when the time comes. All stuff we have talked
> about before.
>
> Nick Zarlinga
> Aquarium Biologist
> Cleveland Metroparks Zoo
> 216.661.6500 ext 4485
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: owner-nanfa_at_aquaria.net On Behalf
> Of Todd Crail
> Sent: Friday, January 31, 2003 10:59 PM
> To: nanfa_at_aquaria.net
> Subject: NANFA-- That whole sandbed thing.
>
>
> Greetings all...
>
> Well now that I'm 3 months into a sugar grained deep sandbed as substrate
> and have watched everything work as expected so far... I thought I'd get a
> picture and talk about it a bit. With certainty, the real meat of this
> discussion is about 1 year and 9 months down the road once any type of
> "honeymoon" is over with it, but maybe there are some who'd like to
> experiment with this now.
>
> http://www.farmertodd.com/freshwater/rainbowfish/SandbedLg.jpg
>
> That thar is a sandbed :) It's about 5" in the deeper sections (this is a
> normal 75 gallon). I bought the playsand at Home Depot for $2 a bag. 75
> gals of substrate for $6, when did you last pay that? :)
>
> Within the bed, I've mixed a bag of Seachem's flourite for extra root
> nutrition (the flourite will get your cost savings back tho ;). The
surface
> layer is all flourite and pea gravel. The bed slopes toward the back so
> that it's about even with the far left corner there (the 5" depth). I did
> this to create a grade from front to back so I could aquascape in some
> ornamental rocks and such. The intention is to only have about 1/2" to
3/4"
> of rocky material up top.
>
> Why is it like this still? I wanted to compare growth on different plants
> in different segments. Some in shallow gravel, some in deep gravel.
Let's
> just say those that hit the sand faster establish better and grow waaay
> faster. Some stuff on the deep gravel is still going as previously
> experienced... Super slow to withering. For example, I've always had
> trouble with val. Didn't matter the kind. Dunno why. I put it in sand
and
> there it goes. Same story with sagittaria. And all plants are forming
> super long roots (even bulbs like apongeton and nymphea? I have an
apongeton
> that's been in bloom on one stalk or another for a month now lol).
They're
> starting to make their way out to the edges so I can see how deep they're
> penetrating. It would be interesting to cut a hole in the foam insulation
I
> put underneath (my $3 solution to a $200 undergravel cable heater for
'warm
> feet' heh) and see where it's all at :)
>
> I do add fertilizers. I've been adding Sera's Florena for soluble iron
and
> micronutrients, potash for potassium and sulfur, and epsom salts for
> magnesium. I was doing this all before in a flourite only bed (which a
> flourite only bed is recommended at the lfs of course ;) and was not
> experiencing even a fraction of the success.
>
> There was one other change.. And that was putting glass tops in and
sealing
> up the gas exchange. I was not doing this prior (had it open top) and the
> additional CO2 is definately a factor... But remember... I'm getting the
> same sort of growth I had prior on the deeper gravel... So I kinda throw
> that out. At the same time, it's arguable that the respiration in the
sand
> is an additional CO2 source (no external CO2 source, even tho all the
> equipment is sitting right next to the tank lol). So it goes many ways.
It
> would be nice to be able to quantify things a little bit better.
>
> There have been other benefits as well. The water was transfered from
> another 75 when I did the tank move. Initial nitrate reading was ~50ppm.
> Pretty crappy huh? Once some plants had reestablished themselves, man the
> whole thing took off like wildfire. I haven't seen a nitrate in 2 months
> (weekly tests). I only did one 15 gal water change back in early November
> just because, well, "you're supposed to" but I haven't fussed with it
since.
> Just tested for nitrate to see how we're moving along. I've also only
> scrubbed the glass twice since this system's inception. Wow. Now I have
> all this time to take pictures :)
>
> Again, the jury is still out on wether the sand is denitrifying or the
> plants are able to absorb all ammonium and nitrate with their roots all
good
> and happy. In either case tho, together they're limiting algal growth and
> keeping the fish all happy. Oh, and the Farmer too :)
>
> So shortly when I go to set up the next native tank (gonna be another 75
> now... we'll see if it's back to the 125 next week ;) I'll pull off a
> majority of the top layer of the gravel as seed for the next tank. Then
> I'll aquascape as intended :)
>
> Same experience in the 30 gal native tank too, except that this sandbed is
> only 3" max due to the limited verticle tank space. And when I moved that
> sandbed a few weeks ago, I never even caught a whiff of sulfide. May be
too
> early to call that good tho ;)
>
> I've yet to work with benthos (bottom dwelling critters) to see who will
be
> beneficial and who will not. I'm going to work with that this summer
> outside in the yard so I don't violate my "3 tanks in house" ruling.
Should
> be interesting.
>
> So for now... To heck with all these rumors of black roots and room
choking
> sulfide nasties... The plants live in anaerobic substrates in the wild...
> Dunno why it'd be any different in a tank. Apparently all these authors
and
> 'experts' have never walked thru the muck huh? ;)
>
> And for a piece of shameless promotion for rainbowfish... check out the
rest
> of the pics at:
> http://www.farmertodd.com/freshwater/rainbowfish
>
> They're native if you're from Oz or PNG right? :)
>
> Night all... :)
> Todd
>
> I hope you know that this will go down on your permenant record.
> http://www.farmertodd.com
> --
> /"Unless stated otherwise, comments made on this list do not necessarily
> / reflect the beliefs or goals of the North American Native Fishes
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> ----
> /"Unless stated otherwise, comments made on this list do not necessarily
> / reflect the beliefs or goals of the North American Native Fishes
> / Association"
> / This is the discussion list of the North American Native Fishes
> Association
> / nanfa_at_aquaria.net. To subscribe, unsubscribe, or get help, send the word
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http://www.nanfa.org
-- > /"Unless stated otherwise, comments made on this list do not necessarily > / reflect the beliefs or goals of the North American Native Fishes > / Association" > / This is the discussion list of the North American Native Fishes Association > / nanfa_at_aquaria.net. To subscribe, unsubscribe, or get help, send the word > / subscribe, unsubscribe, or help in the body (not subject) of an email to > / nanfa-request_at_aquaria.net. For a digest version, send the command to > / nanfa-digest-request_at_aquaria.net instead. > / For more information about NANFA, visit our web page, http://www.nanfa.org /----------------------------------------------------------------------------- /"Unless stated otherwise, comments made on this list do not necessarily / reflect the beliefs or goals of the North American Native Fishes / Association" / This is the discussion list of the North American Native Fishes Association / nanfa_at_aquaria.net. To subscribe, unsubscribe, or get help, send the word / subscribe, unsubscribe, or help in the body (not subject) of an email to / nanfa-request_at_aquaria.net. For a digest version, send the command to / nanfa-digest-request_at_aquaria.net instead. / For more information about NANFA, visit our web page, http://www.nanfa.org
