Driftwood

[Super Dude]

Does driftwood have an important role in a planted aquarium, or is it just aesthetic?

 

[dcarmor927]

mainly aesthetics...but if it has alot of nooks and cracks in it it can be alot easier for a plant such as java moss/fern to bind too...

 

[Super Dude]

kk so i'll just go get some rocks from the river instead of $20 worth of pretty logs.

 

[dcarmor927]

lol thats the smart way to go

 

[poconoboss]

Plecos love driftwood and will actually eat it. So if you have any plecos, it's good to have some driftwood in the tank.

 

[dcarmor927]

Plecos love driftwood and will actually eat it. So if you have any plecos, it's good to have some driftwood in the tank.

not all do tho...

 

[Spikey1007]

I always thought drift wood was a tad expensive for what it is. Normally its a bit of wood which has been sitting at the bottom of a freshwater lake,they pull it out, dry it then they sand blast it and expect £15 for it!

If you find a small lake you can probably get you own, then dry it in an airing coboard or a greenhouse, then give it a good rough to smooth sanding then you have your own drift wood for what £2 if you even need to buy sanding paper.

 

[Super Dude]

ok I want to make my own driftwood.

1. Can I go and grab any old log and use it for question 2?

2. Could I take the wood, soak it in water change leftover water, then do what Spikey said? How long should it soak? A month?

 

[dcarmor927]

wood can take months to leech out all its tannins maybe years...if you can boil it for a while i would, if its too big i would use a dish washer on high heat, which is what i did...

use dead wood, live wood will rot in the tank, im pretty sure you can use any wood...

 

[bitteraspects]

Not only is driftwood used for shelter, food, and decoration, but it can also help lower the ph of your water for fish that require those parameters. It also releases tannins that some fish enjoy.

 

[Super Dude]

if i chop the wood by april-may, would it be dead enough by fall?

dishwasher rofl. now thats what i call innovation!!!

 

[TylerFerretLord]

I would wait longer than that, maybe a year or so.

Make sure it is from a hardwood tree and make sure the tree has no chemical defenses (like how cherry trees have hydrogen cyanide in their tissues).

 

[Super Dude]

ok. when the snow melts(i'm Canadian, eh), i'll go visit my grandparents on their farm in northern Alberta. lots of trees and forestry there. i'll pic up a few different kinds and report back here.

 

[Super Dude]

ok so i have some logs whose fate would've been the firepit. i'm not sure exactly what they are, but it's either:

1. Birch-80% sure
2. Spruce-Maybe?
3. Pine-Maybe?

Are all of these chemically safe? (no cyanide )

 

[saltynay]

No the harder the wood the better pine will kill you fish it has a huge amount of resin which is toxic to humans let alone fish. You want to go to a forest which you can legaly remove a section of a branch of a fallen tree that is dry rotted rather then rotted from damp. Then go home scrape off all the bark and give a light sanding, boil it for 6 hours, place in a bucket with some aquarium salt, weigh it down and for a month change the water every two days. Check it after a month dry it in the airing cupboard for a week, then thoroughly sand making sure to get rid of all loose material. Place in the oven at a 100C and bake for a couple of hours checking it incase it catches fire or appears to start burning, if it does stop immediately and wait for it to cool and try again at a slightly lower heat. It is then ready to be placed in your tank

Fast growing trees should be avoided and slow growing trees should be used. There are tons of guides to doing this on the intertube.