So I bought a 1 yr old 600L set-up including plants, fish & co2. Brought it home yesterday - THANKS!!! to KKat who helped walk me through! I would love to post pix for help ID'ing my plants & for feedback in general on my setup. Is there a post explaining how to do this (I'm not a computer guru 
)?
What I think is inside: plants -
3-4 sword, tons of something red (crypt?),alot of mature vallisnaria, possible few twisted small ones
tons of java fern all sizes, a few anacharis/something with a really long leg that doesn't stay planted
fish stock: 35 total- 8 guppy, 3 molly, swordtail pair, 1 cory (sorry), 1 smalltype of pleco, tetras: 10 penguin, 7 red phantom, 2 with black tail red eye school with phantoms, 1 neon (very sad looking), bunches of some kind of ghost shrimp, of course some snails
ADA substrate covered by net then gravel, running on 2 canister filters 1200Lph 1 has fluted outflow, lighting I think needs adjustment, co2 system - will take 1-2 weeks to get canister filled (But I will need major help figuring out this part)
Fish were out of tank about 24 hrs, were fed 24 hours before removing from tank, kept in filtered rubbermaid bin, adjusted temperature then added to completed tank setup. tank includes about 25% old tank water (wanted more but trust me it was hard enough getting this much home driving up & down the hills of Jerusalem). pH of fish water & new setup before the fish were added was at or above my measurement (7.6). I cut really long roots and then bunched like plants together to plant (there were HUNDREDS of them-it took all night), added the fert like the fellow told me to then realized it was probably a mistake considering hi pH? Washed one filter well in tap water - it was gross, the other one kept as is.
So I'm sure I've made a bunch of mistakes already
please help me fix them! Lites are off for now, but the fish actually seem pretty happy, very active all around the
tank even the pleco isn't hiding, the red tetras were very pale when I put them in but are already pinking a little. When do I feed? What do I do about lites before the co2 starts? how do I prevent an algae bloom? Should I stress about the high pH?
Sorry for the run-on post - I really appreciate everyone's advice !
)?What I think is inside: plants -
3-4 sword, tons of something red (crypt?),alot of mature vallisnaria, possible few twisted small ones
tons of java fern all sizes, a few anacharis/something with a really long leg that doesn't stay planted
fish stock: 35 total- 8 guppy, 3 molly, swordtail pair, 1 cory (sorry), 1 smalltype of pleco, tetras: 10 penguin, 7 red phantom, 2 with black tail red eye school with phantoms, 1 neon (very sad looking), bunches of some kind of ghost shrimp, of course some snails
ADA substrate covered by net then gravel, running on 2 canister filters 1200Lph 1 has fluted outflow, lighting I think needs adjustment, co2 system - will take 1-2 weeks to get canister filled (But I will need major help figuring out this part)
Fish were out of tank about 24 hrs, were fed 24 hours before removing from tank, kept in filtered rubbermaid bin, adjusted temperature then added to completed tank setup. tank includes about 25% old tank water (wanted more but trust me it was hard enough getting this much home driving up & down the hills of Jerusalem). pH of fish water & new setup before the fish were added was at or above my measurement (7.6). I cut really long roots and then bunched like plants together to plant (there were HUNDREDS of them-it took all night), added the fert like the fellow told me to then realized it was probably a mistake considering hi pH? Washed one filter well in tap water - it was gross, the other one kept as is.
So I'm sure I've made a bunch of mistakes already
please help me fix them! Lites are off for now, but the fish actually seem pretty happy, very active all around thetank even the pleco isn't hiding, the red tetras were very pale when I put them in but are already pinking a little. When do I feed? What do I do about lites before the co2 starts? how do I prevent an algae bloom? Should I stress about the high pH?
Sorry for the run-on post - I really appreciate everyone's advice !
So what do I do to clean up. I was planning on rescaping with my first water change tomorrow or sunday. Currently I have all the vallis planted around 3 sides of the perimeter, java attached to rocks/wood, small things in front/middle. But lots of escaped plants floating around. Today's ammonia/nitrites (36 hr post setup) at 0 - too early to see a spike? All the debris has settled and the water is very clear - should I stir up the gravel/debris during the water change or siphon from the top?
