Aquarium Plant Tank Thingy

[coolie]

Does anyone know anything about creating a small 32 litre planted tank for growing plants semi out of the water, no fish,  I'm thinking of a reed bed?
 
Maybe if it works really well, I'll cycle it and put khuli loaches in there.
 
I don't know what to search for on the forums, like vivarium.
 
I'm thinking of having a few inches of heated water in there and a power head creating a water plash pool???
 
 

 

[techen]

A lot of plants will happily live half underwater (Roots wise) so long as the leafs and most of its stem is outside the water.
 
I wouldn't put khulis into a 32 litre and would recommend around a 60litre tank if that's the kind of fish you want.

 

[Zikofski]

okay, i dont know 100% on how to do one of these but i know a few people that do similar, and they like you said heat the water, i think you may need a power head or some kind of flow in there, that they do tho i think is put cling film over the top to keep the moisture in so the plant leafs don't dry out, also not sure how frequent they do this but every week i guess they spray the leafs with water i guess during a water change and general maintenance, if you want fish, once the plants are established i don't think you need to cycle the tank as much as the plants will help again if you use a small filter from the start instead of a powerhead then you will cycle the filter naturally over time hope this information is correct and good for you i'm sure more experienced people will correct me im going to follow this i am very interested in doing something like this my self, but more like a propagation tank, please put up a journal and link it in here please

 

[Meeresstille]

Oh, I could see myself trying this, maybe in a few years when I have learned a bit more! I think the word you're looking for is paludarium!? 
 
https/www.google.ca/search?q=paludarium&safe=off&tbm=isch&tbo=u&source=univ&sa=X&ei=zKGgUd6uA8n54APGhIGQCQ&ved=0CC4QsAQ&biw=1600&bih=775

 

[Zikofski]

aw wow yes thank you oh and another thing is i know, Frogs, frogs like to have some land mass like a tank half full with lots of wood or rocks for them to climb out of i dont now anything about frogs or how to keep them or whats best i just know from looking at frog specific tanks they are ususaly only half full with some kind of land mass maybe that could be a different alternative, same with cory;s cory's LOVE low shallow water, but again with only 32: maybe like Techen said double it and it will give you more room for plants wood maybe and some more fish?

 

[techen]

Seen quite a few paludarium and they are very very pretty things.
 
As Z said frogs are good to keep in these really but people do these on a massive scale (500-600 litres) Giving them a mix of fish space, frog space and other stuff

 

[mike455555]

thats how some of my plants are propagated, having a bog basically, iv got a 3 stage one though, so i can grow all sorts like vaills which is fully aquatic to HC which is small and gets flooded easy.  

 

[coolie]

Wow, paludarium. I don't think mine will look anywhere near as biologically diverse as those ones, though I do have 3 nice pieces of spare bog wood. Thanks for all the replies.
Actually, some of those that stretch right up the wall look a bit OTT to me. Imagine trying to move house with that!
 
So, to start does anyone know if it would be a good idea to put a layer of peat down in the bottom under the gravel?

 

[coolie]

What about putting an ultrasonic humidifyer in there? If I did later decide to put creatures or shrimps in there, would ultrasonic hurt or kill them?

 

[mike455555]

i dont know if it would harm or kill anything but im interested in where you get them from and how much they cost?

 

[coolie]

Well here's the thing right, ultrasonic humidifiers have to be put in purified or distilled water,
they can't go in the tank or even in tap water. But I can envisage a kind of clip on trough over the side of the tank.
They also can't run out of water so where us fishkeepers are used to setting the tank up with either timers or everything on all the time,
it's more of a feature you fill up and run while it still has the water you added.
Maybe someone could develop a robust design that shut off when out of water or such like. But I imagine humidfying with such a device would probably be fantstic for growing plants out of water.

 

[SO19Firearms]

This was my setup with Ultrasonic -
 

 

[coolie]

Wow, so I'm not the first to think it up? Am I right about it needing purified water?

 

[mike455555]

where, and how much did the ultra sonic cost?

 

[coolie]

There's some here Mike, beware cheap stuff from far East though:
 
http/www.ebay.co.uk/sch/i.html?_odkw=feature+ultrasonic+humidifier&_osacat=0&_from=R40&_trksid=m570.l1313&_nkw=water+ultrasonic+humidifier&_sacat=0