Getting Back In The Hobby.

[Dave Spencer]

Hi,
I am just getting back in to the hobby after about 15yrs absence, hopefully with a Juwel Rio 400L tank. My "thing" has always been to have a natural, well planted aquarium (basically a sea of green). My questions are:
Will I need substrate food and does it become exhausted of nutrients? How much will I need?
Will a substrate heater cable be necessary?

I hope to do a fishless cycle to get things moving in the tank and would like to know:
Will the health of my plants deteriorate significantly during this period?
Will it be OK to start CO2 fertilisation during cycling and what effect does it have on water chemistry i.e. will it falsify any readings during this crucial stage?
Is Carbon filtration necessary or will it just remove the Ammonia during cycling of the tank?

Finally, can anyone recommend a good mail order tropical aquatic plant company?

Thanks for your help.

 

[Beemeeup]

ive today just finished my fishless cycle and am a newcomer this year to the tropical fish hobby - everything in the cycle has gone perfectly following the advice in this forum

it has taken 3 weeks to fully cycle -

i added the appropriate amount of ammonia as per 'pinned fishless cycle article'

during cycling i squeezed the 'goodness' from a sponge filter from an existing small 5 gallon aquarium
i also added weekly the Tetra Safe Start which may have helped

the cycled tank is 175 litres

No substrate cable used

the tank was filled to 4 cm with TetraPlant complete substrate 12 kg - covered with 1/8th pea gravel - 10cm
it will take several years for the tetra to run out of nutrients -- so the books say.

fully planted with soaked bogwood and slate - the plants flourished very well with little browning. indian fern did very well.

i placed an additional filter sponge in the filter to remove phosphates (Brown algae)

lights were kept on for 10 hours a day

i used a small co2 kit from the start - did not test water chemistry for PH only for the basic ammonia, nitrite and nitrate. as i am going to do a 90% water change i saw no point in testing PH

i bought my plants from tropical aquarium plants.co.uk

hope this helps