New Tank, New Setup

[Biulu]

Hello!

About 6 months ago I bought a 60 litres (around 18 gallons) tank, and started to put my fish in. That was before I found this forum, and I didn't know that I was putting in territorial fish (gouramis), which require more space than I currently have.

So, I decided to give them a better home, and now bought a (roughly) 180 litre (a good 47 gallon) bowfront tank. The hood and cabinet are currently being made (sorry, no fancy all in one packages here, without having to import) and the hood will have space for 4 40 cm lights. I am looking for a planted setup, without CO2, as I have not been able to find CO2 systems here, and understood that DIY does not work well on a tank this size.

In a separate post I asked which canister filter is recommended (out of the 4 brands I can get here: Fluval, Dymax, Dolphin, and apparently, but not sure, Eheim).

Now, what do you recommend me for the lighting? I have a 'compadre' which can help me putting switches on, and a sort of timer.
How can I achieve good plant growth without a CO2 system, and what kind of substrate should I use? Here the only available complete substrate is Azoo, and it is very expensive. I also would like to top it off with sand for the cories, and am not sure whether Azoo substrate would still function well.

How could I fertlise my plants? There are no roottabs available here, only liquid fertilizer. Is this sufficient?

What plants could I be using for this setup? Stones and wood are in abundance......

ANything else that I should be thinking of?

Thanks for all the help!

 

[Liam]

A good substrate is pretty useful, you might want to think about doing a soil substrate, Tom Barr (plantbrain), has a good post about it here, instead of the Azoo substrate, which should be a good product. I would go for a low light (between one and two watts per gallon), as you don’t have Co2, high light needs Co2. Plants like ferns, anubias and moss don’t need any substrate. The gouramis would appreciate some floating plants. Any of the low light plants like crypts or vallis or ambula will do fine and you can have a really nice tank. A search of the Tropica site would give you more ideas. The liquid ferts will be fine, root tabs are not essential even for root feeders especially if you have a good substrate. I don’t know the Azoo substrate but many of the aquarium substrates work fine under sand. You could of course go with easy plants and just use sand with lower light, I have grown lots of plants in just sand. I always use Eheim filters, have tried others in the past which worked but Eheims are my favourites.
Good luck with it. Hope to see pics when its set up.

 

[Biulu]

A good substrate is pretty useful, you might want to think about doing a soil substrate, Tom Barr (plantbrain), has a good post about it here, instead of the Azoo substrate, which should be a good product. I would go for a low light (between one and two watts per gallon), as you don’t have Co2, high light needs Co2. Plants like ferns, anubias and moss don’t need any substrate. The gouramis would appreciate some floating plants. Any of the low light plants like crypts or vallis or ambula will do fine and you can have a really nice tank. A search of the Tropica site would give you more ideas. The liquid ferts will be fine, root tabs are not essential even for root feeders especially if you have a good substrate. I don’t know the Azoo substrate but many of the aquarium substrates work fine under sand. You could of course go with easy plants and just use sand with lower light, I have grown lots of plants in just sand. I always use Eheim filters, have tried others in the past which worked but Eheims are my favourites.
Good luck with it. Hope to see pics when its set up.

Thanks for the advice! Do you know the difference between the Eheim Classic and Ecco line? Everybody here seems pretty enthusiastic about the classics, but I notice that here in Mexico they only sell Eccos.

 

[DevUK]

I believe the classic is the design thats been around for many years so most will say its a tried and tested design, which is true. Most people really like their classic filters. Personally, I've owned one for approx 1 week but this was a bad ebay deal and some dodgy second hand classic so I can't comment on it.

As I understand it, the Eco range is perfectly fine, its just Eheim trying to incorporate a few things that the classic doesn't have (things like placement of the inlet/outlet). Looking at how they are designed I don't personally see any problem with them, but I've never owned/played with one

As for your tank, you might consider the Diane Walstead (spelling?) approach. Theres several people on this forum putting together one of these styles of tank. Its essentially low maintenance, low light using garden soil as a nutrient rich substrate, and no (or little) fertilizing. Also the filter choice is different as you rely on fish waste for plant nutrients etc. Check out the soil substrate threads