Second tank, 29 gallon planted tank

[Utar]

My first time use of my homemade aquasoil was in my 55 gallon tank. I set this one up in June. It didn't take me long to realize with this homemade aquasoil it produces lots of ammonia. Having said this, there is a small con and a very large pro for this aquasoil. The con is that it produced lots, and lots of ammonia, so much so it was off the chart using the API Freshwater Master Test Kit. I had to do daily water changes to get ammonia down to 4 to 5 ppm. The pro is that as a result I didn't have to add ammonia from any outside source.

You can see in the cut out of my excel spreadsheet the time line from the first day I tested for ammonia to the last day that it finally dropped to zero.
I setup the tank on June 6th 2020 and didn't do anything testing wise or water changes for the next seven days on June 13th. I had added seeded bio-media from a previous tank into my canister filter with new Biohome Ultimate Media. After the natural ammonia dropped to zero, I then added bottled ammonia twice to watch it reduce to zero, after all this I felt very confident that I had a good strong cycle. The letters wc below Temp stands for Water Changes and as you can see I did massive water changes in order to control the natural ammonia. Ammonia was completely gone by July 1st but I didn't add any fish until the July 16.

The end result was a very nice planted tank and I am satisfied with my homemade aquasoil.

So today I am setting up a second tank but this time it is a 29 gallon tank using the same aquasoil, but I am going to add pea gravel mixing it in with this aquasoil. I believe the pea gravel will help to keep the aquasoil from compacting which will give plant root growth and easier time to spread out in the soil.

I will chronicle the progress of this tank in this thread. The big difference is the cap I will be using, this time instead of a pea gravel/sand cap, I am going to use Black Diamond Blasting sand. Making this a very interesting experiment in an aquasoil planted tank journey.

I have posted the ingredients and recipe of my homemade aquasoil on other threads, but for those who have yet to see this, I am re-posting it here. If some of you are thinking that all this is going way overboard well you could be right. But using anything less for aquasoil has been known to lose its nutrient value after a couple of years, all the added supplements will allow the soil to last much much longer.

My homemade aquasoil.
2" thick of aquasoil in 55g tank.

Supplements
1/2 cup (4 oz) each

Earthworm Castings (Made from earthworm farms, has lots of benefits)
Blood Meal (High in Nitrogen lowers ph)
Baking Soda (an alkaline compound raises ph)
Ironite Plus 15-10-10 (Slow release because plants need iron)
Yellow Iron Oxide (For more pure iron,it is safe for aquarium use, slowly breaks down over time)
Pro Aglime (raises ph used in soil for plant growth)
Diatomaceous Earth (for calcium made from ancient diatoms)

================================================================

1/3 cup (2 oz) very little each

Epsom Salt for plants (helps with bad bacteria)
Osomekote (slow release)

================================================================

Main ingredients
16 cups

Black Kow 0.5 0.5 0.5
Organic Miracle Grow
Peat Moss (lowers ph Helps to keep aquasoil from compacting allow an easy time for plant roots)
Pool Filter Sand (will also help to keep aquasoil from compacting)

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Mixed with just enough aquarium water (do not use tap water) to create a paste like aquasoil, you don't want it soupy.
This way it will spread in the tank and not mix with sand and or rock cap.
After adding this aquasoil to my 55g tank, I mixed up a second batch of 16 cups of Black Kow, and 16 cups of Organic Mirical Grow.
Mixed this with aquarium water to a paste. Then added this on top of the previous aqua soil.

I cleaned a full bag of Pool Filter Sand, 1" capping on top of the aquasoil.
I cleaned 2 full bags of Pea Pebbles for a 2" capping.

 

[Utar]

Ok today I got the 29 gallon up and running. Here are pictures, I like to use pictures, lots of pictures......the band is warming up so let the drum roll begin....

The washed pea gravel that I added to the aquasoil, I like to use a special purpose wheel barrel instead of a five gallon bucket to wash gravel, etc for my tanks. This is much faster and easier.


Next comes the cleaning of the Black Diamond Blasting Sand. I like how it says on the bag "Product must stay dry." and here I am using it for aquarium substrate.
It took a long time to get the BDBS clean, and it had an oily residue on top of the water until that finally cleared up and got this stuff clean. It is a product made from coal. But many people use for a substrate, my first so I will see. You can see my hand just under the water line showing the BDBS is clean.


Here I am filling tank with water using a glass bowel so as not to disturb the substrate.



Bonnie Kitty, she likes to help.


Finally a last picture - for now - using a tape measure showing how deep the total substrate is. Two inches of aquasoil with a two inch cap of BDBS on top.


Right now I have an old HOB running full of polyfill to clean the water, this may take a couple of days.

 

[Fishmanic]

You should enter them in future Tank of the Month contests.

 

[Utar]

You should enter them in future Tank of the Month contests.

Thanks for the invite, I will when I feel I have a tank worthy of the contest, I am not very good at aquascaping like some of the other tanks I have seen on here.

 

[Fishmanic]

The important thing is that you enter a totm contest and show us what stage it’s at. You can always reenter a later contest to show off your improvements. It’s not whether you win or lose that is important - what's important is that you participate.

 

[Utar]

The important thing is that you enter a totm contest and show us what stage it’s at. You can always reenter a later contest to show off your improvements. It’s not whether you win or lose that is important - what's important is that you participate.

Thanks for letting me know, but you have to understand I don't know at what point to do that, because it is just the start of the tank. But I will figure it out and do it at some point soon. For know I will leave it here on this thread.

Here is the tank the very next day after setting it up and here you can start making out the line marking the aquasoil from the BDBS cap.
It is still cloudy, but that doesn't matter because I am going to do the first water change today.

Edit: In this picture you can clearly see the pea gravel that I added to the aquasoil.

 

[Utar]

Today I added a piece of driftwood. I have not started cycling this tank yet, but I will start this in a couple of days.

 

[Utar]

Still working on my new 29 gallon setup. I still have a couple of weeks to go before it has finished its cycle. So I have been playing around with some ideas for a theme to the tank. Right now I am calling it the "Tree of Woe".

For those of us old enough to remember the movie "Conan the Barbarian". The first one with Arnold. There is a funny story behind the Tree of Woe scene in the movie. They where using live vultures on the set when one of them died. They had the bird stuffed and it is that one that Arnold is biting in the neck. There was a doctor on scene to give him an antiseptic mouth wash after that scene of biting the neck of a dead stuffed vulture.

But in my theme for this tank, Conan didn't make it. I am thinking about getting this skeleton Christmas ornament. Hang it on my Tree of Woe and have a tombstone beside the tree with Conan written on it. I would have to spray the ornament with plasti-dip to protect it from the water.

 

[mcordelia]

Haha that is too funny. I can definitely see the macabre setting in the tank, love it

 

[PheonixKingZ]

I love tank builds like this! (Cute cat by the way. )

I am watching this thread.

 

[Utar]

I did a film clip of The Tree of Woe from Conan the Barbarian and put up on youtube.

 

[Utar]

I am setting here trying to decide which way I want to go with this 29 gallon tank. The problem I have is with the BDBS in that it is like a fine powder. I tried a test Amazon Sword plant but it is withering away and dying off. Amazon Swords have always been my best plants, never lost one before. But that is with other types of substrates. Because this BDBS is so fine it packs tighter then other types of substrate that I have used, pool filter sand and pea pebbles. I really had a hard time pushing through the BDBS when I planted the sword, I had two sword plants to start with, and the one the root system completely tore off trying to push it through this stuff. Never had that happen tearing off the root system while attempting to plant.

So I am thinking about going two different ways. One is keeping the BDBS and other is getting it out and replacing it with pool filter sand.
If I keep the BDBS, then I will have to go with artificial plants, which is doable. But that renders the aquasoil beneath totally useless. So I would have to take it all down, keep the BDBS cap, remove the aquasoil and add more BDBS to bring back substrate to the thickness I want.

Or remove the BDBS cap and replacing it with pool filter sand so I can plant through it to reach the aquasoil beneath which I can't do with the BDBS. Then plant the tank as I first intended. But then my first theme I was going for with this tank might have to change because the BDBS makes the tank look more macabre, the sand will soften that up some.

Another thing concerning this fine powder BDBS and using aquasoil is that due to the BDBS compacting so tight it does not allow for any space between the grains. Rocks, pebbles and even sand have microscopic spaces between the grains allowing for communication through out their entire layers, because of their size and nature these substrates cannot pack tight enough to cut off the aquasoil below from the upper regions of the tank environment. This cuts off nutrients, microscopic bacteria, and gases isolating the aquasoil below. The aquasoil needs to communicate with the upper regions of the tank, otherwise it grows stagnate trapping dangerous gases and then the pressure one day builds up to such a degree it literately burst through to the surface killing everything above.

 

[mcordelia]

Is this the 20/40 BDBS or the 30/60 BDBS? I got the 20/40 the other week and it was about the consistency of sand, not as fine as what your stuff sounds to be. There's also the option of going with a black sand from the LFS, would be more expensive but not prohibitive for a 29g

 

[Utar]

I keep forgetting to check the bag of BDBS that I have left to see what the grain size it is. Are you setting up your new tank with BDBS?

LOL I have already bought four bags of pool filter sand from Ace Hardware so when I do change out the BDBS I will use it. I wanted extra bags of pool filter sand for my 75 gallon which I plan on setting up in a couple of months. I will consider the black sand from LFS, but I have to travel forty miles to reach the closest one to me, which I did yesterday to buy the pool filter sand... . Hard for me to travel these distances without a good reason to do so and I always plan it around shopping for other things like food.

 

[mcordelia]

Hubby vetoed the BDBS because he said it looked "unnatural" lol. So we went with the even cheaper option and got tube sand haha. I actually like how it's got everything from dust to pebbles, I think it will be a nice look. Been washing it incrementally for two weeks now lol, but I'm down to the last bag!!

Will be setting up the 20g with it on Monday probably; my plant shipment got delayed but just as well, gives me a little more time to try and scape the tank.

The rest of the sand is sitting in a tote in the middle of the garden, found out today that the 125 tank itself is probably not arriving until January sigh. Might try to start cycling the fx6 in a tote so it would be ready to go when I get the tank.