Setting Up A 30 Gallon For Some Plants

[Scott Garrison]

Hello. A friend of mine has given me a 30 gallon tank (picutre attached) and I am going to take quite a while to set it up (my wife says I'm not allowed fish until I'm done with a home renovation project so I have about 2 months to set the tank up before adding anything live). I know bigger is better but the price is right. My aquarium experience is limited to two years with a 10 gallon tank when I was younger.

I would like to plant the tank if possible and have some questions:

The 30 gallon came with a standard hood that accommodates one 24" bulb. I'm not sure how to obtain the necessary lighting for plants with standard hoods. I see that I could buy a hood that accommodates 2 24" bulbs but most of the 24" bulbs only seem to be about 17-20 watts. By upgrading to a double-bulb hood I would still only get 34-40 watts over the 30 gallon tank. Suggestions?

I want to keep the substate affordable so I would like to just mix laterite with gravel. My friend gave me the larger pebbles but I understand those are not very good for plants so I would get a finer gravel. Advice?

For CO2 injection I was pondering something affordable like a Hagen fermenation cannister with a bubble counter. Is CO2 injection worthwhile in a 30 gallon tank? Would I need to buy the "stabilizer" and "activator" packets to it or can I just buy some sort of household product to refill it?

My friend also gave me a small army of filters (Fluval 403, AquaClear 200, Whisper 2, Whisper 3, more). Most are power filters and I understand this is not the best for plants. Could I run the Whisper 2 and 3 together at a low setting without disturbing the plants too much? I'd like to run two filters if possible to assist with biological filtration, have a backup, assist with rotation, etc...)

I am going to skip the house water softener by using the garden hose but the water in my area is very hard so I have to begin thinking about how to bring it down a bit. The kit my friend gave me is out of date but it tested the water at a pH of 7.8 (will get a new kit to test again). Right now I think I want to stock the tank with a shoal or two of tetras, a pair of dwarf gouramis and a coolie loach so I'd like to bring the pH down a bit. Is there value in using water conditioners that claim to bring down the pH? I want to avoid reverse osmosis or other expensive filtration if possible.

Any advice very much appreciated.

Thanks!
Scott Garrison

 

[Snick]

Just so you know, water softners should not effect your fish, or at least I have no problems here. I have a planted 30 gallon which is up and flourishing! I use a Do it Yourself CO2 Yeast system and has gotten exellent results for less than 10 dlls! I also bought a glass diffuser (google it) which really is a vital part to the dissolving of the CO2 bubbles into the water. I have not gotten the chance to create a layer of fertilizer under my sand, but I have read that this is really recommendable. I currently use liquid fertilizers and some tablets which basically act as the solid fertilizers- i just bury tablets under the sand throught the tank every 6 months and wow i have gotten wonderful results! Surprisingly, I have two 20 watt (full spectrum, as this is really important) in my 30 gal and have had great sucsess, but i am shure that the light from the windows really help as well.

 

[Themuleous]

Right I'll start at the top

By upgrading to a double-bulb hood I would still only get 34-40 watts over the 30 gallon tank. Suggestions?

Upgrading lights is normally very easy you just have to find a way of attaching the new reflector and light tube to under the hood, one person recently just used superglue so is shouldn't be difficult.

I want to keep the substrate affordable so I would like to just mix laterite with gravel. My friend gave me the larger pebbles but I understand those are not very good for plants so I would get a finer gravel.

As I found out recently laterite is ok, but there are better options such as Eco-complete and the more expensive ADA stuff, have a look about at some web-shops and see whats in your price range. Aquaessentials does most types.

For CO2 injection I was pondering something affordable like a Hagen fermentation cannister with a bubble counter. Is CO2 injection worthwhile in a 30 gallon tank? Would I need to buy the "stabilizer" and "activator" packets to it or can I just buy some sort of household product to refill it?

For a 30G I would recommend pressurised CO2 as its much easier and for a 30G tank you'll probably need 2 or 3 yeast kits. 3 kits would be about 60quid and I managed to put a pressurized kit together for £85ish so its not that much more, if you are prepared to shop around. If you do decide to get yeast, use a home made mix with baking yeast and bicarbonate its much cheaper and more efficient, but does need changing every 7-10 days.

My friend also gave me a small army of filters (Fluval 403, AquaClear 200, Whisper 2, Whisper 3, more). Most are power filters and I understand this is not the best for plants. Could I run the Whisper 2 and 3 together at a low setting without disturbing the plants too much?

Filters have never been my strong point, but it is always better to overfilter a tank (any tank for that matter ) so use whichever is rated for the biggest tank. Your idea of having two as a backup, sounds like a good one, the only problem might be aesthetics, two in a tank might not look good, but give it a try and decide then.

Is there value in using water conditioners that claim to bring down the pH? I want to avoid reverse osmosis or other expensive filtration if possible.

Apart from perhaps bicard, I always tend to avoid using additives to change the pH it always sounds a bit risky to me, and the less you can add to a tank the better IMHO. RO water mixed with tap will reduce the KH and pH to a better level for fish. If possible aim for pH 7 and then the CO2 can reduce it to about 6.6/6.8 ish.

Hope that helps

Sam

EDIT - I should have added that reading the pinned lighting, CO2 and Estimative Index articles would probably be of great benefit and will give you more info on the in's and out's of planted tanks and help you decided what you want - low-tech or high-tech

 

[Scott Garrison]

Thanks for the great advice! I'm reading what I can in the rest of the forum and from the pinned articles.

Snick: Love your tank pictures. Something moderately planted and not heavily planted is what I thought I'd start with.

I've been looking at lighting fixtures and see that compact fluorescents could bring the wattage up to more reasonable levels (originally I was only aware of the standard fluorescent fixtures). A single-bulb 65 watt Sattelite looks ideal but I think it would run too hot under the wood canopy. Do you think I would be able to run a compact fluroecent at all under the canopy? Maybe the 55 watt All-Glass fixture? I really want to keep the wood canopy on the tank...

 

[Themuleous]

The ASL ones are not supposed to get as hot as the interpet ones. And even the interpet ones are supposed to have been redesigned to not get as hot. The only thing I would say with PC is that they are compact and hence the light tends to be very focused over a small area, especially in a tank like yours. You could always look into T5's they have more power, but the length means the light gets spread over the full length of the tank.

Sam