Today I started what I'm calling a plant propagation tank. I started with a 29 gallon I had and added some "enriched" top soil from Pundam then added about 1/2" - 1" of play sand from HD. For lighting I'm going to start with a simple 48" shop light equipped with 2 Sunlight bulbs. Plants Cabomba, and Anacharis both I believe to be easy to grow under low light. The Anacharis was also donated by Pundam.Thanks Mary.

I am going to try keeping this very low tech and see how it progresses. Once a week I will test water quality to see what effect the plants have on reducing ammonia and PH levels. Again this is only a test tank and will have NO fish in it.

Sounds interesting! 

RJS8540 said :

Today I started what I'm calling a plant propagation tank. I started with a 29 gallon I had and added some "enriched" top soil from Pundam then added about 1/2" - 1" of play sand from HD. For lighting I'm going to start with a simple 48" shop light equipped with 2 Sunlight bulbs. Plants Cabomba, and Anacharis both I believe to be easy to grow under low light. The Anacharis was also donated by Pundam.Thanks Mary.

I am going to try keeping this very low tech and see how it progresses. Once a week I will test water quality to see what effect the plants have on reducing ammonia and PH levels. Again this is only a test tank and will have NO fish in it.

gonna do a DIY CO2 unit? there really easy!

Get a two liter bottle and some air line tubing and a sealant and your ready to go.

Drill a hole in the 2L bottle cap just big enough to put the air line in.

Use your sealent around the air line

Run the tube into the Intake on your filter(HOB  if ya got it works nice!)

now all ya need is bakers yeast and sugar (2 cups sugar, 1/2 teaspoon of yeast in the 2L Bottle and fill it 3/4 full with warm tap water, and shake the crap outta it) put the cap with the air line  in it on the 2L and let it go you should have CO2 for about 3 to 4 weeks and at a fraction of the cost of a fancy unit)

Oh another good thing about DIY Yeast Co2 you cant Overdose the tank with it like you can the fancy units.

Also i would personally dump all the sludge you sphion at water changes into this tank(free fert!)

Vance, I tried the DIY CO2 before. It did work pretty well but it gave the area around the tank a bit of a beer smell, so I'm going to see how the plants do without any additions to it besides I believe you don't need CO2 unless you are using more than 3-4 watts of light per gallon.

RJS8540 said :

Vance, I tried the DIY CO2 before. It did work pretty well but it gave the area around the tank a bit of a beer smell, so I'm going to see how the plants do without any additions to it besides I believe you don't need CO2 unless you are using more than 3-4 watts of light per gallon.

you say Beer smell like that is a bad thing! Beer smells much better than a cycling fish tank ill say that lol!

The soil breathes enough that you don't have to mess with anything like that.  Will be interested to see how this goes.  That soil should be great.  Just not for fish when it's set without aeration for awhile  :)

Todd

farmertodd said :

The soil breathes enough that you don't have to mess with anything like that.  Will be interested to see how this goes.  That soil should be great.  Just not for fish when it's set without aeration for awhile  :)

Todd

Oh shut up you.

I have mostly low tech tanks. First let me say every tank is different.  So, given that, with the 3-4 watts per gallon, that is on the high side for low tech.  You may experience lots of algae - probably hair algae.  You may also get green water if you are high in phosphates and deficient in nitrogen.

This all MAY happen of course, but it may not.  The soil may leach phosphates into the water column. You will probably get some ammonia from the soil at first. 

I set up a 29 gal soil tank recently.  I did not add fish for nearly 30 days - however I did have ramshorn snails- light was ~ 2 watts per gallon.  I got good growth on some plants, poor on others.  This is because there was not enough of a nitrogen source.  Plants use ammonia as the best nitrogen source. Ammonia comes from animal life.  I added some guppies and platies.  About 2 - 3 weeks later, I noticed increase growth on the plants that were doing poorly.

In another tank, I did the opposite of what you are doing - just because I needed a very quick plant repository (I ordered too much!) I filled an empty 20 gal high and put about 2 watts per gallon lighting.  I did not add any substrate.  The plants in those little plastic pots sank, and the stem plants sort-of floated with the plant weights.  This was in early April 2008.  After a couple weeks,the plants seemed to be doing OK, and I did not have time to plant all of them, so I decided to add some wild guppies that I just got. So now this tank is still thriving, no substrate, no filters, just plants and multiplying guppies.

The aquatic plant thing continues to amaze me. EVERYONE'S experience is different. I hope yours works out!  But, I think you may be adding some fish at some point.

Hey, RJ!

You done any tests on that water yet?

Nope, been to busy but I'll try to post tomorrow.