Day 5 - pH

Nothing much happening in the tank today.

Water Chemistry
I purchased a digital pH meter from ebay, only a cheap one for £10.
It's pretty interesting. It shows that the CO2 being pumped into the water is having the expected result, lowering the pH. The pH of the tank water is 7.0-7.1, compared to the tap water which has a pH of over 8. A good validation test for if the CO2 is working properly.

A KH test (Carbonate Hardness) of the tank shows KH at 200ppm (or 11.2 degrees). Therefore we can work out the CO2 level in the water:

With a pH of 7.0
CO2 = 3 * KH * 10^(7-pH)
CO2 = 3 * 11.2 * 10^0
CO2 = 3 * 11.2
CO2 = 33.6 ppm

With a pH of 7.1
CO2 = 3 * KH * 10^(7-pH)
CO2 = 3 * 11.2 * 10^(-0.1)
CO2 = 3 * 11.2 * 0.7943
CO2 = 26.7 ppm

So between 26.7 and 33.6 ppm of CO2, high CO2 levels, great news for the plants.

Day 4 - Slime!

I pruned some of the more yellow and shabby looking leaves (mostly Vallis) and replanted the plants that had floated free of the substrate.

These were the Vallis leaves:



Slime!
Today I noticed a slime had built up around the CO2 diffuser. I pulled it off, it was the consistency of snot but smelled sweet. I suspect it's the yeast/sugar solution from the bottles which has traveled down the airline.



I've done two things to try and rectify this problem:

1. Made sure the airline coming out of the drinks bottles doesn't drop down below the top of the bottle. Previously the airline came out of the bottle then dropped down to the floor before going to the tank above. Now the line goes directly up to the tank.
2. I've lowered the diffuser so that it isn't so close to the intake of the filter. I figure the gentle suction of the filter intake must also be gently sucking on the airline.

We shall see if this solves the problem. If not I shall install a third bottle designed to catch the gunk that comes from the yeast filled bottles, like this one.

Below you can just about see the white diffuser sticking up through the gravel.

Day 3 - Water

Trimmed a few leaves which had melted, a few shoots have floated free to the top of the tank.

Probably should mention the water stats:

• Temperature 24 degrees C
  
• GH 320 ppm (General Hardness - parts per million)
  
• KH 220 ppm (Carbonate Hardness - parts per million)
  
• NO3 between 20 and 50 ppm (Nitrates - parts per million)
• pH 7.1
  

I'm not going to worry about NH3 and NO2 (Ammonia and Nitrite) because I'm actually adding Ammonia to the water daily as part of a fishless cycle. Just some stuff I got from the local hardware store (Robert Dyas). I'm also dosing with Nutrafin Cycle:

Day 2 - Still Alive

The next day everything is still alive! Let's take a closer look around.

The middle of the tank:






A few leaves are melting:


This is the output of the CO2. The co2 enters the tank via the clear airline and has a small white diffuser on the end. This diffuser sits directly beneath the intake of the Fluval external filter. Seems to do a good job of dissolving the co2 in the water.


Some plants, like the Java Fern below are bubbling. Presumably pumping out oxygen due to the high co2 levels.


Various Cabomba like plants whch came as part of the random selection. Not too keen on these and they are hiding the Twisted Vallis which is planted behind them.


Salvinia Auriculata, the weird looking floating plant:


Below is the Java Fern, this is actually five separate plants bunched up.


Below is Java Moss, tied on with some brown cotton.


Dwarf Hairgrass (I think) another from the random selection.


No idea what the plants below are, again these are from the random selection:

Day 1 - Setup!

Initial Hardware:

• Fluval Roma 125 Aquarium (80cm x 35cm x 45cm) (£110 from LFS)
  
• Fluval Tronic 150W Heater
• 2x 24" 20W T8 lighting tubes
• Fluval 205 External Filter (£54 new from ebay)
  
• Fine natural gravel
• Three chunks of bogwood
  

I removed the filter which came with the tank, an internal Fluval U3.

I added a DIY co2 system, basically following this article. The output of the yeast based co2 is going into the filter intake of the Fluval 205. I've used two 2ltr bottles to boost co2 output. The cost of this was almost nothing, about 60p for some yeast :) although I spent a few pounds on airline and fixings to hold the airline in the tank.

Initial Plants
I ordered my plants from Plants Alive. Here's what I ordered

• 10x Vallisneria Torta
• 5x Microsorium Pteropus (Java Fern)
• Vesicularis Dubyana (Java Moss)
• Salvinia Auriculata
• 5x Echinodorus Tenellus
• 100x bargain surplus plants (lucky dip)

Total cost £23.40 (delivered to my door).

I carefully selected 22 plants for my order but then at the last second I added in that random selection of 100 plants too spice things up a bit. :-)

The aquarium has pretty low lighting, only 1.2W per gallon. I'll be trying to rectify that in the coming weeks by modifying the hood to add more lights.

Aquarium Birth
Connected everything up and threw in the plants, here's what we have on day 1.



Not all of these plants are going to stay in here. For one thing I don't even like some of them, so they'll be going. I'm pretty sure some will die off because they don't like the conditions. For the moment though I'll be leaving them all in there, I'm pretty interested to see how they get on with the additional co2.

I also dosed with 5ml of Flora Grow to help the plants along.