Re: Tank, lights, CO2 kits

[Chester Wong <chester_p_wong at yahoo_com>]

> Welcome back into the hobby, and onto the APD.

Thanks.  I'm glad there's so much information available nowadays ;)

> I completely agree with you about the dimensions of a standard 55.  Just not
> deep enough, front to back, to get a nice landscape going.  Personally, I
> really like the dimensions of a 75 gallon tank.  Large enough to be a solid

Space is a little limited.  I just graduated from college 1.5 years ago so I'm
still living my parents in NYC to build up the bank account.  Just as they
weren't too thrilled back then with my fishtanks, I'm sure they wouldn't want a
75 gallon tank in the house =)

> Wow.  I've got four flourescent bulbs on my 75 gallon tank.  Unless my math
> is wrong, that's 160 watts total, which puts me somewhat on the low end, but
> within the range of 2-3 watts per gallon, which I've generally seen written
> as a good rule of thumb.  I don't have any really light-hungry plants in my
> tank, but that rule of thumb is supposed to allow you to grow pretty much
> anything.

Well, I was thinking that if I went with the 36" tank, I'd just use one metal
halide.  Also, has anyone ever mounted the halide higher than 18 inches away
from the surface of the tank?  Will increasing wattage help with the increased
distance?  Basically, I would like to have light for the surrounding plants,
orchids, etc that I would want to arrange around the tank.

> Personally, I've used Karl Schoeler's Substrate Gold and Seachem's Flourite.
> I liked both, although I rearrange my plants so often (pull up, look at the
> tank, replant, look at the tank, pull up again, etc.) that it was annoying
> to have the water clouding up, even temporarily.  For that reason, I like
> Seachem's product, which is a complete substrate by itself, not an additive
> to enrich your substrate (although I do insert Jobe's sticks under
> particularly hungry plants).  If you choose a product like Substrate Gold,
> though, the dust does clear pretty quickly.

Oh....it's the flourite that I've seen before.  What's the diff between
substrate gold and flourite?

> There are several people on this list who appear to enjoy arguing about
> algae prevention, so I'll leave that argument to them.  Personally, I have
> no interest in fighting that kind of a holy war.  I wipe the walls of the
> tank every week or two (ok, sometimes a lot less than that, depending on how
> often I have company), clean out dying leaves and whatever other assorted
> debrit floats to the surface, and try to maintain a fairly consistent
> schedule of doing 15-20% water changes once a week or two.  That keeps me

Hmmm..seems like having the extra plant life would take care of regular tap.  I
live in Brooklyn, NY...I think the tap water is neutral and slightly soft.  Not
sure if they use ammonium, though.  I'll have to check into this.  Anyway, I
guess if I ended up going with discus, I would set up an automatic water
changer.  The only problem would be replenishing the TMG.  That would get
expensive, no?  What do fellow list members who own discus do?  I guess weekly
water changes and not daily?

Have a great weekend,
Chester

=====

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