Build Thread 1000 Gallon High Tech Planted Tank

[SingAlongWithTsing]

This pdf might help with trouble shooting nutrients:

onn130601.pdf

drive.google.com

Page 25 for chlorosis related stuff.

 

[RickyV]

This pdf might help with trouble shooting nutrients:

Thank you! Looking at this document chlorosis can be caused from Fe, Mn, B, and Mo. Looking at your dosing recipe we dose similar Fe, but you dose a lot more Mn, B, and Mo. I'm starting to wonder if this is really Fe deficiency now considering your water is much harder than mine. I may try doubling my dose of CSM+ B.

 

[Unexpected]

This thing is growing in fast!

 

[RickyV]

This thing is growing in fast!

Yeah it's been fun coming in every weekend seeing the tank different than last time!

 

[Mr.Shenanagins]

This thing is growing in fast!

I was thinking that same thing, just wow!

 

[RickyV]

Hey all,
Fish have finally been added to the tank. We added 11 celestial pearl danios, 7 gertrudae rainbowfish and 10 otocinclus. There are a few more fish in quarantine waiting to be moved, mostly more otocinclus, siamese algae eaters and more rainbowfish. I will try next week to get better pictures or some video. The fish looked to be doing really good the past 2 days and even looked to be exhibiting some mating behavior. I accidentally had the CO2 injecting a 1.5 pH drop and all the animals still looked pretty happy so that is good to know but I have since reduced it back to 1.0 drop. I'm hoping the owner ends up wanting more fish like he did with the shrimp. Otherwise hopefully the fish have lots of babies as there are so many hiding places for them including those giant hollow rock structures.

We did end up ordering 250 more bloody mary shrimp and the shrimp have had several weeks to establish themselves in the tank. There were concerns that something in the water may be killing the shrimp since we were not seeing any (I'm sure it was due to only 50 shrimp to a 1000G tank.). So I was asked to make a micro observation tank. The shrimps in the observation tank (micro refugium?) have been doing really good as have the shrimps in the main tank. I have been seeing a lot of babies.

Here is the observation tank. I Iike throwing my clippings in there. Its basically a mini above tank sump.

We also did find a couple of different colored shrimp in the shipment, orange and blue, and I did find an extra one in the observation tank. So I made them another micro tank for themselves. Though it did occur to me right after leaving that the cull shrimp could breed in there and have babies go down the drain back in to the main tank. So I will need to think of something to solve that.

The plants in the tank have been doing okay. I have pretty much eliminated the green hair algae, the diatoms have been replaced by nicer green algae, the BGA went away after using some peroxide, BBA is reducing from using peroxide, the only thing left that has been a problem is staghorn. From experience I know this really only grows on unhealthy leaves which looking at affected leaves it is definitely the case. It is mostly affecting the pinnatifida with a couple other infected spots. I was reading this article from Dennis Wong How to grow Hygrophila pinnatifida and now I am pretty sure it is trace toxicity. I think the pinnatifida started suffering after I increased my CSM+B from 0.25 ppm iron to 0.6 ppm iron a few weeks ago. I had increased it to see if maybe the chlorosis was being caused by another trace, but no significant improvement. I have also been experimenting the last few weeks with different quantities of iron and never saw a significant difference. Dennis Wong also mentions curled leaves which I am seeing on my amazon sword.

As you can see below my frogbit is not doing good so I can rule out CO2 as being a problem, macros are unlikely to be a problem with 12ppm NO3, 12 ppm K, and 2 ppm PO4.

This week I finally got my peristaltic dosing pump and I have set it up to dose micros/Fe DTPA/Fe gluconate 24 times every day. I'm crossing my fingers that this can finally solve the Fe deficiency. I also cut the CSM+B back to the original 0.25ppm Fe EDTA, DTPA is 0.2ppm weekly, and gluconate is 0.2 ppm weekly. I have a 3500ml container in which I added 5ml distilled white vinegar per 500ml for a total of 35ml white vinegar. I am assuming this is correct? I found the recipe on a barreport post.

Here is a shot of the tank right before it got trimmed.

Here is a most recent tank shot

 

[Unexpected]

Looking really good!

 

[RickyV]

Looking really good!

Thank you!

 

[BryceM]

This tank is awesome! I hope they’re paying you well. Seems pretty lightly stocked fish-wise considering the usual appetites of the public and the size of the aquarium.

 

[RickyV]

This tank is awesome! I hope they’re paying you well. Seems pretty lightly stocked fish-wise considering the usual appetites of the public and the size of the aquarium.

Thanks! Yeah not entirely sure on the thinking behind such a small quantity of fish, hopefully more get added soon. The tank will hopefully be around for many more years so I am sure stocking will change. Though I have noticed more interest in the tank now that it has fish.

 

[plantbrain]

Thanks! Yeah not entirely sure on the thinking behind such a small quantity of fish, hopefully more get added soon. The tank will hopefully be around for many more years so I am sure stocking will change. Though I have noticed more interest in the tank now that it has fish.

Target 1.2 to 1.4 pH drop, not 1. Most of the plant issues are new plants...and the CO2 is the ONE thing that will burn you. Light management is a big issue also. You will have better success with lower light ranges. You need to get a good light PAR meter, Apogee etc and see what the umols are throughout the tank. Big deep tanks have big issues with lighting. Mostly they add too much. You can get around it a bit by adding a lot of light for say 1-2 hours. Then low light the rest of the time. Most of these plants can handle pretty low light just fine. Note that ADA AS or similar also has plenty of nutrients. You are not deficient anything other than the CO2 perhaps. Big water changes on big tanks takes work but most have valves to drain, refill. I'd add a lot of algae eaters in there 2 months ago.

 

[RickyV]

Thanks for the reply Tom! Have learned a lot from your forum.

Target 1.2 to 1.4 pH drop, not 1.

Is the thinking behind this that the tank is so big that this ensures there is plenty of CO2 everywhere?

Most of the plant issues are new plants...and the CO2 is the ONE thing that will burn you.

Would they still be having these issues almost 3 months in? I feel like the plants were growing well in the beggning with the exception of pale new leaves. It's been in the past month that I've been noticing plant health deterioting. However mostly in specific plants, all the swords, the pinnatifida, ludwigia super red, and the alternanthera. All the other plants seem unaffected and mostly clean of algae. The only change I can think of I made was increasing CSM+B from 0.25ppm Fe to 0.6 ppm Fe. I don't have issues with this dose on my tank at home, but one difference is at home I use tap water and for this tank we use RO. Not the best video, but you can see the sword is growing curled with some melting.

Light management is a big issue also. You will have better success with lower light ranges. You need to get a good light PAR meter, Apogee etc and see what the umols are throughout the tank. Big deep tanks have big issues with lighting. Mostly they add too much. You can get around it a bit by adding a lot of light for say 1-2 hours. Then low light the rest of the time. Most of these plants can handle pretty low light just fine

I will try getting a par meter. This makes sense. I guess I just thought the fluvals were underpowered for this size tank and being hung 2 feet above the water. The fluval site says 80 par at 12". But I could see how maybe having 6 stacked together is bringing a lot more light than I thought. I currently have pink, blue, cool white, and pure white at 100%. I have the warm white at 0%. Lights on from 7:00 am - 5:30 pm with 30 min sunrise and sunset.

Note that ADA AS or similar also has plenty of nutrients. You are not deficient anything other than the CO2 perhaps

We actually ended up going with Seachem Flourite due to budget. But I'm sure I have enough nutrients with 12ppm NO3, 2ppm PO4 and 12 ppm K total weekly.

Big water changes on big tanks takes work but most have valves to drain, refill.

Yep have been doing 50% water changes weekly, but it's easier than my tank at home with easy draining and refilling.

I'd add a lot of algae eaters in there 2 months ago.

Yeah definitely should have gotten fish way sooner. But I have a big school of siamese algae eaters and more otos ready to go in next week.

Tom, since you have worked with big high tech tanks before, can I ask for advice? I think I'm starting to figure things out with a tank this big, but could use some pointers from someone expericed with working on large high tech tanks. I started high tech tanks a little over a year ago with my 300G at home so I still have a lot to learn.

 

[RickyV]

I took some better pictures of the conditions the plants have been in the last few weeks. Some plants are affected more a lot more than others, such as the pinnatifida, the swords, hydrocotyle tripartita, and the ludwigia super red. Other plants such as the crypts, anubias, limnophilia aromatica, rotala rotundifolia, and pennywort look mostly fine, but some leaves do have staghorn on them indicating they must not be at full health either. As you can see in the pictures there is a lot of melting in plants, and the swords are growing twisted.

These plants were once looking pretty lush other than pale new leaves. Like I said before I suspect trace toxicity since thats probably the biggest variable I have changed when I increased CSM+B from 0.25ppm Fe to 0.6ppm Fe. I did make a small adjustment in flow and inject CO2 into both return pumps instead of one but I cant imagine any of this causing the plants to
deteriorate this much.


I tested the pH in several locations in the tank and the pH at most varies by 0.05, I cant imagine this being that big of a problem but I could be wrong. Currently dropping the pH 1.2 and it stays very steady. I have plenty of gas exchange through surface agitation/overflow and sump. Dissolved oxygen last read at 99% right in the morning before lights came on. Macros dosing has not changed and is at 12ppm NO3, 2 ppm PO4, 12ppm K, I also dose 5ppm Mg. TDS reading at the end of the week before the 50% WC was 175. TDS after WC and dosing macros was 145. GH before WC 7, KH before WC 3. GH after WC 5, KH after WC 2. The degassed pH after WC is 7.5 and rises to 7.8 by the end of the week before the next WC.

I haven't been dosing micros/iron the last week week and a half and just resumed today. Here is what I will be dosing. This is the total weekly dose which will be split into 24 doses every day.
Fe Gluconate: 0.1 ppm (2.5 grams)
Fe DTPA 11%: 0.1 ppm (3 grams)

(9 grams of Planted CSM+B Adds Below)
Element ppm/degree
Fe 0.2
Mn 0.057
Cu 0.003
Mg 0.043
Zn 0.011
Mo 0.002
B 0.025
Here is the frogbit/duckweed currently after the 1.5 weeks of not dosing traces.

Hopefully plants get better with the reduced micros, and the more frequent iron dosing. I cant think of what else would be causing this. Edit: One thing I did notice is that plants growing by one of the returns always grew a little translucent, with melting I guess. Sometimes air gets sucked into the pump and microbubbles blow from this return, is it possible the water right by the return pipe is super saturated with oxygen and that is burning the plants by it? I don't think this is what is causing the problems in all of the tank, but at least the plants right in front of this return.

We also added the rest of the fish today, mostly siamese algae eaters and more otocinclus.

 

[Mr.Shenanagins]

Overhead shots can sometimes be deceptive, it might look like a deficiency while a side shot the plant looks healthy. Dennis talked about this somewhere on his site I think, if the plants look healthy from all other angles I wouldn’t stress over it.

 

[RickyV]

Overhead shots can sometimes be deceptive, it might look like a deficiency while a side shot the plant looks healthy. Dennis talked about this somewhere on his site I think, if the plants look healthy from all other angles I wouldn’t stress over it.

Oh interesting. Yeah from the front they don't look too bad, but I imagine the staghorn on the plants is a sign something is stressing them.

 

[Burr740]

I haven't been dosing micros/iron the last week week and a half and just resumed today. Here is what I will be dosing. This is the total weekly dose which will be split into 24 doses every day.
Fe Gluconate: 0.1 ppm (2.5 grams)
Fe DTPA 11%: 0.1 ppm (3 grams)

(9 grams of Planted CSM+B Adds Below)
Element ppm/degree
Fe 0.2
Mn 0.057
Cu 0.003
Mg 0.043
Zn 0.011
Mo 0.002
B 0.025
Here is the frogbit/duckweed currently after the 1.5 weeks of not dosing traces.

That should be pretty good for a weekly total

 

[Mr.Shenanagins]

I missed the image with the trident fern. You’re experiencing a common issue due to reasons not entirely known. Leaves will begin to rot like you’re seeing and it quickly spreads to the surrounding leaves. I have been able to curb it in the past by immediately removing said leaves, but sometimes it results in drastically thinning out the rhizome. Normally, if parameters are good the new leaves will return. But my guess is that something was off and caused the self destruction you’re seeing. It can literally come out of nowhere when the plant is looking lush like you mentioned. It’s a love hate relationship with the nicer fern varietals.

Looking at your dosing, and considering the amount of plant mass you have, I’d maybe up the dosing across the board. 15-20 N, 4-5 P, and 20-30K. You could be running low at the end of the week, not sure if your testing to see where the tank is at and what the rate of consumption is.

 

[RickyV]

I missed the image with the trident fern. You’re experiencing a common issue due to reasons not entirely known. Leaves will begin to rot like you’re seeing and it quickly spreads to the surrounding leaves. I have been able to curb it in the past by immediately removing said leaves, but sometimes it results in drastically thinning out the rhizome. Normally, if parameters are good the new leaves will return. But my guess is that something was off and caused the self destruction you’re seeing. It can literally come out of nowhere when the plant is looking lush like you mentioned. It’s a love hate relationship with the nicer fern varietals.

I had something similar happen in my personal tank, all of a sudden my java lace ferns started melting and rapidly disappeared. Very strange. I have been removing affected leaves and it seems to have slowed the spread.

Looking at your dosing, and considering the amount of plant mass you have, I’d maybe up the dosing across the board. 15-20 N, 4-5 P, and 20-30K. You could be running low at the end of the week, not sure if your testing to see where the tank is at and what the rate of consumption is.

Last week phosphates were at 4.16 ppm and came down to 3.56 ppm this week. Nitrate last week was 5.9 ppm and came down to 5.1 ppm. I think I remember nutrient consumption was a lot higher in the beggning though, it definitely slowed down with the stress the plants are experiencing. Also not sure why nitrates read a lot less than what I am dosing according to the calculator.

 

[RickyV]

The tank this week is looking a lot better. I think it's safe to say toxicity from the micros was the problem. I'm curious which one specifically was the problem. Pale new leaves seems to mostly be affecting the Amazon sword, pennywort, and a tiny bit on the rotala. I'm not gonna stress about it anymore though as it's not that bad. I'm just happy the plants are growing again. I'll just continue experimenting with the timing of the iron doses, I think in a few weeks I'll try one big dose for the photoperiod and little doses every hour during lights off. I may also try Mn.

Here is the sword and pennywort. Sword was stunted before and it is growing a bunch now, same with many other plants.

Here are pics of other plants in the tank. I think they are looking pretty healthy again.

Here is how I left the frogbit last week.

Here it is one week later. It more than doubled in quantity. No obvious signs of deficiency I think.

I also ended up setting up a little walstad cull vase for this one orange cherry shrimp I found.

I can also confirm that the return pump definitely seems to affect plants that grow right in front of it. I went ahead and removed affected plants in its path. You can see in the picture below how it makes the plants translucent. My theory is still super saturation of O2 and N2 since the pump sucks in air sometimes, but I'm not sure as this doesnt seem to be a thing in smaller tanks.

The siamese algae eaters I added last week pretty much ate every single piece of staghorn and green hair algae in the tank which I thought was crazy. It's such a big tank and they got everything. They didn't seem to touch BBA. I spot treated it with some H2O2 to see if they are more likely to eat it dead.

Caught a video of the rainbowfish doing their dance thing.

Overall I'm pretty happy with how the tank is doing now. I've noticed people really like taking selfies with the tank which makes me happy to see people think the tank is pretty enough for their background. Here is a full tank shot of this week.

 

[Unexpected]

Hats off to you. It’s just so awesome. I want a selfie myself