Well, it’s done. Plants are all ordered. Not what I planned, as it took 7 vendors to find everything, but I can finally close all the extra tabs in my browser. I kept telling myself that this tank will be the most painful, but from here on out I should be able to use plants from this tank for future scapes, too. Since I first thought about starting this tank, to now, I have watched prices slowly creep up, and shipping for everything these days certainly adds up.
I did realize that I probably should not have been ordering the bulk of the plants this month with the looming deadline for IAPLC. Several plants suddenly vanished from my carts over the last few days, and became quite difficult to find, especially detail plants like nana ‘petite’, and crypt parva. Maybe there’s no correlation there, but it did force me to pull the trigger now that the dark start is nearing its end.
Driftwood seems to be stable, and at six weeks the dark start has progressed pretty well. Ammonia was still high over the weekend, with zero nitrites, but nitrates were coming up, so I did a large water change and seized the opportunity to scrub the fuzzy brown mold off the right side of the manzanita. Yeesh that made a floaty mess of a chunky mold soup, but some strategic siphoning, skimming, and filtration had it all cleared up by the following morning. Ammonia now riding between 1-2ppm.
Scoped out a great place for CO2 fills over the weekend that’s only about 20 minutes away, and not exorbitantly priced. Filled a 10lb bottle, and a 5lb reserve so I don’t have to remove the CO2 entirely when refilling the large canister.
I expect things to evolve and get edited along the way, but to start, these are the plants I am starting with, except maybe the Hydrocotyle verticillata. I am having buyers remorse on that one, so I am thinking about putting together a little terrarium as a gift for a friend whose birthday is coming up. Do friends foist H. verticillata on other friends?
I love the look, but I am not sure I want it running amok in this tank, and I forgot to remove it from the cart before I pushed go, so I will figure that out. Regardless, next step is planting once everything arrives (hopefully in good shape). Fingers crossed that the aquarium startup gods are kind!
- Adarium Caulescens 'White Fang'
- Anubias barteri var. nana 'Petite'
- Anubias barteri Nana
- Anubias congensis 'mini'
- Bolbitis heudelotti
- Bucephalandra Blackcurrant
- Bucephalandra Dark Venus
- Bucephalandra Kedagang
- Bucephalandra Theia
- Cryptocoryne lucens
- Cryptocoryne lutea
- Cryptocoryne parva
- Cryptocoryne spiralis 'Caudigera'
- Cryptocoryne Willisii
- Cyperus helferi
- Eleocharis Acicularis
- Eleocharis Parvula
- Eleocharis montevidensis
- Eriocaulon breviscapum 'Feather Duster'
- Eriocaulon sp. 'Vietnam'
- Fissidens fontanus
- Hydrocotyle verticillata
- Hygrophila lancea 'Araguaia '
- Hygrophila pinnatifida
- Marsilea hirsuita
- Microsorum pteropus narrow leaf
- Microsorum pteropus trident
- Myriophyllum mattogrossense (temp)
- Nymphaea zenkeri Red
- Schismatoglottis Roseospatha
- Vesicularia ferriei 'Weeping Moss'
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GlassAqua has some mats you could cobble together
