It's a dirted tank, so the plants will have actual dirt to grow in, and I won't have to dose fertilizers all the time, which is kind of a pain in the ass.
Setup:
30g long
Miracle Gro Organic Potting Soil
Potash
Dolomite
Red Clay Powder
Black Blasting Sand
DIY Carbon Dioxide Reactor w/Nano Diffuser
I already detailed the light conversion I did, so here's the setup for the rest of the tank:
The edges were oak (bleh), so I taped off the glass and repainted it black.
Just a bit of potash in the bottom (provides potassium):
Dolomite (for calcium and magnesium):
Lined it with the washed sand so that you don't see the layers of dirt from the front:
Mixed the powdered clay in with the potting soil and set to aquascape it a bit:
Got some manzanita driftwood to put in it. Had to tie down the big piece with some rock that I put under the substrate so it wouldn't float off.
View from the top after I covered the potting soil mixture with the blasting sand (the sand keeps the dirt from flying all over the tank and making muddy water... and it looks better):
Quickly placed the plants in there before they dried out:
Hairgrass, crypts, Argentine swords, red ludwigia and hygrophilia:
Final setup w/fish (the sponge filter on the right is from a mature tank, and will be taken out as soon as it seeds the new filters):
The plants are melting away a little bit, which is to be expected right now. The leaves that are on there will die away as the plant puts down new roots, and new growth will take their place. In the meantime, I've got laaaaaaarge water changes every day to keep the nutrients down. That will subside in a week or two. And when the dwarf hairgrass in front grows out, it should carpet the whole bottom of the tank very well. The floating plant is some hornwort that will be removed, as it's ugly and messy. I'll replace it with some java moss that will be attached to the front right driftwood, so that it looks like a tree.
Fish stock, since you can't really see them:
Green neon tetras (a lot more blue than other neons or cardinals) x 20
Celestial Pearl Danio x 6
Purple Eraser Pencilfish x 6
Bloodfin Tetra x 6
Clown Loach x 5 (need to get rid of soon, or rehome... they are getting too big for the tank)
Betta x 1 (mine looks almost identical to this)
