New Tank experiment - Ten Gallon Setup ctd. - Subtrate

In my earlier report on my new 10G tank I laid out the overall program. Today I want to focus on the substrate and the first inverts.

Here's what I did for substrate, it is more elaborate than need be, and I would not advise this, as it was dictated in this case mostly by what I happened to have on hand, and I considered that generally it was still in line with what Matt Owens recommends in his book, The Alternative Aquarium, A Robust Habitat.

Note that I had Hydor Hydrokable on the bottom, here's what I did for substrate:

1. 0.25" of AquariumPlants.com's Aquadert, just enough to cover the heating cable, with a 2" wide bank across the front, and about 1.25" high.
2. Behind the bank of Aquadert, I provided a layer of organic potting soil with all the course, un-decomposed organics removed, enough to be level with the front.
3. About 0.75" of Seachem Onyx Sand.
4. About 0.75 of Seachem Flourite.

Since then I've begun to plant, sofar:

• Corkscrew Val
• Micro Swords
• Hornwort ( the course variety, Ceratophyllum Demersum) - fills about 1/3rd of the tank.
• Duck Weed.
• Three Crypt Wendtii
• Java Moss
• Micro Val

With the plants starting to catch on, I've also imported some inverts, for now MTS, Tubifex, Daphnia,  and Copepods, maybe some rotifers... hard to tell with the naked eye. Finally, I have added some Red Cherry Shrimp. Now I'm just curious to see how the inverts establish themselves.

In order to accommodate this development, I am going to keep my betta in my 29G tank for now, where he seems to be very happy. Purely watching these inverts catch on, and observing the plants is going to be my preoccupation for now, as far as this tank is concerned. In the long term I want to preserve my 5G tank as a refugium to breed inverts. 

New Tank experiment - Ten Gallon Setup

Ok, this is going to be my third third-time aquarium, a little Aqueon 10 gallon tank, complete with the hood, that one of my neighbors threw out. I saw they got it at Christmas, for they threw out the box it came in, but by April they must have succeeded in killing all the fish, and they threw it out, so I picked it up, for I wanted to experiment with a different setup, and I believe that 10 gallon is actually the minimum acceptable tank size for a Betta, and after all, this whole experiment was kicked off by a betta fish that came home with me from a dinner two years ago, and he's still doing... swimmingly.

Tank preparation

The thermal insulation backing

Looking down, heating cable installed, and back wall decoration

Frontal view, showing Hydrokable, and the back wall

New Tank Setup in Steps

Here is the program I am following, again, based on earlier experience, and now following the book by Matt Owens, The Alternative Aquarium, A Robust Habitat. In my 29G setup I had just begun reading this book and then I did an experiment with some potting soil for a Wisteria I planted in a terracotta flower pot. The plant is doing spectacularly well. So this time out, I will follow Owens' program even further and use organic potting soil for the first layer of substrate, with sand on top.

1. Cleaning/desinfecting the tank.
2. Installing the thermal back wall and a background.
3. Installing Hydor Hydrokable 25W under gravel heating cable, and backup heater - 25W is not enough by itself, for it can get cold at night in winter.
4. Add 1" water and Prodibio Bacter kit Soil, to seed the beneficial bacteria.
5. About 1- 1.5" of organic potting soil, with all the course matter removed, such as pieces of twigs that are not fully decomposed etc. Actually, I am going to use some Aquadert in front half, and the organic potting soil in the back, for no other reason than that I had some Aquadert left over from my 29G tank installation - and, the taller, deeper rooted plants go in the back.
6. About 1.5"of sand. I'll use Onyx Sand, with a top layer of Flourite Sand.
7. Water fill up. Use ZeroWater, below 6 TDS, plus Seachem Replenish, to add the necessary healthy electrolytes.
8. Tweaking GH & KH, including using AAP Wonder Shell, and Seachem Acid & Alkaline Buffer.
9. Filtration: at first my SuperClean 5-20 moves over, to be replaced later by an ATI Sponge Filter #1. 
10. Lighting, using the Aqueon hood, but add the Marineland 17" Hidden LED in front.
11. Plants.
12. Snails (MTS), and other inverts.
13. Fish (Betta and probably a few cories, or some shrimp). Fish won't go in until the invert cultures are thriving, and the cycling of the tank is well under way.

Notes and Updates

I will make notes and updates and any comments as I go through this process. As I am writing this, I am awaiting the arrival of the Prodibio Bacter Kit Soil. Some plants will be imported from the other tanks and also help starting the bacteria, and by running the filter on here that also came from a long established tank, the cycling should go easy. Eventually, I will replace the filter with a Sponge filter, for the SuperClean would suck up too many of the invertebrates. I don't think I'll need that high of a flow rate. Particularly since I now have Duck Weed and Hornwort in all my tanks, nitrates and phosphates are less of a problem than they once were.