Retirement and forum shutdown (17 Jan 2022)
Hi,
John Howell who has managed the forum for years is getting on and wishes to retire from the role of managing it.
Over the years, he has managed the forum through good days and bad days and he has always been fair.
He has managed to bring his passion for fish keeping to the forum and keep it going for so long.
I wish to thank John for his hard work in keeping the forum going.
With John wishing to "retire" from the role of managing the forum and the forum receiving very little traffic, I think we must agree that forum has come to a natural conclusion and it's time to put it to rest.
I am proposing that the forum be made read-only from March 2022 onwards and that no new users or content be created. The website is still registered for several more years, so the content will still be accessible but no new topics or replies will be allowed.
If there is interest from the ITFS or other fish keeping clubs, we may redirect traffic to them or to a Facebook group but will not actively manage it.
I'd like to thank everyone over the years who helped with forum, posted a reply, started a new topic, ask a question and helped a newbie in fish keeping. And thank you to the sponsors who helped us along the away. Hopefully it made the hobby stronger.
I'd especially like to thank John Howell and Valerie Rousseau for all of their contributions, without them the forum would have never been has successful.
Thank you
Darragh Sherwin
Setting up a low tech planted community tank.
I'm currently running a 70L tank with a couple of plants, 6 cardinal tetras 3 guppies (Fancy) 11 guppy fry (my first), 5 plattys, 1 killifish, 1 dwarf royal loach and a non breeding snail red and black. I know this is over stocked but I have the filtration to deal with the bio-load. the fish are healthy and happy for 4 months now.
I am planning on getting a 285L tank in the next couple of months and setting up a medium planted low tech community tank. I want to avoid adding CO2 and fertz by using a topsoil capped with sand for financial reasons mainly, and I am looking for advice.
My main questions are
1: What brands of soil are suitable for the under-layer of substrate? (don't trust garden center staff)
2: I want to add clay to the soil (modelling clay) can anybody advise, and are there any other additives I should consider?
3: Would I need to mature the soil to help break down the organics before set up, and is it a case of just submerging the soil for a 6 ~ 8 week period?
4: I'm planning on adding some Malaysian tunneling snails to help avoid compacting and general clean up. I know the breed like crazy so would a couple of clown loaches keep them under control and are there any other snail eaters I should consider?
Any advice would be greatly appreciated as I am a NOOB to planted tanks
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