How to: Natural Planted tank

[KenD]

I started a soil based 10 gallon on Monday night and I did a 50% water change on Tuesday night because it was cloudy and it had a yellow hue to it. It still has the yellow hue to it today, Saturday morning, and I am wondering if I should do another water change? I plan on getting a test kit today to see what my levels are at, this is my first planted tank and my first real tank in general so any help is greatly appreciated. Oh and I have a betta, 3 corrys, about 8 ghost shrimp, and a couple common snails. I'm waiting on my MTS to come in the mail soon.

[Oldfishlady]

The yellow might be the soil or driftwood leaching tannins and this can vary on timeline when it resolves, until then, make at least 2 weekly 50% water changes while the system is maturing. In about 2-3 weeks-you might be able to drop the water changes to 1-50% weekly-provided that you have lots of active plant growth.

[KenD]

Thank you for the fast response! The ghost shrimp were the only shrimp I could find at any LFS near me, will they do the same job as RCS or should I order some RCS?

[Oldfishlady]

Ghost shrimp will work...but the RCS are better and easier to keep in general IME

[avraptorhal]

Thanks a bunch!!! A great sticky.

[Olympia]

And folks we are back online! Thanks to yours truly.

OFL if you ever see this, don't get mad, think of all the people that need this...

[KenD]

What happened to this thread? I was looking for it the other day and I thought it was a problem with my account but I guess not.

[DanielaMarie]

Hi everyone! I have a 10 gallon planted community tank I've had set up for 9 months that I'm working on making heavily planted and am interested in converting to an NPT this summer. My question is this: I am a college student who visits home multiple times a year and I take my tank with me for the major breaks, thus moving it 4 times a year and have never had any problems. I put the fish and Anacharis in a half filled 5 gallon bucket for the car ride and drain the tank until the substrate is just covered and then set it back up. Because of the movement of the car and carrying the tank, the substrate and plants shift around some so I typically have to do some replanting when I get to my destination. Would this be a problem for an NPT?

[bettacrazygirl86]

Kind of glad this came back the day after I got my 10 gallon set up. xD It prevented me from spending more money than I really wanted to, since I was thinking about doing a NPT but had no idea how since the sticky was gone.

[Olympia]

Daniella, I think the biggest issue would be the dirt mixing with the sand cap, which would look pretty unsightly and be very difficult to fix. :/