Canister filters

[icarp...@aol.com]

I had a 30 gallon aquarium when I lived in San Antonio which was just about self sustaining.  I had a biowheel filter for which I never changed the media, and the tank had a thick carpet of algae.  I did 25%+ water changes every 2 weeks, vacuuming up excess algae.  The main feature was a very large piece of driftwood.

In this milieu I had a thriving population of shrimp and snails, and a self renewing family of mollies, maybe 6-7 generations in, as well as a few frogs, a few zebras and a few corys.  It was always fun to watch.  Alas I had to give it up when I moved to Peoria, IL 3 years ago.

Now I am settled and ready to start over with an aquarium and I now have the space to try something larger.  I want a 75-90 gallon freshwater tank; I hope to have it rather heavily planted.  It's been some time since I was conversant in the hobby and I don't really have a good LFS.  I also think I'd like to have colorful tetras this time, maybe with some dwarf gouramis.

My questions are as follows:

1.  What is the best substrate on the bottom of the tank to have a natural look and promote plant growth.

2.  LED lighting seems all the rage but it also seems expensive.  For a planted tank this size what is the recommended lighting?

3.  Apparently taks this large are best served with cannister filters.  I am partial to the idea of bio rather than chemical filtration but is there a guide somewhere about the pros and cons?

Thanks

Matt

[Paul Steele]

I've been able to do this, mostly by accident, in a 29 and a 40 gallon tank.

The 29 gallon uses a cheap hood I refitted to take a pair of T8 fluorescents and uses some Profile substrate that I got at Home Depot on clearance at the end of summer a few years back.

The 40 gallon has a T5 fixtures that I bought from Big Al's online, and uses cheap tube sand from the hardware store.  I like it because it has a nice range of grains, from very fine to small pebbles about 3mm across.

The tanks are both planted and have shrimp and trumpet snails with a variety of community fish.  I don't add any supplements and the plants grow well, maybe not at a record setting pace, but I do have to prune them regularly. 

I change about 25% of the water ever week to10 days, depending on my work schedule, and algae is easily controlled by the bristlenose I have in each tank (only one in each), and I scrape/scrub every 3 months at most.

Paul

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[NetMax]

1. A natural colored gravel, fairly fine to not trap too much detritus.  There are various sands available, avoid anything too fine which compacts too hard.

2. LED lighting is an evolving technology which I'm not current on.  T8 and T5 is very popular.  Avoid proprietary lamps which become expensive to replace.  Unless using CO2, avoid excess lighting.  Plants grow fine under the right spectrum of 1 watt/gallon.  Typical setups are sold around .7 to .8 wpg.  I think over 2 wpg can be problematic for algae.

3.Large tank typically use a combination of filters, and canisters are very popular for this as it moves the filter out of sight.  'Chemical' filtration refers to the media, not the filter.  Putting carbon, aragonite, dolomite, peat etc makes a filter have a chemical component.  All filters have a biological component (due to the bacteria coating the filter media), and filters which have bacteria-suitable conditions have the best biological filtration (large surface area media for the bacteria, constant water movement and relatively slow currents).  Canisters tend to have better biological filtration because of their size (larger than internal filters & HOB) and slower current flow (than an HOB filter).  Biowheels are very poor mechanical filters (average or less), average chemical filters (relatively small media compartments) and excellent biological filters (bathing the bacteria in higher concentration ambient oxygen).  A common solution is to put a biowheel on the return line of a canister filter.  Note that the more plants you have, the less concern there is about nitrifying bacteria as the plants will uptake the nitrogen wastes.

cheers

NetMax

[icarp...@aol.com]

Thanks for the information, I am going slow here!  Previously I was doing 25% water changes every 2 weeks.  Does this change with a cannister filter?

[icarp...@aol.com]

Thanks