Blackwater biotope

[KpT]

Hi everyone

I am at the final stages of my biotope now

It may sound funny becasuse the tank has been up and running sicne i changed it to a biotope for a long time now but i have changed it around a lot and have finally settled for what i want after experimenting with what you can do with the south american scene, and trust me ive tried everything.

So some final ideas to make the tank at its best have come to mind.

As it stands, the tank is:

3ft long
white slica 1 and half inches deep
2 fluval internal filters, 2+ and 3+
lots of bogwood
lots of moss
few stones and a tree trunk cave
ONLY FISH IN ARE A PAIR OF RAMS

over the past i have had loads of cardinals, many fake big amazon plants, a failed floating plant, a few almond leaves, moss as a floor of the tank, lots of catfish, coloured ferns and a lot more.

But ignoring all that i want to finally:

DARKENING the sand somehow to enhnace colour of fish to follow
RE leaf litter the tank to make it more natural
RE install the peat filtration but have it hidden undera big cave with coloured bubbles
have better FLOATING PLANTS
have SLOWER moving water
PLANTING some swords and vallisneria
add plant pots and caves to reduce agression
and ADDING some ****************atoo cichlids and apistogrmma Nijessni-macmasteri plus some bottom feeders

THEN THE TANK WILL BE COMPLETE AND ITLL JUST BE MAINTANENCE TO KEEP UP

THE THINGS I NEED HELP WITH WERE CAPITILISED OUT OF THE LIST

DARKENING

i am not sure how to darken the white silica sand?
I want to use soemthing that wont affect the water and that can be messed with when i turn overt he sand
I was thinking maybe FIRST LAYER, that you can mix in with gravel to help the plants grow( which is brown
?????????

FLOATING PLANTS

Last time i bought a flaoting plant was also the first, i have no idea how to look after these well unfortunatley, so it was a waste of 4.25 becasue for once i didnt do my research
The plant got blown around by the current from my filters, the roots broke off when it got in the way at water changes and it just never grew becasue i couldnt find a way to fertilise it well.
The frogbit is supposed to feed of nitrates but the water is pretty pure so theres not a lot of that.

SLOWER

I need a way of slowing down my filters wihtout the risk of too much **** building up?
There is a flow reducer on the fronts of them but i dont want to put them down becasue they dont seem high enough wehn there at full, i think this is becasue the peat gets clogged in them easily and there getting a little old. I dont mind if the solution to this is buying an external filter, if that would be wiser?

PLANTING

Planting the swords and vallisneria im thinking will be tricky, as the substrate is shallow sand, but every profile for these cichlids insists ona planted tank, and im with them as regards reducing agression so im not sure. I also am not sure how to fertilise them plants either as i have not donw planted tanks for a while.
All i know is all plants apart from swords are very fussy and require a lot of CO2 and light yes????

ADDING

Last but not least, the stocking of the aquarium has always baffled me, some people have managed to keep way over the limits with success and others who have even tipped the boundaries have failed miserbaly and have had to start from scratch.
So i obviously want to stock wisely, cautiously and slowly in the most logical order for territory.
All three of the new cichlids mentioned need to be 1 male to 3 or 4 females and im thinking thats like 14 fish all together working it out, and they all have potential to grow to about 3 or 4" so this is over my stocking density already without thinking about bottom dwellers.

So im asking about adding, as regards which out of the fish mentioned to add would be best, like most worth it to add if you like. And which bottom feeders would be okay with them as well???

Thanks so much for your time reading all this

Any responses will be greatly appreciated

Cheers

Sam

PS; the new species if forgotten to choose from are the ****************atoo cichlids and apistogrmma Nijessni-macmasteri!!

[Ichthius]

Yay, a biotope

Darkening the substrate
First Layer sounds like a good idea. It would certainly help to darken it, but I'm not sure how well it would mix. The laterite is pretty small itself, but your sand will probably end up on the bottom. They may give it a more natural look, or the contrast may be too much, and you might not like the look. I personally don't have a problem with mixed sizes/types of substrate. It's more natural, IMO, in some cases. Also, this product is supposed to go on the bottom layer, considering that it's probably heavier and will end up on top, it may not reach as much of the roots as you'd like.

Floating Plants
Duckweed sprung to mind. It should be easy to find, hard to kill, and made its way into South America, so fits with your biotope. I actually like this plant, a lot of people don't, but can't seem to get it to take over like I want it to

Another option is Water Lettuce. Again, native to S.A., fairly easy to care for, but larger in size if you don't like the duckweed. Supposedly it needs a little more lighting, though, which you didn't mention so I can't say for sure if it would be ok in your tank.

Current
I have done many a thing to slow down water movement for my biotopes. I can't say that I'm that familiar with your type of filter (never had one to modify). I have had water pumps with similar outputs that I put mess over to slow the flow, which worked fine for me.

External filters are easier to slow the flow on, IMO. Just stuff it with a little more filter media or raise the water level so the impact isn't so great. I'm sure you can think of something to do with your existing filters, so that you don't have to replace them.

Planting
Some swords are not as demanding as you might think. Ozelot Swords are supposedly one of the less demanding types. You're going to need medium lighting (I'd say 2.5 watts per gallon or more). If you go with the First Layer laterite, nutrients won't be that much of a problem. Have a look through here for swords.

Vals aren't that demanding either. Both of these plants tend to get iffy during acclimenting, the leaves melt, but that's normal. I've kept Vals in a medium light tank, no ferts, no CO2, and they did great.

CO2 is going to be a bonus though, and it's not hard to make a DIY CO2 supplier. I've used this one with great success in many tanks.

Your Stocking
All of the cichlids you've chosen are pretty peaceful, unless they're breeding. C0ckatoos are pretty hard to find, to my knowledge, so they may be out of the runing.

I think it's a bit much, personally. Some people are able to keep loads of these fish together without too many territorial issues, but I wouldn't risk it. I'd skip the apistos and get a school of bottom dwellers like corydoras, maybe 7 or so, or instead of a bottom dweller a school of small tetra: Cardinal tetras, Neon tetras, or Rummynose, etc.

Good luck

[trashion]

I agree w/ what Leah said about the stocking. Don't add more cichlids, they will fight with the rams, as they share the same territory.

[KpT]

Hey

I keep hearing the same suggestions which i think is a good thing for me as it gets it into my head hehe.

EG: having a few corydoras; first got suggested that at my LFS when i first started the biotope.

Also that all the cichlids are peaceful to other fish from south america but not to their own kind that all dwell middle to bottom. So im thinking i MIGHT possibly risk with a pari of something, then get the corys and cardinals.
Any top dwellers?

My hang on external filter is on its way as regards the current and that will be fine as an add on to having one of my originals at half capacity.

Im on my way soon to get some sort of plant substrate, i think i have seen a red flourite one that would mix better, ill probabaly put the laterite around the base of the swords tho cuz that worked well for me last time.

And im getting some salvinia natans as floating plants for free very soon too so its all going great atm.

Thanks a lot for your help

Sam

[trashion]

That stocking sounds okay, 1 pair of cichlids w/cories and cardinals. If you can find them, there's a variety of dwarf hatchetfish that stay quite small and would work well in your tank. You'd need 6+, as you would with the cardinals and cories. They're EXTREMELY skittish fish, though, and you would need a very tight-fitting lid to cut down on loss from them taking a jump out.

Sounds like you're on the right track. If you do go with the stocking I suggested, make sure you're doing serious weekly water changes, as that is a fairly heavy stocking for a 30g tank.