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#1 folmar25

folmar25
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  • antes fort pa

Posted 10 February 2016 - 04:34 PM

ive been keeping aquariums for allot of years now but im looking at making my 130 gal a native tank what are some of your guys reccomendations on plants and what bulbs do I need to get I live in pa so there allot of river and stream critters around any help would be great



#2 gzeiger

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  • NANFA Guest

Posted 10 February 2016 - 06:36 PM

What's the depth of the tank? It will be hard to get a fixture that provides adequate light for low-growing foreground plants. One option is to get a very expensive and overpowered light and deal with the algae as it comes. Another is to use driftwood or other decorations to lift up a few plants such as Java fern, Anubias or the native Fissidens moss (or commercially available mosses). A third option is to use plants with floating or emergent leaves. Many of these are ugly, but Valisneria, Saggitaria (wapato, arrowhead), pickerelweed and several native water lilies look good from the side. Water lettuce and water hyacinth have a certain sort of charm if you're into that sort of thing (I am). Of these, Vals, water lilies, arrowhead and pickerelweed may be locally available in the wild, and all the others I mentioned are commercially available - most at any pet store, and the floating plants at least on Aquabid or Ebay.



#3 Sean Phillips

Sean Phillips
  • NANFA Member
  • Allegheny River Drainage, Southwest PA

Posted 11 February 2016 - 08:24 AM

What species of fish are you wanting to keep? I'm from PA as well and I can tell you know that there are many species around here that go great with live plants, but I've had a few species that will not go a single day without uprooting and or destroying them (e.g. Bullheads, larger Sunfish and Perch, etc).
Sean Phillips - Pine Creek Watershed - Allegheny River Drainage

#4 gerald

gerald
  • Global Moderator
  • Wake Forest, North Carolina

Posted 11 February 2016 - 12:04 PM

Like Sean says, choose what fish you want first, then we can figure out which plants will work.  Vallisneria, Elodea, Hornwort, Najas, Myriophyllum are some of the natives that can do OK without too intense lighting.


Gerald Pottern
-----------------------
Hangin' on the Neuse
"Taxonomy is the diaper used to organize the mess of evolution into discrete packages" - M.Sandel


#5 folmar25

folmar25
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  • antes fort pa

Posted 11 February 2016 - 05:59 PM

thanks guys for the input



#6 strat guy

strat guy
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  • Orland Park, IL

Posted 16 February 2016 - 09:37 PM

My tank is a 120, maybe I can give you some pointers.

1) I keep it pretty heavily planted, but still low tech. I used play sand mixed with aquarium gravel as the base, capped with some special plant soil. All the plants keep me from needing a ton of filtration. I keep easy to use species, nothing fancy, buy most of my plants at Meijer, so they're all pretty hard to kill. Miriophyllum, Ludwigia, Cabomba, Amazon swords, Hygrophilia, Cryptocoryne wendtii, Cardinal flower, and Rotala indica. 

2) I did all my lighting DIY. It can be really cheap if you can do some basic wiring and soldering. Used an aluminum door frame for a heat sink and cheap chinese 10w LED chips with an old computer power supply. Before that I was using standard 48" strip lighting, like shop lamps. I had four bulbs, two cold white, two plant bulbs. The tank is 60", so the spots that weren't covered I used work lamps with 24w full spectrum CFL bulbs. As long as the wattage is around 1.5w- 2w per gal, you should be able to keep most beginner plants.

3) For filtration, I have a simple acrylic column I made in one corner of the tank, with a pond waterfall pump in it and the rest stuffed with filter media. The output is on the other end of the tank with a DIY spray bar. I also have a powerhead with tubing going into the column and the power head on the same side as the spray bar. Both outputs on one end give the long tank plenty of current without creating any dead spots. Technically, its nowhere near what an aquarium needs, but the plants make up for what I'm lacking in electronics. The more plants, the less filtration, to a degree.

3) I keep minnows. No issues with them and the plants. I've got like 50 fish in there, so the aquarium is nice and active. I don't think I could keep sunnies in there without some kind of damage to the plants. Most of my fish are Fundulus, Cyprinella, Pimephales, and Notropis. I've got a couple Campostoma for algae control, and a small hog sucker as my cleaner. They're easy, they like the water flow, and they make use of the long footprint to school.

Hope that gives you some ideas!


 


120 low tech native planted - Blackstriped Topminnow, Central Stoneroller, Fathead minnow, Golden Shiner, Black chin shiner, Carmine Shiner, Emerald Shiner, Sand Shiner, Spotfin Shiner, Orangethroat darter, Johnny Darter, and Banded Darter.


#7 Josh Blaylock

Josh Blaylock
  • Board of Directors
  • Central Kentucky

Posted 19 February 2016 - 08:20 AM

I have a 125, and I can give you some tips too.

 

I'm at the opposite end from Strat Guy, I went more high tech on mine.  Here's my build thread: http://forum.nanfa.o...ld-and-updates/

 

1.  I keep minnows/darters.  I use an underwater pump to provide current in the tank, though it's not big enough.  Iuse regular aquarium gravel, though I'd like to mix sand in with it to make it more natural.

2.  I have 2 LED strip lights.  I used to have 4ft shop lights (cheap from Lowes) and they worked well, just didn't put out the light I wanted.  I also do not keep plants.  I also have 2 white moonlights.  All my lights are controlled by timer or LED controller

3.  I have 3 cannister filters, one being an FX6 that supports a larger bio-load.

4.  I have a 3D background on mine.  I love it, but it presents challenges.

 

 

A lot will depend on the type of fish you want to keep.  You may want to decide that before building the tank up.


Josh Blaylock - Central KY
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