G'day all

[WiLPWR]

Morning all

Just thought I'd drop a quick line and say hello to everyone.

Currently have a fair few hobbies that are physically demanding and looking to start one where (besides the usual maintainance and hard work required) allot of the enjoyment will be derived from relaxing with the calm beauty of a planted tank and watching some CRS and potentially a few small CRS friendly at work and play.

Have just finished moving into a new place in Newtown and have bought myself an AquaOne AR-980. About to purchase some substrate, deciding between ADA and SmartSoil. The priority is CRS and the plants required to support them happily.

Any advice will be appreciated, just wondering what thickness each layer of substrate will need to be and how many KG/Litres of each I will need to get this in a 215litre tank.

Probably should post that second bit in the Substrate forum or do more googling huh?

Anyway, enjoy all and hoping to learn from this forum and in turn, share some experiences.

Cheers

Will

[wayne6442]

Hi Will ,Welcome to the forum. Most if not all of the specialist breeders and growers are on this forum, so I guess there is always someone to help when needed. ENJOY!

[Jess]

Hi Will

Shrimp keeping is a great hobby! I love being able to just sit in front of the tank and watch the little guys go about their business. Very relaxing and enjoyable

I have an AR980 too. I just use Pool Filter Sand and Seachem Flourite for substrate, though. I have it about 3cm and the shrimp and plants seem happy enough. There are some very experienced people here who know a lot about this sort of thing than me and should have some good advice ;)

[fishmosy]

Hi Will, welcome to the forum.

[lachie1998]

Welcome to SKF:cheerful: what other hobbies were you doing?

[lin]

welcome to SKF and lachie1998 i found u one

[Gbang]

welcome!!! i'm sure you will enjoy it here :)

[Loach]

Welcome to SKF Mate :)

[WiLPWR]

Thanks for the warm welcome Wayne6442, fishmossy, shrimp, Gbang & Loach. Seems like a good bunch of people on here =)

Hi Jess, thanks for the advice, in your case is that 3cm in total for substrate what is the split between the Flourite and PFS 2cm and 1cm? Also, do you know roughly how much of each (KG) was required to achieve this depth?

Hey Lachie1998, in terms of hobbies I used to run my own MMA gym. Since I closed it 2 years ago, I just teach private classes, train at mates gyms, keep up with the weights and have had the time to get into Trail biking & the SpringCycle/GongRide Yourself?

On that topic, if anyone is in Sydney and interested in the Spring Cycle (15km or 50km) I can get you half price on entry so let me know.

Cheers all!

[Dean]

Welcome to Skf mate.

Hope you enjoy your time here ;)

[Sprae]

Welcome to SKF! I'll find all your questions here for keeping shrimps.

I recommend a moss planted tank for keeping CRS. They love it. If you can afford it get as thick of a substrate you can for the tank. It will help out in the long term buffering capability.

[lachie1998]

Hey Lachie1998' date=' in terms of hobbies I used to run my own MMA gym. Since I closed it 2 years ago, I just teach private classes, train at mates gyms, keep up with the weights and have had the time to get into Trail biking & the SpringCycle/GongRide Yourself?

On that topic, if anyone is in Sydney and interested in the Spring Cycle (15km or 50km) I can get you half price on entry so let me know.

Cheers all![/quote']

Oh cool what kind of trail riding? MTB?

Whats this spring cycle? sounds chalenging:)

[Jess]

From memory I started with a 30kg bag of PFS, but only used about 2/3 of it - so about 20kg - and spread it across the whole bottom of the tank to about 2cm depth. I recently added 7kg of Flourite to the back half of the tank on top of the sand, which added between 1-2cm depth (it's sort of unevenly spread because I'm totally incompetent at this sort of thing), and then I added a little bit more sand to the front of the tank.

I'll try and get a picture for you this afternoon and take a more accurate measurement. It sort of seems like every 10kg of substrate will (roughly) have a depth of about 1cm in the AR980. I think 3cm of substrate is the minimum depth I would want in my tank. :)

[WiLPWR]

Hi Lachie1998, yeah mate MTB.

The Spring Cycle is a pretty scenic ride that shows you a fair bit of Sydney. It’s challenging, but not so bad as the Gong Ride (90km) You should check it out on www.springcycle.com.au

Hey Jess, gave Clarks Rubber Haberfield a call and they said they only do Zeolite these days? Popped into Aquaristic in Beaconsfield on Sunday and had a look at their smart soil. Looks like I’ll need 3 bags of that at $29.95 and 4 bags of fine black gravel at $27 to get the desired look I want (Have a bucket of the river stuff at the oldies house, but want something dark to show the colours) pricey huh?

Considering ADA amazonia now with CaribSea Tahitian Moon Sand as it is pretty much going to be almost half the price. Hmm…. Will post in substrate and see what people say =)

[WiLPWR]

Hi Guys me again, is it just me or has the Shrimp and Planted Substrate forum disappeared?

Question I wanted to tack on there is can anyone advise on the cycle period/spike of ADA Amazonia NEW before I can add the plants and then fish and CRS.

Thanks in advance all =)

[Dean]

All good now mate, post away ;) sorry about that.

[WiLPWR]

Cheers for that Dean =)

[Jess]

Hey Jess' date=' gave Clarks Rubber Haberfield a call and they said they only do Zeolite these days? Popped into Aquaristic in Beaconsfield on Sunday and had a look at their smart soil. Looks like I’ll need 3 bags of that at $29.95 and 4 bags of fine black gravel at $27 to get the desired look I want (Have a bucket of the river stuff at the oldies house, but want something dark to show the colours) pricey huh?

Considering ADA amazonia now with CaribSea Tahitian Moon Sand as it is pretty much going to be almost half the price. Hmm…. Will post in substrate and see what people say =)[/quote']

Gee, that is expensive! Mind you, I think I've spent more than I paid for my tank on substrate, plants and driftwood. Fish/shrimp keeping is a real drain on the wallet xD

I've heard some excellent things about ADA Amazonia, so hopefully you should get some great information if you post in the substrate section