1 ft low maintenance question

Hi all, saw many beautiful small tanks here and got infected by another hit of Planted Tank Symptom; just couldn't shake off the urge and bought a 1ft cube tank from Gratiola last week.

I have 3 bigger high maintenance tanks and intend to set up a low maintenance shrimp tank, hopefully it will not take up too much time as i am too swelled with maintaining the 3 tanks during weekends.

For the 1ft cube, i intend to have moss only. Have an existing 9w clip on light but just bought a replacement light set- a 1ft 18w PL from NA.

I hope the experts here could give your views whether with a 18w PL for a 1ft cube tank, without co2, without fertiliser and slow growing moss, will the tank attract algae?

BTW, i am quite curious when i saw very slow Co2 bubble count for NA's moss tank, in view of the high light and slow moss in their tank and yet no algae problem. Any thought??

Cheers

Originally Posted by kelloggs

I hope the experts here could give your views whether with a 18w PL for a 1ft cube tank, without co2, without fertiliser and slow growing moss, will the tank attract algae?

Cheers

Wah, 1ft tank is about 3 gallons, thus with 18W lighting, you're looking at 6W/G!

That's kindda high and i think CO2 is necessary in this case...

[armageddon]

Originally Posted by MPeX

Wah, 1ft tank is about 3 gallons, thus with 18W lighting, you're looking at 6W/G!

That's kindda high and i think CO2 is necessary in this case...

for 1 ft tank u can't really calculate with the WPG rule. co2 not nessesary. too non-cost efficient but 1 ft tank no need till 18w pl. just a small 9w pl will do. some more urs is a shrimp tank. later overheat

The watts per gallon rule doesn't apply to nano tanks. Nano tanks imo require much more light that what the wpg rule states. So in this case, the 18W lighting is good.

kelloggs, given those conditions, I'd say that algae will haunt you. If the moss were fast growing, it'd be better. But again this depends. Some people can do what you stated above, but some simply can't. You have to try to see for yourself I'd say concentrate on making sure the moss obtains optimum growth as far as possible ( temperature? ) so as to keep algae at bay.

About the NA tank, bps is not a way to measure C02 content in the water. He may have say, 1 bubble per 4 seconds, but if that could keep his C02 levels good, what's wrong? Some run at 10 bps(crazy), and yet are unable to keep C02 concentrations at say, 30ppm.

[armageddon]

Originally Posted by |squee|

The watts per gallon rule doesn't apply to nano tanks. Nano tanks imo require much more light that what the wpg rule states. So in this case, the 18W lighting is good.

kelloggs, given those conditions, I'd say that algae will haunt you. If the moss were fast growing, it'd be better. But again this depends. Some people can do what you stated above, but some simply can't. You have to try to see for yourself

About the NA tank, bps is not a way to measure C02 content in the water. He may have say, 1 bubble per 4 seconds, but if that could keep his C02 levels good, what's wrong? Some run at 10 bps(crazy), and yet are unable to keep C02 concentrations at say, 30ppm.

wa. 10 bps. they must be having a waterfountain as filter

Originally Posted by kelloggs

Hi all, saw many beautiful small tanks here and got infected by another hit of Planted Tank Symptom; just couldn't shake off the urge and bought a 1ft cube tank from Gratiola last week.

I have 3 bigger high maintenance tanks and intend to set up a low maintenance shrimp tank, hopefully it will not take up too much time as i am too swelled with maintaining the 3 tanks during weekends.

For the 1ft cube, i intend to have moss only. Have an existing 9w clip on light but just bought a replacement light set- a 1ft 18w PL from NA.

I hope the experts here could give your views whether with a 18w PL for a 1ft cube tank, without co2, without fertiliser and slow growing moss, will the tank attract algae?

BTW, i am quite curious when i saw very slow Co2 bubble count for NA's moss tank, in view of the high light and slow moss in their tank and yet no algae problem. Any thought??

Cheers

I had a one-feet cube tank before with a 18 w PL light.

I had a lot of those algae growing on the walls...despite the fact that I am using nutrafin co2.
think should lower the wattage unless u intend to keep nothing but algae eaters..

[clkong]

i am using 18W PL for my i ft tank, each day on it for 4 hrs,
suggest to use air pump rather than internal or hangon filter as it generate too much heat
keeping it for 4 months and no aglea so far.....

my erect moss is growing well with 18W, guess java moss is ok too
but a bit too strong for nana and java fern, thus i hid it under my erect moss canopy

me no expert. just to share my experience.

go see my gallery under march update i think. i hv a 8inch tank and another 1.5ft tank running on 11W PL and 22W PL respectively. so far so good. the WPG rule do not apply strictly for smallish tanks. the thing to note is do not overstock on livestocks. CO2 is not advisable as the tank is way too small to juggle with CO2. fert has never been dosed in both the non CO2 tanks.

so far, no algae, growth is pathetically slow which is to my liking. the only prob i face is the ever evaporating water in the small environment which requires me to top up almost every 2 days....darn...

[jt1]

Originally Posted by kelloggs

Hi all, saw many beautiful small tanks here and got infected by another hit of Planted Tank Symptom; just couldn't shake off the urge and bought a 1ft cube tank from Gratiola last week.

I have 3 bigger high maintenance tanks and intend to set up a low maintenance shrimp tank, hopefully it will not take up too much time as i am too swelled with maintaining the 3 tanks during weekends.

For the 1ft cube, i intend to have moss only. Have an existing 9w clip on light but just bought a replacement light set- a 1ft 18w PL from NA.

I hope the experts here could give your views whether with a 18w PL for a 1ft cube tank, without co2, without fertiliser and slow growing moss, will the tank attract algae?

BTW, i am quite curious when i saw very slow Co2 bubble count for NA's moss tank, in view of the high light and slow moss in their tank and yet no algae problem. Any thought??

Cheers

Hi, currently I'm helping a friend set up a 12" X 7" tank and think I bought the same light set as you from NA a week back. Reason for the high light is because I'm trying to grow HC. So far so good, no algae yet but am observing closely. No CO2 inj also, just fert and seachem excel.
I also have a 1ft tank in my office with a clip on Dymax light, think it was 9w but recently change the tube to 11w. Why not use your clip on light as moss dun need that much light. If you are using the same clip on as me and want a sightly higher wattage, the 11w tube I bought from NA was a little too ex. I saw the same tube at a neighbourhood shop for 60% of the price I paid for it. Alternatively, I believe you can continue to use the 18w but reduce the duration of lights on period.
As for NA's moss tank(the 1ft one at the counter), I think he don't run the CO2 continuously. You will notice he collects the CO2 in a small DIY water bottle which is turned upside down. He will turn off the CO2 when an amount is reach and use a power liquid filter to provide circulation. Pretty ingenious way of conserving CO2 in a low requirement tank.

Actually, alot of brothers here hardly adhere to the 3wpg rule, isn't it? All of us know that 3wpg is an unofficial benchmark, but alot of brothers here usually crank their wattage from 4wpg upwards, usually in a safe combination of co2 injection.

i used 22w and 13w and 18 w before and all are actually fine. it's mainly dependent on your plants in the tank. Hairgrass or HC for instance, will be more comfortable with a 22w nanotank whereas I had java ferns growing like crazy under 13w

since u have the 18w lights, you can consider planting heavily and on lights for max 6 hours a day. Have alot of moss, you can try putting in some fern as well, it will help to form a basic scape, as it will help min algae (though there COULD be a nutrient problem) and since u have shrimps, u can give them more space.

Oh yeah, overheating can be a problem.

Hope this will help you