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Shot in the dark here. Does anyone have experience with building live… | Anything about plants | Planta community

Rhiannon

Shot in the dark here. Does anyone have experience with building live aquatic ecosystems… with no filter? I want to try to build a totally natural tank. I have one set up with both substrate and live plants (no fish). I’ve been trying to read up on proper cycling and am afraid I’ll screw it up. It’s rather small at 1.4 gallons. It’s currently on day 5 and rather cloudy, I’ve read it can take up to 30 days for the ammonia and nitrates to clear. Any and all suggestions welcome. (Planned on making a larger setup if this one is successful)

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3 comments

  1. KodiakCat19

    I’ve been really interested in this topic for most of my life and run a few tanks and YouTube is really your best friend when it comes to low tech planted tanks. I would for sure wait the full 30 days of cycling before adding anything. When it comes to low tech tanks the bigger the better as chemical spikes won’t be as drastic as they are in smaller tanks. Looking up aquarium plants that don’t need co2 unless you plan to use it will help a lot. I know a lot of moss, Java ferns, Anubias, and vallisnerias work great for tanks without co2. High lighting will also help supplement lack of co2. I have a fully planted 20 gallon with a couple frogs, a handful of small cardinal tetras, and some snails and it really only needs a small filter. Balancing the ecosystem to what you would find in the wild helps a lot. You want to look for bottom feeders, top feeders, algae eaters, etc that don’t also produce more waste than what your system can naturally filter. I’d say your tank would make a great nano shrimp tank but will still likely require regular water changes.

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    • Rhiannon

      Thank you so much!! This was super helpful. Do you recommend to do water changes while cycling? I’m getting mixed reviews. Some say water changing during cycling creates more issues. I just have live plants, no fish or creatures.

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    • KodiakCat19

      I’ve seen a lot of the same things for either or. My last 20 gallon I cycled I decided to not do any water changes for the full 30 days while also adding the normal amount of food every other day that I’d feed my fish to help establish ammonia and ended up with a whole bunch of insane algae but I’ll be adding my bottom feeders next to help clean up. I’d maybe recommend using a quick start solution and adding a small pinch of food to help establish the ammonia and do smaller weekly or biweekly water changes and watch your lighting and you should be fine algae wise. Test strips work great for making sure nothing goes terribly wrong but expect to see a lot of fluctuations with your chemical levels at first and they’ll eventually equal themselves out.

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