Tropical Fish Forums

[Lily]

I have recently been looking at the Takashi Amano's Nature Aquarium World book, and ohhhhh I'm so impressed. I'd love to try and improve on my tank design, but I have only a 75 litre tank low light and high phospate, so algae is a big problem. I've got some nice Cryptocoryne growing and also have several Anubias growing tied on slate, but nothing seems to grow the full hight of the tank. I'd love to be a bit more adventurace. But how can I improve my lighting without making the algae worse?

I intend to do a revamp on my tank soon (A Cayman 60 size 25.5 x 13.5 z 18H ins) and will then only keep small fish like Rasboras, so would like something really impressive to look at. Is there any way I can increase my lighting 2 x 15 w bulbs, if not how can I get round the problem of low growing plants?

[hedgelj]

Here is just my $.02

I have a similarly sized tank (20 gallon tall). I am running 2 14 watt T5s, one is a full spectrum and the other is a 6700K plant light. Each is 24 inches long. They came in a kit from coralife and was approximately $40 when I bought them last year this time. I have been pretty successfull with my plants. I have had no problems with my elodea, red ludwigia, my amazon sword, or my red lotus plants growing to the top of my tank (~24 inches high).

Try to find some fast growing stem plants, they should help uptake the nutrients as fast or faster then the algae. Also, make sure your lights are on a timer. Mine are only on for 10.5 hours a day, otherwise I notice more algae growing.

Where are your phosphates coming from? Are they naturally in your water? Or?