Once again I’ve let my blog posting slip. I have quite a bit of news, including a number of great new plants for riparium culture, so I’m going to get back to it.
I have been shuffling tanks around and found a new spot for the 55-gallon that I had going in my home office. It is from a while ago, dated November 30, 2009, but this is one of the most recent shots that I have of the layout in the tank while I still had it here.
The setup was planted with Cryptocoryne, Anubias, Spathiphyllum and Bolbitis ferns in the emersed area. All of the underwater plants were crypts. Before making the move I decided to switch up the planting. For the sake of the crypts I maintained this riparium as a high-humidity setup. With the water heater switched on–as it was all winter long–the glass was perpetually obscured with a condensed water fog. This condition would clearly not be suitable for the new setting, a retail garden center, so I opted to exchange most of the plants for others.
I replaced the crypts with various selections of Spathiphylum, Acorus gramineus, Syngonium, and Dieffenbachia. I kept one Trellis Raft planted with an Anubias barteri va. nana, but used a couple of different Pilea sp. planted on Nano Trellis Rafts to develop a mid-ground emersed hedge. Here is a shot of the tank shortly after the move, dated 23 February 2010.
55-gallon Planted Riparium
That picture also gives an idea of the setting, there near the front door of the Paradigm Gardens store here in Madison, Wisconsin. Paradigm Gardens recently moved to this new location, which is several times larger than their previous store. The carry many useful and innovative products for home gardening and I recommend you check out the new shop if you are ever in the area. Here is a link to their online store:
This next couple of shots will give the reader a better idea of the mix of plants that I used for this new layout.
55-gallon Planted Riparium
55-gallon Planted Riparium
Lastly, a quick shot of the fish. I decided to use the same fish that I had in this tank previously, small groups of yo yo loaches (Botia almorhae), cherry barbs (Puntius titteya) and gold barbs (Puntius semifasciolatus).
I had wondered about these fish becoming too large for this rather small volume of water, but they are still only one to two inches (2.5-5cm) in length, so they are still suitable enough this system.
I have a few other pictures that I have taken over the last couple of months to upload and describe. I visit this tank for servicing once per week, so I’ll more new updates to come as well.
Doesn’t that setup look good in the new foyer of the store.
I never thought one of your tanks would look small… guess the next one in that store could be a 200 gallon! lots of space!
Hey thanks for stopping by you guys. I am glad that you like the setup reassembled there. I will try to keep up with updates here more diligently.