New Hardscape and Blended Moss

June 7th, 2015

This weekend I started to rescape my 33g aquarium. This is my Green Leaf Aquarium tank that’s exactly half of a standard 75g tank. So far, I’ve only completed the hardscape, that you can see below.

Hardscape in 33g

I use my camera phone to take pictures of the hardscape as I go. This allows me to very easily see if I like the positioning of the rocks/wood, and make adjustments on the fly. The GIF below shows a demonstration of how things changed as I moved along. Before I even started, I did a prototype on the floor in front of the tank to try and work out what kind of hardscape layout I would aim for.

20150605_210336-ANIMATION

You can see that I used a mixture of rosewood and ohko stone, sometimes referred to as dragonstone. I was inspired by many of the cliffs and elements on the U.S. West Coast at the Olympic and Mount Rainier National Parks near Seattle, Washington. There, many trees grow out of amazing rock faces, and I was hoping to capture some element of that in this scape.

Shot of Mossy Hardscape

 

I’m also doing a dry start for this aquascape, which is something I do not usually do. I wanted to try George Farmer’s suggestion of blending moss with Greek yogurt and painting on the millions of tiny fronds that result.

Moss in a Blender

I got my wife’s permission to use the Vitamix to blend the moss, and the result was this soupy mixture below. I literally used a paintbrush to apply the moss to the wood. You can see the result of that in the close-up above.

Yogurt Moss Mixture

Now, the tank is sealed off with plastic wrap, and I’ll mist it each day for the next few weeks. With luck, the moss will begin to attach to the wood, and I’ll be able to continue with the full planting and filling of the tank. Comments welcome!




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