It’s been almost three months since I tore down my 40G aquarium, and restarted it with a substrate based on earthworm castings produced from my kitchen scraps. From the beginning I experienced great growth, but I also had a huge outbreak of hair algae. I’m still not sure whether this was leftover algae that came in from the previous setup, or whether it was spurred along by the earthworm castings. Either way, it’s gone now, and the tank it doing great.

40G - Click picture for larger view.

The aquascape has changed a fair amount, as I’ve pulled out a significant amount of the hardscape I originally placed, largely to find room for a smattering of new plants that I needed to house. The Ranalisma rostrata has just about filled in the foreground. The right side of the tank is basically just a growing out space for various stems including Ludwigia sp. ‘Araguaia‘, Rotala sp. ‘Araguaia’, Blyxa alternifolius, Rotala sp. ‘Mini Type I’, and a Limnophila species. Due to all of these plants, I don’t envision this tank ever becoming a cohesive aquascape unless I’m able to setup a farm tank to transfer some of these out. The main thing, is that I’m quite impressed by the substrate sustained growth, with zero dosing. Comments welcome!

I’ve changed a few things around in my 75G since my previous update last month. Most noticeably, I have thinned out a ton of the Blyxa japonica that was in the front right. Overall, I think this gives the right side a little bit more definition because it allows a small amount of foreground all the way across the front of the tank. I’ve been continuing my extra attention to this tank, ensuring weekly water changes, consistent CO2 output, and regular dosing. The payoff has been increased growth and a small reduction of the black brush algae that seems to love the rocks, wood, and Anubias leaves in this tank.

75G - August 27, 2008. Click for larger image.

As you can tell, however, I still probably need to dose more fertilizers, nitrates in particular. That is evident in the bright pink color of the Limnophila aromatica and Ludwigia glandulosa on the right side of the tank. In addition, I probably have too many species of plants in this tank. I’ve recently added Vallisneria americana var. ‘natans’ to the right side of the tank, which is supposed to be a shorter and thinner version of the otherwise monster grassy plant that is Vallisneria americana. I also planted Hygrophila sp. ‘Porto Velho‘ in the front-right of the foreground, and have a number of other species of plants jammed in, particularly on the right side. All of this said, I’m pretty happy with the direction that this aquascape is going in. I wish the Eleocharis sp. ‘Japan’ hairgrass would pick up it’s growth rate, and actually create a lush lawn in the foreground, but I suppose it’s just a matter of time for that. Comments welcome!

About a month ago, I tore down my 40G aquarium’s aquascape, and redid the entire thing using earthworm castings as a base substrate, with previously used ADA Amazonia as the top layer. Below, you can see how the tank has progressed over the period of 1 month.

40G - Setup for about 1 month using earthworm castings.

Since setting it up, I have been doing weekly water changes, removing about 30-40% of the water during each change. I have been doing this because the tank has been having a terrible bout with hair algae. In addition, over the last week, I’ve been treating the tank with hydrogen perioxide, both to combat the algae, and as a preventative measure in case any of the fish I recently collected have any parasites. I’ve noticed a significant reduction in algae, although the problem continues. Despite the algae, I have witnessed fantastic plant growth over the last month. In particular, Ludwigia inclinata var. verticillata ‘Cuba’ has been particularly prolific. I trimmed right before this picture, otherwise it would be occupying the entire back right of the photo. Additionally, the Hygrophila sp. ‘Porto Velho’ and Ranalisma rostrata has been starting to fill across the foreground. I think I’m going to remove the Blyxa japonica from the right front entirely, as it looks out of place. Comments welcome!

Earlier this week, I posted a photographic tour of my garden, but I purposely left out my raised brick pond. That’s not because it’s not doing well, but quite the contrary. The pond is currently overgrown with emersed aquarium plants so it warranted its own post.

Raised Brick Pond - 8/6/2008

The centerpiece plants are two large Crinum americanum plants, which should be flowering quite shortly. They are contained in a single plastic pot of ADA Aquasoil, and surrounding them, I put a smattering of other plants to provide groundcover.

Utricularia graminfolia, Taiwan moss, Marsilea quadrifolia stems.

Utricularia graminfolia is growing emersed in that pot, along with quite a bit of Taiwan moss. I haven’t seen any flowers yet on the Utricularia, but I’m really hoping I get some before the summer is over.

Taiwan Moss emersed

Marsilea quadrifolia is sending up new four-leaf-clovers all throughout the pot. Initially, the new leaves are all folded up in a single leaf, which then opens like origami into the clover.

Young Marsilea quadrifolia leaf

The Marsilea really provides a nice softening effect over the sharp leaves (not literally sharp) of the Crinum. They’re also starting to spread throughout the rest of pond, supported by the frogbite which is now ubiqutous.

Marsilea quadrifolia clover

Also, prevalent throughout the pond, Ludwigia arculata x repens is starting to flower, displaying tiny, but attractive, yellow flowers. Notice how the emersed growth of the Ludwigia has a red stem and green leaves, while submersed this plant usually has dark red leaves.

Ludwigia arculata x repens with flower, over frogbite.

I also have Ludwigia peploides, a native plant to this area, growing in the pond. This Ludwigia doesn’t like to live underwater, as it tries to shoot to the surface when submersed. As such, it’s a perfect pond plant!

Ludwigia peploides

Finally, the water sprite is quite healthy and thriving throughout the pond. I’m a little bit scared to see how big the root system will be when I pull it out in the fall.

Water sprite

When I do that, I’ll probably cram a 20L full of all of these floating plants, and see if I can get some threadfin rainbowfish to breed in the roots. Until then, I’m really enjoying the pond, as a wonderful complement to the rest of my garden.

Yesterday, I went with a couple friends out to survey what native aquatic plants are growing along some portions of the Patuxent River in Maryland. I like to do this every once in awhile because each time you go, you’re likely to find something different. In addition, from year to year, certain plants may exist in huge patches, while the next year, they’ll be quite sparse. Finally, if I ever get around to setting up a tank to mimic my local habitat, it’s good to know what the local habitat consists of.

Lake off the Patuxent River

We visited a lake that is part of the Patuxent watershed. The lake itself is covered with tons of lily pads, which during this time of year were flowering quite nicely. This trip, we saw both white and pink flowers. I didn’t know that the pink flowered lilies were native — perhaps they’re not?

Lily pad, with flower

All along the banks, hairgrass, likely Eleocharis parvulus, carpeted the lake bed. Of course, there was also several giant hairgrass species as well.

Hairgrass, probably Eleocharis parvulus

In several places, amoungst the hairgrass we found a flowering bladderwort, which could be Utricularia gibba. Although the yellow flower is pretty, this is definitely a native plant that I would not want to keep in my tanks. Often found as a contaminate on plants that you buy, this carnivorous plant is much like hair algae in its invasiveness of your aquarium.

Utricularia sp. flower

All throughout the area, Ludwigia palustris could be found. This is one of the nicer local native plants that is an excellent stem plant for any type of tank. We were talking yesterday about how surprising it is that Ludwigia repens is the most widely sold plant from its genus, but that L. palustris is smaller leaved, and thus probably more suitable for a wider variety of aquariums.

Ludwigia palustris

One of the other surprises that we saw yesterday was this patch of Brasenia schreberi. Everywhere else throughout the lake this plant sent small 2-3″ pads to the surface. Within the cracks of the boat ramp it looked like this, staying completely submersed. That brings up the question as to why? My theory is that due to being on the boat ramp, it is occasionally trampled, and thus is being trained to stay short, like a Red Tiger Lotus can be trained in our aquarium. It’s also possible that it’s just stunted due to the limitations of living in a crack between the boat ramp’s cement tiles.

Brasenia schreberi

Another plant that could potentially be suitable for aquarium use is Lindernia dubia. Currently, I don’t think it is being produced by any of the large aquatic plant nurseries, but this is a nice stem plant. We found it growing both submersed, and emersed with flowers, as shown below. (I like the dragonfly too!)

Lindernia dubia

One of the more interesting plants that we have locally is Proserpinaca palustris, or Mermaid Weed. Emersed, the stems look like a Rotala with serrated edges, but submersed, the leaves become quite tooth-like and bright red. I’ve never kept this plant myself before, but I understand it’s a fairly difficult plant to grow in the aquarium. This is probably why it’s available, but not commonly traded among aquarists.

Proserpinaca palustris (Mermaid Weed) with Brasenia schreberi

We saw a few plants that we couldn’t identify, with the most interesting being this plant below. At first glance, we thought it might be an Eriocaulon sp., but the bulbs on this grass are wrong for that. It’s probably just a stunted giant hairgrass, but wouldn’t it be fantastic to find a grass plant that stayed this size underwater? (Updated: a reader identifies this as Xyris caroliniana.)

Probably Xyris caroliniana, unsuitable for aquarium use

Now that I’ve mentioned what we did find, we were surprised that we didn’t find any Lysimachia (Creeping Jenny) or Rotala ramosior. Both of these plants are excellent aquarium plants, and usually present in some quantity locally. Additionally, there were a number of Polygonum species around, but I didn’t get any pictures of those. Despite incredibly hot and humid weather, we had a really good time, geeking it up, exploring our local waterway. Lastly, I need to stress that whenever you go out in your local habitat, do not collect plants from protected areas. If you are in an area where it is legal to collect, only take a stem or two, and grow it out in your aquarium. Never take a plant if it is the only one in the area. Be responsible!

It’s time that I post an updated picture of my 75G tank. (Previous version here.) Besides my recent disaster with not quarantining fish, I haven’t worked too much on this tank. I removed one of the pieces of driftwood in the front middle to make the scape flow a little bit better. The Blyxa japonica in the front right has grown by leaps and bounds. The Eleocharis sp. ‘Japan’ has grown, but not filled in near as full as I’m hoping for in the left foreground. Otherwise, in the back-right I’ve removed all of the Pogostemon stellatus and put Ludwigia glandulosa in its place. I still have a stem of Ludwigia sp. ‘Cuba’ back there, but I’ll likely move that to my 40G tank once it has stabilized. I’ve also added Hygrophila corymbosa ‘Kompact’ to the midground-center.

75G - July 24, 2008. Click for larger image.

I’m working to fight off a minor black brush algae attack that I believe was caused by medicating the tank. Otherwise, it’s growing fairly well. I looks a little bit unbalanced now with the hairgrass being so sparse, and the empty background on the right side, but once those plants fill in, I’ll be fairly happy with it. I’m open to comments and critiques, however. 🙂

After my previous soil vs. earthworm casting experiment, I decided that it was time to really give one of the methods a chance in a “real” setup. For this, I decided to tear down my ailing 40G aquascape, and start anew, using an earthworm castings mixture as the base for this substrate. Following a mixture of Vladimir Simoes’ method and the soil substrate method used by many GWAPA members, I setup the tank.

Earthworm castings, Sand, 1 lb Clay

Vladimir Simoes’ method is basically just a mixture of earthworm castings and sand in a 50/50 ratio. As I did more research, I found that several of the past successful aquascapers that used this method, also used a clay source with a high CEC ratio. For this, I decided to follow much of the soil method by liquifying a pound of clay into the EC and sand mixture.

Dolomite, Potash, and Traces on bottom. Aquasoil around edges.

Also borrowing from the soil substrate method, I added a handful of dolomite, potash, and CSM+B traces to the bottom of the tank prior to adding the earthworm castings mixture. The purpose of these minerals is to provide a nutrient source while the neccessary bacterial colony builds up in the substrate to make these same nutrients available to the roots longterm. Additionally, my final modification is to reuse the spent ADA Aquasoil that was in my 40G previously as the top layer of the substrate. For aethestics, I used aquasoil exclusively around the visible borders of the tank.

Basalt and African bogwood

After adding the earthworm casting mixture, and topping it with the Aquasoil, it setup my hardscape. I’ve never really attempted a “mound” style aquascape before, so I decided to give it a try. I used a combination of the porous mossy rock (basalt) and African bogwood for my hardscape. I left plenty of space behind the hardscape to plant my background plants.

Finally, the planted scape is above. At this point, I’m not entirely pleased with the result. I need the plants to grow in a bit more, and I need the background plants to fully crest over top of the mound. I suspect that I may have placed the mound too far to the front of the tank, but am willing to let things play out for awhile to see how it looks. I basically just reused the plants that I had in this tank previously, but I did add some Echinodorus angustifolius ‘Vesuvius’, Pogostemon stellatus, and Ludwigia sp. ‘Cuba’ to the tank, removing Rotala rotundifolia and Eriocaulon sp. ‘Type 2.‘ My goal for this tank is to have a successful aqauscape while having the earthworm casting substrate provide all of the minerals needed so that I do not have to add supplemental fertilization. Comments welcome!

I haven’t officially planted my raised brick pond yet, but somehow I’ve managed to just about completely fill it up. About a month ago, I tossed out a whole bin of clippings from my aquariums into the pond to stay damp until I could get around to planting them. Well, with the exception of the crinum pot, I never got around to planting anything. Instead, a number of stems have started growing up out of the water, anchored by the frogbite roots, which are getting thicker every day.

So far, the most prolific stem plants are Ludwigia arculata x repens, Limnophila aquatica, and Rotala sp. ‘Nanjenshan.’ Otherwise, some Didiplis diandra is still around as well.

I’ve only partially stocked the pond with a few Endlers thus far. I’m hoping to put out the rest of my Endlers before long. To this point, I have just enough to discourage mosquitoes from taking residence in the water. The frogs still haven’t managed to find the pond yet — something I hope happens soon because I love taking pictures of those guys.

The frogbite is starting to send its leaves up out of the water. I have some water lettuce floating in the pond as well, but only a few small pieces. I’m hoping to have more of that this year than frogbite, just for a change of pace from last year.

One of the interesting things that I have going this year is Marsilea quadrifolia growing emersed in the same pot as my crinum. What’s interesting is how delicate the four-leaf-clovers are right now. I have a pot of this same plant growing immersed inside, but the leaves are much darker, thicker, and waxier. Outside, it doesn’t look much different than the clover you seen growing in your lawn.

Another change from last year is some water sprite that I threw in there. Within a week, it was already growing up out of the water, despite not being planted in any container. I wasn’t planning on growing water sprite, but the price was right at one of the club auctions, so I decided to give it a try.

Otherwise in the garden, flowers are starting to bloom. White icicle radishes just produced flowers this week. I’ve never grown root vegetables before, so hopefully it’s not a problem to let them flower. Any expert root-vegetable gardeners out there? The radishes themselves don’t seem big enough to pick yet. (I pulled a couple already in anticipation.)

Also, the lilies are in full bloom and a beautiful bright orange! I love this picture above of an ant traveling down one of the flower petals toward the center of the flower.

My chamomile pot overwintered last year, and has quite a few flowers right now. I think I’ll actually have enough to harvest for tea this season. The bees seem quite drawn to these flowers.

And of course, whenever I’m out in the garden, Bella, one of our dogs who is obsessed with everything outdoors is always by my side.

It’s been about a month since the last shot of my 75G aquarium. Since then, the Eleocharis sp. ‘Japan’ has continued to grow in, and is still exhibiting the fantastic downward sloping growth it’s known for. The Cryptocoryne pontederiifolia in the foreground/middle has really started to explode. I suppose the roots have reached critical mass, and now there’s no getting rid of it. (not that I would want to!)

Otherwise, I have a few signs of collectoritis showing on the right-hand side of the aquascape with stems of Pogostemon stellatus, Ludwigia sp. ‘Cuba’, Eriocaulen sp. ‘Type 3’, and Ludwigia sp. ‘Pantanal’ all growing in close proximity. I ought to decide on just one of those, and go with that. Not to mention that I’ve totally mixed up Limnophila aromatica and Limnophila hippuroides in the middle of the tank! Honestly, I’m wondering if what I bought as L. hippuroides is really L. aromatica anyways because they look the same to me. Finally, the Java Fern sp. ‘Fingers’ in the top/middle/left is looking fantastic! All-in-all, for not paying much attention to this tank, I can’t really complain too much about its appearance. It could definitely benefit from a couple good trims, but otherwise, it’s maintaining itself pretty well, I think. However, suggestions are always welcome!

At the last GWAPA meeting auction, I bought Ludwigia inclinata var. verticillata ‘Pantanal,’ which is a plant I have tried to keep a few times previously. Known as a relatively difficult plant, any lack of nutrients or light causes the stem plant to melt away. In the past, I’ve even seen a single stem wave in and out, with leaf widths varying from about half an inch up to 2 inches, representing periods of neglect, and periods of proper growth.

Fortunately, if adequately cared for, Ludwigia inclinata var. verticillata ‘Pantanal’ is one of the most beautiful stem plants available, maintaining a brilliant red coloration that is sure to draw the attention of any onlooker. There are many more leaves per node than Limnophila aromatica, which makes the stem look more compact, particularly because the leaves themselves stay a tad bit smaller as well.

While certainly not a plant for any beginning hobbyist, I highly recommend this plant to any more experienced grower. High light, rich substrate/fertilization, and CO2 are a must for this plant.