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First off, this is really my first post back from break, so I hope everyone had a good break/holiday/whatever.

So I come back from two weeks at my parents house (out of state) and thankfully I haven't lost any fish, but my plants look like crap (algea, no leaves on some plants, yellow leaves on others). AND I realise that I still don't like the layout of the tank.

I still have a full week left of break and I'm thinking, what could I do better with my time than to completely redo my plant tank? I'm thinking to empty the tank, bleach it out (rinse), get a new plant type substrate, all new plants, new batch of CO2, the works. Hopefully this time the algea will never have time to take hold, and my plants will start and stay healthy.

What do you think, good or bad idea?

Thanks,
matt

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Critical Fertilator: The Micromanager of Macronutrients

Well only drawback I can see is that you'll end up with a tank going thru minicycle if not a full cycle after you've left to go back to school, that and you'd need a place for the fish....

If you still had 3-4 weeks of break I'd say no problem so long as you had somewhere for the fish, even with saving filter media I'd be a little worried about leaving a newly set up tank home alone.... unless I'm missing something .

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Thanks for the quick input Babel. My tank is here with me at school, so I will be able to monitor it carefully for the next 5 months if necessary.

I have a biowheel on it and the co2 reactor also has cycled media on it so I wasn't worried about a FULL cycle, maybe a small one.

Last edited by mattyboombatty at 05-Jan-2005 12:52

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Critical Fertilator: The Micromanager of Macronutrients

oh no worries then....oh well maybe 1 worry
How soon can you have it ready to be entered in the contest .

Rather than a bleach, why not just a good scrub down? If you use any bleach it'll take a bit of rinsing to get it all off, I have a feeling that a scrubbing should do well enough....of course I don't know what algaes you've been dealing with either .

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With how much algea, green spot mostly, is on the sides of the tank, I'm not sure that a scrub down would work at all. Set in stone comes to mind.

As for the AQ contest, I'll enter one of my 3 tanks, whichever looks the best at the time. Or if you'd let me use my plant tank as it is now, I don't know the rules about that. I'm sure it wouldn't win anyways, hence the redo.

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Critical Fertilator: The Micromanager of Macronutrients

I say go for it! if you have the time then it's a good idea, I've found that a tear down of the tank is not as bad, if you take all the precautions like cycle and such and it gives you as you said the chance of beating algae. I would be careful with the substrate if you have a too rich substrate and you don't have enough plants to take advantage of al the nutrients you will develop an algae problem again.

Good luck

What kind of fish and how many fish do you have in your tank at the present? What are you planning on doing with them? Do you want a new kind of fish in your tank? Or just a new setup?

My stock is in my profile, it's the 38g tank. I'm going to put them into my 10G and one of my 20G for as long as it takes me to bleach, scrub, rinse, and put in a new substrate. For the substrate I may just go with half and half, but I wanted the fully planted look, with the same fish.

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Critical Fertilator: The Micromanager of Macronutrients