Quite a lot has happened since my first blog post. I have done more research, acquired my materials and dirted the tank!  (Video/at the bottom)

The Dirt:

I managed to find a "miracle gro organic choice" soil that is .10/.05/.10 on the nitrogen/phosphate/potash. Nice and low where it counts, and no chemical ferts as far as I can tell. Organic ferts most likely poultry so it may leech extra ammonia from what I have discovered. However, I think it is a good dirt. There are no large pieces of floatable debris (twigs, wood chips and bits).

I mixed the dirt with some Lambert sphagnum. This stuff was very fine, no wood or fill, just a very fine mulch of Canadian Sphag. I liked the cec that sphag brings to the substrate along with the fact that it is organic, and may help water chem a bit as our water is moderately hard and alkaline.

There is also the red potters clay for the bottom and the fluorite gravel layers as a cap.

So my substrate is front to back, approx. Dirt: 1inch to 1.25 inch with gravel/fluorite mix of similar depth for total of approx 2 inches deep in the front sloping to 2.5 inches in the back.

It is going to be awhile before I can get plants here so,...I did the same thing to a little 5 gallon we have here as well. Call it a trial run :D

So I took these 4 very small java ferns (they are remnants of a plant we had when the 55g was up and running 2 years ago these little daughter plants have been doing ok in our beta tank). So I fill/drain the 5 g and refill it again and soak it like that over night. Next day I did 3 fill/drains, with about a half day soak before the last drain and final refill. Into the tank go 4 of the 5 java fern daughters (Microsorium, pteropus). 3 days later close monitoring and no signs of burning or wilting. In fact, I believe that a floating leaf has rooted! (More on that in the video). Water chem tests should arrive today so I can test the little java tank. 5g water parameters are currently (4 days dirted, 5 fill/drains) : room temp, ph 8, ammonia o.6, nitrite o.1 Nitrate N/A (test kit did not ship).

The Planning.

Plant species list is un changed I believe. Going to do 2 -3 "waves" of planting. Initial plant order will be hygrophila difformis heavy I think, along side some hardy stems like L repens and H polysperma, and some small swords and anubias. Later will come some more variety/sizable/slower plants.

Fish load:

We have done a lot of searching/thinking of what we want to do and have finally  settled on Bolivian Rams (M altinipinosa spelling?)

So our thoughts on stocking are something like this:

55g hex. 48 inches long, 12 inches wide, 20 inches tall

5 Bolivian Rams

10? Red Phantom Tetras

10? Diamond Tetras

9? Adolfoi Cory (or other small adorable cory)

2 Bristle Nose Ancistrus

Trumpet Snails

and perhaps shrimp.

Here again it would be a bio load delivered in numerous smaller waves of fish with rams likely last, sometime in the late fall perhaps.

I am curious about the numbers of tetras and corys I can home in a heavily planted tank with those measurements. Opinions on this in particular would be helpful.

(Plan to run the fluval 305 canister and a cascade 600 submersible with a sponge rig as a prefilter/power head if I can, but I will be running a second filter/pump.

Also curious as to why some run 2 heaters? I see mention of it, but no rationale for it. Is it simply a case of having a back up in case of malfunction?

 That is all I have for now, feedback is, as always, appreciated.   

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9yNWXsEQa60&feature=player_detai...