It could depends on what type of tank and layout you want to do.
Some plants do require extra co2, some will do fine without, but growth will be slow or stunted.

one thing i realised about tanks without co2, the plants aren't so healthy. like my moss, it's not as bright as mosses with co2.

Just flooded my tank last week. So far so good. Some algae here and there. Cannot put in any fish, shrimps or snails yet as the CO2 is set to ~5 bps for 2 weeks by following the instructions on the first page.

Next Saturday will bring it down to 3 bps and then maybe down to 1 bps.


Attached thumbnail(s)

very nice!

and this was the tank in the first few days, phai seh phai seh


Attached thumbnail(s)

the bahagian kiri is Monte while on the right is HC. HC looks not healthy. Rotala at the back grows like crazy! have to cut every 2 weeks! wanted to see if monte or HC looks nicer. got some melting after flooding but seems to be pretty much in control (i hope) now. any advice from sifu on how to make the HC more healthy and grow much faster?

This post has been edited by mkcmeng: Dec 10 2015, 04:28 PM

fert + cool temp

temp already set to 25. fert planning later to avoid algae bloom. was advice only to introduce ferts after about a month when the plants have fully climatised to being flooded. Should i dose excel during this period?

Nice, nice... Nice scaping

Nice tank. You use chiller? I think you can dose half amount of normal dosage of fertz after 1 or 2 weeks. Just need to do more WC, like 2-3 days for 20-30% of water to avoid algae bloom. Excel won't do harm, it's pure carbon and it's actually easier to absorb by plant than co2.

Also, does anyone know the name of the thread head of standard co2 for planted tank in malaysia (or whatever you call it)? Is it called M21.8? Or G5-8? Photo below:



This post has been edited by artsyfarty: Dec 10 2015, 11:29 PM

yes, running a chiller, was told it will improve the colour and health of the plants and fishes.

guys, anyone here using DIY CO2 system?

So, today I was doing the routine weekly WC. I was using a small hose to suck all the waste in the area below and suddenly, a little creature caught my attention.


Baby red cherry shrimp!!! Looks like it already few weeks old? Don't know how it happened though, I didn't notice my adult RCS carried eggs before.


And, there are 3-4 of them that I can see hiding in christmas moss! I'm sure there are some more hiding.


And now I hope they will survive, I have 4 cherry barbs, 2 siamese algae eaters, 1 oto, 4 neon tetras, 4 lamp eyes, 3 foxy tails, 2 rasbora galaxy and 7 adult red cherry shrimps in the 2ft tank, but the plant should be dense enough for hiding place.



This post has been edited by artsyfarty: Dec 12 2015, 10:47 PM

guna CO2?.last time my cherry disappear without any sign of dead body..adoi..

Yes. I dose quite intense co2 and fertz.

congratz, your tank must have lots of hiding places for the shrimplets, cherry barbs, flying fox all these would snack on them, be careful.

hey, like what i have replied to you at the other thread, most plants would need co2, some are very demanding, like HC, if you plan to have them as foreground plant, you need to have co2. if not, moss can do without co2 but growth would be a lot slower than usual.

Hi.. Just setup my wife guppy low-tech tank..only use extra material from my main planted tank..can i add some cherries into here?.planning to add some java moss to DW later..is it safe?.im sure yamato are safe with guppies, but how about those small cherries?.

the adult guppies are likely to snack no shrimplets.... unless you have plenty of hiding places for the shrimplets.

better don't, your tank is small.
& Your guppy will be breed. even if your tank is heavily planted.
There is still a big chance for those guppies to eat your cherry.