# Terraphyte/Biotope Tank



## BBradbury (Apr 22, 2011)

*Terraphyte / Biotope Tanks*

Good morning or maybe afternoon...

After several weeks of using land plants to purify the water in my 45 G aquarium, I'm sold (see attached pics)! Am in the process of converting all my larger tanks to this Terraphyte system.

Have found the water stays so much cleaner than I can keep it with weekly, large water changes and the combination of the plant filtration during the day and the standard HOB system running at night, the ammonia and nitrites are "0" and nitrates have never been above 10 ppm.

Have researched the plants and found two of the half dozen available, that work very well.

So, the years of large, weekly water changes are essentially over and my fish can still live in pure water conditions in a balanced tank.

B


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## navigator black (Jan 3, 2012)

*Re: Terraphyte / Biotope Tanks*

I admire optimism... but I don't think a few weeks make a system. It has to be able to sustain itself longterm. I have a number of tanks with terrestrial plants on top, rooted in the water. They certainly hold a higher bioload, and are great for breeding fish, but I have not changed my water changing routine with them. I found that over a year or so, they became very heavy maintenance if I backed off on a regular routine. I see the plants on top as a very viable supporting cast for a regular tank.
The roots hanging down look good, but are limited. The fish life became very stationary, and the root clogged tanks became very dull to look at. They became ideal tanks for a very limited number of fish species - fantastic with small Aphyosemion killifish and some tiny African barbs, but not good for the aquarium standards.
Your test kit readings will support the idea the tank is working - but I don't own a test kit and evaluate tanks from a different point of view. From a fish behavior point of view, your tanks end up a bit like beaslbob's. If you study the evolutionary history of your fish, and carefully choose small species that can handle low oxygen levels in weed clogged habitats, you can have a degree of balance as long as you keep mineral/fertilizer levels up artificially. If an aquarist throws guppies, platys or other flowing stream fish into such a tank, he/she is missing the point. 
They can survive in such conditions - in droughts they get caught in stagnant puddles and pull though til the rains save them. But you have to bring the rains!
It's a great 'narrow focus' specialized tank, but if you present it as a general solution (you have, probably not on purpose) it will lead careless newcomers into dead ends. It becomes like the discus crew who insist on bare glass everywhere, or the Malawi keepers who swear plants are awful in fish tanks because the one group of fish they keep have evolved as plant eaters. 
I like your solution and your project, and have really enjoyed my own version of it (seven years along) but it has a narrow focus in terms of fish choice. If the fish you are keeping are Bettas, rasboras, West African killifish, small slender gouramis, Elasoma from Florida, Heterandria, or other shallow water, riverbank fish or swamp fish, you have an elegant solution to minimize water changes there.


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## jrman83 (Jul 9, 2010)

*Re: Terraphyte / Biotope Tanks*

I agree with NB mostly. If all I wanted to do is reduce my maintenance, then I could do much easier than this or Beasl's methods. But, rest assured if both methods got me to the eye sore you posted (no offense) it wouldn't take me very long to get me back to my old ways. I don't ever set out on any venture to start and figure out how I can do it with less interaction....I would just rather quit it altogether than to do that. I much prefer a little more work with a pleasing item to look at than some experiment looking thing. Lastly, I don't think only measuring ammonia, nitrite, and nitrates really tells me much about the state of my water....if I was really wanting to see where it sat over a long period of time.


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## zero (Mar 27, 2012)

*Re: Terraphyte / Biotope Tanks*

that is quite far the weirdest thing ive ever seen!!!!!


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## BBradbury (Apr 22, 2011)

*Re: Terraphyte / Biotope Tanks*

nav and jr...

Excellent points as usual. I'll keep them in mind as the tanks work. Not getting completely away from water changes, I still remove a few gallons per week to service the media in the HOB systems. So, the tank isn't totally self-sustaining. Am relying on HOBs to filter the water at night, when the plants slow their work.

As near as I can tell, the plants are doing the work of filtering the water during the day and the HOBs take over at night. I do have high aeration in the tank for the benefit of the land plant roots, but so far the high oxygen hasn't affected my aquatic plants.

Continue to use liquid ferts dosed when I top off the water due to evaporation. Have a lot of water loss since the land plants were put in. Apparently, the roots are drawing in the tank water for the nutrients and the water is lost through the leaves.

As far as the look of the tank, I'm getting used to it. The roots are growing quickly and the new plants thrive in the higher nitrate levels in the water. Just have Fancy Guppies and a fairly large number of Corydoras. No plans to bring in anything else. 

Am still learning the whole chemistry thing and am very interested in how the plants and the fish work together to balance the water. Thanks for the input!

Plan to start introducing the plants into my larger tanks. Am looking forward to bringing a little bit of the jungle indoors.

Will post pics from time to time.

B


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## BBradbury (Apr 22, 2011)

*Re: Terraphyte / Biotope Tanks*



zero said:


> that is quite far the weirdest thing ive ever seen!!!!!


Hello z...

You're quite possibly right. But, the plants keep the water cleaner than I ever could when I was changing half the tank volume every week. The bonus is, I have a lot of land plants in addition to my aquatic plants and my fish are as healthy as ever!

B


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## navigator black (Jan 3, 2012)

*Re: Terraphyte / Biotope Tanks*

I hope you can keep us posted. I never went to THAT many plants in my set-ups - I tend to steer the roots of the terrestrial plants along the back and down one corner - no more than a third of the tank. The other areas have traditional aquarium plants, of my beloved low light varieties. 
I have a tank with wild-caught Mexican swordtails and wild-caught and second generation Cuban Limia in it - the filtration's flow (24 hours for bacterial filtration) keeps water open, but in the quieter root hanging area, I get fry hiding and growing out - it's now moving into a third generation of Limia and a second generation of the helleri. 

With the really thick plants on top of your tank, I can't tell if I think I'm looking at a clear rectangular flowerpot or a beheaded punk rocker. It is a different look to a fishtank, or to a flowerpot. 

You've inspired me though, I'm going to take some cuttings and start them in killie tanks, to see what I can see...

Could you give the Latin names of some of the plants you've used? The scientific names would be useful because I don't live in an English speaking area, and the popular names don't translate.

here's an old shot of the back corner - about six inches wide of roots. Balanced with aquatic plants and especially driftwood, I think it looks fine.


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## BBradbury (Apr 22, 2011)

*Re: Terraphyte / Biotope Tanks*

Hello again nav...

There are two different plants in this 45 G. The larger plants in the front of the tank are Chinese Evergreen, a variety of "Aglaonema". These seem to work best. A good second choice is any variety of low light "Philodendron". I have those in the back of the tank.

I put as many plants in the tank as possible, to make sure all the wastes are used. I haven't tested the water chemistry in a month or more, but it must be good, because I have a lot of fry in the tank.

The land plants require only low, ambient light, so nothing special. I do keep a single 6500K, 32 watt light on in the tank for the aquatic plants. I have mostly Pennywort and Anacharis floating with some low light swords planted in pots.

The tank is low maintenance with the exception of servicing the HOBs weekly. There's no visible algae in the tank, possibly because the plants are using all of the dissolved nutrients from the fish and the liquid ferts.

B


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## Kehy (Apr 19, 2011)

*Re: Terraphyte / Biotope Tanks*

Ripariums are ok, but I wouldn't use plants as the primary filtration. Secondary, along with all the other plants, yes, but I would still make sure to use an actual filter and regular maintenance. As for the looks, I only like the green parts of the plants, the roots are ugly. Maybe a false back wall or something to hide the roots. More often people use pots attached to the tank to control the roots, and the substrate in the pots helps the plants root better.


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## Nereus7 (Jun 13, 2012)

*Re: Terraphyte / Biotope Tanks*

Whats up BBury. I have a few plants sitting in a glass of "used" tank water I swap out each day waiting on roots to sprout. I've made a list of about 9 species of plants I want to get going since you gave me the heads up on the Aglanomena. It will be dope I promise you this!

Kehy, I'll put up a link (from mfk, I assume it's ok to link to other forums, I saw one thread linking to them yesterday so...) that includes some pictures of designs people came up with that kept the roots behind the background. Also one guy made a "gutter" system where he pumped water into the beginning of it and snaked it down through lava rock and then back into the tank, keeping the plants technically out of the "tank" but still on top. Pretty cool. Seems when design comes into play, the sky's the limit!

That said I'm pretty ocd when it comes to my levels, I think I'll continue to test params frequently.

Here's a question for ya'll. I'll try to word it somewhat decypherable. Basicly, the test kits we use, measure certain things, but not everything. So when it comes to GH & KH you can have water that tests in your correct level, yet be depleted of certain minerals etc if it sits too long in your tank. Which I take as a sign that even if the nitrates are telling you a water change isn't yet needed, and the GH KH is telling you your levels are all good, you can still have water that is depleted and need replaced. Hence, there really is NO getting around water changes. The more the merrier within reason. I'm thinking these types of planted tanks, may open the door for this kind of accident to happen, if you're not careful. You know what I'm saying?.... your thoughts


Heres that link to the planted tank threads:


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## Nereus7 (Jun 13, 2012)

*Re: Terraphyte / Biotope Tanks*

Link fail... just hit up MFK and search the "plant only filtration (why not popular in the hobby???) thread, you'll find it.


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## navigator black (Jan 3, 2012)

*Re: Terraphyte / Biotope Tanks*

In many ways, test kits tell us what to look for, because we can look for it. In the 1950s, temperature was the issue. In the 1970s/1980s, pH was all the rage, because it was cheap and easy to measure. Now, we know that for aquariums, it's of secondary importance except as an indicator of mineral content. 
Now, we can measure ammonia, nitrate and nitrite, and I see aquarists blaming well known and well documented diseases on them, because they are easy to measure and and easy to know about. They are of primary importance, and have to be taken very seriously, but at the same time, so many newcomers to the hobby inflate their role. It's as if all the knowledge gained before the internet has vanished, since books are unpopular.
If tds meters become more easily available, they will become the next big indicator - again, a very important one, but not where I'd look if a fish has intestinal worms, tuberculosis or inherited deformities.
So the test kits don't cover what we're looking for in the plant filtered tank. We don't usually even know what's in our tap - when I lived on the east coast, I had manganese galore in the water and Hygrophilia grew like weeds - now, I can barely grow it. 
Mysteries are great, as are tubes of coloured liquid. Oftentimes the tests solve those mysteries, but not if you step outside the traditional boundaries.


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## BBradbury (Apr 22, 2011)

*Re: Terraphyte / Biotope Tanks*

Hello Nereus...

Am fairly impressed with the success of the first tank, so I'm going to convert all my others to this Terraphyte system. The neat thing about doing this, is you add plants to the tank, which can't do any harm to the water! No negative side affects that I can see after more than 2 months of running the 45 G. 

I have a 38 G and three 55 Gs currently running in my basement. My current plan is to rig up a lighting system using some old strip lights with a single florescent bulb. Should provide more than enough light for the land plants, since they require only ambient light.

I'll continue to use the strip light system for the aquatic plants and run the HOBs too. The land plants won't do much in the way of filtering the tank water at night, so that's where the HOBs will come in handy. They'll filter the water at night.

B


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## BBradbury (Apr 22, 2011)

Hello AF...

Well, here's the latest on my switch to land plant, planted tanks. I emersed the rootballs of some land plants in my 5 large, freshwater tanks a few months ago and the plants are still keeping the tank water free of ammonia and nitrites as well as the bulk of the nitrates. I've been able to back off on the water changes about 80 percent and still have stable water properties. The Livebearers are reproducing as fast as ever. Even the Corydoras that require constant pure water conditions appear very healthy.

There is an interesting twist, the aquatic plants are growing as well as before, but the Pennywort is growing through the leaves of the the Chinese Evergreen and Pothos. It appears the Pennywort is growing toward the ambient light from several pole lamps I have running in the room 12 hours a day. (See attached pics).

So far, so good.

B


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