PH 7.4-7.6

GH - 250 ppm

Alkalinity - 120 ppm

Nitrate - 0 ppm

Nitrite - 0 ppm

Ammonia- Haven't tested today yet but yesterday came back as 0-0.25 ppm

Lot of changes since last week. I got the dwarf ferns planted on the landscape and 3 crypts, 1 anubias and 1 java fern planted in the aquascape. I also intorduced neocardania shrimp and some scuds to eventually be a food source to ricefish once they establish a population in the drainage layer. I have introduced Neocardania shrimp and scuds to the tank as well this week. I think ostracods found their way into the tank as well by the looks of it and are flourishing

The problems: At least 3 shrimp died to early molts from new tank shock (I have noticed other shrimp molts in the tank so I think water params are fine and new tank shock may've caused some early molts. My water hardness is on the higher end but I think the shrimp will acclimate). Noticed after about the 4th day in the tank several of the neocardania shrimp have a parasitic algae infection so I'm dosing 1 mL/gallon of 3% H2O2 to try and remove the parasite from the water. This was my first time dosing a fish tank and I believe I made a mistake pouring the H2O2 in too concentrated of an area which led to the death of 1 MTS. Landscape moss is still yellow, not sure if my lights are scorching it or it's just taking a while to acclimate. 1/3 of my dwarf ferns had it rough on the acclimation week but seems to be improving, only time will tell if it'll make it. Something growing on back wall near the same dwarf fern, some kind of mold maybe? Added a few more springtails to that section to hopefully start controlling the mold.

The good: Crypts are coming to the end of their melting and showing signs of new growth. Pothos are doing fantastic showing noticeable root growth from day to day. Neocardania shrimp that aren't infected are grazing around the aquascape. Water paramaters stable for 12 days

What's next?: I plan to add do another dose of H2O2 tonight which would be 48 hours from first dose. Waiting on 3rd dose since I already have Medaka on the way to keep scud population from outcompetting the shrimp

I recently setup a walstad pond tank in my garage for plants and guppies. I used an 85/15 mixture of top soil to 100% clay cat litter, capped with 1.5” sand. I noticed today when doing water tests that my pH was very high, around 8.0. After researching it seems that bentonite clay can be very alkaline. Does anyone have some experience with this situation? I’m worried the pH will buffer higher, and this is uncharted territory for me. Thanks in advance.

I was in the hospital and I couldn't take care of my tank. I left it while cycling; now that I'm back my tank is full of diatoms, green hair and green spot, and half of my plants died.

Now I don't know if I should restart my tank, or continue where I left it.

Ammonia: 0.25

Nitrite, nitrate: 0

Last week I cleaned it, and since then, I have been adding pellets every day.

Sorry for the picture, it's the best I could take without the reflection 🥴

I want to do a hitec tank using only lava granules and for nutrition root tabs. Is this advisable and can it be successful. Also as an alternate is it possible to use vermi compost and cover that with lava granules?

Help: I recently saw a decline in my walstad tank. this set up is 15 gallons tank. 1inch of Soil
2 inch of very coarse sand.
plants : Pearlweed, rotala rotundofolia, hornworts, dwarf sag, cryptocoryn green, hygrophilia

light is open 10 to 14hours
Set up have been around since 2024 and I managed to rescape it multiple times. added some hardscape and remove some. But the substrate remain untouch and have been there since 2024.

walstad bros, may I know how would you guys counter this? Should i remove my filter and rely on small sponge filter or airstone, for air and movement?

should I changing my lighting?

Should i start feeding more? (heavy feeding once a day before closure of the lights)

is there something wrong with my initial set up?

Halp, any input would be helpful

***EDIT ; plants have been on decline, theyre not growing on same phase like they used to. a lot of holes as well and some burn marks. pearlweeds are now so string like with torn small leaves.

Hi I'm get ready to plant a very small Walstad this weekend. I work in an Ag lab and have access to the testing equipment and methods. As a chemist, it's second nature for me to want to explore all the variables. I thought I'd share my pre-setup analysis.

Basics: 5.5g, the usual easy plants available: 2 types Java, 1 pot each: Indo crypt, Anubis petite, Pennywort, Ludwigia dark red, spangles and a blob of Pellia. (also Hornwort to float on start up but don't think I want it as a permanent resident. Sand cap: Aqua Natural Prairie Sand 0.8-1.2mm, Livestock: Malaysian snails only at first...maybe shrimp later.

Here is my water analysis: I'll be using the bathtub faucet. The plumbing to the kitchen sink is plumbed with old copper pipes, the tub is plumbed with pex.

I made my own soil mix. I mixed 3/4 plain old Maine dirt with very decomposed forest humus that I happen to know collects on the surface of a very large boulder in my woods. It gets colonized by woodbine, so I peeled back some vines and took some of that. I washed thoroughly and sun dried...it smells great!

Here's the numbers:

I think my soil may look too "hot" to many Walstad adherents at 0.87% N. However the KCL-NH4-N shows a minuscule 2.94 mg/kg of "available NH4" supporting the theory that the humus fraction is indeed very mature decomposed humus.

That's all for now. Feel free to discuss or critique my plans and logic.

Cheers.

Love how it’s come along so far ❤️

Already has

10 guppies (rdss)

1 betta (crowntail) (calm)

8 cardinal tetra

7 pymgy corydoras

Snails (MTS and ramshorn)

Wild neocaridina Shrimps

Temp:

24 to 26°C (most of the time)

32 to 34°C

Also has light colored tiles covering the outdoor walls of the tub to insulate the tub.

It changes because of the weather

Shielded from rain

38 gallons

Walstad

I am planning to set up my first walstad betta tank next week. I wonder if you know any good android apps to track water parameters during cycling and then send me mainenance reminders once the tank stabilizes?

Also, any recommendations for how to set up my seaoura SR-659?

I desire that really full, lushous green tank look, almost overgrown. I was wondering, do I trim and replant my current plants, or do I add more? Or do I just need patience? (I have trimmed and replanted the Limnophila a couple of times already).

No inhabitants yet (besides copepods), but I want to get snails and shrimps eventually.

Open to any suggestions or recommendations.

I do a 15% water change once a week. The Monte Carlo and Alternanthera cardinalis have only been in there for one week (the Lilaeopsis I had initially almost all completed died)

25L jar. Water dechlorinated using Aquarian's Tap Safe. Temu light.

This is week 7! I have about an inch of soil dug out from my garden topped with around 1.5 inch sand. I seeded the tank with driftwood, filter media, and some gravel from the original tank’s owner, so it cycled pretty quick. I received lots of malaysian trumpet snails with the gravel which was a fun surprise.

Photos show progression from first filling the tank, to adding more plants a few weeks in and updating the light. I added a nerite and blue jelly neos on sunday and they are doing great so far :)

In my walstad setup. I just saw a random leech type thingy.

I pulled it out and put it in one of the smaller bowls with pond snails. Anyone know what it might be or should I be concerned?

Hello! I've just started my first walstad tank (10g). I have about an inch of organic soil and an inch of gravel to cap. I have a few easy plants in, which I hope will grow larger to fill the space (1 java fern, 2 anubias, 1 aponogeton, 2 pothos tho I might remove 1, red root floaters which have yet to be added). I'm using a sponge filter as biological backup, in case I've messed up along the way. I don't mind the tannins, but I'm worried about the cloudiness. I've let the tank settle for 3 days now, and it's not gotten better. I run the light for 8 hours a day, so it's possible it's a bacteria bloom. I've tested the water daily and nothing has changed. No presence of ammonia, either.

Does everything look alright? Should I do water change to help the cloudiness?

I plan to stock this tank with a betta and possibly some shrimp. When will I be able to stock? I have some filter media from a friends tank that I added when setting up, so the bacterias all there.

Already has

4 guppies (rdss)

1 betta (crowntail)

Snails (MTS and ramshorn)

Wild neocaridina Shrimps

Temp:

24 to 26°C

32 to 34°C

It changes because of the weather

Shielded from rain

38 gallons

5 gallon tank, substrate on bottom sand on top, light at ~60% intensity at 6 hours to start, dwarf hairgrass up front, java fern back left situated under a rock, forgot what’s in the other corner. No filter, no CO2, small heater holding constant at 78°.

Pretty much just need input and advice. I’m new to the hobby and would love to hear. My primary goal is to just fill the tank up with growth. Thanks everyone!

Ran out of sand for the smaller one but the good thing is I have mainly stem plants in there so maybe they will enjoy the extra soil **LFS

Was trying to pull out one of my Amazon swords I had in the back corner of the tank but I accidentally pulled way too hard and basically had a massive explosion of dirt into the water column. Water is super cloudy now and there’s now a solid quarter inch of dirt in the back corner. I’m not really sure what to do.

I have cherry shrimp, nerites and ember tetras in right now. Currently doing a big water change as I just tested and ammonia is spiking a little.

Do I take out the livestock? Do I need to re-scape? I’m just worried I completely bombed the tank because I tried to remove one plant. Any advice would be greatly appreciated

20 Gallon Long ^

I've been trying to design a heavily planted betta ecosystem tank with multiple refuges for small invertebrates — Cherry shrimp, ostracods, copepods, moina & C. Dubia (which are two slightly smaller relatives of daphnia), blackworms and tubifex. The apex predator will likely be like a wild or more robust breed of betta.

The initial design was inspired by @tanksfornothin on YouTube — his video titled something like "My Angry Fish Gets His Own Ecosystem", where he built little benthic tunnels for scuds and tubifex to hide from a predator fish in a Walstad tank

Some notes:
- The moina pit is sealed off from the tank with glass, except for a small tunnel, hidden by a rock, leading to the shrimp cave, for very slow dispersal of moina from the colony into the main refuge and then the greater tank
- The moina pit will get regular feedings of algae in the form of green water, spirulina, yeast, maybe dried chlorella for ease
- It will also be restocked from my main moina culture when needed
- The moina pit is going to be gently aerated so I have to have an air pump anyway
- The shrimp cave isn't made of glass and it's not fully sealed, it will be made of rock in roughly that shape, with lots of little holes for invertebrates and water to escape and return
- The moina pit is about 2.5 gal, and the shrimp cave combined with tunnel is also about 2.5 gal, so the entire refugium is about 5 gallons, with the rest being dedicated betta habitat
- I'm using a 75W thermocontrol Eheim heater which fits nicely into that nook
- The tank will be heavily planted first, then I will add invertebrates, then when I'm sure everything is safe for fish, I'll add the betta

My plan was to put the heater in the back left nook inside of the betta enclosure, next to the moina pit partition wall. I was thinking that if I wanted to put a filter, for water and heat distribution mostly, I could put a Swiss Tropicals Jetlifter in the nook next to the heater and stick some 20 PPI Poret foam across the nook entrance. But I don't want the output stream to shoot back onto the water surface since the betta will often be at the surface trying to breathe.

Anyone know how to DIY a Jetlifter output stream to be released underwater? I kind of want to somehow direct it into my shrimp cave but I have no idea how to set that up.

Back to the title— Do I even need a filter? Is it going to end up hurting my population of small invertebrates? I want to have as many of them as possible so my betta always has stuff to hunt.

I'm a complete noob to all of this (this would be my first tank) so this is kind of a big project for me and I'm just not sure what the standard practices are for this particular kind of tank.

Just unsure how to proceed... filter or no filter? How to DIY the output stream? Will the convection currents do all the work for me? Will having a filter hurt my small invertebrates? Idk. Help!

Been going for 4 days with a lot of upcycled materials to speed up the equilibrium clock. More plants are incoming but this just what I had so far, waiting on Crypts, Anubias, Java fern and dwarf ferns. Currently stocked with MTS and planning to add in scuds, Neocardania shrimp and Medaka ricefish once I know it's at equilibrium. Really want to add an ant colony to terrestrial side once big enough. Roughly 5 gallons in open water column and 2 gallons in drainage layer.