# The Tree of Life



## Econde (Oct 13, 2015)

Everything will be okay my friend. I like to pour my extra energy into my tanks to stay out of trouble. This year has been a bad year and I hope you find some peace working with this scape. I will subscribe and check up on you to see if everything is okay! Feel free to message me if you'd like to talk about anything.


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## Discusluv (Dec 24, 2017)

Times are tough-- we are all feeling it. 
You are not alone.
Pour yourself into this artistic en-devour. Creativity is life-energy inducing. 
Think about all the little critters and plant life that we bring to this box. They flourish under our care. 
Lean into this task and just do it. Maybe it is not the task that is draining, but the procrastination.
So, try to get some forward momentum going-- soon you will be running.
(virtual hug.)


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## DennisSingh (Nov 8, 2004)

Thank you guys

Now a aquascape for me takes lots of planning and time. First thing, go hard on the aquascape. 2nd plant it well and keep everything clean. I have to plan on cleaning the substrate, keeping the hardscape in tact at all times even water change, sinking the woods ahead of time as some woods can take a long time to sink. In attaching hardscape I tried the cig filter method which i think is the best method, but was unsuccessful fully attaching jagged wood together. So the entire scape the woods are not attached to each other, so this makes maintenance a lot harder if you knock or move wood, it can easily turn into a disaster. 

First is to make the main stump, the solid core of the tree. Now some or most of these beginning pictures are just nothing, not even close to the final, but just to pictures and spend time


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## Econde (Oct 13, 2015)

How big will your tank be?


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## DennisSingh (Nov 8, 2004)

Econde said:


> How big will your tank be?


The dimensions are 36x30x12h inches

I had built a grid 34 x 28 roughly to see if I can fit all woods in and together.


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## Econde (Oct 13, 2015)

Wow about 56 gallons? Is it 30" tall or 12"?


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## DennisSingh (Nov 8, 2004)

Econde said:


> Wow about 56 gallons? Is it 30" tall or 12"?


Ya roughly 56g
12" tall
36"long
30"wide
🙂


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## Econde (Oct 13, 2015)

DennisSingh said:


> Ya roughly 56g
> 12" tall
> 36"long
> 30"wide
> 🙂


Nice. My most recent tank is 36" long x 18" wide and 12" tall. Was your tank a frag tank? Nearly square at the bottom. But man that's a lot of good real estate to work with.


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## DennisSingh (Nov 8, 2004)

Econde said:


> Nice. My most recent tank is 36" long x 18" wide and 12" tall. Was your tank a frag tank? Nearly square at the bottom. But man that's a lot of good real estate to work with.


Yeah it is a custom acrylic frag tank I purchased from advanced acrylics, the amount I paid was ridiculous, and it still bows a little bit despite thick acrylic. The tank is solid though. The thing with frag tanks and their square design, mainly scapes you must do a centralfuge(but can still surprise me) kind've aquascape while the rectangles you've got more lenght to work with and center design won't really work. Your most recent tank sounds really cool and nice, I really like those dimensions.


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## Econde (Oct 13, 2015)

DennisSingh said:


> Yeah it is a custom acrylic frag tank I purchased from advanced acrylics, the amount I paid was ridiculous, and it still bows a little bit despite thick acrylic. The tank is solid though. The thing with frag tanks and their square design, mainly scapes you must do a centralfuge(but can still surprise me) kind've aquascape while the rectangles you've got more lenght to work with and center design won't really work. Your most recent tank sounds really cool and nice, I really like those dimensions.


Man I bet it was pricey. Most custom anything costs a bunch. I got lucky with mine. I paid little for some of my glass except for 3 pieces. The bottom and the two euro braces. I know it's probably overkill but meh. I feel better about the front and rear braces I've installed.


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## DennisSingh (Nov 8, 2004)

Discusluv said:


> Times are tough-- we are all feeling it.
> Maybe it is not the task that is draining, but the procrastination.
> So, try to get some forward momentum going-- soon you will be running.
> (virtual hug.)


I think this to be very true. Procrastination, if I just start its picks up along and goes naturally.




So I've got a bunch of these twigs, this will act like and compliment as a root structure to the main tree.



















































































































> Man I bet it was pricey. Most custom anything costs a bunch. I got lucky with mine. I paid little for some of my glass except for 3 pieces. The bottom and the two euro braces. I know it's probably overkill but meh. I feel better about the front and rear braces I've installed.


cost me 5 bills:nerd:


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## DennisSingh (Nov 8, 2004)

accents like this


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## DennisSingh (Nov 8, 2004)

First problem I encountered was attaching the woods together. I tried two spiderwood stumps, glue, cig filter glue, silicone, couldn't. I thought if I couldn't attach all the pieces I had no scape.


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## DennisSingh (Nov 8, 2004)

So basically the hardscape 4 step build
center stump
branches out the water
thick roots branching out
and twigs acting like root structure
all together a 3d picture, spiraling all angles, center on out


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## DennisSingh (Nov 8, 2004)

uprooting of plants , removal of old hardscape, now its become a canvas, soaking wood need sink


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## DennisSingh (Nov 8, 2004)

planning and pondering and ranging the hardscape


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## Lammergeier (Jun 30, 2020)

Wow, that looks like a good start. I've been dreaming of a future tank with similar dimensions to this one. These frag-tanks-turned-planted-tanks don't seem to be very popular, so I'll be following this thread. I'm interested to see your ideas and creativity come to fruition!


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## DennisSingh (Nov 8, 2004)

Lammergeier said:


> Wow, that looks like a good start. I've been dreaming of a future tank with similar dimensions to this one. These frag-tanks-turned-planted-tanks don't seem to be very popular, so I'll be following this thread. I'm interested to see your ideas and creativity come to fruition!


Thanks for the comments. I love the frag dimensions especially the height. I prefer shallow over high. Highs more water volume. But I don't see many ways to scape a frag except center on out. Its also harder to make it look good from all dimensions


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## DennisSingh (Nov 8, 2004)

Since I failed in attaching two pieces of wood together, the whole scape i decided was going to be unattached. This makes it significantly harder to keep all woods in tact and shape of the hardscape i want.


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## DennisSingh (Nov 8, 2004)

Developing...

















































Turn on filter, the canvas is better with clear water


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## DennisSingh (Nov 8, 2004)

So I had gotten a preview of what I'd like to be built and wood sunken enough. Smaller woods and such sink faster, less water to soak up*








































Now onto some work


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## DennisSingh (Nov 8, 2004)

Attaching moss I used the glue method. I rather tie in any situation except for the hard to tie angles and such of certain intricate woods. Attaching moss to the core was a mistake, as it would be covered up later with other woods. Glue also initial moss adjusts slower I've seen.


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## DennisSingh (Nov 8, 2004)

Planting, i used buces, marsilea hirasuta, erio vietnam, and dwarf hairgrass belem
























































































_if you start out dirty, your gonna have more work ahead of you_


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## DennisSingh (Nov 8, 2004)

Happy new years. 
random hardscaping trial


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## DennisSingh (Nov 8, 2004)

Now that the contest is over I'll catch up. I entered...thats all i can say. hehe
Current the tank is a moss fragment and shrimp tank, I'll update this until the teardown and shrimp

























floating wood, these sink faster than the big pieces
















Wait...this doesn't look right?


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## DennisSingh (Nov 8, 2004)

angle-ing this way gives more rooted look.
































This is what pretty much killed it. The emmersed part of the tree needed humidity i could not provide. If the emmersed part couldn't survive a 8hr sleep night and dries out then its a bust. I figure despite the messy startup, if i had the emmersed buces all over, it would be decently worthy of anything. I know now I could've purchased a monsoon or something else.








dried out


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## DennisSingh (Nov 8, 2004)

More moss








Darn, the tree collapse on me
























tried to shape it up as much i could


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## DennisSingh (Nov 8, 2004)

9.18.20


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## DennisSingh (Nov 8, 2004)

skeleton king would've looked nice








i tried glueing sphagnum moss, dried out quick








see the structure change as stuff moves around


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## DennisSingh (Nov 8, 2004)

So buce and sphagnum moss didn't work, I decided on air plants.
















what a whack and funky scape


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## DennisSingh (Nov 8, 2004)

Here are my submitted photos
by 10/17/2020


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## DennisSingh (Nov 8, 2004)

Now for shots and glimpses of the tank as it slowly gets torn down.
At this point you can tell the tank is very very dirty. A lot of mulm accumulation.


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## DennisSingh (Nov 8, 2004)




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## DennisSingh (Nov 8, 2004)




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## DennisSingh (Nov 8, 2004)




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## DennisSingh (Nov 8, 2004)




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## DennisSingh (Nov 8, 2004)




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## DennisSingh (Nov 8, 2004)

moss just attached to acrylic out of nowhere


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## DennisSingh (Nov 8, 2004)




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## DennisSingh (Nov 8, 2004)




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## DennisSingh (Nov 8, 2004)

At this point added sawed fragments of wood, hence fragment moss


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## DennisSingh (Nov 8, 2004)




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## DennisSingh (Nov 8, 2004)

You can see the detritus build up throughout. It goes in and out depending on how much removal during water change and how much put back by fauna. Overtime it got way out of hand with amount of fauna over time as well.


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## DennisSingh (Nov 8, 2004)




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## MissCris (Mar 7, 2016)

I love all the buce in there.


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## DennisSingh (Nov 8, 2004)

water change


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## DennisSingh (Nov 8, 2004)

wc cont


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## DennisSingh (Nov 8, 2004)




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## DennisSingh (Nov 8, 2004)




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## DennisSingh (Nov 8, 2004)

what think better? in n out/farmer boys?


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## DennisSingh (Nov 8, 2004)

BAck to blank canvas








thats all for this thread, all future updates for this frag moss and shrimp tank go here:
Den's journal


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