# My Walstad style bowls



## madness (Jul 31, 2011)

I mostly just posted this thread to demonstrate another successful example of the NPT bowl method. The bowls are pretty boring in terms of aquascaping. I was worried about getting them cycled and establishing the plant mass and am going to rely upon the eventual Red Cherry Shrimp population to provide the primary visual appeal. I have an expanding fire red population in one tank and a standard (but surprisingly high quality) RCS population in a 10G tank and I will move some of them over as soon as I get the time to net out some shrimp and move them.

Before I thinned out the frogbit in order to spread it to another tank it had gone nuts in these bowls. I have the same strain of frogbit and the same batches of Dwarf Sag in other tanks and the growth in these two bowls of both plants just went crazy. The frogbit roots actually were touching the substrate.

I would assume that the organics released when the tank was started are what was behind the rapid growth of the frogbit because I have high light in my other tanks (but inert substrate) and it does not grow as quickly or look as healthy in the other tanks. Perhaps the lack of surface agitation helps too. For the dwarf sag the nutrient rich substrate is obviously the likely factor behind the accelerated growth. 

The only ferts that I have added are if I have left over water change water from the big tanks and I add it to the bowls to top them off but that is rare.


----------



## kamikazi (Sep 3, 2010)

nice!!


----------



## BruceF (Aug 5, 2011)

Looking good!


----------



## madness (Jul 31, 2011)

kamikazi said:


> nice!!


You were one of the inspirations.

My original plan was to have a german hybrid sword plant growing emersed out of one of the bowls but when they arrived they were fully grown which put an end to that idea. 

I think that I may have to pick up one of those 4 gallon tall cube vase things that a couple of people around here have been using lately and try again.


----------



## Newman (Jul 3, 2010)

these look nice. they do remind me of my own =)

I think the more red shrimp varieties would really look great in here!


----------



## LucyLoofa (Jan 24, 2011)

What plants are you using? How often do you change the water? 
I would like to have this kind of success after just two months. That grew in very fast!


----------



## mcqueenesq (Aug 29, 2011)

I'm really digging this bowl concept. I can't believe how healthy your plants look in there.


----------



## madness (Jul 31, 2011)

LucyLoofa said:


> What plants are you using? How often do you change the water?
> I would like to have this kind of success after just two months. That grew in very fast!


I have frogbit and duckweed floating on top (the duckweed I would love to get rid of though).

I have dwarf sag planted all over the substrate and that is what the long stalks that are bending over near the surface are. Then I have large amounts of java moss glued to hardscape. One bowl has a piece of driftwood completely covered in java moss and the other has a granite stone that you can't even see because it just looks like a giant ball of java moss.

There are a few stem plants in there somewhere that I grabbed from other tanks and there are a couple of crypt wendtii green in one bowl and a red tiger lotus in the other bowl but the mass of plants makes both hard to see.

Neither the dwarf sag or the frogbit grow anywhere near this lush or fast in my other tanks (with filtration and with sporadic fert dosing). The combination of the miracle gro organic complete potting mix at the bottom of the bowl and just letting the water and chemicals stew in the bowl really seemed to make the plant growth go crazy. The first two weeks growth was sort of slow and normal then it just went nuts.


----------



## madness (Jul 31, 2011)

LucyLoofa said:


> What plants are you using? How often do you change the water?
> I would like to have this kind of success after just two months. That grew in very fast!


I have never changed the water - only topped off.

When I add shrimp I will probably start topping off with distilled water so that I don't get a mineral build-up in the tank. I probably ought to do SOME water changes as well at that point just to help protect the shrimp but in a bowl this densely planted there is only so much you can do in it without messing up the plants and scaping.


----------



## Newman (Jul 3, 2010)

you can always trim up the plants and moss (trim the dead or yellowing leaves on the dwarf sag)
that should free up some room. dont trim too much at once or youll get an algae bloom, but I trim my bowl's moss once in a while and it does good for the bowl - improves oxygen circulation etc.


----------



## madness (Jul 31, 2011)

I finally got around to adding some Red Cherry Shrimp to the bowls 4-5 days ago. So far they seem to be doing fine but to be honest I don't pay much attention to them other than dropping in food every other day or so.

I will update this periodically in regards to the shrimp health and population which I plan to just let run wild. People seem to be interested in how the shrimp will do in these heavily planted bowls so I figured I would test it out a bit.


----------



## Newman (Jul 3, 2010)

you should be successful as long as you keep the plants from choking out the shrimp lol! I find that to be a problem in my bowl; i need to trim my taiwan moss very soon...


----------



## psalm18.2 (Oct 16, 2010)

How do you keep the water from stinking? Every time I have tried the NPT method I get horrible smelling water. I've had to throw every try away.


----------



## h4n (Jan 4, 2006)

what kind of glue did you use to glue down the moss?


----------



## Newman (Jul 3, 2010)

psalm18.2 said:


> How do you keep the water from stinking? Every time I have tried the NPT method I get horrible smelling water. I've had to throw every try away.


that's odd, did you cap the soil with something and let it sit as planted for a while? i never noticed a smell, but eventually the plants just take over and use up all the phosphate/nitrate and w/e else may be causing a smell from the soil. you also should be changing water, so the bowl never really gets a chance to smell other than an earthly plant smell.


----------



## jerilovesfrogs (Oct 22, 2010)

cool little bowls! are they heated? you need to get some shrimp in there asap! =]


----------



## magma (Oct 31, 2011)

You have same very nice growth in your tank! I have the same question as @psalm, do the tanks smell bad/how do you deal with this?

-magma


----------



## madness (Jul 31, 2011)

I have never noticed any sort of smell that differs from what my other planted tanks smell like.

I think that the stagnant water smell which people probably are expecting is missing because whatever algae or bacteria normally causes it is out-competed by all the plants (especially the floating plants).

I probably have more MGOC potting mix than anyone would recommend since I didn't estimate the volumes very well when filling it so I would imagine that if I don't have problems with organics being released by the soil causing problems (algae, smell, massive ammonia, etc.) then people with thinner layers of soil should be even less likely to have those problems.

I have not wiped the inside of the glass on the bowl even once yet and I still don't notice any algae. There ARE natural tannins in the bowl which must be from the soil but they don't hurt anything and since the planting is so dense they aren't really noticeable either. I am sure that a few 50% water changes would probably get rid of them if it was something that bothered me.

I have no equipment of any sort in the bowls - no heater, no air stone or water circulating or oxygenating device of any sort. I keep the bowl in the middle of a room (away from windows) to avoid temperature spikes from drafty windows and other than that I just let the central air/heating do the work since I run it year round at ~75.

With just plants (or just plants and Neocaridina shrimp like the Red Cherry Shrimp) you can really get away with a LOT in these bowls since both the plants and the RCS are so tolerant of water conditions. If you wanted to put fish (even nano fish) or Crystal Red Shrimp like Newman has done then I imagine that it starts to push the envelope of what a bowl this small can manage without using heaters, filters, etc.

Newman: are you talking about the plants literally choking out the shrimp or was it more of an aesthetic issue with the overgrown bowl?


----------



## madness (Jul 31, 2011)

psalm18.2 said:


> How do you keep the water from stinking? Every time I have tried the NPT method I get horrible smelling water. I've had to throw every try away.


I tried the bowl first and after about 6 weeks without problems (and with incredible plant growth) I decided to try it in a regular aquarium.

The nice thing about the bowls is that they are small enough that you CAN just toss the contents out if things don't work out for some reason.


----------



## Newman (Jul 3, 2010)

When the plants get too up against the glass and cover most of the bowl from top to bottom, then I think the shrimp might not only have issues of getting around to find food, but also might have the issue of being suffocated. 

Especially at night, when the plants are consuming oxygen, and there isn't enough access from the bottom of the bowl to the top of the bowl, where oxygenation happens via air flowing over the surface of the water. Plant growth that is too dense side to side and from top to bottom might cause stratification in the bowl, with the most oxygen depleted areas at the bottom, where shrimp like to be.

This is why i trim my moss from time to time - it creates as sort of seal by growing outwards and blocking the mixing of water at the bottom of the bowl with the water that is above the mass of moss.

Daytime isn't much of an issue because all this plant mass produces a heck of a lot of oxygen that gets dissolved =)


----------



## magma (Oct 31, 2011)

Thanks a lot for this! Very useful information. I have a couple of spots where I could keep a bowl like that. I think i will give this a shot.


----------



## madness (Jul 31, 2011)

magma said:


> Thanks a lot for this! Very useful information. I have a couple of spots where I could keep a bowl like that. I think i will give this a shot.


If possible go with a larger bowl. I don't mean go with a larger bowl than the one that I have, I mean that if you have several options to choose from then choose the larger option. 

These can be made to work with relatively small bowls but at this size any extra water volume can make a huge difference in terms of making the bowl more stable and easier to take care of.


----------



## madness (Jul 31, 2011)

About a week ago I pulled the moss covered driftwood piece out of one of the bowls in order to use it in my new 20G high Tangerine Tiger tank. It left a large space unoccupied in the middle of that bowl (though you still can't see into it because of Dwarf sag near the close and floaters on the surface. I have been debating what to put back in the center of the bowl.

Today in my Amazon tank I noticed that one of my Tanzende Feuerfeder swords had cast off a baby (daughter?) plant. Looks like a crypt floating at the surface of the tank (I actually thought that it was a crypt since when I get plant orders I sometimes toss them in this tank for a day or two until I find time to plant them) but it appears to be a fully formed baby sword plant. The 20" flowering stem is suddenly gone and the new plant appears to have been the result of the previous bloom.

Anyways, I originally bought this particular sword (as well as some Kleiner Prinze swords) to be the centerpieces of the bowls but they arrived full grown and way too big for the bowls.

I think that I am going to thin out the floaters on one of the bowls and plant the plantlet from the red sword right in the middle of it and let it grow emersed (they get like 2 feet tall in proper conditions).

I will post new pics when I get done with it.


----------



## Seedreemer (Sep 28, 2008)

Very pretty! I love these natural little bowls.


----------



## Newman (Jul 3, 2010)

sounds like a plan, i would like to see this sword.


----------



## madness (Jul 31, 2011)

Newman said:


> sounds like a plan, i would like to see this sword.


Me too. 

It arrived emersed grown (so it looked different) and the tank that it is in has had such tannin heavy water that all I can tell is that the leaves darken up nicely - from what I have seen in pictures it is probably a heavy red straying into the brown - but when I pull the colored up plantlet out of the tank it will be the first time that I have seen the colors under clear light.


----------



## madness (Jul 31, 2011)

These tanks have carried on as before (let run wild and mostly neglected).

I noticed baby RCS in one of the tanks the other night while feeding though. 

Really a testament to how hardy Neocaridina Heteropoda is once established in a tank.


----------



## GMYukonon24s (May 3, 2009)

Beautiful bowls.


----------

