Forest Aquascape or forest style decorative in the aquarium is most popular among the users. It is becoming prevalent due to its innovative aspects of the aqua style. You get a good scope in the Forest aquascape and utilize your imagination to produce a unique aquarium. Forest aquascape looks fantastic in the fish tank kept in the home.
You have the opportunity to mimic the beautiful scenery of the forest in your fish tank. Give your fish a natural habitat where they can enjoy their time roaming around the aqua forest.
How To Create A Forest Aquascape?
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Here is the step-by-step guide to start building your Forest aquascape.
1) Pick the aquarium:
The aquarium must have sufficient space to set up all the material and creates a breathtaking view. Forest aquascape creates the illusion of the dept when properly arranged. The tank and dept size would determine how perfect that illusion will be in your fish tank.
The small tank with less dept would not be able to create the required illusion, and your efforts to build the beautiful-looking aquarium would be futile. The ultimate goal is to build an aquarium that looks bigger and feels like an actual rainforest. It would help if you tried to achieve the forest that feels some forest elements are farther away.
Tank dimension around 15.5 litter by 12.5 and 11 height would consume sufficient water and provide the required depth.
You need a space in the tank to arrange the elements in an excellent order form, giving you a pleasant look. The cube-style aquarium is also great, with equal size on all sides. Forest style would look awesome in the 40-gallon breeder aquarium.
2) Collecting the materials:
Finding the right material for the forest-style aqua scaping is a crucial part of the process.
Before you decide to style your aquarium with forest aqua scaping, you should consider the amount of time it would take to place all the material in the water and the cost connected to buying these products. Here is the list of the materials you would require to decorate your forest aquascape.
1) Tank:
Large enough to place all the material in the tank.
2) Substrate:
The Substrate would require to cover the bottom with the naturally found sand or gravel.
3) LED Light:
The LED lighting would produce natural light that mimics the aquarium’s sunlight. The shadow of the lives, trees, and other elements would make the aquariums look extraordinary.
4) Filter:
A filter for cleaning the water regularly would be needed to keep the waste product away from the water.
5) Wood:
A special type of aquariums wood can be purchased from the aquarium store. Choose the particular wood which looks similar.
6) Rock:
Choose a rock that mimics the forest condition in the water.
7) Glue:
You might have to stick some parts of the equipment, trees, and rocks to each other to form the natural-looking forest.
The plants you buy from the aquarium would be in different shapes and sizes. Cut them to prepare the perfectly looking forest and arrange them carefully in the water.
8) Plants:
Dwarf hair grass, mini Christmas moss, or any other elements that would help you style your forest would be great.
9) CO2:
You may require a CO2 regulator to ensure the level of CO2 in the water is not going up. It may be harmful to the fish.
You can use any materials in the fish tank that elevates the style of the aquarium.
How to create the Aquascaping jungle (forest aquarium)?
The core element of the Aquascaping jungle is wood. The right type of wood enhances the beauty of the Aquascaping jungle (forest aquarium). You may have to spend a reasonable amount of time researching and finding suitable wood that sustains longer underwater and does not react to the water.
Any wood that reacts to the water condition would be lethal for the fish. It would help if you chose only those wood types naturally found in the water, river body, or driftwood.
Working on the wood:
The wood arrangement is the daunting task of making Aquascaping jungle. Every piece of wood will require a proper placement to keep them in a stable position. You may have to tie them to fix them together.
If needed, create a base where all the standing pieces of the wood will reside comfortably without falling. Ensure that the moving water does not affect the wood structure. If it falls in the water, it may harm the fish.
The filter may create vibration in the water, so consider all the aspects before putting the water in it. Hard fixing would be needed to make the wood structure stand its own. Next, arrange the wood, so the front side of the tank is kept free for swimming.
Put the larger and thicker pieces of the wood in the front and smaller and thinner pieces at the back in a way that creates the illusion of the dept in the forest. Forest aquascape would stand out when the wood is arranged in proper order to gain the right ambiance in the fish tank.
Placing Rock:
Well, rocks are a vital ingredient of the forest aquascape. Without the perfect rock, the aquarium would look empty. Arrange the rocks to produce a natural-looking fish tank. There is no fixed pattern that you should follow when placing the rocks in the tank.
Focus on the natural feel and arrangement. Anything that looks unnatural should be removed or rearranged. Keep the scale in mind. Match with the wood pattern and keep the large rock in the front and smaller-sized rocks back in large to a small order.
Planting the Plants:
Once the rock placement is done, the next step is placing the plants. Forest Aquscaping would be incomplete without having the tiny plants that improve the aesthetic of the fish tank.
It is the make or breaks part of the whole forest aqua scaping procedure. It is recommended that you should keep the planting as simple as possible. Do not overboard it to fill the gap.
Keep sufficient space in the tank so that fish would have an incredible swimming experience between the forest and the plant. You are trying to mimic the natural rainforest in the aquarium style. Put the plan in the large to small order where the large plants are kept in the front and small at the back.
Ensure that you are not using the large leaves plant. The plant you use many looks like bushes in front of the large size wood structure. If the plant has a large leave, then it may destroy the whole purpose of the forest aquascape style.
Try to maintain the natural look and reduce the amount of the large leaves of the plant. Your forest aquascape-style aquarium is mimicking the large-scale forest in the minuscule version.
Maintain the Look:
When you put the live plants in it, they grow exponentially when the water condition is good for them to thrive. You maintain your fish tank with the perfect forest aquascape and do not allow the plant to grow without direction. Cut some part of it if it is destroying the essence of the fish tank.
Make sure that the fish has sufficient space to swim. Arrange the growing plant. If required, let the plan grow outside the water where the roots are still in the aquarium. Aquscaping jungle designing and maintenance is part of the procedure.
You cannot put the live jungle as it is and let it grow the way it wants. Have full control over it so that when the aquascaping jungle reaches its peak, you can remove some of the plants from the tank and separate them in the other tank.
Water condition:
Considering the lots of live elements in the water may produce a good amount of waste material. It would be best if you kept an eye on the water condition. If you find the water is cloudy or dusty, immediately replace some portion of the water. Advisable to change 25% of water to avoid the development of the health problem to the fish.
Also, clean the filter regularly to remove the waste product stuck in the filter. The filtration process removes the waste and adds oxygen to the water. If the oxygen level drops in the water, increase the filtration process’s speed and hose more power to increase the oxygen level.
Also, moderate the CO2 level in the water, especially in the nighttime when the plant produces the CO2. Water containing a high level of CO2 would be dangerous.
Conclusion: How To Create A Forest Aquascape?
The forest aquascape would be easy to build and can make your aquarium look awesome. It would help if you did not go overboard when planting trees, wood, and rocks. It is a tedious job and requires more patience.
So you do not have time to do it, you should avoid it as some Forest aquascape take days to complete depending on the size of the aquarium. If you do not arrange the trees and wood properly in the aquarium, the whole purpose of setting up the Forest aquascape will be futile.
Prepare yourself early to get your Aquascaping jungle ready without additional requirements.
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