Planting Providence Per Poseidon's Pleasure

Well that was an adventure.  As you can see to the right, I did not know how to put water in a tank with soil in it.  I have now gone online and learned that I should have covered the bottom with loose plastic and poured on that.  But hey, live and let learn.

The trouble just continued after that.  I did not know how to put together the filter.  Eheim makes top brand filters, but their instructions were pretty much unreadable.  So what should have been a quick setup turned into an hour of me online trying to piece together stuff from YouTube.  Come to find out I had it completely backwards, for future reference, inflow is at the bottom and outflow is at the top.  I actually have blisters on my fingers from turning the fasteners back and forth because none of the tubing fit correctly.  I went out and bought clear tubing because who in the world wants green tubing, I mean come on!  Also because the sizes fit weird, my inline heater is in the inflow instead of the outflow, but today the water was much warmer than a bucket I sat out for the night, so I think all will be well.

I still have 2 pieces of green tubing, the inflow and outflow pipes, but I just bought some really nice glass ones on Amazon in order to preserve the minimalist style I am going for.  I also don't like the black on the CO2 bubble counter and diffuser on the left of the tank, but since it is mostly clear I am going to keep it up.

Well all the little patches of grass is called Dwarf Hairgrass and I will be using it to "carpet" the bottom of my tank.  Planted on each side and to the back of the driftwood is some Telanthera Cardinalis that I am hoping will grow up around it and kind of surround the wood. You can also see one of the two Green Cryptocoryne that I am putting up in the front of the driftwood, hoping to give it a weeping affect from the wood down to the grass, just to keep the eye flowing from top right to bottom left.  In the back left corner, I am trying some Umbrella Papyrus in the back left corner, should hide some of my stuff and I felt it would be too bare on the left side of the tank.  We will see how I feel once everything grows in on whether or not I keep it.  I am on a wait list for some Java Moss that I want to put on the driftwood.

Well enjoy the couple of pictures I have below.  I will post some more in a day or so, once the water clears up.  And here is hoping to some plants a growing!