New Riparium Setup in 50-gallon Tank

Hi Everybody, This is a project that I started a couple of weeks ago, but I'll begin here with my first pictures. I am putting together a riparium display that will showcase plants, of course, along with a really cool new fish that I recently acquired, the small Synodontis catfish, S. lucipinnis. Here is a shot of the group of seven individuals acclimating in their shipping bag.



And here is a picture of the 50-gallon (190 litre) aquarium. Unlike most of the ripariums that I have set up this one is filled most of the way to the top.





I think that it has about 32 gallons (121 litres) or so of water in it. I painted the background behind the underwater portion with black latex paint, while leaving the glass behind the above-water part clear. I have generally found that it is easiest to do a convincing riaprium scape in a tank filled to only about 40% full (using the golden section as a guide), so it will be interesting to see how this one turns out.

More later...

Thanks very much Jur4ik.

Here is a shot of the setup with gravel and a view of life support.



This picture was dated December 10. You can see that the appliances really are very simple. I just included a 100 watt Eheim heater and a Fluval 205 canister filter. The filter pipes were modified slightly to reach down to lowered water surface. I have since added a Koralia nano powerhead for a little more water circulation.

Here's the hardscape that I am starting out with.



If I need a change it will be easy enough to switch up those stones for something else later on. There will be only a few plants planted in the bottom.

Here is the emersed layout with the first of the plants.



This picture was dated 13 December 2009.

And here is a quick description of the selections, beginning from the left.

• Limnophila aromatica, this is an excellent riparium plant for creating a floating carpet of stems. Here it is planted in a hanging planter, then trained to grow across a trellis raft.
• Cyperus ??, I don't know which variety this is. I wish that I had not lost the variety information, because this one is perfect for riaprium culture. Most of the other ones that I have tried grow to be too large.
• Bacopa ??, I am not certain, but I believe this one to be madagascariensis. It is really great for creating a floating carpet. It looks thin here, but I will trim the growing tips to encourage branching and make a nice dense green carpet.
• Cyrtosperma johnstonii, this thing is really cool. It is a tropical aroid with unique red-veined leaves. It might eventually grow too large for this setup, but for right now it is only growing very slowly. I wrote an entry about it over in the Plants sub-forum,
• Lipia nodiflora, this is not a true aquatic, but it grows as a creeping stem in wet areas. I have seen it a few times in Florida.
• Echinodorus cordifolius 'Tropical Marble Queen', this is an excellent riparium plant. Here it is sort of competing with the C. johnstonii as a centerpiece, but the two also make an interesting contrast with each other. The leaves are about the same size on each, but white-variegated in the sword, but re-veined in the aroid.

Here is a full-tank shot.



This one was dated 16 December 2009.

Thanks. I agree that the emersed portion and the underwater portion seem to be visually separated. The effect is somewhat better in person. I have found that it is generally easier to resolve these riparium layouts in tanks that only have 1/3 or so of depth filled with water and with most the foliage (emersed and immersed) all within the same frame.

I have since added some underwater foliage, which is beneficial because it puts some green into that area. I need to go dig up a couple more pictures.

Here is a shot with just one underwater plant, a small Amazon sword.



I am working on getting a few similar plants into that area. You can see that having the fish in there also helps to build dimension for the underwater portion.

Thanks very much. The plants are mounted primarily with these magnet planters.



Some of the other less expensive planters use suction cups. There are also some plants planted onto raft planters.

simply fantastic!
I'm also comninciando to appreciate this type tubs, beautiful outside and inside the essential ...
just as one feeds the plants emerged?
lighting and how many watts per liter?
What kind of light and color?
I use 80w HPL from 6500k

Thanks so much elmagico82. That setup that you have is very nice. The Hydrocotyle is a very good choice for this kind of display.

This riparium that I have has a fixture with two 6500K 39-watt HO T5 lamps. The tank is a 200 liter (90cm X 45cm X 45cm).

I have another new shot from a couple of nights ago. I moved some of the rocks around.

Yes you are right Jur4ik. It is just difficult because now that the Synodonits are larger I need to make more cave room for them. The best way to make the caves is to stack the larger rocks on top of smaller stones, but this is not such a good representation of how the rocks would be arranged in nature.

I might work on moving the hardscape around some this week to look for a better solution.

The Bacopa lawn has finally started to cover well. You can see just a couple of little corners of the foam trellis raft around the edges.



It took some time and training to get it to grow like this. As the stems have grown longer I have snipped them off where they reach past the edge of the raft. This encourages branching and more compact growth.

The other night I admired the Echinodorus cordifolius 'Tropica Marble Queen' that I have going off in the right corner of this tank.



This is such a nice plant. It is the perfect size and shape for growing in a riparium. This variety of E. cordifolius grows rather slowly and stays smallish, so it does not become unruly the way that the species does.

Here is a close-up showing that white leaf variegation.

I got some update pictures last night. Here is the full-tank shot...



...and here's a different angle.

Here is a quick photo-update. That plants are looking happy enough.