My 55 Gallon...Unplanted w/ Driftwood

[The Curious]

I've always been extremely intrigued by planted tanks and usually have put a large amount of focus on keeping plants in my tanks.

I recently cleared out my 55 gallon tank of all plants...I am now keeping Oscars and they would perfer my plants all be uprooted :doh: . I also removed all of my gravel and replaced it with cheap play sand from Lowe's that I carefully cleaned and rinsed.

I then found a driftwood/tree that had washed onto shore off the coast of Sapelo Island in Georgia a few weeks ago. I sawed the root structure off of the 8-9 foot tall tree and brought the root structure back home to cure.

Now the driftwood has cured...sand has settled...and plants have been moved to a 10 gallon guppy breeding tank.

I love the simplicity of my new set-up...My Oscars seem to dig it as well.

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The walls of my place look purple/pink from the heat lamp running in my Turtle tank...thought it added a cool mood to the pics

[SW Florida Kid]

Wow! That looks great! =) Very nice!!!

[The Curious]

Thanks...I dig the blue look you got going on. I just gave my lil bro a 30 gallon with the same blue gravel look. Good stuff.

I see you got a red-eared slider too...is that what you are planning on putting in the blue 55 or do you have something else set-up for him?

[SW Florida Kid]

Thanks...I dig the blue look you got going on. I just gave my lil bro a 30 gallon with the same blue gravel look. Good stuff.

I see you got a red-eared slider too...is that what you are planning on putting in the blue 55 or do you have something else set-up for him?

Thanks!

I have the turtle in another tank.

The 55 gallon is in the middle of cycling right now. Right now, it's just an empty tank. The gravel is a black and blue mix. I really liked it. I still have to decide what else I wanna do with the tank.

[gm72]

That driftwood may be the single coolest piece I have ever seen.

[The Curious]

That driftwood may be the single coolest piece I have ever seen.


My exact reaction when I found it under a bunch of debris in a marsh...and the perfect fit for a 55 too....:19: thumbs2: :19:

Thanks!!!
I wanna get a pic with a better camera so that the gnarliness can truly be seen...hehe...these pics don't do the driftwood justice.

[rich311k]

Very nice. I like it.

[DrNic]

Tank looks great! Do the oscars move around the rocks at all?

[The Curious]

I kinda put them all together thinking the Os might move them around a bit, but so far the rocks have been paid no interest.

[Rhaethe]

I really like that. Really neat piece of driftwood :shappy:

[kathymac]

Love your driftwood, nice looking setup.//

[lowlight]

Nice piece of driftwood. For a basic no hassle set up that is cool.

[fins_n_fur]

What a great piece of driftwood!

[The Curious]

thumbs2: Thanks guys...it was kinda funny...I had to take a ferry back to the mainland and I wasn't sure if I would be allowed to take the driftwood with me, but a group of 20 of us were camping on the island so we had enough baggage along that I wrapped the piece in a blanket, inside of a trash bag, and duct taped around the whole thing and it blended perfectly with our massive mound of camping equipment.

Until I got off the ferry and put the piece in the car I kept thinking, "please don't look too hard at the random shaped trashbag", but they didn't and I succeeded...this is contraband driftwood right here...hehe...thumbs2:

[The Curious]

I'm in the process of getting a strip of 72 LED lights that I'm gonna glue to the underside of the plastic top of the tank, in the front directly over the driftwood. I ordered them and recieved them in the mail, but only 3 worked so I'm waiting on a replacement package to be shipped.

Like I said the wood looks much better with more light, and I think this strip is gonna really highlight the structure even more. I put one plastic plant on the left side of the tank...looks nice...I do think I'm gonna get ten or so Marimo balls for the tank as well. They seem to be a plant the Oscars would enjoy moving around and that wouldn't just get torn to bits + they look pretty damn cool.