Blackwater Aquariums/ soft water tanks

Jimkel

Anyone here keep a black water/ South American themed Aquarium. Im planning on setting one up, have ordered Apistogramma species and cardinal tetras, anyone offer me any advice on keeping soft water?

Rippleman

Hi Jimkel,

SA tanks are a favourite of mine:) What size tank are you setting up?

If your tap water is naturally soft you should have no problem in keeping the water at an acceptable acidic pH. If it is hard you will have a bit more work on your hands. What are your tap water specs? With a little more info I may be able to make a suggestion or two.

Any décor should be inert so as not to affect the water chemistry. River sand, childrens ‘play’ sand, smooth glass chips (from garden centres) or any non-calcerous gravel will be good as a base.

Suitable rocks would be granite, slate, coal (which can look quite magnificent!) and anything else that will not bubble when acid is poured on it.

I would consider bogwood an essential in a blackwater tank. It will slowly leech out tannin and beneficial acids that will help keep the water in good condition. If you are going to keep any Ancistrus in the tank to help with keeping algae under control they will chew on the bogwood to get essential lignin, which is part of their natural diet and prevents constipation. You can never have too much bogwood in the tank!

A ketapang/Indian Almond leaf added directly to the water every month to 6 weeks also improves conditions for the apistos & other SA fish. It has antiseptic & anti-bacterial properties that help with fish health and is often used to induce spawning.

Plants are a great help in keeping water parameters stable but will need sufficient lighting and ‘feeding’ to prosper. That’s an entirely different topic though!

Getting back to basic water... If it needs to be softened or acidified for water changes this should be done at least a day in advance to allow it to ‘settle’. Difficult to comment on without knowing what your tap water is like. Do you have test kits? They are an essential part of fish keeping. If not get some now & test your tap water for pH, GH & KH. Then test a sample of tap water that has been left to ‘age’ for at least 24 hours and compare the results. If they are the same you have very stable water to work with. If there is a difference (e.g. pH has risen or fallen) you will have to take this into account if altering it.

Many South American blackwater fish are bred in captivity and are more adaptable to water conditions than most people give them credit for. Deciding in advance on the exact fish you are going to keep may eliminate a lot of hard work. Sticking to tried and tested varieties that will adapt easier to different water conditions is a lot easier than trying to accommodate wild caught fish that are a lot more demanding of specific parameters.

Hope this is of some help. If you post your tap water test results I may be able to come up with a few suggestions.

Good luck with your new set-up:D

All d best, Rip

Jimkel

My tap water is fairly hard, I'll try find out the GH soon as I can, But lets assume it's rock hard. th PH from the tap is 7.5, so Its not ideal at all.

I set the tank up yesterday. I have had the water cycling with lots of bogwood for 6 weeks so Its good water, I used White cloud mountain minnows to provide ammonia while cycling so the bacteria can grow on the sponge, The same 2 filters went into the tank.

Heres my tank

30 UK Gallon's (4 Foot Standard)

LIGHTING: 1 Aquaglow tube and 1 Reptiglow 5.0 Reptile tube, I know It sound crazy but together they offer a full spectrum of UVB and UVA, Im using Bogwood and I'm gonna get some floating plants to darken the tank, The water's pretty tanned now anyway so its not too bright.

FILTRATION:
I'm using one large (Oldschool) Fluval internal powerhead (Bacterial Sponge filter) and 1 small Fluval internal filter WHich doubles as an oxygen injector, originally with a bacterial sponge and a carbon sponge, I removed the carbon and added peat moss enclosed in nylon to help soften water and lower PH.

PLANTS
At the moment lots of egeria densa (Brazilian water weed, good Nitrate Buster I hear) and 2 large Amazonian Swords

DECOR:
Bogwood, lots and lots, 1 Granite rock, want to avoid hardening water.

SUBSTRATE:
Well a tray off an undergravel filter first, just to ad somewhere for water to flow under, On top of that about 2 inches of Natural Peat moss (Pure, No additives), Plants are potted in this, Then Finally about 2 1/2 inches of Pea sized River gravel.


I have in the tank now

2 temminckii's Bristlenose Catfish, Ancistrus temminckii
2 Dwarf suckermouth catfish, Otocinclus sp.
A shoal of Cardinal tetras

All looking and doing fine.


And I have ordered these, should get them in 2 weeks:

Apistogramma Macmasteri 1 male/2 females
Apistogramma cacatuoides 1 male/2 females

A shoal of black phantom Tetra's
A shoal of silvertip tetra's

I've always kept coldwater Fish in ponds and tanks, I decided to try Tropicals, becuase I live in an apartment now and the Koi and goldfish were HUGE, I considered different types of setups, I didnt really click with the African cichlids because they grow large, and Livebearers didnt do it for me either.That was when I laid eyes upon Blackwater and south American Cichlids! Love at first site!

So this is my new baby, any advice you can give me regarding the set up would be much appreciated, Do you think I'm adding the right amount of fish??

Oh and important question! Ive heard Bacterial sponges become ineffective If the PH drops below a certain number, Is this true??


PS Nice to meet another Blackwater fan, I Don't think there are many, most people seem to go with livebearers, African Cichlids or community fishtanks. Thanks for the tips!!

Rippleman

Hi J,

Sorry 4 d late reply... past couple of days have been a tad hectic 4 me and when I saw your detailed reply I thought to myself "it will have 2 wait"!... But it is now almost 10pm on a Wed night so what else would I do but sift thru ur info and see what I may have to offer

Ok... first off I will tell you that at the moment I have a VERY overstocked 48"x12"x18" due to getting an extra 30 fish last week which I had 2 'dump' in with the already overstocked residents (41). They are all doing fine in a well matured tank that gets gravel cleaned every day and a 30% water change every second day. This is a temporary measure though and I would never recommend that level of stocking in any tank as an ongoing proposal!

Having said that I see no problem with your intended stocking level except for one thing… in a tank that is used as a permanent residence for its inhabitants I am a firm believer in ‘outside filtration’. Many others would disagree with me so I can only offer this opinion from my own experience. I find that removing an internal filter for cleaning maintenance always allows a good deal of the ‘crap’ to drain back into the tank as you try to lift it free of the water. An external filter allows no ‘drain-back’.

The overstocked tank I mentioned above has an Aqua-Pro 2 external (filled with foam for mechanical and sintered glass for biological) with 2 internal filters purely for mechanical. They come with me to the bathroom every morning for a good rinse under the tap before I shave.

Your lighting sounds a tad weird but fine. The Swords may not survive too long in the water but I never worry about which plants survive in my tanks as long as there is a plentiful supply of them. Limia is a good floating plant to help reduce carbonates in the water but on the downside it can be a bit ‘messy’ when you have surface agitation. Java moss is a plant (weed) which I like to have in every tank (ask me another time… I am too much of a fan to cover it in a line or 2).

NOW to the water (oh my God!). Water chemistry is never easy and any advice I may give could be totally off the wall without detailed analysis of tap water. As your pH is 7.5 I would make a semi-educated guess that your GH would be about 16-18 with a KH of 7-9 (IF you live in Dublin… do you?). With this in mind it is very probable that your water supply has ash (slacked lime) added to it that will make it very resistant to pH change. To make Apistos really happy it needs to be diluted with distilled/R.O./DI/rainwater to get it down to about 4GH (which will probably have about 2-3 KH) so that you can adjust the pH. pH can often be lowered easily and successfully in water with a much higher GH/KH than that but I have a sneaky feeling that your tap water may be one of the more resistant ones (I only say that because I had a very similar situation myself for 7 years which broke my heart).

If my assumptions are correct (who was it said ‘never assume anything… it only makes an ASS out of U and ME’?) it may be that the peat you are using as a filter medium to try and soften the water will have little or no effect. It tends to fail miserably when faced with slacked lime unless used in HUMONGUOUS amounts that cannot be considered viable for an apartment. IF I am on track with your situation (and as I said I could be way out because I do not know your exact water situation) I could recommend nothing better than a Reverse Osmosis unit.

Often people shriek in horror at the thought of going to the ‘immense’ expense of installing one of these units to just supply their fish with suitable water. In reality it is a very cheap method of providing YOURSELF with good quality drinking water… FAR better than anything you pay thru the nose for in the local shop! A bottle of ‘mineral’ water in the newsagents costing €1 is full of undesirables and the same amount produced from a RO unit costs mere cents for excellent quality H2O!

If you decide you may go in this direction I can forward you a link to a company in the UK selling excellent units that are very easy to install and much cheaper (even with shipping costs) than you will find here. I SWARE I do not have shares in d company… just a fan b’coz they supply high quality products & do not rip people off.

ANYWAY… I think I have written enough for now. If you want me to spout on a bit more let me know.

All d best, Carl
(OMG... I just saw d time. I have been thinking/typing for almost 2 hours!!!... me off 2 bed NOW!)

nag

Rippleman: around how much are RO units? and where do you attach them? its probably a little extreme for my situation right now but further down the line id probably look into setting one up

and while im at it, what about deionizing the water too? whats the extra benefit with doing that?

Rippleman

nag wrote: »

Rippleman: around how much are RO units? and where do you attach them? its probably a little extreme for my situation right now but further down the line id probably look into setting one up

I do not know what the policy on giving links to other websites (especially when they are selling something) so I have sent you a PM with the details on where to get one at a reasonable cost.
This one sits in the cupboard under the sink and is very easy to attach. The only tricky bit (and even that is easy) is you may have to drill a small hole in the plastic waste pipe.

nag wrote: »

and while im at it, what about deionizing the water too? whats the extra benefit with doing that?

The link I sent you does not include a DI unit. If you add one after the RO unit you will end up with pharmaceutical grade water! It is not necessary unless your tap water is heavily polluted and the RO unit cannot handle it by itself. Mind you in that case I would be more inclined to go for a much bigger RO unit with extra membranes inline. I doubt if your water could be that bad

If you only need small quantities of pure water you can skip the RO unit altogether and just run the tap water through carbon (to remove chlorine) and then through DI resin to get a TDS of 0ppm. This will work out expensive in the long run as you will have to replace the DI resin when it is exhausted. My tap water has a TDS of 82ppm and 1l of mixed bed DI resin will give me 220l of water before having to be replaced. This cannot be taken as standard. Another person’s tap water with the same TDS may only produce half that amount! It depends what is IN the water as to how quickly the resin will exhaust itself.

Hope that helps:)

nag

tnx Rippleman but im still a little confused. i presume you have to connect the RO unit somehow to the water coming into your sink right? or do you manually fill it up? and if its just filtering the water, why connect it to the waste pipe? what waste does it produce? i would have presumed that any waste would be taken out when you're replacing whatever filters it needs?

as you can tell, im totally clueless on this and to make matters worse, ive never even seen one in operation so im completely at a loss. ive only heard of people using them so i thought id find out once and for all what the hell it was

TDS = total dissolved solids?

Rippleman

nag wrote: »

ive only heard of people using them so i thought id find out once and for all what the hell it was

TDS = total dissolved solids?

Sorry mate, I will explain a bit better.

Yes... TDS is total dissolved solids. Basically it is the total combination of everything that has dissolved in the water before it reaches your tap. Water picks up all sorts of things along the way as rain soaks through the ground before finding its way to a river/lake/reservoir. When the water is treated for human consumption it has more things added to help kill bacteria, pathogens etc.
The water supply varies from area to area and ranges from very soft (low TDS) to extremely hard (high TDS). Whatever type of water comes out of your tap NONE of it is suitable for keeping fish in. It will at the very least contain chlorine that will kill them. Adding a water conditioner, bought from an aquatic or pet shop, before using it to keep fish in easily rectifies this. A good one will also bind any deadly ammonia and heavy metals so they will not harm fish.

This leaves you with water suitable for aquarium use but the TYPE of fish that will survive or thrive in it will depend on how hard or soft the water is and whether it is alkaline or acidic. The harder the water the more likely it is to be alkaline and resist any effort to make it acidic (by using peat filtration/acids etc.). If your goal is to keep fish that need soft acid water to live in and your tap water is hard and alkaline then you have to do something to make it suitable. That is where a Reverse Osmosis filter comes in.

RO filters come in many makes and sizes depending what amount of good water you need to produce on a daily basis. The link I sent you is for a 5-stage (I will explain that later) unit that fits in the cabinet under the sink and has a collecting tank that will hold 3 gallons of water. Plenty to supply the house with drinking water and do water changes on a fish tank. A clamp automatically punctures the pipe that brings water to your cold tap so you need no plumbing experience to fit it, just a few simple tools (screwdriver/pliers).

This clamp in turn feeds the water directly to your RO filter system. The water first passes through what is called a Sediment filter to stop any ‘physical’ dirt getting through (rust, silt etc.). This will filter out dirt bigger than 5 microns (EXTREMELY tiny).

Then it passes through a Granular Activated Carbon Filter that will remove chlorine, Odour, Organic Contaminants, Pesticides and Chemicals.

The third stage is another carbon filter but this time a Carbon Block Filter which is highly effective at getting all the other nasty stuff that the granular carbon filter missed including Cryptosporidium Cysts (which are the little critters that have been causing havoc with the Galway water supply of late).

The fourth stage is the actual Reverse Osmosis membrane that only allows good quality water through and rejects the rest (which will have Dissolved Salts, Lead, Copper, Barium, Bacterial By-Products, Oestrogen, Silica etc. in it). The water that is rejected flows through a tube, which you attach to the waste outlet under your sink. This is where you will probably have to drill a hole in the plastic pipe that allows your sink to empty to the drain.

The good water from the RO membrane is passed through one more carbon filter to give it a final ‘polish’. This good water is then sent to the 3-gallon storage tank ready to use whenever you want. The storage tank has a chrome tap that you fit beside your sink taps, which makes it simple to access thewater whenever you want. This of course means you have to drill another hole in the draining board to attach the tap but no plumbing experience is necessary at all. If you can use a screwdriver, pliers and drill you will have no problem fitting one.

There are other ways of doing it but I think you have plenty of info there if you want to research RO a bit more. Check out the rest of the website I sent you for lots more info.

All d best:cool:

nag

a fountain of knowledge! tnx Rippleman

out of curiousity, would water from a britta filter be any good for doing water changes? better than tap water at least?

and i was also told recently that distilled water was the purest form of water. is that true? like, better than RO water?

Rippleman

nag wrote: »

out of curiosity, would water from a britta filter be any good for doing water changes? Better than tap water at least?

Almost any form of filtering will make tap water better. As far as I am aware a Britta filter has a ceramic pre filter to trap physical dirt and a core of activated carbon, which will help remove chlorine and other nasties. Its size is the main drawback as the more contact the water has with the carbon the better it works.

nag wrote: »

i was also told recently that distilled water was the purest form of water. is that true? like, better than RO water?

I researched distilled water some time back but can not remember all the details now. I know triple distilled water is very 'pure' but bear in mind that as soon as purified water comes in contact with air it will start to absorb gases and is no longer quite as 'pure'. Distilled water is also expensive to make, especially in the quantity you need for water changes in a fish tank. The process is also quite slow:(

What type of fish do you keep? It is really not necessary to have overly purified water unless you are keeping the most delicate and sensitive marine life. I have always found that it is better to test you tap water after leaving it to rest for 24 hours and then decide which fish are suitable to live in it. If it turns out to be hard & alkaline then go for African cichlids, livebearers etc. If soft and acidic then Amazonian fish etc. It is much easier to work with the water you have than trying to adjust it to suit other types of fish.

Most fish you buy now are bred specially for the aquatic trade and are hardier than wild caught fish. They will adjust to live in a wider range of water conditions and do not always need to be kept in what would be considered their ideal conditions.

Looking forward to hearing about your tank setup & which fish you keep.

All d best:)

nag

im not in the hobby all that long but with the amount of reading ive been doing, it seems like a lot longer!

my tank is just a community tank (Juwel Rekord 70) and is only three months old. so far ive got:

6 neon tetras
1 guppy
1 otocinclus
1 red-tailed black shark

and last weekend i added:
4 marbled hatchetfish
2 ghost shrimp

i think ive hit a nice balance in the tank now but i do want to get a pleco (obviously not one that grows too big) in the near future

the whole objective of this though is to get sufficient experience with this small tank first and then move to something much bigger, eventually get some fish that require more specific water conditions and eventually move to marine fish. its all just one step at a time but by doing my research now, i'll be informed for the future

Rippleman

nag wrote: »

i think ive hit a nice balance in the tank now but i do want to get a pleco (obviously not one that grows too big) in the near future

It sounds like a nice setup you have. I imagine by the majority of the fish you keep that your water is on the soft side. Your Guppy may not like that too much but should be fine as they are bred in all sorts of conditions to supply the aquatic trade.

A nice plec to add would be a Bristlenose. They are active and friendly fish and the male has lots of 'bristles' on its nose for added interest. It will only grow to about 5" and will help with the algae clean up. They love some fruit or veg put in the tank to munch on. Cucumber is a favourite but a stick of boiled carrot will help other fish to colour up if they decide to nibble on it.

Good luck with your new hobby:)

Rippleman

nag wrote: »

by doing my research now, i'll be informed for the future

Hey nag... if the time comes for you to invest in an RO unit let me know! I have come accross another supplier much cheaper for an initial setup.

The units may not be as sophisticated as the link I sent you but would do the job a lot cheaper.

All d best

nag

heh, awesome

what kind of money we talkin btw?

Rippleman

nag wrote: »

heh, awesome

what kind of money we talkin btw?

Probably less than €50 for a basic unit but let me know when you are actually ready to buy one and I will link you if they are still available.

Jimkel

Rippeleman thanks for all your advice, sorry I abandoned this thread after I got no reply for a few days, didnt realsie how many posts it had.

Well I have a water update, turns out My tap water comes out of the tap at exactly PH 6.8
and not 7.5 as I said in the beginning, basically my uncle who lives around the corner from me told me that there is no way my PH test was right, his waters 6.8 and so should mine, So I bought a good liquid test kit and waddayaknow! 6.8. Turns out my first results were innaccurate, maybe a shoddy test kit, now everytime I do the test its 6.8.

So with my Blackwater efforts in place the tank has been PH 6.4 for the past few weeks, although I have figured out how to produce Water of Between PH 5.5 and 6.0 with minimum effort. I am finetuning this to find out if I can produce a constant PH given, then theres the whole job of acclimatising the fish to a lower PH again, so untill I need to change it Im happy with 6.4.

Not exactly blackwater PH but getting there, My tank looks quite tanned i can tell ya.
One thing Ive noticed regarding the benifits of blackwater is the colour quality in Cardinal Tetras,Rummy nose tetras and rams. they look good in the pet store, but when I get them in the blackwater for a week or 2 they look just stunning. You'll be pleased to hear my Sword plants are actually doing quite well, I think its my weird Light set up . Iv'e been looking for Java Moss, cant find any, please tell all about this plant when ya get a chance,

Rippleman

Jimkel wrote: »

Iv'e been looking for Java Moss, cant find any, please tell all about this plant when ya get a chance,

Sorry for the delay in replying... I saw your post the day you wrote it but have been up to my %$£& with work and did not get a chance to come back to it until now:(
Glad to hear all is well with your blackwater efforts.
I normally have extra Java Moss but sold a load of it recetly so will have to wait for more to grow if you would like some at a later date. Shops rarely stock it as it is difficult to 'display' in shop tanks and hence difficult to sell.
Here is a quick summery of why I like it so much:-

Java Moss is very easy to grow with little to no demands.

• Suitable for both cold and warm water (grows faster in warm water)
• Will grow in very poor lighting but thrives if adaquate light is supplied
• Suitable for very soft or very hard water and everything in-between
• Grows in a wide range of Ph values from Ph 5 - Ph 9
• Uses Ammonia and Nitrate in the water to grow helping keep excellent water quality
• Competes well for nutrients in the water helping to keep algae under control (obviously no one thing will keep algae at bay but every little bit helps)
• Excellent in fry tanks providing hiding places where they can feed off the micro organisms that grow on the plant in abundance as their first food and helps to keep good water quality for them
• Provides a hiding place for timid fish
• Can be attached to rocks, wood and decor (with poly-thread or fishing line) where it will grow and spread giving a magnificent show
• Can be left to grow long fronds or trimmed to a close carpet
• Egg laying fish can use it as a spawning medium which is then easy to remove from the tank once they have laid all their eggs in it

I think that covers most of the merits of this 'weed'... what more could you ask for in an aquarium plant:)

Jimkel

Rippleman wrote: »

Sorry for the delay in replying... I saw your post the day you wrote it but have been up to my %$£& with work and did not get a chance to come back to it until now:(
Glad to hear all is well with your blackwater efforts.
I normally have extra Java Moss but sold a load of it recetly so will have to wait for more to grow if you would like some at a later date. Shops rarely stock it as it is difficult to 'display' in shop tanks and hence difficult to sell.
Here is a quick summery of why I like it so much:-

Java Moss is very easy to grow with little to no demands.

• Suitable for both cold and warm water (grows faster in warm water)
• Will grow in very poor lighting but thrives if adaquate light is supplied
• Suitable for very soft or very hard water and everything in-between
• Grows in a wide range of Ph values from Ph 5 - Ph 9
• Uses Ammonia and Nitrate in the water to grow helping keep excellent water quality
• Competes well for nutrients in the water helping to keep algae under control (obviously no one thing will keep algae at bay but every little bit helps)
• Excellent in fry tanks providing hiding places where they can feed off the micro organisms that grow on the plant in abundance as their first food and helps to keep good water quality for them
• Provides a hiding place for timid fish
• Can be attached to rocks, wood and decor (with poly-thread or fishing line) where it will grow and spread giving a magnificent show
• Can be left to grow long fronds or trimmed to a close carpet
• Egg laying fish can use it as a spawning medium which is then easy to remove from the tank once they have laid all their eggs in it

I think that covers most of the merits of this 'weed'... what more could you ask for in an aquarium plant:)

Thanks very much for the info man,;) If you ever do have excess Java moss I would love to get some off ya, I have seen it recently in a display covering bogwood and it looks fantastic, So far the only moss I've seen in petshops here are "Moss balls" and no one seems to be able to tell me exatcly what plant a "moss ball" is, not the most attractive plant and I don't think it would go well in my tank. My tank is still not "complete" but it's getting there, just have to find me some nice Apistogramma species and I'm set. Plus I've been toying with the idea of a peat or clay only substrate, but i'll need to do my homework first

Rippleman

Jimkel wrote: »

I've been toying with the idea of a peat or clay only substrate

I tried a peat only substrate some years ago but found it to be very messy and as I only use sintered glass as a biological filter medium it clogged it way too quickly. Other less porous filter media may last a little longer before needing a good cleaning. Too much filter maintainance for my liking:(

I boiled it first to help waterlog it so that it would stay at the bottom but found that the slightest disturbance in the tank caused it to enter the water column and quickly get sucked into the filter. I have not experimented with it since and would be interested in hearing back from you if you have better success.

I now prefer to use Indian Almond Leaves sometimes mixed with oak or beech leaves as a substrate as they hold their shape well and do a very good job of helping keep the water parameters good. IAL's also have anti-bacterial and anti-fungal properties which help with keeping fish healthy.

Clay I have never used. Let me know how you get on with it if you go that route.

Jimkel

Rippleman wrote: »

I now prefer to use Indian Almond Leaves sometimes mixed with oak or beech leaves as a substrate as they hold their shape well and do a very good job of helping keep the water parameters good. IAL's also have anti-bacterial and anti-fungal properties which help with keeping fish healthy.

Clay I have never used. Let me know how you get on with it if you go that route.

yeah I tried boiling it and letting it settle (in a pot, not the tank) just to see how it behaves, and I found it too easy to disturb. I think I'll avoid it then, on your advice.

I think clay could be an option I could even use it over peat, it would hold the peat down, and be great for planting. Finding some pure, toxin free Clay might be difficult and i've no idea about the mineral content of clay effecting hardness.

However My latest Brainstorm was to get some peat moss into a large tray with a few inches of water, let it sink and plant it with underwater short grass (or even Java moss). Give it a few weeks/months to settle and the grassroots should hold it together pretty well, then just carefully transfer it to the tank, over a few inches of new peat. if it works you would have a beautiful, and nitrite busting substrate that wont be disturbed by fish. You could also plant what you want in it then. Not really a blackwater idea but I't just might be worth a try.

Jimkel

PS where do ya get the Almond leaf? and does it and the oak leaves need regular replacing? Is this the only substrate you use, or do you have gravel as well?

Rippleman

You are a fund of ideas:)
I am really interested in hearing how you get on with trying out both the clay and 'tray of peat'.
Will you keep me up-to-date?
I can pm you my email address if you prefer to mail me direct… although there may be others reading this thread that are also interested.

PS where do ya get the Almond leaf? and does it and the oak leaves need regular replacing? Is this the only substrate you use, or do you have gravel as well?

I have one tank with gravel which I just scatter some leaves over and another with glass bottom and nothing but leaves as a substrate. The leaf only tank I am going to change to incorporate a r/f undergravel filter. For decorative value (as you live in an apartment) I would go with a scattering of leaves over a 'pretty' base to keep things looking good. Apistos may 'set up home' in the leaves and surprise you with a brood of fry you did not even know were there:D
I had a huge box of Almond leaves sent from Thailand. They were not cheap but do a great job and hold their shape very well. This time of year you can collect fallen oak & beech leaves but I do find they start to disintergrate in the water quicker and after doing a bit of research found that they do not have the added medicinal benefits of Almond leaves. I have a plentyful supply if you want to experiment with some.
All d best, Rip

Jimkel

Thanks for the info man (And the Blacwater support). Suprised I found someone who has an interest in these things too, I'll keep ya posted on how I get on, I'm gonna try source some Almond leaves while im at it, if I find an easier way to get them I'll let ya know.