Planters - What are my options?

[Dancingmad]

Anyone use planters for their Macros? Kicking around using some smaller terra cotta pots or an acrylic box w/ some "Mud" and sand as a substrate.

I'd like to grow some "shaving brushes" and Halimeda again but either my tank is bare bottom, or doesn't have the open sandspace for these.

Shaving brushes are one of my favorites because they can propagate w/ runners. Start having tiny trees emerge from your sandbed - Totally cool.

Comments, pictures, suggestions, and snarky remarks are all appreciated!

 

[TriggerFinger]

I have seen a bare bottom tank that made a sand pit by stacking rocks just so their wrasse had a place to sleep. I’ve also seen Tupperware with sand but if you don’t like the look you could camouflage it with rubble and coral. Terra cotta pots are used a lot in breeding tanks so that’s also a good option.

 

[ichthyogeek]

If by "planter" you mean taking a spare rectangular tupperware container and filling it with crushed coral pieces then yeah I've tried it. I needed to make a space for a pistol shrimp, and had some Caulerpa prolifera I wanted planted. It's doing okay (not good, but not horrible) with what it's got.

I would add some rubble around the edges of any planters you get. Right now, my tupperware is kind of an eyesore...

 

[Dancingmad]

Thanks for the replies! I've also seen these glass orbs with a section cut out that mount using suction cups. I just see those falling down and dumping sand everywhere.

@ichthyogeek any issue with sand escaping from the tupperware? How much clearance did you give between the bed and edge?

 

[ichthyogeek]

Given that it was crushed coral, what I did was I filled the tupperware up to around the area where the lid snaps on, and then added water there. Then once most of the air bubbles had escaped, I gently submerged it into the tank. There wasn't much in the way of crushed coral floating (since it's already a fairly dense and porous substrate).

With miracle mud or oolite, I think I'd do the same thing, but I'd go ahead and stir the substrate after adding in water to reduce the amount of air bubbles that got into the tupperware.

Since the tank the caulerpa's in doesn't have any fish that can cause sandstorms like wrasses, I felt comfortable going with a fairly low margin between the substrate and the lip. If you're worried, you could always put a .5"-1" gap between the substrate and the lip of the container.

 

[Dancingmad]

Okay, Appreciate the input! I'm going to put something a little more coarse than oolite on top of the mud. I like the idea of adding water mixing it up - those pesky air bubbles could be a problem.