Bioactive drainage question

[JoXie411]

Trying to picture what you are talking about. You are saying to get a 2" pvc pipe with the pump inside the pipe at the bottom?

Got you fam

 

[Tony_S]

Got you fam

This is how I'm planning on doing mine. I was talking about having the fountain pump in it to pump out the water

 

[JoXie411]

This is how I'm planning on doing mine. I was talking about having the fountain pump in it to pump out the water

He has one with a pump but I’m having a hard time find it when I find it I will tag you

 

[JoXie411]

This is how I'm planning on doing mine. I was talking about having the fountain pump in it to pump out the water

Ok this diagram is the best I can find for now but I don’t give up

 

[Brodybreaux25]

Ok this diagram is the best I can find for now but I don’t give upView attachment 241926

Good post^

 

[Tony_S]

I agree, I wouldn't want to dig everything up when the pump dies

 

[JoXie411]

I agree, I wouldn't want to dig everything up when the pump dies

That’s why I would rather cut a hole in the false bottom

 

[Tony_S]

Can someone supply a link for the bulkhead you are using? I can always get my local glass company to cut it for me.

 

[FramsChams]

So, there're two common methods of dealing with draining in bioactive enclosures: installing a bulkhead (which can be risky with glass enclosures if you're not skilled with a drill!), or providing some other form of access to the water table. It didn't take me long to rule out bulkheads for me, so I havent done a lot of research on how to make it work, but I'll share what I plan on doing (yay graveyard shift doodles!! )

View attachment 228406

Essentially, I'm going to take a PVC pipe (or similar), drill some small holes in it that will allow water through but not the hydroballs/drainage material, and place it in one of the corners of my viv. Then I'll build my substrate layers (hydroballs, barrier, soil, leaf litter) around it, and cap it off with something so that feeders and CuC can't get lost in there. That'll allow me to siphon off excess water with a baster or similar if the water table gets too high. A bit of water isn't bad, though, and can be beneficial as it carries a lot of nutrient run off! It's stagnation that can be harmful. I may skip the barrier layer to allow roots to dip right into the "nutrient soup", but haven't made a final decision yet.

Hope that helps! I'm still doing some reading on the matter, but these are my plans so far.

We did just about this same thing when we were glass and bioactive. We used a wet/dry vac to syphon the water whenever we needed. It worked great!