I'm quite proud of this build so I'm going to do a quick runthrough:
Before adding anything else I started with the 3d backdrop, which is now mostly obscured by the plants. This is the "stone granite" background by Juwel aquariums. The giant wood centerpiece isn't stuck into the soil, but actually attached to a metal stand that is suction cupped onto the glass.
Along with that, there are also three caves hidden under the soil. 2 of these are 3D-printed and can be viewed into from the sides. Along with those there is also a large, DIY-ed cave in the back-left corner, made with a Chinese take-out box and two pvc pipes. All of these are glued onto the glass with aquarium-safe glue.
The bottom layer of the soil consists of large gravel, mixed with muck from the local creek. Not only to kickstart the cycle with some decaying plant matter, but also to introduce scuds, worms and micro-organisms into the soil. The rest of the soil uses aquasoil from my old aquarium, which unfortunately had a leak and I had to evacuate.
I installed an additional 5 caves, consisting of 3 tubes out of an old marble run, and 2 ceramic caves. As well as the rest of the hardscape, of course. Every time I go on vacation I turn into a magpie and start collecting pretty rocks, so all rocks in this tank came either from France or Spain. One particularly rectangular rock made for the perfect border to the planted area. Unfortunately you can't exactly use the wood you find in nature in an aquarium, so the wood pieces all came from the pet shop.
After putting in all the plants and the gravel layer into the "basin" at the front of the tank, next came the water (kind of important). This is a mixture of creek water and water from my old aquariums, which I kept in my room in buckets for over a month.
Two final "cheat codes" I used was to add a packet of water fleas, sold as live food, to the tank. I also put the dirty sponges from my two old filters (which were quite small) into the huge new filter box which came with the aquarium.
All this resulted into my aquarium cycle only taking about a week, and my fish being very showy
