susankat,

My hats to you building the thing by yourself. Did you build the stand and canopy too?

They are look wonderful.

A quick question. I see that you use sand in you other tanks too and they are heavily planted. I am trying to set up my first tank and want to put lots of plant and fish and trying to figure what substrate to use. I like sand (the look of it and usually its very cheap) but I read that with sand plants don't grow as good as they do in gravel or other substrate because sand compacts and hinders root development.

From your experience what do you think?