I am in the process of starting a whole new venture for Hartlands Aquatics, its going to take a little time to put together. I will be revamping the shop, making it larger and just specializing in freshwater Planted tanks, so it will be permanent stock of plants,, fish and equipment for planted tanks. I will also be starting a Hartlands website that we will be selling equipment and plants throughout South Africa. What I need to know is what equipment,foods, fertilizers everyone likes to use so that I stock the right stuff, also what products does everyone want that you can not get locally..... I have tried to organize the ADA distributorship but the minimum quantity is way too large and extremely expensive. your help will be most appreciated. as I said it will be a while before all this takes place. regards Nick
Hi Nick Can you send me a current price list of your plants and fish. Hope your revamp goes well. Online shopping could also be the answer
hey nick, great idea! fluval has a range of plant substrates now you could try. there are a couple of other brands as well, like gex, ebita and ebi-ten. these are all nice alternatives to ADA aquasoil. flourite is also popular especially the sands and the dark. t5 ballasts, ranging from 24,39 and 54 w with appropriate bulbs would also be nice. hardscaping tools like planting tweezers, curved scissors etc. are also difficult to find. there is a guy in pretoria that says he is going to start importing tropica soon, so maybe you can as well, they have fantastic plants and their tropica plant nutrition plus is the best fertilizer so you cant go wrong. CO2 regulators with solenoids and gas bottles of different sizes already fitted with the gate valves are expensive to source locally so if you could provide a better alternative you would be in business. also some glassware, like inlet and outlet pipes, diffusers and bubble counters would be nice to get locally. i think that about covers everything, substrate, lighting, CO2, plants, glassware, ferts and tools..
Nick, great to receive some news about you and your plans. Hope everything go well. Above suggestions covers about it. A weekly updated available stock list from you on this forum could also help. How about a dedicated weekly delivery point? You could use my place! Good luck! Gert.
all of the above and some proper wood for scaping but is it posible to import things like mazinta? A proper selection of plants wil be the thing that gets me to drive out to you every weekend! All of the best and realy hope this works out, you have my full support! schalk
Hey Schalk I don't think I will be able to import the manzanita wood as any raw wood has to be fumigated before entering the country, this includes pallets with stock inside. I will find out though, that is why you only seem to get the mopani wood as this comes in from Namibia. I am looking for a supply of awesome pieces of wood. We will be permanently having a good selection of plants, first shipment will hopefully be on track for about 6 weeks time.
