LECA & screen

[taipan]

Question people
I am going to convert an existing 2' tank to a plain ( planted ) viv - no animals. This is in addition to my frog question posted awhile ago but unrelated
I will be making a false bottom with egg crate with LECA on top ( covering screen ) I thought about the following & would appreciate some feed back
1) As I am using LECA would it be appropriate to use pea gravel on top of the LECA before the soil mix ??
2) Does one place another layer of screen on top of the LECA before putting soil ??.
3) Would the following do for a soil mix -
Coconut peat &/or fibres,chopped tree fern, sieved soil mix,aquarium gravel & possibly some leaf mold ( mulch ). I will also be putting a layer of sphag.moss on top & place the green moss on top of that.
4) I will also be siliconing some tree fern panels to the back wall. Would normal "clear" aquarium silicone do. The black is very expensive & the viv will NOT be a show peice
Please remeber that I cannot get or import any "pre-mixed viv compost but have to make do with local stuff which is absolute s**t
Many thanks

[froggsong]

If there are no animals, just use whatever would be good for your plants. I think the substrate issues are generally so that nothing is going to hurt the animals. Any color silicone is fine, I think the issue is, again, generally that some things are more toxic to animals, and the black is generally used so that if coco fiber/peat/whatever leaves a gap/falls off, that you wont see it as well. Use whatever color you want to.