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We recently upgraded our 1 year old RES' tank to a 120 gallon and are finding it difficult to keep up with water changes. I am wanting to try to make it so natural filtration could reduce the need for water changes.

So far...

We have a powerful filter and an army of ghost shrimp, a yoyo loach for parasites, and a 8" placo. I plan on picking up a few square feet of duckweed in the next few days to act as both a veggie source and filtering. Other plants get torn up and die.

Accually the Anubias Nana doesnt get destroyed but always gets displaced. The RES doesnt like it. Im working on bolting 2 pieces of drftwood to use as a clamping planter, but thats off topic.

Can anyone recomend anything else that would reduce the need for frequent waterchanges?

This is going to be an hard task,there is something called denitrate made by seachem.

Its a media you put in an really low gph filter,its a bit hard to setup but it complete the cycle.

What filter do you have in there? With proper filteration, you shouldn't need to do excessive water changes.

As it sounds like you've found out, RES love nothing more than to tear up plants (even if they don't eat them ).
You could try an in-tank refugium. Block of a small area of the tank and grow plants in that area, where the turtle can't get at it. I've seen someone here use egg crate to create an in-tank refugium.