Desert's Edge

Hi All,

I've kept a tank for about 7 or 8 years now. Low tech, crypts, valis, cories, harlequins etc. Originally it was a Juwel Rekord 60. Had it for about 3 or 4 years at my last place. Moved it to my current place. Then a year later moved it upstairs to the bedroom. Few months later it developed a leak. Two days before I was going on a two week holiday.

Not great.

Stripped it out, took fish up to LFS who kindly agreed to look after them and ordered the first thing that would fit the space:

http://www.seapets.co.uk/products/a...a-125-aquarium-and-cabinet-oak-and-wenge.html (without cabinet).

That's the current tank. About 2 years ago I decided I wanted to start aquascaping, without really knowing what I was doing, which meant upping the lights (added 2 t5s) without co2 or NPK. Therefore algae bloom.

Have been learning a lot in the last couple of months, especially since I found this site.

Previous incarnations (crap photos and lots of them):

Re: An inconvenient space

And some more recent ones







Some pics of my shrimp:















This is where it is now (sorry again for this pic, wife's slr is out of memory):

Re: An inconvenient space

Thanks. What you can't see though is the rampant algae. That's why that tree ended up on its side - was as much a thread algae tree as a peacock moss tree. Up to recently it had weeping moss on it but stripped it out as I didn't like it very much.

Should have said, this is a very temporary setup. All the wood in there is coming out to be replaced with a single piece of manzanita that's on its way from Tom Barr.

Also, forgot to post this pic:



Rather sardonic blue neon goby.

Will post parameters, flora, fauna and maintenance shortly.

Re: An inconvenient space

It's a fairly thin layer of ADA amazonia (I) over some bog standard gravel (hence bits of white gravel in some of the pics). I think there's some flourite deeper down too but can't remember. Added the amazonia a few months back which was a bit stupid as I got a big old ammonia spike leading to losses.

Re: An inconvenient space

Tank parameters and current setup:

Fluval roma 125 which is 80x35x45
Substrate: some flourite at the bottom, gravel (I think it called itself river sand) and ADA Amazonia Aquasoil
Lighting: tank came with 2xT8s, added 2xT5s, then recently swapped the T8s for T6s and turned the T5s off
Heating: Fluval Mirrored 150W
Filtration: Currently Eheim Pro3 2071 with Koralia 1600
CO2: D-D disposable cannister set with Sera acrylic diffuser (diffuser highly recommended, D-D kit not)
Hardscape: Two large (and one small) pieces sumatran driftwood, one large piece redmoor root, a few small rocks (mainly mini landscape), lots of driftwood and redmoor twigs, almond leaf litter
Fauna:
- 3 oto affinis
- 1 oto zebra
- about 10 pygmy cories
- 2 neon blue gobies
- 6 sudandanio axelrodi
- about 20ish boraras brigittae
- 25ish vietnamese cardinal minnows
- handful of assassin snails
- job lots of cherries (various grades)
- 4 amanos
- 1 rhino shrimp
- 9 golden bee shrimp
Horribly horribly horribly overstocked I know. This is because a) it's a holding tank until I get my nano up and running and b) I'm really stupid and have no control. The big mistake was the minnows, biggest fish in there and I ordered too many. Will probably sell some shortly.
Flora:
Lots, so will forget some
- Anubias nana and nana petite growing on leftmost drift wood
- Narrow leaf java fern growing at base of left drift and on redmoor
- wee bit of needle leaf I'm cultivating
- wee bit of l. brasiliensis
- Dwarf hairgrass here and there
- hydrocotyle (sib I think)
- (badly struggling) HC
- marsilea crenata
- valis americana natans
- some invasive riccia
- p. helferi
- h. angustifolia
- c. helferi (bba infested)
- subwass pelia
- coral pelia
- wee bit of java moss
- lots of taiwan moss
- tiny bit of creeping moss
- fissidens fontanus
- common moss
- peacock moss

Re: An inconvenient space

Oh, forgot to say, ferts are EI

Re: An inconvenient space

Woo hoo 😀 Manzanita has arrived and very nice too. Three separate pieces. The challenge now is figuring out the composition of it. Will post some pics in the next few days.

Am probably going to tear out the Cyperus helferi. So infested with BBA it's probably unrecoverable. Will replace it with cuttings from H. angustifolia.

Re: An inconvenient space

Here are a couple of inspirations for the rescape:

http://www.cau-aqua.net/index.php?option=com_zoom&Itemid=29&page=view&catid=258&PageNo=1&key=0&hit=1

http://ukaps.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=35&t=13425&start=110

All about using the wood (and the plants) to create a sense of flow from one side of the tank to the other.

However, I dumped the manzi on top of a cupboard and it randomly looks rather good:



Maybe that's the nature of this wood. If you lobbed it across a room it would probably still look good wherever it fell.

Anyway, for this sort of wood layout I guess I'd be going for this kind of look:

http://www.thegreenmachineonline.com/gallery/2578

Dunno if it's doable in a 80cm tank though.

What do people think?

Re: An inconvenient space

Can I get some advice on surface film?

Since I introduced the vietnamese minnows this has been a consistent problem. As a result I've been running an airstone for 2 hours each night directly after lights off which has solved the problem. However, this is destroying the co2 levels in the tank and it takes 5 hours of co2 running before lime green as a result. This week reduced it to half an hour and the film (very oily looking) is back.

Purely due to over stocking/feeding? Any alternative causes?

Re: An inconvenient space

Chump - thanks. Very helpful link

Sentral, so would I mate 😀 but would be seriously challenging I think. From previous experience of trying to grow a moss tree I found it was pretty hard to avoid algae growing on moss planted that close to the lights.

Am going to play around with the manzi this weekend and will post some pics for advice.

Re: An inconvenient space

ARGHHHH!!!!

I hate catching fish

Spent half the day bagging the minnows then spent the other half catching the last chili rasbora. And failed. The little bugger is in there now but as soon as I get the net out it disappears.

Have swapped the minnows out for ember tetras. Well chuffed with them. As soon as lights were out they started shoaling round the tank. Even better the 6 sudandanio axelrodi started shoaling with them.

RE: the scape design, everything is determined by the wood. Will play around with it over the next couple of days and post some pics.

Piece of fish: Ta, let's see if I can do anything useful with that wood.

Re: An inconvenient space

Another post of rage

ARGHHH

I hate Fluval for making this tank with it's stupid thick plastic hood and lid

ARGHHH

I hate myself for sticking it in a tight alcove with no room to play with

Let me explain - I just bought the Eheim installation kits, 1&2. Stupidly not realising that there is not enough room behind the tank to install them.

Have I ever explained the reason for the name of this journal? There's literally less than 1 cm space on the left and back of the tank. About 10cm on the right and obviously as much as you like at the front.

This makes putting in external kit an utter pain if not impossible. In this case it's going to be a pain. I can put it into the right hand side of the tank but I'm going to have to cut a chunk out of the hood to allow access.

By the way

ARGHHH

I hate Eheim. I also bought a nozzle/adaptor set which is supposed to allow you to adjust the direction of flow. Except it's missing the the adaptor that allows you to move the nozzle. This appears to be a separate spare part. Despite the fact that the set I bought is advertised as designed to work the installation kit I bought. But doesn't.

Re: An inconvenient space

BTW if anyone else fancies attempting that layout here's a thread from someone who did:

http://www.plantedtank.net/forums/tank-journals-photo-album/130919-130-gallon-project.html

Re: An inconvenient space

Well, despite my best attempts, the three pieces of wood I have will not come together in anything vaguely resembling Yutako Kanno's incredible scape (thus wasting lots of people's time on the substrate forum asking how to build some hills in the back). So back to plan A which is wood and plants all emphasising directional flow. Here's my best (out of tank) effort so far:





Going to be a bit of a tight squeeze height and depth wise as the tank is only 45cm high (and 35cm deep):



Have also added 3 CRS (1 S and 2 A), 4 more sundadanio axelrodi blue and 7 hisonotus leucofrenatus. Have also moved out large redmoor.

Re: An inconvenient space

So, Erdal came round today and we made some minor adjustments to the position of the manzi. Am happy with the result:



Now to figure out what goes where. Plant list is:

[CURRENTLY IN TANK]:
H. angustifolia
H. pinnafitida
HC
Tiny amount of M. crenata
Hydro sib
Needle leaf java fern
Narrow leaf java fern (going to be sold)
Anubias nana
Anubias nana petite
P. helferi
Eleocharis acicularis
L. braziliensis
Random crypt that just appeared from under the fern. Haven't had crypts for over a year. Parvula I think.
Valis americana natans (?)
Peacock moss
Fissidens fonatus
Grid of anchor moss
Grid of mini-xmas moss
Micro fern moss/mini taiwan moss/unidentified on bog wood

[GROWING ON WINDOWSILL]
Decent amount of xmas
Decent amount of taiwan
Ickle sick looking bit of coral pellia
Ickle bit of willow moss
Ickle bit of weeping moss

[ON IT'S WAY FROM TAIWAN]
Pearl moss
Mini-bolbitis
Crepidomanes auriculatum

Bit overwhelming. Placement ideas?