# Memorable Night / My 20 liter ADA Nano



## viktorlantos (7 Jun 2009)

Before i begin to introduce my current Nano tank i would like to let you know that i am a fan and a frequent reader of UKAPS.org however i am from Hungary   . You guys have an amazing community here and a great forum. You may not know, but you inspire a hell lot of people in the World with your daily posts. So i would like to say thank you first for this amazing site and community. Many of you inspire us to do better in aquascaping.

We're in the process of building a similar aquascaping community in Hungary. We made a few scapes before like the ones below, but this was the first time when we involved our community too.

















We had a great evening in my flat a month ago, when we created this Nano tank.
Since my flat has only a limited space and we wanted to show the moments of the setup to our community, we used live streaming for the 6! hour show...   





Used 2 webcams and had 25-30 people continuously on our show. We've had 2000 comments on this nite, so some of the folks had a chance to ask questions while we worked on the Nano. A very cool interactive feeling.





Because of this i decided to name the tank to "*Memorable Night*" 









*Tank details:*
Tank: ADA Cube Garden Mini M (20 liter)
Light: Started with 2 Arcadia Arc Pod 11Watt, later installed an ADA Solar Mini M lamp
Substrate: ADA Power Sand Spec S, ADA Aqua Soil Amazonia, ADA Nile Sand
Decor: ADA Dark Iron wood
Filter: EHEIM Ecco Pro 130, ADA transparent tubes. Currently i am working on to replace the original Eheim tubes to glass nano inlet and outlet.
CO2: Aqua Medic 0.5kg bottle, Papillon Regulator, Aqua Medic valve, ADA non-return valve, ADA bubble counter, Nano diffuser, ADA CO2 tubing, ADA Drop Checker
Fertilizers: In the first 2 weeks only ADA Brighty K. Currently Brighty K, Step 1, ECA, Green Brighty Spec. Lights, Easy Carbo

We used one ADA Bacter Ball for the filter start additionally to the Power Sand Spec built-in Bacter 100.

At the end of the setup:




Plants: Taxiphyllum barbieri (Vesicularia), Pogostemon Heliferi, Didiplis diandra, Ludwigia arcuata, Urticularia graminifolia (this is gone after the setup unfortunatelly), Hemianthus callitrichoides "Cuba", Eleocharis parvula, Rotala sp. green, Microsorum pteropus "Narrow". Lately i added in an Xmass Moss and Fissidens too which is still shaping.

2 weeks after setup:




All of the plants came from Tropica.

After 2 weeks my setup was up and running. I started to use the daily ferts and slowed down on water changes. The water quality was perfect so i added in 2 Otocinclus affinis and 6 Nannostomus beckfordi. An additional group of Sulawesi Cardinal shrimp will come this week. So i am getting closer to the completion phase.

The plants are growing nicely. The HC runs well. At the beginning i had to put some small stones to keep it down because of the elevated background. Now i removed them and it seems fine.

current images: need some pruning shortly..   








Will add a glass inlet and i guess the scape will be final by then. I just need to focus on the plants from that time 
This is still very early, but if you compare the result with the first images from the start a month ago, i guess we did well. This was supposed to be an ADA Showcase, so we mostly used ADA stuff to bulid it.

Anyway your comments are welcome on this tank. Thanks UKAPS and to the community. The World is watching you 

The original images in large resolution are to be found on my Flickr account. If you're interested in the details.  

http://www.flickr.com/photos/viktorlantos/


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## samc (7 Jun 2009)

great little nano   im glad people on the site help others learn you guys are allways welcome to ask question ect


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## Stu Worrall (7 Jun 2009)

tank looks great viktor, especially with all that ADA gear  .  The webcast you did sounds really good and something I'd probably log on to but haven't heard of anything like that being done in the UK.  If you do one again youll have to post a link up here.  The HC carpet looked a lot easier than planting individual plantlets!


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## Tony Swinney (8 Jun 2009)

Great little tank Viktor, and the webcast idea is very cool     As Stu said, if you do another one it would be great to watch   

So how do we webcast the Ukaps BBQ then   

Tony


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## Dan Crawford (8 Jun 2009)

Lovely nano and the webcast idea is great.


			
				Tonser said:
			
		

> So how do we webcast the Ukaps BBQ then   Tony


LD is already on it


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## Steve Smith (8 Jun 2009)

Great nano Viktor!  It looks so much bigger than it actually is   Brilliant work on the live webcast.  We're hopefully setting something up for Dan's BBQ in a few weeks.  I like the idea of having live chat though!

It sounds like you have a thriving aquascaping community going


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## viktorlantos (8 Jun 2009)

Thanks guys for all of your nice comments.

Yeah live streaming is really a fun. Having a lot of people around you, chatting, laughing, joking meanwhile you're working on a setup with your friends makes the setup process a great time. Also for those people who could not afford a nicer setup they have at least an overview how that goes.

Next time if we do this i will note you 
I also would enjoy to be a part of your BBQ streaming  

stuworrall, 
The HC planting was easier this way and as i see this spreading much quicker than it would do with plantlets. In 1 month the HC doubled its size and gave a very dense feeling. Of course in a larger tank this may not work as you need to buy too much of it. But for a nano this was perfect.


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## LondonDragon (8 Jun 2009)

Great set of tanks Viktor, and the nano looks brilliant. I have a friend in Budapest, might visit sometime soon 



			
				Dan Crawford said:
			
		

> Lovely nano and the webcast idea is great.
> 
> 
> 
> ...


Yep its all basically setup, just need to perform a couple of tests and thats it  then its just setting it up on the day


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## Fred Dulley (8 Jun 2009)

Superb cube!


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## George Farmer (8 Jun 2009)

Hi Viktor

Thanks very much for the kind words about UKAPS.  It is great to hear that we have an international reputation.

The tanks look great!  Thanks for sharing and keep up the good work!


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## rawr (8 Jun 2009)

This tank looks well professional, top class mate! 

And the webcast idea sounds great! Let us know about the UKAPS BBQ webcast, sounds interesting.


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## fish.com1 (8 Jun 2009)

Very nice tank and equipment   Those pictures really show how pink the arcpod's light are, it looked much better with the ADA solar lamp.


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## JamesM (8 Jun 2009)

Excellent work Viktor


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## John Starkey (8 Jun 2009)

Hi viktor,exellent thread and some superb nano tanks,you have some talented aquascapers in hungary ,regards john


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## Superman (8 Jun 2009)

What a great concept, it must of taken some organisation.
The tanks pictured look great and the nano is looking great too.


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## TBRO (9 Jun 2009)

Very nice nature look. I like the idea of a tank party night - Beer has plenty of CO2 

T


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## viktorlantos (9 Jun 2009)

Thanks guys for all of your nice comments. I am glad you liked the Tank. will post some progress later on.


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## viktorlantos (20 Jun 2009)

Today i shoot some new photos on this nano. Sorry guys i did not prepared well, no spec cleaning, additional lighting or equipment removal. This is more of a progress report now.

The green Eheim inlet will be replaced next week to a glass one. So no more green other than the leaves 

For high resolution version please check my flickr page:





Same shot as above just cutted to fit the screen:


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## TDI-line (21 Jun 2009)

Great tank Viktor, nano's rule.


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## ceg4048 (21 Jun 2009)

Nice one Viktor. I agree with you. I ditched my awful green spraybars as well. Can't wait to see the effects of the fabulous glass one. Please update as soon as you get it :!: 

Cheers,


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## viktorlantos (25 Jun 2009)

Today finaly i had a chance to replace the green eheim shower which i hated on this scape.   
also added in an ada glass thermometer, the transparent one. looks kewl i guess.

so a few shots maybe you find some good one from this. as all the gears are in, now the main goal will be to maintain the scape. i love the fact that nothing distract my eyes from the scape now 

for larger res please check my flickr page.


















oh the Sulawesi Cardinals looks happy in this scape


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## fish.com1 (25 Jun 2009)

Nice thermometer


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## samc (25 Jun 2009)

looks even better now    loving this scape its my favorite nano on here at the mo

 i think it would look good if you put some sand in the open substrate at the front 

cool thermometer too


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## viktorlantos (17 Jul 2009)

a bit of an update on this Nano.

I had a bit of an algae issue in the past few weeks. (still in progress   ) probably because of the additional natural light which comes into my living room around the summer time.

so after i limited the lights from 10 hours to 9, shifted the lighting time from 12-9pm (from 9am to 7pm) looks like things are getting better. Additionaly i feels like my ADA Green Bacter which i started to use perform well. The water is extremly clear. No greenish color.

This week i filled up the front of the tank with some remaining ADA Nile Sand. So the shore is there again 
Cardinal Shrimps love that. They walk very ofthen there with their white gloves   

Pushed back HC a little. Trimmed that down earlier and this start to look ok again. The rotala sp green cutted this week so this is too short on far right.

The photos below i just did to capture the new sand on the front. Sorry i did not prepared welll for shooting. My glasses need some cleaning. But i thought this worth to share with you guys.


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## Steve Smith (17 Jul 2009)

Looking lovely Viktor.  I love how the moss is growing up the wood on the left.  Very natural looking


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## viktorlantos (30 Aug 2009)

I made a few shots a week before. The plan was to throw the tank to the AGA this year. So some shots i made for that.

But here are 2 others which i would like to share with you. The tank matured nicely.









For larger shots please visit my flickr page.

I used the default ADA lamp with 2 extra t8 lights as a backlight. This helped a lot on the contrast and the nicer effect.


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## Mark Evans (30 Aug 2009)

looking great viktor.

the lighting on the images looks good too. i know how difficult photographing moss is...for me at least. the darkness of moss can make things difficult in getting the right exposure.


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## JamesM (30 Aug 2009)

Beautiful tank, great job Viktor


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## Joe Faria (31 Aug 2009)

Hi Viktor,
Great little tank you got.... congrats   

BTW, which mosses you currently have in this nano?


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## viktorlantos (31 Aug 2009)

Thanks guys for the nice words.  Maybe this is not be best momentum of the tank, but without running out of time i wanted to have a clean shot.



> BTW, which mosses you currently have in this nano?



On the woods i used Taxiphyllum barbieri (Vesicularia) which is growing very fast, so i have to prune weekly.
But have a bunch of Xmass Moss and Fissidens on the front right.


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## flygja (31 Aug 2009)

The room in which the nano lives in is quite cool too. Modern looking with a person's attention focused on the tank.


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## George Farmer (31 Aug 2009)

Very nice indeed, Viktor!

You've executed the Nature Aquarium perfectly.  It looks better than some that we see in the Nature Aquarium Gallery!

Congratulations and thanks for sharing your beautiful creation.


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## viktorlantos (31 Aug 2009)

George, thanks for your nice words, this is really kindly from you.   

somehow i fallen love with these moss tanks they looks so natural in the NA Gallery. I decided to make a similar green natural tank for my larger tank too. That is 240 liter one  the plants are on its way, so hopefully i can share that shortly too on another journal.


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## Mark Evans (31 Aug 2009)

viktorlantos said:
			
		

> somehow i fallen love with these moss tanks they looks so natural in the NA Gallery



so true. 

Amano has taken on a new look.

i've recently bought amanos book "suikei" the look of his works then (2000) to now is so radically different. 

both styles look amazing, but the look he has now is IMO the most natural he's done.that said, "suikei" contains some of the best tanks i've ever seen   i did mutter out loud @ TGM when i flicked through the pages

look forward to a new journal Viktor


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## samc (31 Aug 2009)

just my kind of nano  

i am also now into this style of scaping as like you say it so natural looking and IMO more interesting than iwagumis


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## viktorlantos (19 Oct 2009)

in the past weeks a few things happened. i had to remove the HC from the left side of the tank.

Added in some Utricularia G. to fill that space but this is just melted. so the 2nd fail in this nano with the UG.
Will find some HC probably to fill again the left side.

Had some artistic shot over the weekend on our cabinet. I thought i share it with you guys.





























for large res check my flickr page.


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## Dan Crawford (19 Oct 2009)

That looks so sleek Victor, fair play! ADA all the way 8)


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## George Farmer (19 Oct 2009)

Very cool!  I'm looking forward to seeing this featured in PFK soon... 

The ADA Mini-M and related gear really does look special, and with your skills you have done it justice indeed.

Shame about the UG - so many people have the same troubles.

Keep up the great work, Viktor!  You're doing Hungary proud.


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## andyh (20 Oct 2009)

Hey Viktor, The tank looks amazing, really stunning i am big fan of moss (just not the pruning and tidying up!)

Can you tell me what the plant is front right, looks like some sort of hair grass?

Looking forward to seeing you feature in PFK!

Andy


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## hydrophyte (20 Oct 2009)

That looks great Viktor.


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## viktorlantos (20 Oct 2009)

andyh said:
			
		

> Hey Viktor, The tank looks amazing, really stunning i am big fan of moss (just not the pruning and tidying up!)
> 
> Can you tell me what the plant is front right, looks like some sort of hair grass?
> 
> ...



Thanks Andy   
The right hand side is Parvula, xmass moss and fisssidens fontanus. But since i left it to grow the way it wants it's kind of a mixture of parvula and xmass mainly.



> That looks great Viktor.



Thanks hydrophyte 



> Very cool! I'm looking forward to seeing this featured in PFK soon...
> The ADA Mini-M and related gear really does look special, and with your skills you have done it justice indeed.
> Shame about the UG - so many people have the same troubles.
> Keep up the great work, Viktor! You're doing Hungary proud.



Thanks George for your nice words. I can not wait to see the PFK personally   
It's a very good feeling to be featured in UK's best selling fishkeeping mag. Thanks for all of your help guys.

yeah for some reason UG is a hard plant to keep. the ones who grow it nicely use less lights.
others using RO water... so that's the 2 things which is not present on my tanks   
well one more plant to conqueor on my list. i love the challenges.


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## Stu Worrall (20 Oct 2009)

tank and all the gear looks amazing viktor. are those ADA cabinets or ones youve had made?


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## viktorlantos (20 Oct 2009)

stuworrall said:
			
		

> tank and all the gear looks amazing viktor. are those ADA cabinets or ones youve had made?



Thanks stu, yup we're making those cabinets here in Hungary. shooting for a quality piece. 
so something which is really in a level of other ADA goods.

like the door handle which is a fine detail etc.










i bet our cabinets are in party with the ada ones.

the problem is that when someone wants really an ADA style cabinet tanks etc, so a full ADA setup, they will have hard times to get all pieces together. most of the ADA goods are acessible localy, but things like cabinet or large size tanks are hard to get. probably just too expensive to bring in from Japan in containers.

so the GA cabinet solve our problem. 
you guys are lucky with sponsor like aquariums ltd you can have an ADA style cabinet a while ago.


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## George Farmer (20 Oct 2009)

Wow!  Those look like very well-crafted cabinets with superb attention to detail.   I am very impressed!


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## viktorlantos (9 Dec 2009)

well i not posted a while ago.

as you may know that the nano was in the AGA competition. however i not felt that i could win anything there, but was fun to try it. the judges gave useful comments.   

in the meantime this was a while ago and when i captured the contest images, probaably because of the summer extreme brigh days and other factors, but i got a massive algae attack. had brush on the tree and on the mosses, had fuzz like algae on all my plants which really killed me. especially as i had too many plants there and the algae infected all my plants including the background ones too.

fight very hard with it for months. did several attempt to kill it. used easy carbo and pressurized co2 at that time with ADA fertilizers so i wondered why this all happening.

changed the flow direction, changed the diffuser position, decreased light period added a little more carbo a little more co2.... no luck at all.

a bit more than a month ago another round of changes happened as a last attempt on this battle:
- decreased the light now it is only 6 hours a day.
- co2 starts 3 hours before the light and last 1 hour after the light
- replaced nano diffuser as that was useless. did not provide really enough CO2 for this tank. so added in a larger one.
- changed my filter media. used eheim substrat pro before in my eheim ecco pro 130. fully replaced to ADA NACarbon did not worried about any bacterial colony as i use green bacter weekly anyways after water changes.
- added in 2 amanos (earlier they escaped).

the result in a month every allgae dissapeared. first the brush died off from the wood. used phyton git there to brush it. then hair algae disappeared from leaves but deep in the tank i still had a lot from them. plus on the Microsorum leaves i had this. The leaves cleaned up in a few weeks and the algae fully died. even the small brushes from the mosses.

with NA Carbon i got a crystal clear water. Where crystal clear really means crystal 
i have bright white walls in my living room. but when i see my tank in front of the wall i do not see anything just glasses and plants  no color by fertilizers before the water changes, no color from woods, no cloudy water. nada 
its hard to tell myself this is WC time as the tank looks so clear.

Added in a group of CRS and shrimps feels much better as the carbon cleans better the water.
I seen that amano uses this filter media in all his nano tanks which you can find on the aquajournal site. so that was the time when i wanted to check this. now after some time i can tell this is the best filter media for a nano.
you may need to replace it in every few months or so, but the result is shocking   
and not the ADA guy speak from me now.

allright here is a few shots which i made today before the lights turned off.
the tank will be rescaped in january to an iwagumi one with manten stones as i was jellous by your tanks 

so a few of the last moments on this scape. carpet was redone but i will not wait til its complete. so please forgive me i not cleaned up the tank, the glasses, did nothing just shoot some pics for you.





























you can check these in high res on my flickr page.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/viktorlantos/


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## Superman (9 Dec 2009)

It's refreshing to hear that its not just the newbies that get algae.
It's also good to hear how you tackled it and will help us all in the future.

The tank looks beautiful, keep up the hard work


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## samc (9 Dec 2009)

looking great viktor  

i really like the first picture. it shows how clear the water is too  i will remember this nano for a long time


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## JamesM (9 Dec 2009)

samc said:
			
		

> i will remember this nano for a long time


Amen brother, this has been a very inspirational piece of art, and its been great following its journey


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## viktorlantos (10 Dec 2009)

Superman said:
			
		

> It's refreshing to hear that its not just the newbies that get algae.
> It's also good to hear how you tackled it and will help us all in the future.
> 
> The tank looks beautiful, keep up the hard work



thanks mate 



			
				samc said:
			
		

> looking great viktor
> 
> i really like the first picture. it shows how clear the water is too  i will remember this nano for a long time



cheers   hope the next will be eye catching too   



			
				JamesM said:
			
		

> samc said:
> 
> 
> 
> ...



thanks James, its nice to hear from you that it was inspirational. will do my best on the next too.   
it was a nice learning curve with this setup so i learned a lot whcih will be useful for the future.


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## andyh (10 Dec 2009)

Hey Viktor 

Glad to see this back on track as this is a real favourite of mine!
My deep rooted journal below is based "slightly" around your 20l nano, i defiantly took some influence!  

Preparing the main piece of woof took me a while its got fissidens, Christmas moss, java moss, and Narrow leaf fern on it. 
ADA ferts and substrate as well

So keep updating us this one!


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## viktorlantos (2 Jan 2010)

Happy New Year to all of you   
I had a little time today and made a few shot after the regular water change.

The flow was weak in the past week or so, and i read that in the NA Carbon leaflet, if this happen, the filter medium need to be shaken i mean need to move/stir a bit. (sorry i do not find the right word but i bet you know what i mean)   

Anyway i did that and the flow is back up again to top speed. The NA Carbon still does a great job. Do not feel that this is getting stuck or filled. Still just like at the beginning this clear the water very well 

Still no other filter medium. I can tell you that i haven't seen algae in this tank since i use it. Disappeared from the wood, decor, moss, and from the backend plants too even from the deepest points.

Using the Rhinox larger diffuser. Just like in my 240 liter tank.

HC is not formed a carpet again as the new shrimps (which i introduced a month ago or 2) kicking out all these plants   

Here are the shots:


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## TBRO (2 Jan 2010)

Looking beautiful as always, Viktor. Is that a snowball shrimp ? Have you added another piece of wood on the left hand side ? Happy New year too you, Tom


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## viktorlantos (2 Jan 2010)

TBRO said:
			
		

> Looking beautiful as always, Viktor. Is that a snowball shrimp ? Have you added another piece of wood on the left hand side ? Happy New year too you, Tom



Thanks mate 
Yup that's a snowball. Added in 10 snowball and 10 CRS a few weeks earlier. they enjoys the tank a lot  with the carbon i do not have problem keeping them. Not using easy carbo anymore, just CO2.

The wood was there ealrier too, but the lens i uses and the dense moss made it hidden. Now i used a different lens (17-40) and probably this is the reason why i stand out more.


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## CeeJay (2 Jan 2010)

Hi Viktor

Stunning tank mate


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## hydrophyte (3 Jan 2010)

Nice work Viktor!


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## samc (3 Jan 2010)

the java fern looks really good viktor. just need the carpet to fill in now and it will look even better


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## Mark Evans (3 Jan 2010)

stunning mate!


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