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Betta than a puddle

Myrtle

Member
Joined
21 Aug 2008
Messages
827
Location
Basingstoke
Now that I'm back into the swing of all things fishy after a 10 year hiatus, I've decided to upgrade my betta imbellis tank from the ancient 30l to a 60l denerle nano cube. I'm sick of the silver plastic and she'll appreciate the space. She'll be taking her Cherry entourage with her too.
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As you can see from this tank, I'm no aquascaper. I'm more of a 'throw it in and hope for the best' kinda gal normally, but I'm going to make an effort with this one.
It'll be another low energy tank as, to be honest, so am I. I'm planning on a capped soil substrate, probably aquatic compost topped with sand, and more of a riparium than the existing one (though I'll reuse the plants!). The 30l is filtered by a tiny fluval internal filter which feeds a kind of waterfall (which isn't at all visible :p) so the flow is minimal. I'm debating whether I can get away with a similar set-up using the same filter in a 60l and I think, theoretically, provided the plant mass is large enough, I should be able to with such a small bioload. At least when it's matured. Maybe a small HOB filter whilst it's still young and establishing might be worth it?

I'll be reusing the plants already in the tank and have been scrolling through pages of tank shots on here looking for inspiration but as usual, it's all a muddle with no clear plan right now. All I know is that it'll have wood, water and soil. Oh, and plants, shrimp and Mrs Betta!
 
The tank has arrived quicker than expected which means I have to get a move on as it can't stay where it is for long.
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I've settled on a biotope inspired set up, kind of a Malaysian ditch, lots of wood, botanicals and surface cover. It's also a good excuse to go a for a bit of riparium planting too! I've had my eye on some ivy wood in the park behind my house which came down last year, so I've stripped the bark and started soaking it but it was pretty sodden already.
I haven't settled on a substrate yet, I'd like to do soil capped with sand but I think maybe aquasoil or something would be less messy when I inevitably move plants...
 
Progress has been made!
Episode 1: The Ugly Years
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To be honest, it looks pretty awful - cloudy water, half planted, floating wood weighed down with stones and generally nothing to get excited about. To be honest, I wasn't convinced at this point that it was going to turn out how I hoped. I actually wrote an update last night, while it looked like this but one of the dogs stood on the keyboard and deleted it all!
So, today I decided I didn't like one of the lower wood pieces and removed it, so I'm happier with it now, but still feel it's missing something on the right hand side. I've got some smaller pieces to play with so I'm not too worried about that. The main thing I wanted to achieve by tonight was getting the majority of the planting in one way or another and that's done, so I'm happy. The riparium plants are not in their permanent positions yet, but I wanted their help with cycling the soil. The swan necked lights also double up as a way to hold the floaty wood down!

So, one water change later and this is where we are now:
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Some of the plants have the potential to become a bit thuggish once they take off, but I'll either try keeping them in check or I'll move out the less competitive plants (assuming everything works out and the whole lot doesn't just melt!). The wood is yet to be adorned with moss and I've done nothing with the emergent wood yet as I want to test out the capillary matting first to see how high it'll wick the water.
A bit of ammonia leeching out already, but only a minimal amount. There is some matured filter sponge over the inlet of an Eheim CompactOn pump for the time being, but the flow from that will be too strong for the Betta, however, she needs her filter with her so I'm planning on running both side by side for a while when she moves in. Sadly, her Cherry entourage won't be joining her as she ate them. I knew it was a risk, but I'd hoped that as they were cull shrimp and pretty invisible, she'd ignore them. I guess that means it's possible they're just hiding and also invisible to me... She is an excellent huntress though so I need to rethink my clean up crew...
 
Seeing as shrimp are no longer a safe addition for the tank I'm rethinking a few things. Initially, I was planning on 100% tap water (hard as nails stuff) to ensure there were enough minerals for the shrimp but now I'm thinking I might swap to rainwater. I'm thinking that this will also limit any/all "decorative" crustaceans unless I cut with some tap but the ramshorn and bladder snails seem ok in the 'arium and that is pure rainwater. The rainwater will also mean I can expand the crypt selection a bit more once everything is stable.
With the removal of shrimp and the fact that the front of the tank gets hit by direct sun for a few hours in the afternoons, I'm expecting a huge algae outbreak at some point soon. As the footprint is only 45cmX45cm, I'm limited in algae removing lifeforms so I'm contemplating making some curtains for the front of the tank 😆
On the plus side, out of curiosity I tested the ammonia and nitrite levels this morning :
Ammonia - somewhere between 0 and 0.2
Nitrite - off the charts!
The soil is cycling at least. I used Westland Topsoil in the end as I had half a bag lying around in the garden, covered it with a layer of mosquito net and topped off with silica sand which hopefully does a half decent job of representing the silty, iron rich sediment... Not a colour I'd go for normally!
 
Seeing as shrimp are no longer a safe addition for the tank I'm rethinking a few things. Initially, I was planning on 100% tap water (hard as nails stuff) to ensure there were enough minerals for the shrimp but now I'm thinking I might swap to rainwater. I'm thinking that this will also limit any/all "decorative" crustaceans unless I cut with some tap but the ramshorn and bladder snails seem ok in the 'arium and that is pure rainwater. The rainwater will also mean I can expand the crypt selection a bit more once everything is stable.
With the removal of shrimp and the fact that the front of the tank gets hit by direct sun for a few hours in the afternoons, I'm expecting a huge algae outbreak at some point soon. As the footprint is only 45cmX45cm, I'm limited in algae removing lifeforms so I'm contemplating making some curtains for the front of the tank 😆
On the plus side, out of curiosity I tested the ammonia and nitrite levels this morning :
Ammonia - somewhere between 0 and 0.2
Nitrite - off the charts!
The soil is cycling at least. I used Westland Topsoil in the end as I had half a bag lying around in the garden, covered it with a layer of mosquito net and topped off with silica sand which hopefully does a half decent job of representing the silty, iron rich sediment... Not a colour I'd go for normally!
i would suggest trying to avoid direct sunlight, not even so much from the algae aspect but that it could overheat your tank quite quickly and endanger your betta. You can also cut your RO with tapwater to get your desired levels if in doubt!
 
Sadly, my room is south west facing so there's not much avoiding it. The previous tank was in the same position and I avoid the worst of it by keeping the curtains closed on that side. In summer, the curtains are almost permanently shut as the room becomes unbearable otherwise. During the heatwave this summer, the window had an aluminet sheet on the outside to reflect the sun away as well as shutting the curtains for the sake of the dogs. In fact, I'm not sure I opened the curtains for about a fortnight lol. This time of year the sun hits the back of the room and bypasses the tanks due to a large tree.
This tank does sit forward more than the previous one so if I have to make a sun shield, or curtains for the front, I will :)
 
I had a bit of time to play with the tank this afternoon, abruptly halted by an onslaught of fireworks before it was even dark. One dog is phobic so that took precedence. Before I was rudely interrupted, I managed to make a bit of progress with the riparium planting so it now looks like this
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I've not tried planting on floating cork bark before, but as I had a load left over I thought I'd give it a go. The Fittonia is planted on it with some Hydrocotyle and sphagnum to help wick the water, so hopefully I don't just end up with a mound of sphagnum regrowth! The front left pot is just temporary.
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After the expected ammonia and nitrite spike on Sunday, by yesterday (5 days after set up) the ammonia was down to barely discernible and the nitrite had dropped from 8 to 4. Today the ammonia is reading 0, nitrite 0.25 and nitrate 0. There are a couple of Ramshorn snails living in there as of yesterday and I threw some daphnia in last night, which are still alive and kicking today. I must admit to being surprised how quickly the soil stopped releasing ammonia. I've only changed the water twice, once 50% when the NH3 and NO2 were off the charts and again around 30% when it was still off the charts on Tuesday. The recent drop has been with the same water in the tank which makes me think I need to increase the bioload now. However, I don't want Mrs Betta to be the first into the tank in case she decides to be super territorial...

Another positive is that she hasn't eaten all the shrimp after all, they're just staying hidden (which I don't blame them for!).
 
There has been a veritable explosion of life over the last few days. Copepods, ostracods, daphnia (added), planaria, hydra and other unidentifiable beasties have appeared and are apparently thriving. Not all are particularly welcomed (looking at you, planaria!) but they're all part of the ecosystem.
Obviously this is in no way a mature tank (even though the filter media was) and some would say that it's too soon to add anything, but I popped up to my lfs to pick up a few cull shrimp this morning. They breed throughout the whole tank system in there and are pretty hardy. They're doing well so far.
The black net pot on the left has been replaced by a slightly less ugly clear planter.
There has been very little melting so far and everything has put on some growth other than the crypts. The water has clouded a bit which I'm not fussed about as it diffuses the light a bit more. Diatoms have started making a film on the glass so the cloud could be that or a bacterial bloom, neither are unexpected!
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The shrimp are all doing well, just one lost to my knowledge, and the last plants have gone in now. I triggered a mini cycle when I accidentally knocked a load of compost into the tank from one of the planters and despite attempts to clear it up, enough was left to cause a small ammonia spike hence the shrimp loss.
The tank was originally designed for my female Betta imbellis but now houses a male imbellis who can't tolerate any others in his tank. My 1m 3f imbellis turned out to be 3m 1f and they're slowly being shuffled about to see who gets on with who...
The tank is a long way from an aquascape but I like the natural slice of nature look :)
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Things are ticking along nicely in this tank, given its youth. I've removed some of the floating Limnophila as it was blocking too much light and removed the part growing in the left corner as it was trapping a shed load of detritus. There is still some floating at the back as it's not a heavily planted tank and the Betta like it. Everything else seems to be putting on lots of new growth (for a low tech) and the slight melting of the Hydrocotyle tripartita has stopped and been replaced with new leaves. As for the emergent plants, the Maranta is struggling to recover from drying out when I forgot to put it back in a while ago (whoops!) and the Fittonia suffered with botrytis and dissolved. There's a tiny bit of that left. The tradescantia is going great guns (hard to kill so not anything to be particularly proud of!) and following a post on here, I've added a cutting of Monstera adansonii from the 'arium which has readily rooted. The fern on the left is struggling a bit, not sure whether it's too close to the light or if the leaves are just still damaged from transport as they were crushed a lot when I got it.
Oh, and in case anyone is wondering, the plant pot at the back is a makeshift baffle for the filter as Mr Betta chose that spot for his home. He spends a lot of time there which makes me wonder whether the rest of the tank is too open for his comfort, though he readily comes out to feed and flirt with Mrs Betta...
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The wood is still growing a lovely fungus which becomes more elaborate every day and is quite beautiful in its own way. There are also still diatoms which is most noticeable on the roots of the floating plants. The added bonus for blackwater is that you can't see the diatoms as they blend in to the tannin stained water!
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Mr and Mrs B. Imbellis have been joined by a small gang of Pygmy Corys (6). There were initial 'are these edible?" vibes from the Bettas but they quickly lost interest and settled down to blatantly ignoring each other. There is a group of 3 or 4 who are always out and active but they never shoal as a group of 6, there are always one or two doing their own thing. I'm contemplating increasing the number as the Betta are fine with them. Apologies for the rubbish phone photos, the white dots are, I think, baby snails... The Bolbitis heudelotii is still hanging on in the background; I've got some growing emersed as well but one of those had melted already.
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A gratuitous, rather rubbbish, photo of the ever-hungry Mrs Betta 😍 this pair have spawned once now which was a spectacular disaster!
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Figured it was time for an update.
All the beautiful fungus on the wood died out and has now been replaced with some weeping moss. Not convinced it'll do well in the lower depths, but the higher up portions are growing. In fact, everything is growing. Some things faster than others, but nothing has failed other than the liverwort. Even the tiger lotus, which I'd given up hopes of sprouting, has suddenly launched into life. The Lagendra meeboldii is twice the size of the one I planted in another tank around the same time.
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Up top, things are settled and growing in well for the most part. The Monstera cutting has rooted and both ferns seem to be holding their own; the white veined one, whose name escapes me right now, dropped all its old fronds but has grown a raft of new ones, I assume due to the difference in humidity from where it grew previously. Since the central heating has kicked in and the relative humidity in the room has dropped, some older leaves have developed brown edges. Hopefully that will be survivable as they're all pretty hardy plants. The Calathea flatly refuses to stay put so I've had to stick a rock on top to stop it nose diving onto the floor.
The floating cork rounds were a success - so much so that I've introduced them into my other tanks and the submerged crevices proved to be a favourite hideout for betta fry.
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As for the fauna, Mrs Betta turned out to be yet another Mr Betta, masquerading as a girl. My MFF trio have ended up being 3 bloody boys. Given that the 2 boys lived together for 2 months, I never saw any fighting, there were no injuries and the second male just continued pretending to be a girl. That is until I had to remove the dominant male to fast, as he was constipated, and suddenly the "girl" coloured up and built a bubble nest! There was no reintroductions likely to happen after that, so here I am with 3 bachelor imbellis boys and 1 female splendens. Thankfully I've now found a relatively local source for proven female imbellis and will hopefully be adding them soon.
The 6 pygmy cories have been joined by 6 copper harlequin rasbora, who seem feistier than the bettas! This group appears to be male heavy too, from what I can tell... They, along with the cories, enjoy playing in the flow from the ugly powerhead with its plant pot baffle at the front of the tank. Because of the tank being a cube, and the excruciatingly gentle flow of the pump feeding the rear planter, I needed something to spread the heat. This does the job well, despite being less than pleasing to the eye, and doesn't interfere with the betta's ability to reach the surface or the floor. The enjoyment provided for the other fish is an added bonus!
The biggest issue I seem to be facing are freshwater limpets. Now, I don't mind them too much, but I'm beginning to get a bit over run with them. I think I need to find out a bit more about them to see if there's any way to naturally limit their population...
Anyway, here's the customary fts, complete with limpets if you look closely enough and ugly powerhead/baffle:
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This tank is developing nicely. I had to move out the nymphaea as (surprise, surprise) it sent up more pads than I could keep control of and blocked all the light. Plus, being a tank with Betta and cories, it blocked all their access to the air. It's now residing in my sparkling gourami tank where it'll do the same thing but will be easier to control as it's much shallower. It's opened it out in the middle and I'll probably leave it empty there, at least until I change my mind!
All the emersed plants are doing really well, to my surprise. I added some spare crypts to one of the planters and that's taken off well after the initial melting. Not sure I have room for any more now! Almost all the filtration is done by the planters now, just the eheim/plant pot combo with it's tiny bit of sponge assisting. It does still get water changes though.
The inhabitants are now complete with the addition of 2 definite female Betta imbellis, neither of whom got in the shot! Excuse the ugly lid, reflections and, as usual, the plant pot baffle!
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There isn't much to update regarding the plant side of things. Following the original 'arium rescape, the Spathyphyllum has been relocated to this tank until I find a better home for it. I may have a juggle of the emersed plants here to accommodate it. Both ferns are now throwing up new growth and the Maranta, which spent a long time sulking, is now growing well. The emersed crypts are very visible now though still small. With the addition of the Tradescantia from the 'arium and the Spathyphyllum, I've removed the pump and sponge from the front which does look nicer!

Crypt and Maranta
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Obligatory fts, without pump and plant pot baffle. If you zoom in to the top right, just under the frogbit leaf, you can guess the rest of the update!
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Yep, the addition of the female imbellis has gone well and there is now a nest with almost free-swimming fry :) Mr is seeing off anyone who wanders too close and is generally being a good daddy. With the harlequins there too, there's a lower chance of survival than in the 'arium tank, but we have a similar scenario there too. Maybe tank number 9 is on the horizon...

The best shot I could get without seriously annoying him! You can just make out the nest under the frogbit leaf.
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I love this. Im intrigued though, do you have the male and the females all living together all the time? I wasn't aware you could do this! (Not a surpise I know next to nothing about bettas)
 
Yes, though I wouldn't do it in a cube tank again with imbellis. They are part of the splendens complex (along with the domestic Betta with the fancy fins, so can be aggressive still. I now have these is a 60cm tank, but the juvenile males will have to move out once they're old enough to sex as it's not really big enough for more than one male.
 
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