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Looking good, plant choice is key with lower lighting...mine are doing OK, pretty good but I think the HC is going to do little to nothing, but it is hanging on well enough, just not growing much. Added in 6 tiny panda corydoras yesterday, alongside 15 of these little beauties, tiny but...

From yesterday...

I have two lights also...stems, p.helferi and crypts/ferns are fine, not so sure on the hair grass and HC...though being away from the tank for 7 days, leaving it with reduced light and fertiliser means I'm not 100% sure yet - I don't want any more light though, so if anything I'll just change a...

Crikey the plants have really grown in seeing that photo! I'll try for some new ones this week. HC is...well not doing so well, it almost looks like nutrient issues, but it is likely light - I will 99% replace it with the other similar plant which I forget the name of but is fine in less light...

There's something to be said for a plants-only layout :)

They'll get more in, I'm not rushing things, too much hassle - we also have a week away shortly, so I'm waiting to add any livestock until we get back to save extra faffing around :)

Looks like someone else managed to do what I was wondering, and added a spray bar to the internal Juwel filter outlet :) Does it work OK?

Sunlight was my problem in my last tank years ago, the aquarium got lots of it and I always struggled with algae issue...I also found DIY CO2 too unstable personally. I am using a 6hr lighting period on my current tank which gets significantly less sun than my old one - as much as I would...

Second LED unit ordered today, it won't give me high light levels by any means, but it should match things better with the liquid carbon and NPK fertilisers. Had a day or so of a white bacteria bloom in the water which has now gone, may well schedule a few water changes in to keep things all...

Yep, that was me OWB :) I left the aquarium stuff behind the shed, it was all there for your taking! Plants all in, I started a journal here: https://www.ukaps.org/forum/threads/juwel-primo-110-led.50340/

All planted today after a stunning selection of plants from AquaEssentials, every single one in excellent condition and a great size too! I have since removed all of the floaty bits and it the water has cleared lovely:

So, the first step back into planted aquariums, something larger than I've had in 20 years, though still small compared to my future aims :) Juwel Primo 110 LED - 120 litres, 81cm width. Standard lighting, filter sponges replaced with generic sponge and filter wool. Substrate - Tetra Complete...

Things have clearly moved on in respect of lighting in new aquariums :) Very impressed with the upgrade options on the Primo 110 - it comes with an LED light tube but you can add at least another 3, if not 4 more, as it has the mounting holes in the lid to screw them into. Way easier than my...

Thanks :) All ordered today, aquarium, substrate (I'm a fan of Tetra Complete so that topped with dark sand) and some generic filter foam and wool as I'm not going to be touching the carbon or nitrate removal sponges that are supplied with the aquarium. Went for the AquaEssentials NPK and...

Hey again all, after a huge break of 5 or 6 years, my life now has space again for another aquarium :) Pretty much stemming from babysitting a neighbours goldfish in a 'lacking' plastic tank and the kids have loved it, I'll likely be going for a low-tech 80cm tank next week to set up with the...

Mine takes an age to start passing CO2 into the tank - I've got the needle valve almost fully open and today I added few hours extra to the CO2 start time to see if this helps. Bubbles are MUCH smaller, which I presume is why the pressure needs to be so high...

Will do if my wife ever agrees to one, cheers :)

Within the realms....is this something you do commercially perchance? If I can persuade my better half to let me have one, it would perhaps be half the size of yours.

Ed, if you don't mind me asking, if someone were to pay for something like this to be built, complete with filtration etc., what sort of figures are we talking?

It has finally started to bubble in the tank! I'm guessing the bubble counter was leaking enough, small as it may have been, to prevent the pressure getting high enough for the atomiser to pass any CO2. I'm amazed how fine the bubbles are, I 'mist' them at first - need to go source a decent...

Am I being impatient with mine? Setup the new Up atomiser on Monday evening, I left all the regulator settings as they were on the previous Boyu inline setup. Never thought much of it until last night when there were no CO2 bubbles/mist to be seen. Reg is showing 50psi on the cylinder, just...

Personally I've used CO2 for so long I haven't got any comparisons :)

That's some markup on the AE one! I just got the eBay one and it took about 4 weeks to turn up...much cheaper though. I have a Hydor and Boyu inline at present, no issues at all. The internals of the Hydor are smooth, I'd not worry about any air being trapped, not sure it's even possible :)

The tall central plant llikely died because it wasn't aquatic (the white/green leaved one).

I would be curious on the source of the food if they've only done this after feeding? Cory's are pretty hardy and my group of 4 appear happy and are always active. I'm also tight on feeding, mine get fed every other day or so.

Crypts and ferns are a good choice, moss may be OK too but I find it a bit invasive. Use a general fertiliser such as Tropica Plant Nutrition Plus (or the non-Plus version if you have a high fish load) and job done.

1) They may just be using it for cover, breeding behaviour is pretty noticeable. 2) They probably enjoy it :) 3) Depending on the plant, this is possible?

Different and good start, keep the photo's coming :)

I have this regulator which also has a solenoid built in which is great, stick it on a timer switch so C02 is on an hour or two before the lights: http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/CO2-regulator ... 3a5e701777 I have this CO2 drop checker kit: http://www.aquariumplantfood.co.uk/tool ... t-jet.html...

You don't need that much :) Dual-gauge regulator from eBay ~£45 2kg CO2 fire extinguisher from eBay ~£25 Inline atomiser (assuming you're using an external filter?) from eBay ~£20 or in-tank one for £10 or so 4dkh drop checker (~£20 or so from eBay/UK shops including 4dkh water and bromo blue...

Not all T5 twin-tube ballasts allow a single tube to work on its own so choose carefully. I've gone from 2 x 15w T8's to a 2x24w T5 luminaire - I'll be honest, with the same bulb brand used in each (Sylvania daylight), I can't see any major difference in how it looks to my eyes, nor do I so far...

In all honesty, any shoaling fish is better in groups of 5,6 or more. They really prefer larger groups, and I doubt for the most part many care if the group is male and female and how you tell when buying most of them is hard if not impossible. Fish aren't often like humans with a 2-person...

Must be eating something otherwise they'd die within a very short time frame, I'd not be worried, though I suspect being a single tetra they'd be happier with a few more of the same around for company.

Mine is doing this at the moment too, however I did realise on the water change night that a filter hose hand kinked, therefor reducing flow and not moving the surface around much. Sorted that one, then noticed last night another one was also kinked - sorted that one and the difference is...

As above, drop the lighting period and if you're running full EI dosing, you need to consider upping the water change frequency to 50% each week ideally.

So how do the likes of Tropica Plant Nutrition Plus work then?

If the fish likes it, leave it be :) Beyond asking it, I have no idea how you'd find out why it does it.

If you dose daily, make sure you reduce each dose accordingly. I do both on the same days, Mon/Wed/Fri, then it rests the weekend...

My fish enjoy chasing it around the tank :)

Are you not better just setting those as reminders in a calendar? I'm not sure what benefit a spread sheet will bring? For a simple table you could use any software: Each column heading is the date Under each date column, have a row for: Hours of light Fertiliser amount to add Water change...

I have a used but no longer used set in the cupboard if you want them?

Drop checker is the easiest way to monitor CO2 levels - if it's lime green it's fine, yellow too much, blue not enough.

Estimative Index is easy, or perhaps a simpler method further by using an all-in-one fertiliser such as Tropica Plant Nutrition Plus which has nitrogen, potassium and phosphate as well.

Fertiliser is key - have you plans for that?

I've had two sets of eBay cheapies...I'm pretty lost why others are significantly more expensive and appear identical :)

I've had panda's before which were often active but very shy, any noise around the tank and they'd go hide. I've currently got 4 leopard cory's and for the most part, any noise just makes them stop still and the then continue with their business once they're happy again. I would prefer a...

Some bubbles do join together in the pipework, more so I find now I'm using a spray bar with ridges etc. where all the pipework joins together. My lily pipe was a much smoother connection so I got less larger bubbles.

I have the same 'issue' however my oto's love the stuff so I tend to leave it there mostly :) If I ever scrape it off, I'll most likely do this whilst siphoning away the scraped material to reduce how much spreads into the water column.

eBay most likely, I've had acrylic rod from there plenty of times, I'd presume there is also tubing too.

I find shrimp poo almost constantly vs. fish....does this not actually give a higher bio-load than fish?

27c seems warm, not sure if it would affect the fish, but I would have presumed 23c or so would be better for tetra?

I had one myself a good few years ago - freaked me out as they're big ugly buggers until they turn into dragonflies!

If you have enough plants, you could add some livestock now. 65 litres is probably 10-12 smaller fish (tetra for example), perhaps the same for shrimp. Mine is 65 litres or so and I've got 4 cory, 12 neon's and there will be around a dozen shrimp added in a week or two.

Air leak in a pipe somewhere?

Be careful with the CO2 via yeast with decent lighting, I found it hard to maintain a stable CO2 rate and gave up in the end on the same sized aquarium.

Shock perhaps? Never saw that when I had some of those, nor with any other fish.

Kinky pipes ;)

Bumble bee shrimp appear to be very sensitive - even being really careful with water changes, I've struggled with them. Plain old amano shrimp seem fine, cherries aren't too bad either, but any of the 'posher' species need more care.

There's a recent thread on here discussing how the bacteria can last MUCH longer than first thought - weeks and months instead of a few hours.

Butterfly/Honk Kong plecs may well be OK, they're from cooler waters and don't get too big (5-6cm). As good as oto's for algae clean up by all accounts! Weather loach too are cold water I believe.

That's shrimp for you...how long have you had them?

Re: Algae and java moss won't grow What fertiliser are you adding and what is your light/CO2 timing like?

Nice shoal of neon's went in today - 6 for £5 so 12 it was. It almost became 11 when the lights went off as one got rather skittish and jumped out of the tank, though it was lucky enough to land on a plastic bag and it was promptly dropped straight back in again - random that I happened to...

Re: oddn0ise - 270L rebuild The first setup was lovely, I think I'd struggled to tear it down :)

I don't think there's an issue with cardinals in a 60cm tank, a cube perhaps, but not a 60cm/24" one.

I had some boraras maculatus and they were just like mini zebra danio in temperament - they were not shy and were mostly out in the open. I'd think a larger group would be fine in that size of aquarium, I'm debating 12-15 cardinal tetra in a similar sized aquarium, and I already have 4 cory, 3...

I'd not be overly surprised to find they have a whacking great custom filter in the tank base, they seem to know their stuff, it just isn't explained that much.

Gonna be a tight fit this large tank...watch the fountain and the doors... 2 hours later...Oh, well, we can just move the fountain, it's really easy to move! Seriously, I so laughed out loud at that moment! Honestly, the house owner was helping them lift the heavy tank base around the...

Gush Jet CO2 drop checker went on last night and was a nice shade of light green after a few hours. It's still the same colour this morning (always find that with my aquarium, it never goes back to blue even with CO2 off for 12+ hours), so I am assuming CO2 levels are OK which is good. I'll...

I can only comment on those I've received - they were double-bagged, with pure oxygen piped into the air gap. A thermal pad was put in the box along with newspaper to fill any gaps. The box has always been polystyrene with brown tape around the lid/base seal. They were always marked as you...

They can just fail like that unfortunately...if the thermostat sticks, then it just stays on.

I've got a Boyu at present, but I don't find the bubbles overly small - managed to find an UP one via eBay for £16 delivered (12/16mm) which is on the way now so I'll soon know if I have a preference! I have to admit to never cleaning the Boyu one as the piping is zip-tied to the ends. The UP...

Has anyone tried these two and has an opinion on which is 'better'?

A gentle ripple from the spray bar, nothing in any way excessive and there is no water surface being 'broken'.

Gush Jet drop checker kit on the way, I'm pumping an almost impossible amount to count of CO2 bubbles per minute, far more than in the previous setup, yet the fish seem to have no hassles at all. Strange that others here seem to run tiny bpm's for much larger tanks but mine has always needed...

Jeez...time to hire/beg/borrow/steal a wet and dry vacuum methinks!

That would be a leopard/trilineatus cory, not a Julii... http://www.seriouslyfish.com/species/co ... rilineatus

Watched FTK this morning...not a bad watch, but I was surprised at the extensive use of fake corals, and even then, the fakeness of the colours used. I guess that makes for low maintenance, but it still felt a little like cheating.

A Windows Phone. Seriously. Apple is dated, Android is, well, anything and everything.

Interesting, I previously used Tetra AquaSafe, though I don't need the chloramine removal so far as I can find from my water board info.

Nutrafin AquaPlus handles chlorine and chloramine and needs much less per bucket full than AquaSafe - 10L of water needs only 2ml so it lasts for well over twice as long as the Tetra product which needed 5ml for the same treatment volume. My local LFS was also doing BOGOF which may be a Hagen...

Well the second group of 8 turned up in excellent condition! No problems at all, took 2 hours to acclimatise them last night, lights and CO2 off, all went straight from the bag into picking around the tank so fingers crossed the last ones were simply weak from the bag leak issues. The 1-2-Grow...

Never struggled with amano or cherry, they bred like rabbits...

I guess oops is one word, though I can't say I expected the water change to do anything...live and learn possibly, hope the replacements are better as they're due tomorrow...don't fancy killing those off too!

Not if the buyer is intentionally creating additional accounts to bid on their own items to up the final sale price though! Livestock of sorts must be allowed though, plenty of fish/shrimp etc. for sale on there.

Report them to eBay - a relative of mine got caught out doing the same thing and had their account removed/blocked.

What have you bought? Some may be better kept emersed as this is how they may have been grown already and would save any algae issues etc.

Plenty of fish that love green algae too, oto's being one, plec's another depending on tank size. Hillstream loaches also seem good if your tank is cool enough and has decent flow.

I'm guessing these bee shrimp are more fussy than cherry/amano as the one I know is still with me appears to have disliked the water change this evening...

Some of the smaller gourami? Things like rams are nice too, very brightly coloured and a good size for a 20g :)

Quite probably, ours have some form of contract to cover that as a 3rd party company is milking off some of the feed-in tarrif...can't see how they'll get much from us though :)

All I know is that at work, where our electric is £8000+ per annum, our LA put up masses of 3-phase panels and we're saving £600 per year. A house is going to generate much less on 2-phase and less panel coverage...

Current panels are very inefficient - the next gen ones are within my lifetime and efficiency is much improved. This current thing about solar panels is going to land people with loads of old tech in not that many years if you ask me.

That, sir, is a darn good read! Also happened to link to the hillstream loach article, there are some lovely specieis around!

Not sure if the pub ones are good for aquariums? I have this one: http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Up-Aqua-CO2-r ... 3a699390ce Can't fault it at all.

Just need to ditch those plastic plants for real ones now ;)

No need for CO2 to be on after lights off, however it is best left on until the lights go off. I was trying to get to James Planted Tank guide on the Interweb but it doesn't want to load for me, the algae guide is superb: http://www.theplantedtank.co.uk/algae.htm

Is yours the tank I have seen in front of the window in your room? First off, drop the lights to 6hrs. There's no need for CO2 after lights off (which I can't see would cause the algae).

One of them that stopped long enough :)

No panda cory, the LFS had some lovely looking trilineatus/leopard cory (yes, they are these and not julii's) so we got 4 this morning. Amazing how active cory's are, within 10 minutes they were having a good root around the tank and have settled in nicely - even the oto's have perked up in...