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90cm/150litre - "Patience"

Did a 70% water change last night with a bucket 🙁 Mind, I syphoned using some 16/22mm hose instead of my usual syphon thing with the squeezy end that gets the syphon action going... Much quicker to fill a bucket 😀

I have 10 metres of silicone hose on it's way to me at the moment. I plan to use an old Fluval 204 to pump water out for water changes in future!

I also just seeded one of the EX1200's with media and sponges from a "live" EX1200 on another tank. I was going to do the other one too, but it was such a hassle doing one I figured I'd do it another day! It was 12.30am after all!

Whilst seeding the filter I "smooshed" the two bags of activated carbon in the filter... Unfortunately that means the water has gone a little cloudy now :| Thankfully it didn't look too bad. Hopefully when I get home tonight it'll be totally clear again 🙂

I also destroyed another little tank whilst trying to do a water change. The ADA AS just mixed with the ADA forest sand and everything went cloudy. I got fed up then and left it (new setup, nothing alive in it!) I'll tackle that tonight I guess. Good excuse to re-think it again!
 
Well, Dan's (TDI-Line) blyxa arrived yesterday in great shape so naturally I had to rip out all of the blyxa I already had and re-plant :lol:

Day004_Blyxa.jpg


And from the front:

Day004_Front.jpg


I'm thinking I need to re-plant a little more, and spread it out a little, and I think I need to bring it left a bit more, to about where the CO2 diffuser is at the moment.

Interestingly I've been playing with flow to get good CO2 distribution. I have 2 diffusers running at the moment, in a temporary configuration. As it stands I have one EX1200 outlet flowing from left rear to right rear and the other EX1200 outlet sort of right middle flowing to left front corner (slight angle). This seems to catch most of the Co2 and send it in a loop around the tank, and I can see CO2 bubbles floating about near substrate level. Most plants show a little movement which is good 🙂

My eventual plan is to keep the inlets where they are, more or less, and have the two outlets on the right side wall flowing straight down the tank length ways. I also want to aquire 2x 17mm glassware sets 😉

Annnyway. Everything growing as it should do will do for me at the moment!
 
It looks great! I can't wait to see this one grown in.

I think the Blyxa would look better if you kept it where it is now... I don't really know how to explain what I mean but I think it would be distracting if you put it where the diffuser is now.
 
SteveUK said:
I'm really warming up to Ember tetras at the moment. Getting the right number is going to be difficult, but I'm thinking a shoal of 30 perhaps?
Click to expand...

Maybe. With a 90cm tank to play with you could look at getting 60/90/100 though....? They're tiny fish!

Mark
 
SteveUK said:
I'm really warming up to Ember tetras at the moment. Getting the right number is going to be difficult, but I'm thinking a shoal of 30 perhaps?
Click to expand...

30 is the minimum I'd say. I have 10 in a 30cm and that's about right. You could look at gettina few more, though - say 40 or so.

Nice fish choice though 😉
 
Length is tiny, but that makes all the other dimensions tiny too, so they're tiny cubed!

Imagine 90 of the little blighters in a net - probably as much biomass as two 10cm goldfish. (I'm just guessing, but you can see roughly what I mean). Stocking guidelines of cm fish to litres of water are just a starting point, really to help beginners - but you can''t compare, say, 12 x 1" neons with a 1 x 12" oscar!

Have you ever seen a 3 or four foot tank with a massive shoal of one tiny fish in it? Aquatic design centre had a 4' tank in the basement the other day, planted (looked really good, bit messy now, I think they nick plants from it to sell) and they had at least 100 green neons in it - I was hypnotised!

You've got a great sized tank anyway, looking forward to seeing it progress!

Mark
 
Thanks Mark.

It wasn't so much the inch per gallon/cm per litre thing, more that I can't visualise what 30 or 60 would look like in my tank. To me the tank doesn't look that massive, so I wouldn't want it to look too crowded 🙂 That's why I sound a little unsure :lol:

Anyhow, I've been chatting to a friend on TFF that works at an MA in Northants, and she's going to be sorting me out 🙂 (she's also just managed to tempt me with some micro rasbora - coffee beans and mosquito rasbora! Apparently no one's buying them at the moment 🙁 These are for different tanks though 😉 )
 
SteveUK said:
(she's also just managed to tempt me with some micro rasbora - coffee beans and mosquito rasbora! Apparently no one's buying them at the moment 🙁 These are for different tanks though 😉 )
Click to expand...

I am tempted to buy a shoal of these for my tank at some point. Seems weird to me that no one is buying them! Each to there own I suppose.
 
Hi Steve,

awesome mate really awesome,i love the planting when it fills out its going to an absolute stunner,Dan (tdi line) sent me some blyxa and the quality was awsome,well done steve,regards john.
 
Super job, Steve. I bet you're really excited about seeing this one grow in?

With your photoshop skills I bet you could add some fish to get an idea...
 
Thanks for all the encouragement guys! It's the constructive criticisms and the encouragement that really spur you on to try to get it right, but also to learn! 🙂

JamesM said:
Looks great, Steve.

Any reason for not using the EX1200's spraybars?

And how are you splitting the co2? A second needle valve?
Click to expand...

Ideally I want lily pipes :lol: Also I wanted to play about with the flow. I've split the CO2 using a Y connector from AquaEssentials. I've not done it in a temporary way really. I do have two needle valves I could of used, but it's only temporary.

Good thinking about photoshop George, I'll try to have a play over the weekend, mothers day permitting.

Just a little update too. I've just done a second water change. I'm noticing some patches of HC are dying back, and I assume (hope!) it's because it's emmersed growth transforming into submersed. I've noticed some detritus build up on the e. acicularis. A bit of a swoosh over with my tweezers sorts that out. I'm assuming it's from the HC die off. Also a little P. helferi die back, but I think the plants weren't in the best of condition from storage for 2 weeks (came from Ice in good condition!)

Anyhow, during the water change I decided t tinker with the Blyxa and I think I did good 😀 Basically I've just moved some of the shorter plants further forward on the right edge and spaced some of the plants out. It looks a little less compact and just generally sits better on the eye 🙂

I'll post some pics tomorrow hopefully!

Thanks again for the encouragement guys 🙂
 
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