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Re: A Chocolate Puddle

What else are you thinking of using for floaters. I used Water Hyacinth and they looked great, And provide large areas for shrimp,fish, fry to graze and hide in. And plus the flowers are lovely.
 
Re: A Chocolate Puddle

Shallow, deep, riparium!? :D

Can't wait to see this finished! Exactly what I planned to build next.
 
A Chocolate Puddle

Gill said:
What else are you thinking of using for floaters. I used Water Hyacinth and they looked great, And provide large areas for shrimp,fish, fry to graze and hide in. And plus the flowers are lovely.

Not too sure yet Gill, the amazon frogbit and hydrocotyle lucophela seem to be getting of to a good start, I may just use the frogbit as I like the roots they give too. Might give the hyacinth a try.

Thanks Morgan I'm really excited about this tank, more so about how I can get the riparium part added to.

Have added some rotala rotundafolia to it today which the cory fry absolutely love swimming through, most of the crypts have melted completely so will be a bit Before they pop back up but am on the look out for more and tennelus.

Quite like the very tall eleocharis which I may add at some point.

Anyway here's just a couple of pics to show the very slow progress (thanks corys)

7222496516_f8e385eec7_b.jpg
Untitled by Mr-T-, on Flickr

And
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So still away to go. The cyperus is sprouting lots of new side shoots which will help thicken the immersed section out.

I've also done zero water changed since the weekend of set up

Ps not too sure how good the pic quality is loading to here from tapa talk

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A Chocolate Puddle

BigTom said:
Hurrah, clear water :p

Looking good, I'm quite jealous of all that empty space, there's no way I'm ever regaining control of mine!

I know, crustal clear almost I'm very chuffed. I don't want all the clear space we can do a straight swap of you like mate ha ha. No, I'm hoping to have just a little open space at the front left corner and along the front with tennelus (hoping!!!) lol


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Re: A Chocolate Puddle

Keep coming back to these pics cos the substrate looks SO natural Alastair. Is that florabase on top ? If so have u got a mix of sizes ? It looks incredible.

PS you got mail :)
 
Re: A Chocolate Puddle

:D can see thing becoming very nice.
 
Re: A Chocolate Puddle

Antipofish said:
Keep coming back to these pics cos the substrate looks SO natural Alastair. Is that florabase on top ? If so have u got a mix of sizes ? It looks incredible.

PS you got mail :)

Thanks Chris,
Yes it's the black florabase but think it is a mix of sizes, some of it is also the soil which accidently got brought up from the dancing hose but it gives it a very natural look. I'm really impressed with how good the soil looks in this tank.

awtong said:
Loving this tank so far. Everytime you post the progress is quite amazing.

One to watch!

Andy

Hey Andy thanks mate. The progress is really down to just adding bits here and there. Once everything's in and I can eventually pull out that bloody terracotta pot weighing the wood down, I can finish off adding lots of needle lead to the wood and then let nature take its course.

Quick stats too, KH has stayed at 4, GH6 and PH still seems between 6.5 and 7 but would like to get this down to 6.
 
Re: A Chocolate Puddle

This is looking GREAT Alastair, well done. Still planning on having the Choc's in there ?

:D
 
A Chocolate Puddle

KrisHumphreys1991 said:
This is looking GREAT Alastair, well done. Still planning on having the Choc's in there ?

:D

Thanks mate, glad its appealing to people. Looking forward to eventually filling it with plants.
Absolutely planning on putting my chocco's in there once I've got water parameters to how I want them. I want them to breed.
Also have some mixed shrimp coming from a friend at the end of the month too which I'm looking forward to adding. I'm really surprised how clear the water has stayed too. Once the cory fry are a little bigger that's when I'll look at adding in the chocco's. Need lots of foliage on the water too yet.


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Re: A Chocolate Puddle

Nice tank mate, it will look cool when all the plants have grown in. I'd like to start a shallow tank some day.
 
Re: A Chocolate Puddle

saw some corydoras pygmaeus today, wow they were so small and cute.
 
Re: A Chocolate Puddle

Alastair said:
Gill said:
What else are you thinking of using for floaters. I used Water Hyacinth and they looked great, And provide large areas for shrimp,fish, fry to graze and hide in. And plus the flowers are lovely.

Not too sure yet Gill, the amazon frogbit and hydrocotyle lucophela seem to be getting of to a good start, I may just use the frogbit as I like the roots they give too. Might give the hyacinth a try.

Thanks Morgan I'm really excited about this tank, more so about how I can get the riparium part added to.

Have added some rotala rotundafolia to it today which the cory fry absolutely love swimming through, most of the crypts have melted completely so will be a bit Before they pop back up but am on the look out for more and tennelus.

Quite like the very tall eleocharis which I may add at some point.

The Tall Eleocharis will look great in here swaying in the current. Provides a very Nice effect in the tank. And there are is a VVgood Quality seller on ebay, when I bought some last year. It does grow alot quicker than normal hair grass so needs a good trim.
 
Re: A Chocolate Puddle

I see :D

Hopefully they will breed, have you tried it before ? That would be exciting !

I'll stick some Hydro Leucophala in an envolope for you, just give me postage I can imagine you've spent a LOT on this tank already :D It should start growing pretty fast and grows right out of the water, happily :D

Would look good maybe "overflowing" over the edge of the tank.
 
Re: A Chocolate Puddle

If you like the Idea of having a plant trailing down and around the outside of the tank. Do you remember I experimented with Hydrocytle varieties in the pipefish tank. And I had it growing in a Dense Matt and trailing down the sides of the tank. It Is a Very Thirsty plant so absorbs alot from the water. I used Hydrocoytle Rannanculus for trailing
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One thing I did towards the end of this scape. Is I used airline suckers to train the hydrocoytle to grow in the direction I wanted it to grow in. And they are are hidden by the leaf pads once they get bigger. A Very easy method to get a trailing plant in control.
 
Re: A Chocolate Puddle

thanks Gill, was actually thinking of getting the Hydrocotyle lucocephila to trail over the edges of the tank once its really settled in which it seems to be doing. Have been having a bit of trouble with either fuzz algae or staghorn on crypt leaves so have just ben snipping off the leaves, i know this will be down to not planting very heavily from the start but i have my baby corys to thank for that ha ha. im getting some plants in this week to fill everywhere up which should help tons. the frogbit is doing great and to be honest is growing better in this than it iver did in my co2 tank. Have just added a pinch of kno3 and kh2po4 too especially with the cyperus as they are hungry buggers.
ive raised the light unit a further 15cm and they are almost touching again so may have to start snipping off the taller ones. The echinodorus triffid is breaking the water surface now and throwing out new leaves so will hopefully see that apperaing above water soon i hope.
plants will go in this weekend, which ive been kindly donated and add some more surface plants i e frogbit, a bit more to the riparium section then i think in will go my choccos. i just need a bit more substrate.
all the plants in here all seem to be doing brilliant though with no signs of deficiency at all so im happy with that too. still nil water changes also, just top ups when the levels drop.
i have lots of cherries going in which have been sat in a tank for over 2 months and once these go in i think ill add a variety of other shrimp too and leave it to do its own thing, may do say a ten percent water change once a month but everything looks fine.
havent tested for ammonia nitrates etc, and as the cory babies are doing so well then it must be with in safe limits.

Ph is sitting comfortable at 6.5 and gh is still 6/7. Hoping it will go below 6 though for the gouramis as they like it lower
 
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