A Tale of Two Roma's

[mort]

I think council tips can recycle fire extinguishers, or at least ours will. It's hard getting them filled but if you have any fire safety services around you, they might be able to help. We have one that services local shops and private building and they can refill and certify them quite cheaply.
I seen in the past some of these services just swap your old for a refilled one plus the filling fee.

 

[John q]

It's hard getting them filled but if you have any fire safety services around you, they might be able to help.

The company we use at work won't service and refill them after the 10 year expiry date has lapsed, cost wise it seems its more economical to simply replace them a new.
This works in my favour when we have the yearly fire extinguisher service as I always end up with a couple of free bottles.

Think our recycling centre also takes them, will just have to remember to take them piecemeal.

 

[John q]

Did I ever tell u the joke about the creeping rotala and the panda garra?

 

[John q]

Random update. Going to watch Ben Elton...
Fish are fine, plants are... OK. Pics contain gsa....

Night night peeps 😴

 

[Hufsa]

Pics contain gsa....

In fishkeeping circles GSA is said to indicate a healthy tank 😊 Maybe there's something to it?

Lush plants and happy looking fish as usual @John q 😍
Does the panda garra like to play on your arm when you're in the tank?

 

[John q]

In fishkeeping circles GSA is said to indicate a healthy tank 😊 Maybe there's something to it?

Well I'm hoping that's the case. Since adding the parotocinclus I've stopped the weekly front glass cleaning to try and ensure there's some extra goodness in the tank for them, been 3 weeks now without cleaning and certain areas are getting coverd in GSA, today is maintenance day and the glass will get a partial clean.

Yes the Garra love to nibble my arms and hands when I'm in there, I used to think they did this because their diet was lacking something but now just think they are incredibly social creatures and like to say hello.

Thanks for the comments mate, I'll probably do a more in depth update over the weekend.

 

[Libba]

I used to think they did this because their diet was lacking something

Their diet is probably lacking in human flesh

 

[Hufsa]

Yes the Garra love to nibble my arms and hands when I'm in there, I used to think they did this because their diet was lacking something but now just think they are incredibly social creatures and like to say hello.

Ive heard a lot of people say they come up on the arm, so i think theyre just curious fish as a species 😄 They're related to garra rufa, the so called spa fish after all

 

[mort]

I have a lot of moles on my arms and it's not great for feisty fish like barbs, where they seem to attack them like a gang of piranhas. I had the same issue with blood thirsty clownfish including one cinnamon clown (who was dumped at our shop doorway, it didn't take long to find out why) who hated everybody and ended up as our 8ft coral tray guard dog. That little "darling" used to swim all 8ft just to take lumps out of me. Still we did know when anyone in the shop put their hands in the water, the screams still haunt me.

So it would be quite nice to be welcomed to the tank in a nice way.

 

[John q]

Two years old ... what's changed... lights. Now have 2x aquasky and 1 aquasky 2 in 1 tank, and 2x aquasky 2 int tother.

Ferts wise I dose, Yong Yong ying yang methods , of little importance 😃 think about that???

Easy plants are easy, difficult plants are difficult, for everything else there's Barclaycard.

In other news I added 12 tangerine tiger shrimp, haven't seen them since. Suspect the Rams and Gourami enjoyed there tea 🙄

 

[John q]

The good, the bad and the ugly.

Weekly update time, bit of a mixed bag this week.
The erm good... totally overgrown tanks.

Since adding the extra lights growth has taken off, which is good unless the plants grow quicker than you can remove them 🤔
Higher light brings brighter colours in some plants.

Vallisneria spiralis going red.

Cryptocoryne spiralis red is losing its green stripe.

The not so good.
BBA.. Still here.

Doing glutaraldehyde spot dosing every two or three days, purely because I don't like adding it to the tanks, and to be honest I'm not overly bothered about a bit of algae, I have overgrown tanks, flow is hampered, and we don't care....

If we did care we would spot dose neat glutaraldehyde on exposed echinodorus leaves, now doesn't this look pretty.

Quick vacant picture of some glass catfish.

The bad.

Unfortunately one of my rams has presented itself with exophthalmia (Popeye). You obviously question yourself "what have I done wrong?" The answer is I don't know, I've kept fish on and of for the best part of 40 yrs and never experienced popeye, I suspect trauma on this occasion 🤷‍♂️

I've treated the tank with esha 2000 to try and prevent secondary infection but don't hold out much hope for this fella. Not so nice pics of said ram, looks healthy other than the eye.

Enjoy what's left of the evening peeps.

 

[John q]

Just a little update on the ram. He's still hanging in there and seems healthy enough and eatining normally.
The eye isn't protruding just as much and the eye itself seems clear, there is obvious signs of bacterial infection around the socket, although this has diminished in recent days.
The tanks had two rounds of esha so far and I've added some extra mgso4 for what its worth.
Suppose now its just a waiting game to see if he can pull through.

The Parotocinclus are still active and seem to be healthy, although of the six I added I can only account for 5.

Cheerio.

 

[dw1305]

Hi all,

The Parotocinclus are still active and seem to be healthy,

They look really good and have coloured up a bit.

cheers Darrel

 

[Conort2]

The Parotocinclus are still active and seem to be healthy, although of the six I added I can only account for 5.

They look really good. I moved mine out of quarantine the other day and could also only find five instead of six. since I’ve moved them I’ve not seen them at all in the big tank, hopefully they’re just hiding.

Are your feeding just on algae and veg or do they take any prepared food?

Cheers

 

[John q]

Are your feeding just on algae and veg or do they take any prepared food?

To be honest I think they're enjoying the algae and biofilm in the tank. At first they seemed keen on the veg but don't tend to bother with it now. I do feed various algae wafers and repashy cubes, although there's generally a three way fight between the amano shrimp, bristlenose or garra for who claims the prize.
I'd say 60% of the time they graze the leaves, 10% on the glass and 30% playing hide and seek.

 

[John q]

Garra on a leaf, by Tony Hart.

 

[John q]

Good evening guys and gals, thought I'd a a few details of the tanks for those that like to know these things, and to be fair I don't often mention it.
Both tanks get an approximate 60% water change every weekend, if I'm very busy at work they might get two 30% midweek changes.
Action shot on water change day.

Top down view.

I have fairly soft water so to the incoming 130L of water I add magnesium sulphate and calcium chloride, occasionally I switch out the chloride for calcium sulphate 🤷, this gets me to about 11ppm calcium & 4ppm magnesium.
I then front load the Macro's to 11.5ppm No3, 4ppm Po4, 9ppm K. These numbers are worked on 130L, not the full tank volume.
Micro's get added daily (6 days), which gives me a weekly total ppm based on full tank volume.
0.2 Fe Edta from apfuk trace.
0.14 Fe Dtpa.
0.9 Mn.
I also add into the micro mix mgso4 and urea.
0.99 Mg.
0.35 N.

C02 enters each tank via two twinstar diffusers, one is placed under the inlet, and the other far left of both tanks. Not the best, or indeed most economical method, but that's what we have. 1ph drop is achieved in approx 3 hrs.

Most of the plants in these tanks are easygoing affairs, the difficult ones generally don't survive. My scaping style is, ermm... Messy.

Hope that fills in any blanks, now update time.

Latest fts.

Random plant pic.

Corydoras have been busy laying eggs again, here's the proud mother.

And her eggs.

Some random shots of the unidentified brown ottolincus.

Meanwhile in the ok coral the Ancistrus braved a snatch squad consisting of an Angel fish and Parotocinclus, I'll set the scene.
So enter stage left the players and a tasty algae wafer.

The Angel fish builds up confidence and eyes the prize.

Not so fast screams the Ancistrus and does a fancy tail flick manoeuvre.

The prize is mine, ha ha ha (evil laugh)

I'd assumed all the Tangerine tiger shrimp had been eaten, however during the latest water change about 6 of them broke cover and decided to show themselves. Not the best pic, but proof of life.

Couple of moody fish pics.

And finally side view down one of the tanks.

Thanks for reading.

 

[hypnogogia]

My scaping style is, ermm... Messy.

I like the natural look you achieve.

 

[MichaelJ]

Action shot on water change day.

Great shots as always John! You really got this together.

Cheers,
Michael

 

[John q]

I like the natural look you achieve.

Thanks, I'll take the natural look compliment any day of the week ☺️

Great shots as always John!

Still grappling with the phone camera mate but sometimes a half decent shot materialises.