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First attempt -Ciano 58 litre

just finished acclimating 1..2..many shrimp and put them in the tank where they've promptly buggered off somewhere more private , did get a glimpse of one before they wombled off to the back of the tank . i ended up buying from this guy 10 + 2 FREE Mixed colours low grade Neocaridina shrimp + FREE FOOD SAMPLES | eBay and they came well packed with polystyrene and a heat pack in a clear bag inside a black bag , topped with a large catappa leaf and some food samples, they're just what I wanted, inconspicuous and no lairy colours though they're identifiably coloured, just very see through. i also got a selection box of glasgarten foods that will last long enough for me to get hold of full tubs
 
down 6 shrimp as of today, there's one little red one that keeps popping up in different places munching away, but no sign of the others, which I hope are just lurking until they get over themselves .I've been keeping things as stable as possible and I've put an airstone in today to see if more flow will discourage the algae on the wood that the Garys have carefully eaten round, it's starting to look a bit poorly already. the Garys are doing a sterling job apart from uprooting some recent plants by crashing into them. If the other shrimps re emerge the right way up, I'll be happier that I'm not wilfully murdering things and that the deaths up to now are down to travel and the new environment. If it all goes pear shaped I'll be taking out the wood for a boilwash
 
Well the Garys approve of the new jacuzzi , they were all gathered round it this morning, egging on the intrepid Gary who was climbing the wall in the bubble stream, still no sign of the shrimpies , but the stubborn algae does. not. like. the stronger flow - I'm thinking of getting one of the Oase thermo corner filters to try to get better filtration , the Ciano one isn't really cutting it even though it's technically ok and the media is in cartridges that aren't really economical, plus I can use the present heater for the cube, can't go external because of the lid and frame
 
still no sign of the shrimp, but no more dead bodies visible -this month's budget has been spent on a better filter because it's getting absolutely minging and I've still got dead spots even when it's newly cleaned -put the manufacturers bio cartridge in , which is a pitiful tablespoonful of biomedia by the feel and look of it . I'm replacing it with an Eheim biopower 160 so i can either have a spray bar or aerated flow, whichever does the best job with the advantage of much more biomedia room . Kicking myself for getting a rimmed tank now b/c I'd go external if I didn't have the lid to contend with
 
Hmm, I have a visitor, only possible sources are my LFS ( not likely b/c the plants I got are mostly in the nano) or the shrimp bloke, but I netted them out individually so no idea how it hitched in , I'm guessing it needs to come out so I don't end up with snail soup?

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E has decreed that the snail is to pretty to die (I agree , it is pretty), so I guess we have at least one bladder snail in the Gary team , also the tiny shrimp that lives under the biggest rock is still with us and munching away happily, I'd be happier if some of his mates showed themselves though
 
Did a bit of a hoover and small water change today and ! Hallelujah! I think that the only C.Parva that hasn't relocated to plant island (see third picture) has actually made it down to the soil by the look of it's new growth , there's signs that the others have also got their toes in the soil as well. Algae blanket on the wood is pretty much deceased and the Garys have been making short work of it. Plant island has a Val, some lilaeopsis, some hemianthus and two types of crypt drifting around. I've left them because I've been seriously considering changing the substrate to something more conventional,but with things actually behaving as though they're getting established that's gone on the back burner. Due to not being able to get hold of the matching plant light that clips to the lid, I've gone with one of the nicrew submersible plant ones and suckered it to the lid, the light levels are looking a lot better for it and we'll see if it helps the smaller plants. I've also ordered some easycarbo for both tanks we'll see how that goes

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I'm unreasonably excited that tiny boi the little shrimp that could has been out front tonight doing his thing, i hadn't seen him for a week and was convinced he'd turned his toes up - still 5 of his mates unaccounted for though, I'm trying to stay positive that they're in the back having shrimp parties among the limnophila (either that or tiny boi's eaten them and he's the survivor of some sort of shrimp deathmatch) . In other news, there's actually 2 teeny ramshorns who were getting far too friendly for my liking on the sucker for the CO2 diffuser this morning, so I'll probably be a snail granny soon
 
went to Wharf yesterday and we have some new inhabitants! 3 panda cories who will be augmented by 3 more next week if all goes well , if they're all the same age, it looks like there's 2 girls and a boy -they've been exploring and hoovering up whatever they can find since yesterday, and got a singular sinking pellet this morning, which took them ages to find, took it out when they lost interest and the Garys have cleaned up after them, I've ordered some bug bites so I can control the food situation a bit better with it only being the 3 of them cos the fish science pellets are huge. glamour shot below with the two of them that didn't wander off

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WTS for posterity ( Guy at Wharf asked if I'd got one, and turns out it's a month since I did the last one ) Ignore curtain reflection on the right , also huge sponge filter assisting the stock filter because the air pump might as well be doing something useful, Eheim still hasn't got here thanks to an out of stock situation on the carbon pads I ordered as an afterthought )

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ETA , Not sure if another of the shrimp has reemerged or if tiny boi has moulted after seeing a shrimp that was slightly bigger and paler red than him - I guess the only way to be sure is if we get 2 out at the same time
 
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Tiny boi appears to be actually Tiny girl, there's a definite saddle there now she's bigger , so am torn about getting her some new friends . The overly affectionate snails are now parents , and the original interloper has cloned themselves - I'm torn between siphoning the nano snails out on sight or letting a couple of bladder snails grow on for the shrimp tank. New filter finally got here, so i swapped it in with the sponge filter yesterday, it's on minimum flow and has effectively doubled the circulation so was worth the hassle of edging a couple of rocks over to fit the rather portly body. I'm running the old and new together for a month and the new one got the biomedia from the sponge filter as well as the sponges being soaked in the mucky sponge water before it went in
 
The big filter is definitely doing a good job -the substrate has stayed a lot cleaner since it went in, I'm mid water change and when I squished the sponge out, it turned the previously clear water I'd taken out to gravy , the tomato plants are going to think it's their birthday, now all I've got to do is surreptitiously siphon out as many baby snails as I can without Ella noticing . Oh, and Tiny Girl must have been lonely, she spends a lot of time hanging out with the Panda gang now
 
E's tank is chugging along nicely now, surreptitious snail fighting ongoing , pretty sure the heater's caput which is not an issue as it's staying at 23 degrees pretty solidly, so that's a job for when I get round to it rather than an urgent issue, added another 5 shrimp last weekend (went for ember tetras, none in so we decided to give tiny girl some friends ) I think this gorgeous red rili is a boy

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and we've got 2 big red girls (the bit on the second picture that looks like BBA had disappeared when i went looking, so 🤷‍♀️

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post w/c and limnophila haircut shot, next thing will be to gradually move in some nicer stems as the weeds get stringier, the wood needs something, not sure what yet though, maybe some dwarf anubias or buces


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Well, we're down to 3 cories, still haven't got any other fish because of fighting snails and the shrimp really taking off , tank needs a huge trim, and we've got hair algae that just won't go away, I'm thinking of pulling out the java ferns it's living on and putting in new ones,but the shrimps enjoy it's food catching capacity so I'm just pulling it out every few days at the moment. The 6 mixed shrimp have basically turned into a herd of very nice reds and red rilis

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I'm pulling out frogbit on a weekly basis now, everything needs trimming hard and the last of the scraggly limnophila needs to come out, I'm planning on using the trimmings from the cube to fill the gap where it was. Bladder snails everywhere, I'm using a dennerle snail roller to keep them down but it's a big job. The dark patch on the left is my brown leaved crypts that I had to keep replanting early on, i don't think they're going anywhere now ;)
 
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