• You are viewing the forum as a Guest, please login (you can use your Facebook, Twitter, Google or Microsoft account to login) or register using this link: Log in or Sign Up

Frankenstein

Looks great, seems like everything is growing in beautifully, can't wait to see more shots of it!! Very intrigued by what colours you'll get with the rotala blood red without the effort of nitrate fiddling.
 
Looking Great, can't wait to see this matured, where did you manage to get some blood red from? Been after it for ages!
Thanks Ash, likewise!

I got the blood red off eBay but the seller appears to have stopped selling it. If they don't restock I can put some cuttings up when it gets bushy enough. 🙂 Mind you, they'll be small because the tank is tiny haha.

One thing I've noticed though is that Dennis Wong was right, even without nitrate limitation the plant is turning pink and my H'Ra looks green/orange at best. Even pictures don't show it properly.
 
... my H'Ra looks green/orange at best. Even pictures don't show it properly.
My ludwigia is doing the same thing. Really difficult to capture on camera. I've read that this is due to light intensity, at least for the ludwigia. I imagine as it grows taller and receives more PAR it's likely to deepen in the uppermost leaves.
 
My ludwigia is doing the same thing. Really difficult to capture on camera. I've read that this is due to light intensity, at least for the ludwigia. I imagine as it grows taller and receives more PAR it's likely to deepen in the uppermost leaves.
I agree, although I wish I had a par meter to get a bloody reading lol. I'm basically having to take a holistic approach to lighting.
 
At the 1 month mark now.

I've had some drama with my CO2 equipment which has contributed to fluctuating CO2 levels. It seems to be all sorted now but stability is pending. Some staghorn has appeared in the hairgrass and Bucephalandra only. I can understand the Buce because it's a slow grower, up higher and in a decent flow path but the hairgrass is growing so I don't get that. Either way I'll do some spot dosing, water changes and I've added some floating plants.

In the last few weeks diatoms have covered the rocks but I've decided not to remove it. I like the aged look it gives and it covers up some of the blueish parts of the rocks.

The stems all seem to be doing well and have already had one major trim which instantly made it more bushy. Some of the plants took a 'pause' and some of the Rotala even turned white at the tips; I realised I was underdosing on fertiliser big time so I've increased it to 5ml daily and everything is chugging away again. I do wonder if that's why the Rotala was having an easier time turning orange... The Monte Carlo is also actively growing now and the Marsilea is going bananas!

Overall I'm happy with how things are going. Despite the slightly rocky beginnings, one of the cherry shrimp is berried! My only concern is the substrate. The grain size is quite large and so detritus is falling down between it and lots of different bugs have appeared, like all kinds. The monte carlo is not anchored enough to do a gravel vacuum either so I'll keep an eye on that. Also had one cherry shrimp skydive out of the tank to its death.

0DB7A296-F382-473F-B592-DBB710D5432E.png


A50E87B4-70CC-4C18-8D0D-A2D9E50E1BC6.png

5D1EDD4E-9E4E-4AEE-9E8A-ABDC001F8A50.jpeg

713A6212-2A34-493F-B013-7A66AC3E3243.jpeg
 
That is looking stunning. I agree about the diatoms giving the rocks an aged feel.

Regarding the staghorn, I think I have some in both areas of decent flow and low flow, with it appearing on the slowest growing leaves or on any damages leaves (like on the S Repens where some of it began to melt). I've considered trimming these leaves but am not sure whether I'll be doing any good and may need to suck it up and see what happens in the long run. I'll keep an eye on this thread to see how your treatment of it goes and may follow suit as it's preferable to trimming unless the leaves are on their way out anyway.
 
That is looking stunning. I agree about the diatoms giving the rocks an aged feel.

Regarding the staghorn, I think I have some in both areas of decent flow and low flow, with it appearing on the slowest growing leaves or on any damages leaves (like on the S Repens where some of it began to melt). I've considered trimming these leaves but am not sure whether I'll be doing any good and may need to suck it up and see what happens in the long run. I'll keep an eye on this thread to see how your treatment of it goes and may follow suit as it's preferable to trimming unless the leaves are on their way out anyway.
Thank you Kogre!

Yeah I'd much prefer to try and get rid of it than remove the leaves since Kedagang is such a slow grower. We shall see!
 
Thank you Kogre!

Yeah I'd much prefer to try and get rid of it than remove the leaves since Kedagang is such a slow grower. We shall see!
I had shedloads of staghorn on my buces after I did a blackout to get rid of spyrogira, 3 days of spot dosing with liquid carbon with the filter off for 10 mins fully did the trick, with buces totally fine after.

It's looking awesome, I love the rocks, algae on rocks def gives them that extra bit of drama. Looking forward to seeing it in another month now your big issues are sorted out!! 😍
 
I had shedloads of staghorn on my buces after I did a blackout to get rid of spyrogira, 3 days of spot dosing with liquid carbon with the filter off for 10 mins fully did the trick, with buces totally fine after.

It's looking awesome, I love the rocks, algae on rocks def gives them that extra bit of drama. Looking forward to seeing it in another month now your big issues are sorted out!! 😍
Oh thanks! That's actually good to know. I was holding off spot dosing it because I wasn't sure how sensitive buce was to glut. I'll give that a go.
 
I wanted to upload these pictures so they were in the journal at the right time and not months later sitting in my camera roll lol. I'm re-learning how to use my DSLR after not picking it up for about 5 years. Also had to compress them quite a bit to upload so hopefully it still looks half-decent on your end! 👍

Thanks for looking. 🤓

IMG_2927-compressed.PNG
IMG_2934-compressed.PNG
IMG_2930-compressed.PNG
IMG_2928-compressed.PNG
IMG_2932-compressed.PNG
 
So I've run into an issue...

I had 3 shrimp die in the last week and I couldn't understand why. At first I thought I was changing the water too frequently. Then I tested my water... I've never seen nitrates that high. 😳 I think it's because I majorly increased my dose of TNC Complete from 1ml per day to 5ml.

Problem is, now that the nitrates are high, the foreground plants have stopped stunting and are growing well. However, I obviously don't want to kill my shrimp so I need to find a sweet spot between nourishing the plants and keeping the shrimp healthy.

I think I should go back to 1ml per day? It equates to 7ml per week which is almost 3x the recommended dose on the bottle. What are your thoughts?

Edit: Come to think of it, everything was probably in excess. I think I'll try reducing it (1.5ml per day - 10ml per week) Going by Rotala Butterfly.
 
Last edited:
Wow, this look great, love the look of that rock. I like the softer lines it has, seems to be a trend to more dramatic, harsh sharp rocks, but this is beautiful and works well with your scape. Such lush growth too!

I bought some similar rock, so if anyone is after it, try

 
Wow, this look great, love the look of that rock. I like the softer lines it has, seems to be a trend to more dramatic, harsh sharp rocks, but this is beautiful and works well with your scape. Such lush growth too!

I bought some similar rock, so if anyone is after it, try

[QUOTE="noodlesuk, post: 648536, member: 20076"] apagos-rock-per-kg-2519-p.asp[/QUOTE]
Thank you very much! Much appreciated 🙂

I love the rocks too, I didn't even know what they were when I bought them lol. The shop has since closed down too.
 
8EC69A8D-84C0-47EB-9F44-F242ADFE6C1B.jpeg

The war on staghorn has begun!

I've been doing some more water changes, siphoning out the stratum which traps a lot of waste. Also dosing some easy carbo and tomorrow I'll clean the filter. At some point I'm thinking to take some Amano shrimp from my other tank too.

It's interesting how much more difficult the nano has been to balance compared to my big tank. I know big tanks succumb to less fluctuations but damn.

The algae is not going to win though!
 
Last edited:
Back
Top