Re: Swamp Creek - established 20/04/2010
The Danios are ace! They school really well and look like little brown trout. I even have a 2mm fry that's still alive (see the black dot at the top of the water on the left front, in the meniscus)
Mawgan I lost 2 fish
🙁 . One is current in pathology having it's innards examined under a microscope because it had a change in colour to its coelomic cavity before it died after a week in the tank. It died alone in a net which i trapped it in that morning. The fish never swam with the crowd, I thought he was just an individual taking things easy, a Johnathan Livingstone Seagull type. But he had pathology and I wish I could be a fly on the wall when they open the post at the path lab and decide which pathologist gets the fish case
😀 The other became shrimp food one day 2. I initially thought they were bothered by excess co2 as at night they spent a bit of time at the surface, this did not change though with a green drop checker so I have gone back to yellow. The other 22 and the otto and shrimp all seem fine as well. I'll keep you posted with regards to the fish pathology report.
So some things with the tank are good and some bad. I have growth, my Pogostemon stellatus is growing well, no mushy stems anymore. No algae. All the plants are putting out new growth.
The bad is that I have yellowing of older leaves and some pinholes forming especially in my hydrocotyle and my crypt wendetti green. I am dosing EI as recommended and have recently added MgSO4 as I don't know how much is in the tap water and neither do Thames water. I still get a white surface film that accumulates daily and builds up over the week.
So back to basics. I need the correct level of light, 30ppm co2 and good flow.
30ppm CO2 I have but I think its time for a spray bar to rule out flow issues and I have ordered a PAR meter so I can measure the out put of my LED lights as no one seems to have much experience with them. They are great lights but still have to prove themselves and I have set them at 35% strenght for an 8 hour photoperiod. Personally I think my light levels are to low! It's time to be objective and measure the PAR. The meters a bit pricey at £200 but I don't have any kids except for the 2 dogs, 6 cats and the horse, and now 22 fish. If kids needed to photosynthesise we would all have PAR meters!
I'm really struggling with tank photography. I have an external flash and the tank lights but I just cant get a fast enough shutter speed or decent lighting. How do you all do it? Getting sharp images of fish is a nightmare.
Pogostemon Stellatus and Danio Tinwinii
Danio Tinwinii
Now for a description of my flow as promised, but its a boring read
As far as flow is concerned my lily pipe pumps water at approx 700l/hr down the front of the tank (90cm) from right to left. I can see the CO2 bubbles flow around the tank. The water then moves along the left wall and back from left to right down the back wall. When it gets half way down the back the majority is directed diagonally towards the right corner by the hardscape. Some flow occurs down the length of the back wall. The water exits from the back right corner (I'm not keeping the inflow and outflow in the same corner). I have a vortech mp10 attached to the back wall on the right just below water level. It pumps a broad stream at low output from back to front and creates a circular flow from top to bottom and back to top in the right side of the tank.
So almost all my plants sway in a breeze constantly. I think the hardscape makes flow difficult to acheive in the back right of the tank. Do you really think that flow is an issue in my tank?
iPhone pics - sorry