Updating an old aquarium, Juwel Rekord 72, and other ramblings

[dcurzon]

Finally got around to doing a PH Profile... Not sure what this means for me... it looks like I need to switch co2 on a couple of hours earlier?

 

[dcurzon]

The small 'grow out tank' had a very old led thing in it, and I measured that as being roughly 2w... which isn't going to do anything at all.... so I found a 7w smart bulb and some wood and dangled the bulb from a make shift frame (bulb isn't touching the water as the pics may suggest). a piece of foam board to help cut out the window light, and another piece hinged from the frame just to bounce some light from the bulb back in and can flip it up out of the way if I want.

It seems I had an unnoticed diy jelly co2 incident over the weekend, as the diffuser was full of strawberry jelly and everything in the tank was coated... but there's no live stock in here anyway. Things do appear to be slowly growing under 7w, however I've ordered a 14w led bar to sit on instead.

 

[dw1305]

Hi all,

It seems I had an unnoticed diy jelly co2 incident over the weekend, as the diffuser was full of strawberry jelly and everything in the tank was coated.

I'm willing to bet that that particular statement doesn't occur anywhere else on UKAPS, or possibly not even anywhere else on the WWW.

cheers Darrel

 

[dcurzon]

I was attempting to do a bit of time lapse...

Pre Jelly incident...

Mid, and you can see the diffuser getting jellied...

Post, filter now gummed up, some stems floating wild...

 

[dcurzon]

So with a tiny bit of metal bending, the new light fitted

Short lived however, as it seems I must have done the bolt up too tight :/


It isn't leaking yet though...

 

[rebel]

I must have done the bolt up too tight :/

Hate when tanks crack! Lucky it's your little tank.

 

[dcurzon]

Hate when tanks crack! Lucky it's your little tank.

A strip of sellotape and its still holding together

 

[dcurzon]

Terra base day 1

Looks like I could probably throw some more spiky moss at it. I ordered 5 trays and used 3. Awaiting some Buce red to arrive to be tucked in

 

[dcurzon]

Staghorn has made a reappearance, plus some stringy green algae also. Not going to worry too much about those.
Some hydrocotyle triparita Japan added - I got some for the terra base and obviously there's spare, so some in the 72 and some in the tiny plant only tank.

Also started up a heated propagator, so a few strands of it have gone in there also to see what happens. And some spare mosses, and some stem cuttings. If the mosses don't grow, I hope they at least survive.

Gave the dhg a haircut. I can never get all the cuttings out!! Would a skimmer style inlet pipe help with that?

 

[not called Bob]

if you have kids of a certain age then you know ben and hollies magic kingdom and have heard JELLY FLOOD shouted a lot, that was what sprung to mind

 

[dcurzon]

Tiger lotus seems to have sprouted a new plant. Not sure if it might develop a new bulb? I've not had any flowering action going on, but clearly it's recovered from its root loss
View attachment 155144
View attachment 155142

And so a month on, and that baby plant has sent off another baby plant. Like a Vallisneria

 

[dcurzon]

Had a good trim and thin out, took most of the lobelia out (moved to different tank), and flow seems to have improved. Also cut a couple of bits of the dwarf sag out and stuck them in the other tank to see how they would fare in sand and under very old t5's.

I've very often read about how cutting a stem will cause 2 shoots from the cut point... But never experienced it... I've cut some and it's sent some side shoots from other places, but nothing at the cut node. So I was quite pleased to see a good example at last!
Pic is 5 days after the snip.

Ludwigia super red. Ironic as none of it in my tank is red :/!but maybe just maybe these bits will be

 

[Andy Pierce]

Saw your comment about the Ludwigia super red being not red. This is my current project plant and for me although the emersed growth form from the grower was all green leaves (and maybe some red to the stems) all the new submerged growth started out red and has progressively become redder over the last six weeks (time lapse pictures here: https://aqua.egads.uk/ludwigia-palustris ). The version I purchased from AquaEssentials is labelled "LUDWIGIA MINI SUPER RED" on their website. Is yours the 'mini' version and where did you get it from?
-Andy

 

[dcurzon]

@Andy Pierce
Just took a look at your blog, mine don't look as good as yours. I got from an eBay seller, they arrived looking healthy and red, and described as ludwigia mini sp red.
Leaves fall off easily, they go a bit of a brownish colour, they just don't seem to be doing well. Frankly they look awful. Maybe I need to cut them down low and let it be all new growth and see what happens.

I have taken some cuts to grow in a small no livestock tank to compare, and those ones are very red. So I might need to replace the ones in the fish tank with ones in the growout tank (once there's enough trimmings growing) and see if that sorts it out, or cut my losses and try from tropica etc.

 

[dcurzon]

Just thought it looked a nice photo.
Thought I had some odd looking dwarf sag growing right up against the front glass. Turns out its a crypt crispulata decided to grow another plant exactly where I wouldn't want it

 

[dcurzon]

Still a bit of growing for this to do, but this is about 6 weeks in. New growth on the fittonias. The hydroctotyl triparita is struggling though :/

 

[dcurzon]

Just throwing in a FTS.

The ludwigia is a total mess.
Tiger lotus thingy is casting a fair shadow beneath it but the dwarf sag seems to be ok under there, maybe a little slow.

 

[dcurzon]

I've no idea why the ludwigia doesn't like to grow in this tank. Offcuts seem to do ok in the biorb of doom.
Anyway, FTS.

 

[dcurzon]

Java moss is getting big
Crypt has thrown another runner out, this time to the back glass
I don't know why but the hygrophilia plants have all lost lower leaves?

I've not seen any berried shrimps for a while, and have plucked 3.or 4 dead shrimps out over a few weeks. I was starting to worry that something was wrong

Then spotted this little fella, and have seen possibly 4 hiding away.

Gave the filter, pipes and glassware a clean... Removed the floss from the filter and flow has increased, and cut off some staghorn infected leaves

 

[Paulthewitt]

Found my way onto this thread due to the back light posts, but found myself hooked!
Keep posting... I enjoyed this thread!
(Even when you don’t get many replies!)