Wy Renegade's 30gal Paludarium

The friendliest place on the web for anyone with an interest in aquariums or fish keeping!
If you have answers, please help by responding to the unanswered posts.
Full Tank Shot Update

And of course, one cannot end without an updated FTS;
img_1916013_0_e55512823db9d141364af5abad3cf4c5.jpg


And one of my new favorite views;
img_1916013_1_0fedf9e95a5a6e38cd33e16408979d21.jpg
 
Last edited:
Looking INCREDIBLE as always. Every time I see your tanks makes me want to make one of my own!

Well thank you! And by all means go for it - surely you have some amphibians there that would do well in this type of tank?

Its been kind of like Christmas here today, I got my order of invertes in. Got some Amphipods, Brown planaria, Daphnia, Hydras, and Rotifers as well as a Spongilla (freshwater sponge colony). Hopefully I'll get some pictures taken and get em posted.
 
Waiting patiently for pictures. :D

The only non native amphibians I know of in Aus are axolotls. Any non native amphibians and reptiles are illegal to import and keep. We have native species but they are not commonly available and you need a license to own them.
 
Preparing for the Arrival of the Invertebrates

So I knew I had a big shipment of invertebrates coming in today, so I wanted to make sure that the aquatic zone was ready for them when they arrived. I mentioned earlier that I had been soaking some leaves to drop into the aquatic zone once they became waterlogged, and today they were all setting on the bottom so I was ready to go. Went ahead and scattered them around the bottom to create a more "natural look to the bottom.

img_1917008_0_ce06bc09895e167ac4ec3e5e6c90c4bc.jpg


img_1917008_1_4463f2e239680a65d4de6948d05a4656.jpg


img_1917008_2_27d692e049b2ded61a21ab0eed4b0c60.jpg
 
Christmas in April

It was a little like Christmas in April when my package arrived today. I got all kinds of cool invertebrates. Of course the challenge was getting some decent pictures to show off - some were easy and some were impossible!

I got some amphipods;
img_1917013_0_c221d8e0eb9c132d3732519a90cab887.jpg


Some Brown Planaria;
img_1917013_1_9017978d775ec760fbd0326f9ae8ab96.jpg


img_1917013_2_49bf12ebb5fc0c6e3546cecdf92d7ec2.jpg


Some Daphnia;
img_1917013_3_c6db8b2c26999de4a8e3e32a5d797c16.jpg


Some Hydra (this one was budding);
img_1917013_4_3c8d46295b48890e8cfb917f82a8f65b.jpg


Some rotifers (which I wasn't able to get any pictures of at this point),

And a spongia (freshwater sponge) colony;
img_1917013_5_a24ed59df6fae32ad97fbebf8921a707.jpg


The amphipods, planaria and rotifers, will all consume the debris and decomposing plant material, while the daphnia consumes the rotifers, and the hydras and eventually fish will help to keep the population of daphnia in control.

The spongia was completely new to me, but I figured if it would thrive anywhere it oughta thrive in this tank.
 
Last edited:
And a Couple of New Plants

With the invertes, I also got a new lycopodium or club moss plant and some sphagnum moss. I placed a couple patches of the moss, but didn't get any pictures at this point, we'll have to see how it does.

The club moss plant I placed across the front of the terrestrial area;
img_1917016_0_dc41807812f479a676dbb42ff241c222.jpg


I really like the look of this one in here, so got a couple of close-ups;
img_1917016_1_14f91a18e8248ca3f5daa5f5016d5fc8.jpg


img_1917016_2_2bcaab6bed42b9cfa38ace34c4270e69.jpg
 
Last edited:
Waiting patiently for pictures. :D

The only non native amphibians I know of in Aus are axolotls. Any non native amphibians and reptiles are illegal to import and keep. We have native species but they are not commonly available and you need a license to own them.

There you go! I don't know much about the axolotis, other than what I've read on the internet while researching my tigers, but they seem to be pretty popular as a pet. They do get fairly large however.
 
Wy Renegade said:
So I knew I had a big shipment of invertebrates coming in today, so I wanted to make sure that the aquatic zone was ready for them when they arrived. I mentioned earlier that I had been soaking some leaves to drop into the aquatic zone once they became waterlogged, and today they were all setting on the bottom so I was ready to go. Went ahead and scattered them around the bottom to create a more "natural look to the bottom.

Maybe just a stupid question but wont the leaves eventually decay and worsen your water quality? Or do you have something that will take care of them?
 
Maybe just a stupid question but wont the leaves eventually decay and worsen your water quality? Or do you have something that will take care of them?

Not stupid at all, in a normal aquarium set-up that is exactly what would happen. However in this case, the amphipods, planaria, and rotifers will all use the decaying leaves as a food source.
 
Wy Renegade said:
Not stupid at all, in a normal aquarium set-up that is exactly what would happen. However in this case, the amphipods, planaria, and rotifers will all use the decaying leaves as a food source.

OK thought that's what those guys were for. I knew you would have a solution
 
What's plan B? Remove the leaves and a water change?

Thats plan C! Plan B is that the leaves decompose, I get increased nutrients and an explosion in plant growth and an algae bloom. Then snail and planaria populations explode as they consume the algae, then I have to harvest plants and figure out something to balance the invert populations.
 
Wy Renegade said:
Thats plan C! Plan B is that the leaves decompose, I get increased nutrients and an explosion in plant growth and an algae bloom. Then snail and planaria populations explode as they consume the algae, then I have to harvest plants and figure out something to balance the invert populations.

Wow what a plan. Yur like Batman or something lol. Make sure to put those extra plants for sale in tthe classifieds section here :)
 
Wow what a plan. Yur like Batman or something lol. Make sure to put those extra plants for sale in tthe classifieds section here :)

Yeah, I don't know about that - maybe the Joker instead of Batman :hide: LOL. I'll see what I can do, no point in getting the cart in front of the horse.
 
Our weather has been unseasonably warm this year, so the ice is already gone off all the ponds and streams, so I was able to get out and pull a little duckweed out of one of our local ponds.

img_1924604_0_9d79b6cb61687c81e867e07cbc736781.jpg


It was pretty interdispersed with some algae, freshwater mussels, assorted inverts, and some hornwort, so I only skimmed a bit off the top for this tank. I went ahead and threw a couple mussels, and also one sprig of the hornwort.

img_1924604_1_1d7d981a3ad2ff5f3c831d2a2ffd402d.jpg


The duckweed has been a bit interesting due to the current from the filter. Its actually staying out of most of the deeper areas, but collecting in some of the shallower areas.

img_1924604_2_915c6af8f39968ee71cb8faaabe1f18f.jpg


img_1924604_3_9676d3e35a48ebeb0a66ce1f27e04546.jpg


The Dwarf hairgrass seems to have recovered well from the transition and is coming on strong, but the Microswords not so much.

img_1924604_4_59c46fc66e2a858f4bbc0b1c2f924f7b.jpg
 
Last edited:
Wow, looks amazing!!

I might have to steal some ideas when I do my fire belly toad tank.

Thank you Jamie, you help yourself to any ideas that you like. Down the road I may do a bigger tank for the salamanders and use this one for something different as well :whistle:. Just have to see.
 
I have the same problem with duckwed and filter. It's a never ending battle. I'm seeing browning in my duckweed, it gets natural sunlight an date occasional uv lamp. Wat else would you guys recommend?
 
Back
Top Bottom