Jack's 20G Long Build Journal

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JackBinimbul

Aquarium Advice Freak
Joined
Jul 29, 2018
Messages
315
Location
Texas
I figured I may as well start a thread for this that I just update as I go. I'll include links of where I got things if anyone wants to do similar things. I did a lot of research into affordable, trustworthy sources.

Items already obtained will be marked with *


Tank

*20 gallon long, Petco dollar/gallon sale

Hardscape


Plants
Sources not yet fleshed out, will update when they are. Currently deciding between Jacob's Aquarium and ebay's Plants Factory. I've seen concerning things about the former. Any comparably priced recommendations are welcome.

Anubias Nana Petite

Java Moss

Bucephelandra - Green Wavy

Dwarf Hair Grass

Java Fern

Frogbit
Fish
Sources in the works. LFS and AquaBid are possibilities. Let me know recommendations.

10-12 male Endler's Livebearers - possibly going with tunamanphd

6-8 Pepper corydoras

12-15 neo. shrimp, color unimportant​

Filtration

Lighting

 
Alright, so step one, I'd love some feedback on location of my tank. I have one section of my living room that is suitable, but am debating which wall to put it on.

The space is between the back of my couch and the partial wall separating my kitchen. I have a low, old and worn aquarium stand that my mother was keeping in storage. For now, it does just fine, but it is low for my tank size.

With that in mind, I can put it against the back of the U created with the other wall and my couch, like this:
uS4zn09.jpg

But this creates obvious issues with my back glass door throwing massive glare and light against the tank. This is, however, a better viewing angle for myself and my fiancee who tends to do yoga and meditation in that space. It also minimizes the possibility that the cats will jump up on the stand as the 10 gallon quarantine tank blocks the right and the wall blocks the left.

The other option is this:
lhRMLCK.jpg

where it is against the wall to the kitchen. This way has less glare, but more day light hitting the left end specifically. It's more viewable from the front door, but we literally never have visitors other than family. This also shortens the space and allows the cats better back access to the tank.

What are your thoughts??
 
I like the second option. The glare would bother me and I think it could possibly lead to algae issues. Once you get ready to buy plants let me know. I have a few anubias nana petite and as much dwarf hairgrass as you could possibly need for low prices.
 
Second pic. Makes more sense with your plug in as well. Seems like pic #1 would possibly allow your cat to jump from the back of the couch into the tank?? You got a lot of light coming into that whole area. Personally, id hang curtains to cover that door and cut out the light for most the day or completely.
 
You could post in the classifieds forum in your quest for plants. I don’t keep a Planted tank anymore but when I did, other AA members were a good resource for buying, selling, swaps, and RAOK (random act of kindness). For vendors I’ve used AquariumPlants.com and AquariumPlantCentral. You can save on shipping if you can find most/all of your plants at a single site.
 
The cats jumping from the couch was definitely something I was concerned about. I'm going to have a glass top to protect everything, but I don't want to come home to find a cat laying on it.

I've debated covering the back door, but I have a jack russell who jumps against it like crazy when she wants to go out. One does not simply get a jack russell to not jump. I'm going to look into some options for diffusing that light, all the same.

I can also put a higher light plant in that corner and hope it out competes algae.

Thanks everyone!
 
Moving on! My hardscape came today and I've started prepping it.

Mopani is tannin intensive, which I'm OK with. I'm not going to try to get out all of the tannins. I don't mind the look and the softening would be good for my water. But I did want to do a quick disinfect and get some of the tannins out.

I started with a quick 15 minute boil on one side, then 15 on the other.
zGLgj68.jpg

I clearly need a Dahmer-esque pot in the future. Even the "small" mopani is too big for this little pot.

I then scrubbed at them with a tooth brush and went over them by hand to remove any debris or rough patches. Now they're soaking on the back porch.
cZrYPHt.jpg


My rocks got a good rinse with the hose and are also soaking.
NI5z2be.jpg


The containers I'm using are ideal since they have lids to keep critters and mosquitoes out. They are actually old cat litter bins! I just rinsed them out really well.

Tomorrow I will go over the stones with skewers and a bottle brush. I'll also be giving my sand its first of many rinses.
 
Tunamanphd also sells plants. Good dude, he will treat you right

Any aquarium journal that has a dahmer reference is intriguing for sure. Following!
 
I hit up Tuna about plants as well! I'm trying to get them all from one source, so we shall see. I'll be touching base with him again when the time gets closer.

I spent all of today cleaning the dragon stone and I learned many things.

1. I'm never buying dragon stone again.

2. If you can enlist children, spouses or naive friends, do so.

3. It makes an unholy mess and should be done outside.

4. My dog does not understand my fascination with rocks.

I don't regret getting it. It's beautiful rock and it'll look amazing in my tank, but it takes so much cleaning. After the initial soak, I went at it with a bamboo skewer, a long toothpick, a bottle/pipe brush, a toothbrush and a syringe to flush the crevices.

It's absolutely packed with clay and even roots. It's a strangely meditative and interesting process, all the same. You find new holes that you didn't know were there and passages that are connected.

It's amazing rock, it's just time consuming. If you spend less than an hour on a larger piece, you're not doing it right. If you happen to get one of the greenish blue chunks, count yourself lucky. They seem to have way less clay and detritus.

They are on their second soak now and will be coming out for one last once over in the morning and I'll pull the mopani at the same time. Didn't get to the substrate today, so will get on that tomorrow, too.
 
Got down to the nitty gritty with the substrate today.

I set up the ubiquitous kitty litter bins and separated it into two so that I could really get in there and rinse it well.

fz1mlvF.jpg


You need to rinse the hell out of this stuff. Initially, there will be an icky film on the top that clings to you, the bucket, the hose, everything.

I went ahead and poured off each fill instead of letting it overflow because I wanted to get all that gunk completely out of there.

I used the hose to agitate and stir and also my hands. I figured if it hurt my hands, it would hurt my fish. There are a few points to this.

Cons:
You will get sand all up under your nails.
You will also get the oil film all over your hands and it only comes off with soap.

Pros:
You can really get in there and scrub the substrate against itself and get it cleaner.
You will know if there's anything sharp in there.
It will make your hands silky smooth. Your wife (or husband) will comment.

I will say that medium grit is actually very fine. Definitely a "sand". I think it'll work fine, especially with my cories, but don't be afraid to go up to a coarser grit. Here's a couple shots of the texture:

eEzfOuf.jpg


G7mWxoJ.jpg


I poured off water about 10 times and then poured it all into one bucket for a multi-hour soak. I cleaned the empty bucket and will pour it all back into that one tonight for an overnight soak.

Then tomorrow I will rinse and rinse and rinse until it runs clear. I didn't get to it today because I'm water-logging the hell out of my yard with all this. We had a pretty big rain earlier this week and I've been turning out 15 gallon buckets all day every day.

I definitely don't regret getting the blasting sand for the amount of money I saved. But if you don't have the time, space or patience for the prep it needs, go with aquarium sand.

But hey, my wood and stones are done! They came out of their bath this morning and got another scrub. I'll be fiddling around with ideas later.
 
Thanks for showing that medium grit blasting sand. I thought it would be more coarse. Im thinking of getting some so I'll go up a bit on the size.
 
Alright, I fiddled around with some black towels and my hardscape and found a layout I like. Thoughts?

LaM2HqW.jpg


My only concern is that the sand won't pile up the way I want and stay that way. I know some people use gravel in bags to achieve this, but I think the sand would just settle into the crevices and then I'd have mountains of gravel bags. It would also add on to the cost of this build.

Since I'm probably going to have extra, I thought about using the blasting sand in panty hose. Any tips on this?

Edit: My light arrived and I'm stoked!

6NKjy1e.jpg

PkO23y9.jpg
 
I think the panty hose filled with blasting sand is a good call
 
I'm definitely looking forward to seeing how this continues on. :) post new pics soon~!
 
To help maintain a slope, get one of those food grade plastic cutting boards (black or dark blue if possible) and cut into credit card and smaller sizes. Push these into the sand so that they are just under the surface along the slope. They act like (sub surface) retaining walls.
 
That's an awesome idea, Fresh!

I did the panty hose solution for now and if that fails, I'll use the retaining wall idea. I used black nylons so that if they show at some point, it won't be jarring.

I should be getting my plants in about a week and will post more pics then!
 
I actually had an...interesting?...situation with my LFS. Other than Petco and Petsmart, we have one fish store within a 60 mile radius. I went to it a couple of weeks ago and was not impressed.

Upon walking in, you were hit with this stench of algae and fishiness. All of the tanks needed a good scrubbing and had significant hard water build up on the waterline. There were numerous dead fish. They also had a hamster in a teeny tiny barred cage near the register that was horribly inappropriate for anything but a vet travel cage. I left them a review that was straight to the point without being dickish. They responded with an apology that I blew off.

I went back in a couple of days ago just to see if they had the filters I was looking for and things had changed dramatically. The layout was different, all the tanks were scrubbed. It smelled like clean water. No dead fish, no algae, no depressed hamster. When I asked the clerk about the change, it was apparently the owner and she informed me that her previous manager had been "let go".

Yikes!

The icing on the cake is that they now had all but one of the plants I was looking for. They were also willing to order the fish I want. They had one little male endler who was appropriately in with two females and she said she would be starting to stock them.

I'm still hoping to get the buce I'm looking for from a user here.

Now, I won't be getting my plants until the end of the week, but I decided to go ahead and flood the tank to test my equipment. I wanted to be sure the pump I got was sufficient, that the substrate would stay in place and that the tank wouldn't leak. I had done a previous fill test, but only for a couple of hours.

Valuable lessons were learned.


1. I need a much better filling solution. The bucket I was siphoning from wouldn't fit in the sink and I didn't want to weigh it down too much to safely put it on top of the 10 gallon. Long term, the python system will be worth the money.
v8aMTcM.jpg


2. Even with all my rinsing, the substrate still kicked up some of that film. A decent amount of sand also floated so I skimmed the top. This worked really well. Obviously you want no filters or anything on when you do this. I let it fill most of the way and just gently skimmed with a cup.
mgzmFtc.jpg

eDYS4PZ.jpg


3. After sitting in the empty tank for a few days, one of my driftwood pieces is no longer waterlogged. So it's currently having a lazy float around the tank.
X3jJDV4.jpg


4. There's a portion of the silicon edge that looks...odd. I assume it's fine and will keep an eye on it, but it's clear that a bit of air got in the edge when they sealed it. Let me know if this is a red flag.
XXIhHFn.jpg


5. 20 gallons isn't going to be enough. It seemed so big when I first got it, but the more I work with it and put things in it, the more I can tell I'm not going to be satisfied with it. I'll keep dreaming about a 55 one day!
 
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