RSugelSr
Aquarium Advice Apprentice
Hello folks. I'm Ray and I live in the far NW suburbs of Chicago. For those of you that have had contact with WhiteDevil, he is my son and turned me on to this list. The 210g Discus build he has been documenting is actually going to be a display tank in my home office. Found it on craigslist for a steal. WhiteDevil has done most of the grunt work getting this used, formerly reef tank, cleaned up and ready for a freshwater population. After scrubbing and scraping the barnacles off it's looking real good.
I had been in the hobby for around 20 years then, due to a military transfer, sold everything off. After the last couple of decades out of the hobby I am getting back into it. What got me back in the hobby was my son aquired a 45g during a foreclosure cleanout and gave it to me. The bug had bitten.
Still in the set up phase, the 210 (72"' x 24" x 30") is planned to be a South American display tank. The stand framework is complete (had to build one, the one that came with the tank was way too tall). Received the remainder of the mechanicals; filters (AquaPro 300 w/d and Eheim 2080), lighting and heaters, this week. This will be a busy weekend. Plan to have the tank set up with H2O by Sunday evening. In the meantime I will be placing the Eheim on one of WhiteDevil's established tanks to get it "seeded", hoping to cut down the cycling time of the main tank.
Speaking of cycling, I've been doing a lot of reading on the various methods in use today. Not like it was 30+ years back when you filled a tank, let it run for a day to gas-off chlorine and pile in the fish. I am leaning towards using the fishless method with fishfood. Fishfood adding will start as soon as the tank is filled with H2O. I looked at the ammonia method but am shying away from it for a couple of reasons; 1) I have never done it before and 2) I am chemical-adverse, not only with fish but with everything (drive my doctors nuts with the amount of explaining they have to do before I'll take a prescription).
My local water district doesn't use chlorimines and the tank will be filled with RO. Running the Eheim on an established tank for a week should get it good and seeded, then switching to the main tank should provide the seed bacteria for the wet/dry. I will also shift the driftwood centerpiece to the tank when the filter is switched. It's been in an established tank for the past month. Hoping to cut my cycle time down to a couple of weeks.
Plan is to populate it with a dozen discus, a dozen angels, a dozen rams and assorted corys, plecos and tetras.
I had been in the hobby for around 20 years then, due to a military transfer, sold everything off. After the last couple of decades out of the hobby I am getting back into it. What got me back in the hobby was my son aquired a 45g during a foreclosure cleanout and gave it to me. The bug had bitten.
Still in the set up phase, the 210 (72"' x 24" x 30") is planned to be a South American display tank. The stand framework is complete (had to build one, the one that came with the tank was way too tall). Received the remainder of the mechanicals; filters (AquaPro 300 w/d and Eheim 2080), lighting and heaters, this week. This will be a busy weekend. Plan to have the tank set up with H2O by Sunday evening. In the meantime I will be placing the Eheim on one of WhiteDevil's established tanks to get it "seeded", hoping to cut down the cycling time of the main tank.
Speaking of cycling, I've been doing a lot of reading on the various methods in use today. Not like it was 30+ years back when you filled a tank, let it run for a day to gas-off chlorine and pile in the fish. I am leaning towards using the fishless method with fishfood. Fishfood adding will start as soon as the tank is filled with H2O. I looked at the ammonia method but am shying away from it for a couple of reasons; 1) I have never done it before and 2) I am chemical-adverse, not only with fish but with everything (drive my doctors nuts with the amount of explaining they have to do before I'll take a prescription).
My local water district doesn't use chlorimines and the tank will be filled with RO. Running the Eheim on an established tank for a week should get it good and seeded, then switching to the main tank should provide the seed bacteria for the wet/dry. I will also shift the driftwood centerpiece to the tank when the filter is switched. It's been in an established tank for the past month. Hoping to cut my cycle time down to a couple of weeks.
Plan is to populate it with a dozen discus, a dozen angels, a dozen rams and assorted corys, plecos and tetras.
