What Did You do With Your Tank Today?

[BBradbury]

Well...Topped off the "no water change" tanks. There's six tanks that range in size from 20 to 60 gallons. They use roughly six gallons of distilled water each week, but the cost in water is much cheaper than the hours I used to spend changing the water in the tanks before I started using the house plants to filter out the nitrogen. The plants do an amazing job of removing the ammonia, nitrite and nitrate from the water. I haven't tested the water in several months, but the fish continue to reproduce normally. Attached is a pic of a couple of the tanks.

Old

https://imgur.com/iwkqSqU

 

[stooker]

I spread out the phyllanthus fluitans a bit, they were clumping in some spots. Ever since I drilled out the spray bar holes to cut down surface agitation, this stuff has exploded! Looking back through my photos, I only had about 20-30 healthy leaves on 8 Dec, and the below pic is today!

 

[Delapool]

That looks great - loving the tank there.

 

[Autumnsky]

Upgrading lol, consolidating and cutting back... still buying great tanks though! For the upgrading.....(as I'm being dragged to aquarium addict rehab ).

Got some new plants in the mail.
Long day at work. Want to start the paludarium, (house plant sanctuary, not an aquarium at all [wink, wink] I'm not even sure how come it's name sounds like aquarium.

 

[Autumnsky]

I spread out the phyllanthus fluitans a bit, they were clumping in some spots. Ever since I drilled out the spray bar holes to cut down surface agitation, this stuff has exploded! Looking back through my photos, I only had about 20-30 healthy leaves on 8 Dec, and the below pic is today!

It looks really happy. That's a great looking floater.

 

[DesktopTankDiva]

Nothing.

I looked at my aquarium and thought "I wonder which will happen first....the cycling of my tank, or the second coming of jesus".

I'm betting on the latter.

DesktopD

 

[lauriezuki]

Our new 20 gallon arrived yesterday. Still working on the PRE set-up. (washing tank and gravel etc.)I am so anxious to get the betta and female guppies in this new home. Using some water from the old tank, can we put the fish in immediately, without waiting for it to cycle ? How tough are bettas in this situation ? We surely don't want to kill them at this point, but don't want to wait for 6 weeks to get a cycled tank either. Opinions please.

 

[Autumnsky]

Our new 20 gallon arrived yesterday. Still working on the PRE set-up. (washing tank and gravel etc.)I am so anxious to get the betta and female guppies in this new home. Using some water from the old tank, can we put the fish in immediately, without waiting for it to cycle ? How tough are bettas in this situation ? We surely don't want to kill them at this point, but don't want to wait for 6 weeks to get a cycled tank either. Opinions please.

Do you have a filter to move over?

I just learned about cycling but I already have fish. What now?! - Aquarium Advice
Fish-in Cycling: Step over into the dark side - Aquarium Advice
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Spent some time with the plants and water containers with plants.
Took and removes the nuisance bladder wart [plant in one jar, and deas leaves.

Added my new plants to a number of containers and divided some quantity so they could get more light.

Removed the Thai Betta and for his feeding and then found the tub which hadn't had a water change for 2.5 days and it has so much slime. (working busy schedule)

Found the prepared Rooiboos tea which was going to go into the tub later was soured. Dumped.

Mixed additional Epsom salts and aquarium salt for the Betta. I resisted using the meds, and didn't use any yet, but although it seems to some degree the upper fins seem better the lower seems to still have recession.

Read through some info on setting up a paludarium (again).

Watched some videos and gained some momentum for my home.

Really hoping towards reducing unnecessary items.

A great thing I heard today is don't sort through your stuff by what you want to get rid of but what you want to keep. This may be a game changer, lol.

So still preparing to set up the Paludarium. I need a couple additional bark chunks, and some silicone and to go into the rafters for my leftover screen material. Maybe Sunday will work on it. Going to get the supplies tomorrow.

 

[lauriezuki]

thanks for the links. We put the female guppies and betta in a bowl
and thoroughly cleaned the tank and gravel in the 5 gal. that they
were in. Saved half the water and put it back in. Then added aged
water to fill and stresscoat and stresszyme. Now at least they have a
clean tank until we can get the 20 gal. one set up and running. We
could move the 2 filters from the 5 gal. to the 20 gal. I suppose.
I'll check out your links. Thanks again.

 

[Autumnsky]

Starting with some cycled or nearly cycled media is better than none.

~~~~~~~~~~

Took pics of the materials which came in the Paludarium kit and of the added items I had purchased a while back and the ones I got today (from a Christmas gift to the well supplied lfs) and will try to get them loaded so they aren't upside down and will post a link.

Got
5 Indian almond leaves medium (some for the Thai Betta and some for leaf litter) 3.00

5 mangrove leaves (for Paludarium leaf litter) 2.50

1- scrapy 6 inch piece of Indian almond tree bark which was on the shelf with a tag for literally $199.99 per pound!!! I got a tiny lite $2.00 piece! $200 per pound!!!

A bunch of misc sizes and shapes of bulk cork for background and or building in the Paludarium. Just a smidge over a pound for 11.50.

A small scoop of activated carbon as I couldn't recall for sure if I had any left.

5G or RO/DI water

Will shop for fish later.

Picked up aquarium silicone for the bark background pieces to stick together.

Got the Pal tank build started at least. Intended to set up the filter to dry fit in, but realized I don't have any clue how I could get it out easily after it gets all built up. Have to figure out a way for that to happen.

Had to wash off some old not used for 3 or so years Caribsea supernaturals peace river small with added green turquoise gravel bits, which has been sitting out under a tree collecting dirt and leaves in the back corner of the yard.

Need to get the correct size tubing for the pump for the waterfall feature- the 4 sizes I DO have didn't fit. Hahaha, of course not.

 

[TMaier]

All the tanks got a clean today and pulled some of the plants out in here. It was a jungle.

 

[TMaier]

Igor too.

 

[Autumnsky]

Igor too. View attachment 311514

Hello Igor and Tmaier!

Loaded pics for this thread for the Paludarium...
take a peek!
http://www.aquariumadvice.com/forums/f19/autumns-zoo-med-paludarium-habitat-kit-367720.html

Had planned to get the recent additions of aquarium plants set up in new thrift store glass vases. Thinner containers which will fit in the ledge of the window sill to get the most daylight - evidently people think the totally no extra cost starbucks trenta cups don't have the best decor aesthetic. Only paid about a dollar each for each of 4 ReStore containers.

But didn't have enough time to get that completed. Got the thread updated which after making sure all the pics are not up side down, had to do other stuff!

 

[stooker]

Thinned out the red root floaters today. Probably grabbed about a third of them out, packaged them up, and they are now on their way to goatnad!

 

[Autumnsky]

Sounds like a great new home!

I have been trying to get the Thai Betta better but...better a little isn't well yet. I decided to just use the meds, gave a few more days as it seemed maybe like he was getting better.

Dosed Kanplex this morning with a 90% water change. Hoping this gets him well. He seems a bit like he is still in a delicate condition

Fed him his buffet frozen defrosted food - he got only about 15 minutes to eat as I had to get going to work.

Ordered a large pretty cool looking
17/ Bucephalandra var. Red Biblis - $35
you can see the pic on junglefowl's recent Classifieds thread plant #17
Way more money than I had intended to spend (what's new?)

And finally got 5 stems of Ludwigia Arcuata/Repens ( $5 ) Been looking to get as well.
Also got some Red Moss which I actually had been planning to buy for maybe 3 years! And since I have to pay shipping, I thought I would just buy something cool too - the Buce. Excellent value for the size. Will have some for the Paludarium and the Betta tank and the Shrimp tank.

http://www.aquariumadvice.com/forum...-moss-bucephalandra-and-driftwood-368008.html

Oh I hope I don't kill it all!

 

[Autumnsky]

Did a 3G pwc on the 12G Edge (with the 1 PRL ) appx 10/12 Boraras Brigittae.

There was a bunch of leaves on the Java Fern with BBA, trimmed off about 20 leaves, pushed the ferns down farther away from the light. Stirred up a big mess, changes the pre filter.

Did a big 4G pwc on the 12G SW nano and a couple gallon on the 6.6G Edge SW.

Added water for the evap. on the rest of the tanks.

Fed the Thai Betta in his cup. 50% pwc & meds.

 

[lauriezuki]

We have NEW baby albino cory cats. The eggs were only 3 days old, and started to develop tails. There are only about 5 that are active now, and many eggs had fungus growth on them. But as new fishkeepers, we are tickled. The guppies are reproducing like crazy, and we pulled the adult females and put them in a separate tank as guppies are hard to 'adopt out'. On Wednesday we changed water in all 3 tanks, and they are crystal clear now. Nothing 'to write home about', but the cory eggs and fry really tickled us.

 

[Autumnsky]

We have NEW baby albino cory cats. The eggs were only 3 days old, and started to develop tails. There are only about 5 that are active now, and many eggs had fungus growth on them. But as new fishkeepers, we are tickled. The guppies are reproducing like crazy, and we pulled the adult females and put them in a separate tank as guppies are hard to 'adopt out'. On Wednesday we changed water in all 3 tanks, and they are crystal clear now. Nothing 'to write home about', but the cory eggs and fry really tickled us.

That is fun news!!!

 

[stooker]

Not much to report today besides dosing iron and trimming the tops of the hygrophila corymbosa. I'm really trying promote leaves and sideshoots to grow out from the bottom of the stems.

 

[Delapool]

Igor too. View attachment 311514

How is Igor doing?