10g rescape thread

[James_in_MN]

After I moved my RCS from a 2.5g to a 5.5g, and rescaped my 20g high with eco-complete, I just knew I wasn't done with the pain. My 10g had this white PetCo gravel in it, and I was convinced that a darker substrate would show the fish better and look better in the tank. So, today is the day I decided to rescape the 10g.

We're never quite done with our tanks, are we?

I'll start with a picture of what my tank used to look like before I got the rescaping bug. It wasn't that bad of a setup, with a couple pieces of driftwood, one large stone, and java fern/moss. The only problem was, I had picked the white gravel to show the RCS I had in the tank better, and I later moved the RCS out of that tank into a small breeder tank (2.5g, now a 5.5g). I've also noticed that they show better on black substrate, which I have in the 5.5g.

 

[James_in_MN]

Within the last couple of weeks, I decided to redo all of my tanks. Most of the reason was the need for a good plant substrate in my 20g, and I chose eco-complete.

For this tank, I decided to continue with the idea of only non-planted plants. I kept the moss ball, took out all of the java moss, and tied the java ferns (the two I had sprouted new ferns) left from the parent plants to my two pieces of driftwood. I then won some frog bit at the MN Aquarium Society January auction, and floated that on the top.

I still couldn't help the fact that I wanted to replace the substrate.

 

[James_in_MN]

Replacing substrate can be a royal PITA.

1) Remove the plants.

2) Remove the fish; I moved them to a 5g bucket.

3) Shut off the filters and put the filter media in another bucket of water.

4) Drain as much decaying junk out of the gravel as possible so you don't get too much stirred up.

A few observations...
- harlequin espeis aren't too bright and were easily caught
- nerite snails will hide in the most obscure places; I still don't know where one is (hopefully on the driftwood in the other bucket)
- amano shrimp are the biggest pains to catch; unlike other shrimp, they can crawl out of your net like nobody's business, even out of water

I moved my only remaining ghost shrimp to my 20g tank; we'll see if he can survive there, because they're sure losing to the amano shrimp.

For my substrate, I combined grey and black sand from PetCo to create a darker salt-and-pepper look. Picture attached.

 

[GodFan]

Looks great man! I like the white but Im interested to see the salt and pepper look! Yes amanos are a pain with the crawling thing! My bros ADFs escape the net too. Then they hop as much as they can lol

 

[James_in_MN]

Looks great man! I like the white but Im interested to see the salt and pepper look! Yes amanos are a pain with the crawling thing! My bros ADFs escape the net too. Then they hop as much as they can lol

Thanks! So far, the new sand looks great, just have to wait a little longer for it to settle down a bit before I start putting everything back in.

 

[James_in_MN]

I successfully added everything back in late last night (or early this morning, depending on your perspective ). Four hours of sleep FTW.

I'll post a picture once I get home from work. I didn't take one yet because I wanted to get the light off to calm the fish down from a stressful day, not the mention the fact that I was wiped out from 6+ hours of working on a tank.

 

[James_in_MN]

Well, here's what the tank looks like now, with the new substrate.

Besides putting the driftwood back in that was there before, I changed out the one rock I had in the tank with a zebra rock. I really like how it matches up with the sand.

I'm not sure if I'll add much else to it right now. Maybe another java fern on the driftwood, or another moss ball.

 

[GodFan]

Looks good!

 

[red_tide]

What's that floating at the surface? Looks pretty cool!

 

[savage]

That frogs bit does look sweet!

 

[James_in_MN]

What's that floating at the surface? Looks pretty cool!

As savage suggested, I have amazon frogbit (limnobium laevigatum) floating on the surface.

Amazon Frogbit - Limnobium laevigatum

I'm really liking the idea of floating plants in my tanks. I have two types of bacopa floating in my 20g tank (mostly because bacopa is a PITA to plant, LOL).