Long time, no post!

Well we had a forced move in August due to the landlord deciding to stop paying his mortgage and thus having the house we were renting foreclosed on.

During the move, the 30 gallon dirt tank broke, and we lost 2 buckets of dirt. The dirt tank is no more. :(

But I have replaced that tank, and managed to save some of the plants and restarted it with ADA AquaSoil instead.

I did have to sell my 100 gallon setup recently - but that is okay, I could have never set it up in our new house without having to modify the floor to support the weight.

I have the shrimp tanks still set up and the 12 gallon JBJ cube and the 30n gallon and 7 gallon at work still, plus two bowls and a small betta tank.

I just bought another 12 gallon JBJ cube as well because it was modified and I was intrigued by what I might be able to do with it.

I should get some pics of it all soon.

Dirt tank vids!

Thought I'd take some vids of the dirt tank for the heck of it!

here is one that shows the FTS (full tank shot).


and this one shows only close-ups.


I need to do a SERIOUS trim on this tank, but it is looking pretty good so far all things considered!

A month of CO2!

Well, it's almost been a full month now of CO2, and check out the dirt tank!



Looking pretty good! About time to put in a new mix though I think.

Here are the closeups!

The left side ...




The middle ...




The right side ...



And I added it to the "progress pic" just to see the views side by side!



Big difference, huh? Now I have to do a good trim and plant a few more and do a little maintenance but it's looking MUCH nice than it was just 30 days ago!

Ohhh holy cow! Or should I say ... tank?

Oh for the LOVE of pete!

I found an INSANE good deal on TPT last night, and managed to talk Ray into saying "yes!" on getting it!

We will be getting a real honest to god ADA tank, stand, light, the entire setup, for a really great deal!

I think it's going to replace the 25 tall since I'm having a tough time with planting that one on the stand it's on.

Wow. How cool!

Here are the pics that I saw ...

Look at the difference a couple of weeks can make ...

Wow.

So I put these images together to better show the progress of this tank ... it's pretty cool I think!

Dirt Tank Update!

Well looks like I might have beaten the cyno!! Yayyyyy!!!

I applied lots of H202 and then hooked up a DIY co2 because my dad has had amazing luck with his tank and been doing that for years and since there isn't any fauna in the tank except scuds and snails - it's not like I can overdo it. lol.

I am dosing with Tom's excel every other day and then Flora Pride as well to add in iron and pot ash to the water column ... but thinking of stopping the flora pride, and opting to find Iron Fe by itself, maybe.

Anyways, here is what it looks like now! Here is the full view ...




Close up of the left side:




Close up of the middle:




Close up of the right side:




Looks like I'm going to have to trim real soon! The growth is amazing! I kept hearing that, but nothing really prepares you for the real deal I don't think! LOL!

Betta Tank

So here is Ray's betta - we just upgraded him from a bowl to this little 3 gallon tank (a Tom Deco Kit) because his fins were getting black from fin rot because his water quality was just not great.

Now he has a filter, along with his favorite crypt plant (he likes to sleep on the leaves, or on the rocks underneath the crypt) and his own little light (going to have to get a different bulb, this one is just too blue).

The tank sits on Ray's desk beside his cameras and nick nacks.

25 Gallon Tall with ADA Aqua Soil

This is our tall 25 gallon that we plant to use as a stem plant farming tank.

This is the first time that we are using ADA Aquasoil with Power Sand underneath so I am very interested in how this substrate will help with overall plant growth since I've heard sooo many fabulous things about it.

Just finished setting it up and planting it this weekend - most of the plants we got from our plant groups at the swaps and auctions!

Should be interesting to see this one fill in!

30 gallon MTS update

Well, so we've been struggling with a variety of algae blooms and also a bloom of cyanobacteria as well. Plus many plants have melted as this tank is just seeming to take FOREVER to settle down and get its groove going.

Anyways, here is the update on where it's at now, it's not pretty but I've had worse, so not complaining! LOL!




Here is a close-up of this blue-green slime algae as it is called (it's actually a bacterial bloom and not algae at all) and how it's spread ...







Good news though, (I hope anyways! LOL!) ... I got C02 started on it! So tonight I will be scraping off as much of that gunk as I can, doing a 50% - 70% water change (no fauna in it as of yet so I can do whatever the heck I want to with it to get it under control!), squirt on some H202 on all the cyano I can see, and then clean out my filters and I'll remove the charcoal and the floss and see if that helps at all. Treating it with Maracyn at double the dose for 8 days did not see to really affect it at all unfortunately, so hopefully these other measures will help.

Taking Pictures!

Okay sooooo I have decided that I *HAVE* to wrestle this camera until it OBEYS me and does what I tell it to cuz my point and shot camera SUCKS.

So I made Ray help me a little bit with the settings and though it's still not where I want them to be, they are MUCH better!

Here are some of my attempts tonight off some of my tanks ... hope you like them!


Here is one of the Melanotaenia Splendida Splendida fry that I hatched out of eggs back in October! Getting a bit bigger, he is!




Here are two of the orange shrimp that I got this weekend next to one of my little kuuhlie loaches! I am trying to figure out what species they are. They are very pretty though!

C02 Explained

So I've been researching how to do co2 and have just found it hard to wrap my brain around certain bits.

In my research digging, I found this and wanted to put the link in a place that I could find it again easily and hey - maybe others will find it helpful as well!

A Treatise on DIY CO2 Systems for Freshwater-Planted Aquaria

I think it really covers the subject pretty thoroughly really, and I wish that I had found it months ago, lol!

Enjoy! :)

30 gallon ... MTS with sand cap

Well we finally got the cap for our MTS tank and got it all put in and planted!

Here it is right after we added the sand cap!



And here it is right after we planted it and filled it up!



Here is a close of the tank starting from the left side ...



And then the middle ...



And then the right side!



Can't wait to see it start to fill in! :)

Scored a Fluval Ebi setup, w00t!

Yeeehah! Looks like I just got a hold of a Fluval Ebi setup, might wind up being my dedicated shrimp tank for my office!

The fry are doing good after their move, feeding well as far as I can tell, doesn't seem like I've lost any - yay!

Going to try to score some micro worm and vinegar eel cultures I think, not sure. Might be a little too late for this batch of fry to get a colony established.

Think I'm going to redo my yellow shrimp tank soon, and switch out the Fluval shrimp substrate and add in the natural large grain sand instead. I just throw plants in willy nilly and the shrimps don't seem to mind so I left it/ The plants are doing well as they are, but I'd prefer it to look a lot better.

In their new tank!

So the fry are in their tank and doing well so far!

Thought I'd take a few pics of them getting the hang of their new tank to share with ya'll! :)

Moving, moving, moving ...

All of the M. Splendida Splendida fry have hatched (pretty sure anyway!) and when I tested the water in their hatching tray today, OMG! The ammonia test bottomed out!

So I quickly tested the water of the planted tank that they'd been floating in, which had been set up for about a month now and the parameters were almost perfect (although the ammonia was at .25, so I'll be watching that like a hawk!) and then scooped them all in.

The count so far of hatched fry were 60 + 4 that if they don't die or straighten out will need to be culled. I just thought that since they were such strong swimmers, that *maybe* the water being so horrid was making it hard for them to get their tails fully free of the egg so now they have a shot and if they die, well, best to do it in a planted tank rather than some other method.

But so far, 60 strong babies! Already planning for getting the larger grow out tank set up ... I have a brand new 25 gallon that I could easily setup, and I'm going to need to - this 2.5 gallon might at the most last me 2 weeks ... if that if they all stay healthy!

Thank goodness payday is next week so I can make sure I have everything to upgrade them quickly.

Video of rainbows in my office tank

Finally put up this video I took in mid-October of my tank in my office. I absolutely love watching them swim when the sunlight is dabbling through the water, they are so pretty when the sun hits them!

4 little fishies ....

Okay and now we have four successful hatchings and four cute little fry! A lot of these eggs still appear viable, but I expected more of them to be hatched by now, unless the first four were just super early developers.

One fry (#5) is on the bottom with a curled tail - not sure if it was injured or poorly developed or the tail just hasn't fully escaped the egg casing ... it's alive, but only time will tell although in my experience, that doesn't bode well for the little guy.

So far, only a few eggs have "gone bad" so just hoping for a bit more to hatch in the next day or so!

Melanotaenia Splendida Splendida Deepwater Creek eggs - I got some!

OMG tonight we scored one of Gary Lange's egg kits for Melanotaenia Splendida Splendida Deepwater Creek at the SAS meeting!

Two had already hatched in the vial and most of the eggs appear viable! Yay! And such a pretty fish too! <3 Plopped them into the 2.5 gallon grow out tank for small plant clippings in a floating tupperware dish until they all hatch, and gave them a little airstone set on uber low for some gentle circulation. They are soooo cute! (but then they always are!) Sadly there were three small blue fry and a few eggs that just didn't make it ... but rainbows tend to be hardy fish and they always seem to do very well for me, so hoping we get most of the batch as hungry healthy fry! Was a great meeting, the presentation Gary gave was really cool - as someone that has loved rainbows intensely for at least a decade or more, it was neat to hear a little about where some of the fish that I used to breed so long ago came from! Even better, I think R enjoyed it and actually got interested in rainbows too (YAY!), turns out that he really liked the colors (natch!) and he even got very interested in a few species (w00t!). He really liked the gertrudes and the splendidas - and I am thrilled that we were able to get the ONLY egg kit of M. Splendida Splendida being offered to have him really see how to raise these guys first hand. We've now dedicated his planter tank to these fry once they get big enough - which is great! And if we need to, we can always yank out the 55g or one of the 100s to use as a breeding/display tank for the adults.

Also won some free Leaf Zone - which we TOTALLY needed for the water column as one of my anubis is just yellowing out hardcore and scored some Water Sprite to suck up some nitrates in the tanks. I really love the clubs that we have joined so far, and even better, R seems to really like them so far too!

Great SAPS meeting!

Another wonderful meeting tonight, but a low turnout sadly!

Matt gave a wonderful presentation on backgrounds and back lighting, to be honest I just never gave any of that much thought, but ... after seeing the effect it had on the demo tank he used, wow! Really got my attention and changed my mind I think!

I was able to donate my riccia mat that I had been growing out (yay!) as I had finally decided that yeahhhh not interested so much in that plant. Hope the new owner likes it!

We were able to pick up a few more free plants for our tank as well, got a bit more java fern, some stem plant that I don't know what it is, a wispy needle leafed plant that I was told what it was but have now promptly forgotten what the heck it is called, a few unidentified little tony stemlings that had stowed away in the leaves of some other plant (no idea what they are either, but they looked cool, LOL) and a super tiny little green gecko crypt! Should be interesting to see what they all turn into! lol

But always fun to hang out with other tankers and talk shop and compare notes on stores and whatnot. Hoping that we will be able to donate more things at the meetings in the future!

Shrimplets! ::::squeeeeee!::::

OMG! I found babies in the yellow tank! How cooool! And they are all soooo tiny! And soooo CUTE! watching them jump is just the most adorable thing, lol.

Sooo I guess they are liking their setup! But damn - that is one hell of an ugly ass tank. Now I can't redo it and make it pretty cuz now I'm scared I'll hurt the babies. ARGH.