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Andrew's 1st tank - fluval spec V - never ending breeding

19K views 56 replies 20 participants last post by  horsedude 
#1 · (Edited)
Hey there, take a look at some recent pictures and a video of the tank... I have enjoyed looking through many of the journals here, this forum really has some amazing aquariums!

This is my first and only tank, I definitely want to start more but I won't until I am more stable...

Anyway, it is a fluval spec 5gallon tank, all stock except now that it is cold out I have added an ugly 25w water heater.

Plants:

javafern
javamoss
crystalwort
duckweed
green wendtti
anubias (unknown variety to me)
nana grass
dwarf grass of some sort
1 marimo ball

Fish & Inverts:

4x Red cherry shrimps
1x Dwarf orange crayfish
2x Assassin snails
15+ Tiger endlers of varying maturity
unknown number of pond snails being hunted by the assassins

Pix:

















^ the last couple are most recent with some new growth and the damn heater installed

Vid:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=IuAXLHL_x0I


Thanks for looking :fish:
 
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#3 ·
yeah, I made the scape without really thinking of the heater, and considering how little space I have (can't get it real close to the plants ideally) where I put it is pretty much the only place I can... I am thinking about looking into a smaller heater but I can't really find much on that. At least the stable temps are making the fish (especially the inverts) MUCH happier.

Thanks for the comments! The crayfish is funny, he really is great... a very interesting creature, im surprised more people don't keep these lil guys, they stay small and really don't mess up the plants - though you do NEED to have the tank covered because when they jet around occasionally I have even heard him smack the cover when he was doing that.

He is missing a claw since last nite (he molted) hopefully he is ok, I dont know how that happened, perhaps one of the new assassins attacked him while he was molting :( well either way I think he will be ok till next molt
 
#4 ·
some new pictures... I think you guys will appreciate the first one of one of my assassin snails - my planted assassin snail ;)





 
#5 · (Edited)
so obviously given how many posts I have made in this so far I am obsessing right now haha... well I finally dealt with that eye sore of a heater and put it in the chamber of the filter the outflow goes, it barely fit but it doesnt contact any of the plastic tubing or the pump below so I think it should work really well hidden away in there... so here are some proper current pictures of the tank with that thing hidden away with the only memory being the bright red led that comes on when it powers up:







and I figured I would include a decent picture (hard to capture these quick small guys) of one of my young male tiger endlers and a couple lil fry harassing a hidden RCS :D
 
#56 ·
so obviously given how many posts I have made in this so far I am obsessing right now haha... well I finally dealt with that eye sore of a heater and put it in the chamber of the filter the outflow goes, it barely fit but it doesnt contact any of the plastic tubing or the pump below so I think it should work really well hidden away in there... so here are some proper current pictures of the tank with that thing hidden away with the only memory being the bright red led that comes on when it powers up:







and I figured I would include a decent picture (hard to capture these quick small guys) of one of my young male tiger endlers and a couple lil fry harassing a hidden RCS :D
Hey, great looking tank. I'm putting mine together tonight and like you, I have a heater like yours also. How is it working out in that compartment? Is there enough circulation in there next to the hose to keep the whole tank at proper temperature? Right now I have mine suctioned to the black plate inside the tank, not in the filter compartment.

Thanks!
 
#8 ·
I really like the dwarf cray fish but I guess the only thing people that keep them can say perhaps negative about them is that you need a lot of tank to keep more than one together because of territorial issues whereas shrimps you can obviously pack a ton of them together.



Nice looking tank

thx! :smile:
 
#9 ·
I like your tank, simple and small makes it easy to care for and my favorite is my nano 2.5 gallon just for that reason. When you get a couple dollars in your pocket you might consider buying a 9 liter bag of Aquasoil and it will feed all your plants plus you'll have enough left over to do a couple more small tanks, I've only tried it for the first time in the last year and I'll never use any other substrate again, good luck.
 
#13 ·
I like your tank, simple and small makes it easy to care for and my favorite is my nano 2.5 gallon just for that reason. When you get a couple dollars in your pocket you might consider buying a 9 liter bag of Aquasoil and it will feed all your plants plus you'll have enough left over to do a couple more small tanks, I've only tried it for the first time in the last year and I'll never use any other substrate again, good luck.
I just bought a bag and plan to use it on my next tank (in the mail) - I will rescape this spec V some day and get a quality substrate in there... eventually

You can put a small heater in the pump well.
Already did ;)

*tries not to want a dwarf crazy*
they are a lot of fun :D

Me tooooo T_T
dooo it :icon_evil heh :)
 
#14 · (Edited)


hunrgy hungry shrimp




found the shrimps hanging out at the local pub



liking this young male endlers color pattern on this side
 
#15 · (Edited)
Yeah, he's all dressed up all right. The furry assassin is hilarious. Makes me wonder why you don't see fuzz on shells more often.

Nice looking tank. Not sure about the gravel size, but it all looks like a nice home.

Nice job on the photos too.
 
#16 ·
Hey there, take a look at some recent pictures and a video of the tank... I have enjoyed looking through many of the journals here, this forum really has some amazing aquariums!

This is my first and only tank, I definitely want to start more but I won't until I am more stable...

Anyway, it is a fluval spec 5gallon tank, all stock except now that it is cold out I have added an ugly 25w water heater.

Plants:

javafern
javamoss
crystalwort
duckweed
green wendtti
anubias (unknown variety to me)
nana grass
dwarf grass of some sort
1 marimo ball

Fish & Inverts:

4x Red cherry shrimps
1x Dwarf orange crayfish
2x Assassin snails
15+ Tiger endlers of varying maturity
unknown number of pond snails being hunted by the assassins

Pix:

















^ the last couple are most recent with some new growth and the damn heater installed

Vid:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=IuAXLHL_x0I


Thanks for looking :fish:
Firstly like the tank, but i have to say that door has one of the best paintjobs i have seen in a while very cool indeed.
 
#21 ·
Yeah, I can see how this forum does that... I just got done scaping and planting my little spec 2 tank - had to get it a bit fancier with a CFL and aquasoil and seriyu stones :D

MTS is a real disease haha :D
 
#26 ·
sooo craycray my CPO was looking a bit under the weather for a couple weeks now, his last molt went bad and he was missing a main claw (and his antennae remained really short after this too) - this happened like a day after I added my assassin snails (I wonder if one of em attacked him while he was molting?) - but yeah the last couple days he was kinda twitchy and not moving around well one his claws was stuck and like seized a lil vertical....

but I am curious what you guys think about the cause - I wasn't really supplementing the tank for hardness or calicum or anything for shrimps/crays - any advice here? only thing I did was a few weeks back I started giving the tank some fluval shrimp granules.

so yeah, today I found him dead, apparently halfway molted and he just didn't have it to complete the molt :( :'(

craycray was a loved member of the 5gallon community from the start back in july - may he rest in peace in my pet cemetery - and out of respect I might retire the 5gallon from CPO keeping perhaps indefinitely.





RIP
 
#32 ·
All invertebrates need calcium supplementing or calcium enriched diets for them to grow and molt properly. A diet rich in protien also will cause them to grow faster than the rate of shell development which results in premature molting. Many can survive with partial molts but with obvious deformities like lost limbs. Learn more about dosing the water column with calcium. It is easy and inexpensive.

Also for a tank with the stock lighting, id recommend not having any floaters as it makes a low light tank that much darker. If you wanted to keep floaters, get a few larger ones like frog bit or dwl where the shrimp can feed off their biofilm. Duckweed doesn't offer this benefit and just serves to multiply and choke light out.

Good luck.
 
#28 ·
Nice tank! Sorry to hear about the crayfish. It sounds like the assasins or something harrassed it. If you don't like the heater in the pump chamber, you can just cut out part of the filter sponge and drop it in there, I did that on my spec 2 gallon and it worked out fine. Eventually I replaced the filter altogether with a small filter driven by an airpump, seems to work better than the built in filter
 
#30 ·
it is working out pretty good so far... yeah I dunno maybe an assassin messed with him while molting - it was also suggested that perhaps my frequent water changes were irritating him.

Hello, sorry about the CPO, he looked like a nice one too. I was reading up on CPO's recently and apparently they are very vulnerable while molting. Your guess about something attacking it may be very well correct.

do you think you will get another, they are so cool.
yeah, they are really cool... I dunno I might have to get another one, it is either that or more RCS (only have 4 rcs in there now)
 
#29 ·
Hello, sorry about the CPO, he looked like a nice one too. I was reading up on CPO's recently and apparently they are very vulnerable while molting. Your guess about something attacking it may be very well correct.

do you think you will get another, they are so cool.
 
#31 ·




two new pix... replaced the blyxa plant in the front left which was doing real bad with the remained of my dwarf sub then added a crypt parva next to the crypt wendtii and finally added some flame moss over the biggest piece of driftwood - I think it all looks a bit more lush :D

oh and maybe you can spot the new nerite snail, on algae duty
 
#33 ·
thanks for the input, I really appreciate it - oh and yeah I've been taking out the duckweed more and more lately...

any more specific input you can give me on the calcium issue? I am wondering if supplementing the water or the diet is the way to go... well I will be searching on this
 
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