2.5 Gal Desk Tank, new diy fan and light

[yikesjason]

I share my home office with my wife. She is a big time scrapbooker so her desk is all decorated and creative. I just have a big mess. Well, to be fair, her scrapbooking desk is a big mess most of the time too.

I think I might be coming down with MTS, but luckily for my wife, we don't have the room or budget for it. But I was still able to talk her into a nano tank for my part of the office. After some searching and waiting on craigslist and PT, I finally found one. A 2.5 gallon planted cherry shrimp tank.

It was going to be on top of a cabinet next to my desk, but it fit perfectly into a shelf on my desk, so it is now basically a wall tank.

Equipment-
RedSea nano HOB
Marinland mini heater
26W screw in CFL
Fluorite Black substrate

Flora-
anubias petite
lace java fern
downoi
HC
anubias ?
floater ?

Fauna-
20+ juvenile cherry shrimp
1 oto
? TBD

Ferts-
excel
flourish comprehensive

My messy desk


My light is kind of hoaky. I put it together with parts from some old worklights from the garage. I think I will upgrade that soon to something a little nicer.


A better view of the tank


The petite had some BBA from my 125, so it has some recovering to do. I want to grow the HC across the tank some more and I would like to add some thing to the drift wood. I think subwassertang or maybe a nice moss like star.

What do you all think?

[seadreamer]

Very pretty. I like the location too. Your lighting looks just like mine except without the rusty reflector, lol.

[Church]

You'll definitely need to upgrade the light, I think, but it definitely looks good, and I like how snug it is in that desk!

[Reginald2]

The tank looks great, and I like the location. What are you using for a background?

[yikesjason]

Originally Posted by Reginald2

The tank looks great, and I like the location. What are you using for a background?

I spray painted the background with white, green, and black. I used a crumpled up plastic bag as a stencil to do some layering to get some depth. It came out a lot better on my practice glass than it did on here. I will probably redo it at some point.

[yikesjason]

Originally Posted by seadreamer

Very pretty. I like the location too. Your lighting looks just like mine except without the rusty reflector, lol.

The inside of the reflector is a lot cleaner, and it has at least a little bit of polish. But hey, it was quick and cheap. The tank came will plants and shrimp, and the light it came with didn't fit in that spot. So I just came up with something I could do on the spur of the moment because those plants weren't going to wait.

[Danielle]

It looks a lot better than it did when it left here

the anubias is supposed to be a nana (non petite) .. and the floaters came from world of wet pets.. sold as water lettuce.... but true water lettuce is quite large (leaves 1 to 6" across) so I'm not really sure what it is.

Have you spotted any of the younger shrimp yet? I know there's at least one or two. They're 1/4 the size of the others and I couldn't tell if they were cherry or tigers.

I'm glad they've found a good home other than on the floor in my office!

[yikesjason]

There are a lot of shrimp in there. But everything I have seen so far looks like cherries. But that is fine with me.

[problemman]

wow i like it nice job

[Kayen]

Very, very nice.
Light seems really rusty, but if it works , and it's hidden it'll do IMO.

[FrostyNYC]

Like others have mentioned, I really love how it fits into that desk. Nice.

[Dollface]

Originally Posted by Danielle

.. and the floaters came from world of wet pets.. sold as water lettuce.... but true water lettuce is quite large (leaves 1 to 6" across) so I'm not really sure what it is.

Water lettuce has a mini form that it takes in aquariums. So yes, it is really water lettuce.

[yikesjason]

To day my 2 year old son got to my container of Hakari shrimp food next to the tank and dumped the whole thing out, I am just glad he couldn't get to the tank.

He helps me feed the fish in the big tank everyday. I should have known he would try to feed the shrimp tank too. I was able to scoop most of it up off the floor. The adventures of having children.

[AzFishKid]

Nice tank. Glad to hear that you were able to clean up most of the food!

[Ignignokt]

That looks sweet man, I love the way it fit into that cubby hole. I dont know if it would eat your cherry shrimp but a really nice half moon betta would look sweet in there, just a thought. I might have to try this out lol.