90cm Mr Aqua w/LEDs (now a Riparium) (5/19/12)

[IWANNAGOFAST]

Hi guys, started this tank few weeks ago. My girlfriend bought the tank for me for our 1 year anniversary and I set it up recently.

Here are the specs

Lighting: 3x39w catalina t5ho with moonlight LED

Filtration: Eheim 2213 and Eheim 2232

Glassware: 2x 13mm Aquatic Magic Lily pipes set

Heater: Hydor ETH 200w

co2: 5lb tank with azoo regulator

Ferts: EI dosing set on automatic using tom's aqua lifters

Flora: Staurogyne sp. 049g foreground, Blyxa Japonica midground (around wood), a buncha stem plants (sorry, I'm no good with names, I just know that there is ludwigia repens x arcuata and tonina belem)

Fauna: I am currently quarantining 40 cardinal tetras. In the tank right now I have: a lot of RCS, some otos, and a bushynose pleco

Anyways, on to some pics.

Empty tank


My dad and I built this stand using wood from an old cabinet


Finished stand, my 4 year old nephew used for size comparison


3 bags of 9L ADA aquasoil II


Tank mounted on stand with lights mounted. I plan to add a shelf or something on top of those brackets.


Shot of the final scape.

Since this pic has been taken, I've removed the moss from the wood, and the staurogyne has started to carpet very well.

Everything is growing nice and slow, just the way I like it. I like working on my tanks, but I hate trimming, just because I have no where to put the plants after a trim and I usually end up tossing them. With the lower amount of light on this tank, the plants grow at a decent rate, so I foresee I'll only have to trim maybe once every month or so.

On my 20 long, I had 96watts of t5ho, and I was trimming every week, it was annoying as heck.

Anyhow, tell me what you think! I'll be updating this as I go along, and look forward to reading your feedback.

[F22]

tank looks AWESOME

[xmas_one]

I have the same tank, yours looks a bit like the mirror image of my layout...

Can't wait to see it fill in!

[ddtran46]

I can't wait till this tank fills in. It's going to looks sweeeeet!!

[Dan the Man]

That driftwood is amazing...where did you get it?

[jinx©]

Great start and also a great wood arrangement.

Next time you trim your staurogyne, let me know and you can gladly toss it in my trash...lol

[IWANNAGOFAST]

thanks guys!

The wood is manzanita wood that I bought from Tom Barr (PlantBrain) at our local club's meet last month. It's really some awesome stuff. It's the same wood that speedie408 has in his tank, he just has a lot more.

And Jinx, I'll keep you in mind as I'm throwing away my plants haha

[speedie408]

Stop throwing away plants! Give them to the newer members on BAAPS so at least they can try to grow it out.

Tom's already flooded the market with Tropica 049, now wood. What a good man.

[IWANNAGOFAST]

haha, I've only thrown out the ludwigia repens x arcuata, that thing. oh man... I trim it from my big tank and now every single tank in my house has this plant. It grows in low light, high light, your light, my light.

But yes, I will pass this plant on next trim

[pandapr]

Congrats on a nice looking tank!! And a cool girlfriend!!!
Sometimes I have nightmares that my wife is drowning me on my tank!! LOL

[IWANNAGOFAST]

A couple of updates


Ludwigia Repens x Arcuata... I don't like this plant enough to spell it right. It grows too fast! But I love the way it looks. The R. Colorata I got from a member of our local club is also growing intensely quick. Grew to the top of the tank in a few days!


This plant is nifty, I got it from our local meet. (I should really pay attention or write down the names of these plants) It grew some purple underneath

.
I like this plant too


Here's some of the Alternanthera reineckii ''roseafolia''


My cardinals. They're eating voraciously, they seem to like the frozen blood worms the best, with frozen BBS next. I'm too grossed out to feed them live worms.


One of the RCS. Even with 100 in there, the tank is so densely planted I barely see them.


I just bought 5 of these guys. Assassin snails to deal with my snail problem. I smush all that I see but theres just so much, I can't get to them all. These assassins actually look kinda cool too!


FTS. Sorry, a little bubbly from the water change.


I built this thing to help with the water changes. Got the idea from PlantBrain. Its actually really convenient. I just screw it onto a hose, and hang it from the side of the tank. I put a sponge over the end so it doesn't suck up any fish and it's cut so I change about 45% of the water. Once water is siphoned out, I reconnect the hose and just fill it back up. I add a little bit of RO water, but its usually just top offs with RO for me.

and LASTLY....


AUGHHHHHH :evil: :evil: :evil: :evil:

ALGAE!!!!!!!!!!!


This covers just about every stem of staurogyne I have, a lot on the drift wood, a few leaves of blyxa. However, everything else is algae free...

I pulled my auto doser for now. I also turned off the middle bulb and running a shorter light period (reduced it from 9hrs (9 hr of single bulb, with the 2 outer bulbs for 7 hours) to 6 hrs of just the outer bulbs)

The RCS don't eat it, I don't think my 3 amanos are eating it (do they? do i need to get more?) My otos and pleco definitely didn't eat any of it.

My co2 is a little inconsistent as I'm still tweaking it but shouldn't this result in BBA not whatever this is? I don't have any BBA.

I'm also battling some GDA, but its mainly on the glass so its not that bad.

If someone could shed some light on this and what I can do.

[IWANNAGOFAST]

updated picture. The tank doesn't look this green in real life, it's just hard to get a good picture with the iphone.



Staghorn is in it's last dying stages, everything is growing very nicely. The increased co2 and that little powerhead for flow along the bottom of the tank definitely helped.

I have a koralia evo 425gph coming soon to replace that little powerhead on the bottom right corner. It'll probably be going in the back so it could be somewhat hidden by the stems. Defeats the purpose of all this nice glassware to have a big ol' pump but what can I do, my 2 filters are not providing enough flow for the bottom of the tank.

[IWANNAGOFAST]

Took some pictures today with my point and shoot camera instead of the usual iphone pics.


I took some of my staurogyne and glued it to the wood, it actually grows pretty well attached this way. I may cover the rest of the exposed wood with this but I'm not sure yet. This is just a little test to see how I like it and so far it's not too bad.


EBR I got from a local group member.


It's hard to get a good shot of the cardinals, they keep moving so fast. No problem getting a good shot of the BAJILLIONS of snails I have though! My 5 assassin snails can't work quick enough, I think I may have to try another method. I'm thinking of trying the pool liner trick to see if it works.


Some new fish I picked up. "Diptailed Pencil Fish" Nannostomus eques. Saw these at my LFS the last few times I went and finally decided I had to have them. They're so cool, they just chill at the top in a group like that all day.


FTS. The bottom right is a little bare because I've been pulling from there to use for my staurogyne branch and to give to people.

Thanks for looking!

[sapphoqueen]

looks good to me

he he he

this is awesome!

[thatgmc]

nice. This is turning out nice