Rusty's 30 high tech

[AUvet14]

Originally Posted by Fishies_in_Philly

sorry to hear about the outbreak, that sucks. but the rebuild looks outstanding!! it's gonna fill in a lot better than you probably imagined it would originally.

and for what it's worth? i put clothes on my dog as well. she's a little toy fox terrier, and she's a prima donna too, she will not go out in the rain. forget snow, she won't even go near a door...LOL

Haha. That's funny.

About the outbreak, it appears to have worked, at least for the most part. Only today I've started seeing what might be a little green hair here and there. If it turns out this is the case, I will try to catch all or most of my shrimp, place them in quarantine for a while, and use the AlgaeFix treatment that Tom Barr suggested. Not looking forward to catching those little shrimpies though... If only they knew their lives depended on it. Lol.

[AUvet14]

Weekly photo:



Not looking its best, but considering I pulled up just about all the stems so I could catch the shrimp to quarantine them while I treat this tank with AlgaeFix, it doesn't look too bad. The rotala macrandra didn't seem to like being handled all that much. It's not looking too hot but it does have a few healthier-looking side shoots growing. The water looks somewhat hazy due to the AlgaeFix. Hopefully this time I'll get rid of the spirogyra for good.

[AUvet14]

Last Friday night photo of the year 2012

[AUvet14]

Well, bad news... It looks like my CO2 ran out while I was gone and now the tank is completely algae-ridden. I believe at this point, it would be easiest to scrap everything and start over with all new plants. Any tips for getting BBA off of all the driftwood? The driftwood is completely covered and unless it can be killed and removed, I might have to scrap the driftwood as well. I'm trying AlgaeFix to kill the hair algae. I think the shrimp must have died shortly after I added them back to the tank after treating with AlgaeFix before I left. That probably set off this super algae bloom. Any way you look at it, it's a bad situation.

[hydrophyte]

Oh man I'm sorry to hear that this planting was looking so nice. I am certain however you will make something equally as wonderful.

Have you considered H2O2 for cleaning the driftwood? You could apply that and then use a plastic brush to scrub the dead algae away.

[seahawkshos040]

love it!

[AUvet14]

Originally Posted by hydrophyte

Oh man I'm sorry to hear that this planting was looking so nice. I am certain however you will make something equally as wonderful.

Have you considered H2O2 for cleaning the driftwood? You could apply that and then use a plastic brush to scrub the dead algae away.

I did consider doing that. I could remove the driftwood, treat with H2O2, allow the algae to die, then try to brush it off, though I'm afraid it could return again .

I did consider scrapping the hardscape and perhaps doing something more Dutch style, focusing on color variety and neatly trimmed groupings. Any thoughts?

[tex627]

Dutch is awesome, but really hard to find well done. Tom Barr's dutch inspired scape is pretty well done and has really good plant choices.

[AUvet14]

Well now that the AlgaeFix has taken care of a lot of the hair algae, I think I'm going to try to salvage most of the plants. If I can figure out how to eliminate the BBA that has already established itself all over my driftwood, I might even keep the driftwood. If not, I might just do a rescape with a piece of manzanita or something.

[AUvet14]

Update: I've been doing an overdose of Excel (2x recommended dose) daily for about a week now and the BBA appears to be dying off. It's all turning reddish pink. I am going to continue the Excel treatment for another week to see if it eventually completely dies and then falls off of the driftwood. So far it looks promising though.

Keep in mind that I have fixed the CO2 again so the levels are back to 30+ ppm. I now have 3 drop checkers throughout the aquarium (one is a DIY, one will be for my nano tank once I get it filled, and the other is the one that's been in this tank) and all 3 drop checkers show a lime green color consistently throughout the day. I've also adjusted my photoperiod and CO2 timers as follows (I'll double check this when I get back to my apartment):

9am- CO2 on
10:30pm- lights on
3pm- lights off (CO2 stays on)
4:30pm- lights on
8pm- CO2 off
9pm- lights off

I have also raised my light another 2 or 3 inches inside the canopy. I've maintained my normal fertilization routine.

[AUvet14]

Well, the more I think about it, the more I'm leaning toward a dutch or dutch-inspired rescape. Here's the tank after using an Excel overdose for around a week and a half to kill off the BBA.



I think it's done pretty well as far as killing the BBA. (Note: I have some new bunches of plants in there that I'm holding for a friend, so a lot of that will be leaving shortly)

As far as my rescape, here's my ideas so far: I'm removing the 5 pieces of malaysian driftwood that I've had in there. I may or may not use this piece of manzanita:

Plants I'm taking out:

limnophila aquatica
mayaca fluviatilis
cardamine lyrata
myriophyllum mattogrossense (maybe)
fissidens fontanus

Plants I'm adding:

ludwigia peruensis (glandulosa)
nassaea pedicillata 'golden' (maybe, I'll have to see how I like it after it grows a bit)
didiplis diandra
staurugyne repens (might be taking the place of some of the blyxa)
pogostemon helferi (also might take the place of some blyxa)
syngonanthus 'belem' (maybe in place of myrio mattogrossense)

I might even throw in a red tiger lotus for a little while.
Here's kinda what I have in mind as far as positions:

glossostigma- thin carpet along front

blyxa japonica- midground
staurugyne repens- fore/midground hedge
pogostemon helferi- fore/midground hedge
hemianthus micranthemoides- fore/midground hedge

didiplis diandra- mid/background hedge
heteranthera zosterifolia- mid/background hedge or street

pogostemon erectus- background cluster
ludwigia peruensis- background cluster/focal point
limnophila aromatica- background cluster
nassaea pedicillata 'golden'- maybe a background cluster, if I decide to keep it
syngonanthus 'belem'/myriophyllum mattogrossense- background cluster

myriophyllum sp. 'guyana'- street
rotala macrandra- street

This is by no means a final plant list, as any given plant is subject to removal at my discretion. Lol.

Sorry for the novel of a post, but maybe some of you can manage to follow it and maybe share your thoughts/suggestions.

[Brian_Cali77]

Nice to see that the Excel worked to kill the BBA. Although I don't see many dutch (inspired) scapes using stones or DW, I think that piece you have there would look pretty nice and add a little more dimension IMO. I'm also a big fan of s. repens and p. helferi, so I applaud that decision to utilize that flora in your rescape. Perhaps more shades of colored plants would help instill that 'dutch' look? Something like ludwigia glandulosa, rotala colorata, (purple) cabomba pulcherrima, and/or limnophila aromatica?

[AUvet14]

Originally Posted by Brian_Cali77

Nice to see that the Excel worked to kill the BBA. Although I don't see many dutch (inspired) scapes using stones or DW, I think that piece you have there would look pretty nice and add a little more dimension IMO. I'm also a big fan of s. repens and p. helferi, so I applaud that decision to utilize that flora in your rescape. Perhaps more shades of colored plants would help instill that 'dutch' look? Something like ludwigia glandulosa, rotala colorata, (purple) cabomba pulcherrima, and/or limnophila aromatica?

I've got several colored plants in there. Limnophila aquatica (still recovering from no CO2 in my absence), rotala macrandra (all of it died, but I have more on the way), I do have ludwigia glandulosa, didiplis diandra can sometimes show some red/orange hues on the tops under the right conditions, and nassaea pedicillata 'golden' hopefully could add a nice yellow/orange shade to the tank. Not a big fan of the cabombas. Idk why, but I just don't like the look of them. Lol.

I haven't done the rescape yet, so right now I'm just kinda in limbo, growing plants until I have time to do a full rescape. I'll have to track down some staurugyne repens and pogostemon helferi too...

[AUvet14]

Okay, here is it after grooming the glosso and HM. Things are still recovering a bit, so it's a bit of a random mess right now.

[AUvet14]

It's been quite a while since I've updated this thread, so here it goes. I've pretty much been sitting back and watching some new plants grow so I can decide how I want to use them. Here's what I have now:

Green plants:
hemianthus micranthemoides
heteranthera zosterifolia
myriophylllum sp. 'Guyana'
myriophyllum mattogrossense
staurogyne repens
didiplis diandra
glossostigma elatinoides
blyxa japonica
pogostemon erectus

Colored plants:
rotala macrandra
rotala colorata
ludwigia sp. red
nassaea pedicellata 'golden' (I'm probably getting rid of this one)
ludwigia peruensis
red tiger lotus

I'm thinking I might have to replace the ludwigia peruensis with something else. It is growing nice and healthy, but the leaves and resulting stem width are just too large for me to use the way I would like to in this tank. I'm open to other suggestions of what I could use in it's place.