Jared's Underwater Jungle

[frogmanjared]

No, I'm going to wait and add my fish from the 5 gal into this tank and turn the 5 into a shrimp tank. Even though it's sad when a fish dies... that just means I'm one step closer to a shrimp tank

[cah925]

For behind the sword - How about Didiplis diandra or a Rotala species.

[frogmanjared]

Should I get Didiplis diandra or Wisteria? I've read that didiplis doesn't tolerate algae well, and the ottos won't be able to clean it. I'm thinking wisteria because the green will make the ozelot stand out better.

[ZooTycoonMaster]

Wisteria and Water Sprite grow REALLY fast...Water Sprite took over my 10 gallon in less than a month I'd go with Diandra

[frogmanjared]

I've had a lot of algae issues the last month or so with this tank... so I did a huge trim and spent nearly 2 hours scrubbing the salvagable plants, it looks even worse because of a pink light on the left side(really need to get a new one).
The sword only has 4 leaves now... it should survive, right???

[FrostyNYC]

You should really clean the glass, especially if you're having algae issues. Cleaning the plants is only half the battle -- get the algae off the glass too.

The sword should survive.

You should consider getting some faster growing plants in there if you want to outcompete the algae. Maybe some floating plants, or some fast-growing stem plants to suck up nutrients.

Also, I didnt see your lighting, CO2, and fert routine mentioned anywhere. Whats going on with those?

[sewingalot]

I love this transformation. The co2 and new bulb really sent away that algae, didn't it?

[frogmanjared]

Well, I got frustrated to the point of almost smashing my tank today... The BGA came back during my vacation and OMG it wouldn't go away! Here's a pic before I tore the whole thing down earlier today.


3 hours of back-breaking work, and no dead fish it looks great!The tank is still a little cloudy since I stirred and rinsed the flourite/sand also. The bleach dip seems to have killed most if not all the algae on the plants, and the ones too sensitive to dip are currently in a 1.5 gal near a southern exposure window to grow out. If the tank is clear enough later tonight I'll update, otherwise sometime tomorrow.

I'm going to start dosing excel and flourish as soon as my order arrives and on thur, I'm finally getting rid of the colormax pink bulb! So there will be more updates to come.

[frogmanjared]

LOL I was just looking at the tank and the Cherry Barbs are mating again! This time it's the male who's blind in one eye (from the looks of it he's not very good!), with the same female as before... man she must love the changes in scenery from one tank to the next. I guess this means there's no bleach residue left on the plants or filter!

[demonbreedr16]

WoW! That looks like my 50 gallon pond used to!! About 50$ worth of plants go thrown out(don't tell my mom) and got replaced with natives, and everything looks good!

[frogmanjared]

The water is clear this morning and I'm very pleased with the results. The D. diandra accidentally got dipped... ooops so it's not going to survive. Now I just have to wait till tomorrow for my other light and for the ferts to come and it should progress nicely.


I've got the more sensitive plants, and some babies, runners in a 1.5 hex that I'm growing out. If the sun doesn't come out soon I'll have to use that pink bulb to light it.

[frogmanjared]

This is the look I want, just waiting for it to fill out, and I'll know for sure. Now it's 30w 6500k 10 hr photoperiod. Petco had a buy two, get one free sale, so I got 3 pots of Lilaeopsis brasiliensis for 10$... not too bad.
My flourish and excel also came today, so I'm going to start a dosing regime tomorrow. I'll probably also going to be adding some RCS to help clean around the base of the microsword.

What do you guys think... is this a good layout? Please, any comments are welcome, if I'm moving any plants around, I'd like to do it sooner that later.

[BENOLUX]

Hey mate, looks much better, sounds like you have got it all planned out.
Have you got any hard scape in your tank, like bigger rocks or driftwood.
Looks 110% better, once the microsword fills in will look great.

[mott]

Looks 100 times better, Thank God you got rid of those awful lights

[frogmanjared]

Last night I traded 7 RCS for some plants from a neighbor(she works at petco and her apartment is like a zoo, didn't realize we were neighbors until last week!) I still have a little BGA, but it's under control now! Here's the pic from today, can't wait for the H. diffiformis to fill in on the right side!