2.5 Gal Desk Tank, 6/4/10 restart

11489 Views 44 Replies 23 Participants Last post by yikesjason, Sep 27, 2010

yikesjason

Discussion Starter · Aug 17, 2009 (Edited)

3

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?

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1 - 20 of 45 Posts

seadreamer

· #2 · Aug 17, 2009

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

Church

· #3 · Aug 17, 2009

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

· #4 · Aug 17, 2009

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

yikesjason

Discussion Starter · #5 · Aug 17, 2009

Reginald2 said:
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

Discussion Starter · #6 · Aug 17, 2009

seadreamer said:
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

· #7 · Aug 17, 2009

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

Discussion Starter · #8 · Aug 17, 2009

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

· #9 · Aug 17, 2009

wow i like it nice job

Kayen

· #10 · Aug 17, 2009

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

FrostyNYC

· #11 · Aug 18, 2009

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

Dollface

· #12 · Aug 20, 2009

Danielle said:
.. 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

Discussion Starter · #13 · Aug 22, 2009

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.

Centromochlus

· #14 · Aug 22, 2009

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

Ignignokt

· #15 · Aug 22, 2009

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.

shrimpo

· #16 · Aug 22, 2009

Nice looking, and perfectly fit...that kind of desk you have will be out of stock soon.:icon_smil

yikesjason

Discussion Starter · #17 · Aug 22, 2009

shrimpo said:
Nice looking, and perfectly fit...that kind of desk you have will be out of stock soon.:icon_smil

The desk is just something I got off of craigslist. But it works out nicely for me. I did have to cut off part of one end of it to fit in my office. But it works well.

The wood above the tank is a divider that ran vertically in same spot where the tank is now. I had to cut it to make it fit as a door way to the lights. I am a little worried about the heat from the light though. There is very little air circulation and it could heat things up quite a bit. I need to get to the store and get a thermometer so I can keep an eye on things.

yikesjason

Discussion Starter · #18 · Aug 22, 2009

The first day or two, the shrimp were very timid about coming out to eat. Not a big suprise with all they had been through. But then they started to come out in mass when I would feed them. I could see between 20 and 25 of them. But yesterday they didn't come out again, and today either. I just pulled out 9 dead shrimp this afternoon. I don't know what has gone wrong. I just did a water change and used distilled water. (I don't have any RO water around that I could find.) Hopefully I don't loose the rest.

shrimpo

· #19 · Aug 23, 2009

Sorry to hear that....so they died after water change? i am wondering if its the temp diference that shocked them..
for the light, i am using a self balasted 10w 6500k coralife from petco..it dosen't produce as much heat.

yikesjason

Discussion Starter · #20 · Aug 23, 2009

They died before the water change. I am starting to think it might be the oto. He is kind of a headcase. He gets spooked easily and then goes nuts thrashing around the tank throwing shrimp around. I need to get him out of there.

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