[ChemGuyEthan]

And my final update of the night!

Took the AR out of this one. I don't really like how it looks. I kept some rotala trimmings from the 40 gallon and may add them here, but I'll leave this for a night and then decide tomorrow if I want to add them in or leave it. I'm still not satisfied with this scape...the moss has grown in really nice, but the tree effect isn't really hitting me any more. Thoughts on changes would be appreciated. I do have several more pieces of ohko I could add to the back too. We'll see.

Pics.

Before:


After:


I now I have a hanger for the light so it doesn't sit right on top of the tank.


Thanks again for the comments and views!

 

[mistuhmarc]

Wow, hard to believe it's been a month since I updated this...

Well as you may anticipate, the plants have actually grown. Shocker, I know. I mean, they haven't grown much, you can see from this picture they've really just barely done anything...barely...
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...just sad really...
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Ok, in all seriousness, these plants grew like wildfire! And thanks to a healthy dose of neglect from myself in trimming (but not in my fert dosing :thumbsup, things really overgrew the tank. The fish barely had room to swim anymore. So, TRIM TIME!!! :red_mouth



Amazing how different things look. The "tree" is starting to grow in nicely. I like the look of the xmas moss for trees. The mini pellia is also looking good in the ohko. I divided my once, three plants of blyxa japonica into about 15 stems worth! Most of which made it's way into the 40 gallon to supplement what I already had in there. Hoping to get a nice patch grown in on that one. I removed the bacopa that was in there, not really feeling it in this scape. And my final comment is on the alternanthera reineckii, It's really making a nice wall of red in the back that I wanted. I'll probably have to trim that soon too, getting close to the surface.

I had hooked a rig up to hang the light from instead of having it resting on the tank, as I've had some thread algae on the upper most parts of the plants, but then it broke... So I gotta figure something else out.

The final fun little tid-bit. Somehow an amano shrimp made it from this aquarium to the bathroom...still alive at the time...still alive tonight. My roommate called me while I was at work this morning, very confused... as was I, haha. He found the shrimp this morning and cleaned him off a bit, then put him back in the tank for me. I barely believed it until he sent me a picture. At the time, I hadn't done anything to the tank except add some more water to it (it's been so hot here that the water is evaporating quite quickly), I did the trim tonight. I had no idea these little shrimp were so resilient, that's about a 30 foot journey across carpet and tile...a very dry, 30 foot journey. :confused1:

Here's the picture, kinda blurry, but you can tell it's a shrimp!


As always, thanks for looking!

I've had this happen to me several times...only once did I catch an amano surviving out of the water. The others, well, they met they're timely demise . Anyways, I think they jump out most when breeding, they'll be more active and jumpy as they try to play around with each other. The only other time I had them jump out was when something went really wrong with my tank, so they tried to climb out and then jump out. Just be careful on how things go!

 

[ChemGuyEthan]

I've had this happen to me several times...only once did I catch an amano surviving out of the water. The others, well, they met they're timely demise . Anyways, I think they jump out most when breeding, they'll be more active and jumpy as they try to play around with each other. The only other time I had them jump out was when something went really wrong with my tank, so they tried to climb out and then jump out. Just be careful on how things go!

Yeah, it may have been the heat, not sure. I don't have a good way of cooling the tanks down, unfortunately. Should be about done with the heat wave out here though. Haven't had any more climb out or any casualties though, so I think this is just an adventurous little shrimp, haha.

 

[ChemGuyEthan]

Considering I don't really like where this scape has gone, I'm going to change things up!

Picked up a few cool pieces of wood. The first is a log-type piece that is pretty cool, it's hollow in the middle and has lots of little nooks and crannies for me to stuff plants into. The second was bought to accent the first, just has two long branches that are about the same length as the log. I'll move the fish and shrimp out and keep them out for a week or so after rescaping while things settle back in.

The pieces are both about the same length as the tank, so with substrate, they'll stick out the top of the tank.

I plan on using both the mini xmas moss and the mini pellia on the wood. I also want to get some anubias nana petite in there and some of that hydro japan. I want the hydro to climb up and out of the tank, ideally... The blyxa will stay and I might add some AR mini for some color.

Here are pictures of the wood. I've got it soaking now. It's not too floaty, so probably next weekend I'll be able to set things up, assuming I have the time and motivation.

 

[ChemGuyEthan]

Hey gang, update time!

Here is a picture. Obviously not done yet, and clearly these aren't the glamour shots, haha. Just wanted to show you all the updated layout. I took the picture this morning as things were quite cloudy last night after refilling so I just didn't do any more work on it.

Got all the fauna out and tore up all the plants. Took a large amount of the substrate out as I think it was too high. Glued/tied some moss to the wood (which took a surprisingly long time...). Replanted the blyxa in the back and got some hydrocotyle tripartita in there around the base of the largest log. It should do well filling in the back corner and kinda spilling out around the base. Unfortunately, the smaller wood piece in the back is deciding it wants to float sometimes, I'll have to tie a rock to it.



Here's a shot of the wood sticking out the top of the tank.


Here's where I'm a little undecided. Aside from "dusting" things off and leveling the substrate, I'm not totally sure what I want to plant in the foreground. I'm leaning towards glosso (if I can find any). I thought about HC, but decided against it. I want something a little more leafy since the wood is so dominating. I would also consider some s. repens as a carpet, since it's a little larger. I don't think I want to replant the grass (meaning I'll probably sell it!), it was a lot of work keeping it trimmed and near the end I just didn't care.

I'll clean things up a bit tonight after work. Should also be getting some buce in the mail to tie onto/glue onto the wood as well.

Any thoughts on the carpet plant would be appreciated.

Thanks!

 

[ChemGuyEthan]

Greetings all!

Just thought I would continue to keep you updated on the progress. Got some plants in this week. Barto got me some foreground plants, rotala mexican goais (which I'm hoping will turn red even at this depth) and some limnophila mini vietnam. Also got some buce from EricJ. Got those tied or glued to the wood and I think the tank is starting to come together! Now the waiting game as things grow in...

 

[ChemGuyEthan]

Hello everyone,

Been feeling pretty under the weather all weekend, but I made some changes to this tank today. I swapped the rotala and limnophila out for some downoi. Hoping the downoi will take off and compliment the leaf shapes of the buce. The others were getting pretty leggy and the rotala was never going to color up at this depth.

Apologies in advance for the phone pics.

Here's the full tank:


And you may notice a little something on the lower right, I call it "Mini Buce Island!"
Got a few different mini buce species and decided to tie them all to a small piece of lava rock to make a little island. Got some (naming from left to right) "hyperion," "mini belinda," and some "lamandau mini." The first two are courtesy once again of EricJ and the last is from Ryantube. Really great plants from both guys!

Here's a closer picture:


Sorry for the crappy phone pictures, I'm not sure where my camera went...I tried to touch them up a little as my phone has a hard time dealing with the light.

You may notice too I added some floaters. Been getting some algae so trying to keep the light a little bit more diffuse.

Haven't figured out fish yet, this tank has such a tiny footprint it's hard to find something that'll be happy here. I'll get some amanos and cherries in soon though.

Thanks for checking it out, comments welcome!

 

[ChemGuyEthan]

Well, another 3 weeks gone. Buce are doing fantastic! The larger species are putting out a leaf per week! The small ones are settling in nicely as well. Had a small melt from the downoi, but I suppose that's to be expected.

Added a couple amanos as a habitability test a few weeks. They have survived with no problems. Added 4 ottos as the sole fish in the tank.

And as a final addition, I got 20 pumpkin neos from sbarbee54! Got a few adults, some subs/juvies, and definitely some really young ones. But they made it through the mail without problems and acclimated to the tank quite nicely! I've spotted some of them roaming around over the past few days since I got them in on Thursday, but frankly there are too many hiding places for the little guys as the main log is hollow, haha.

Pics of the shrimp:
Youngster-


One of the adults, male I believe-


The thing I've been worried about with shrimp in this tank, as it's medium-ish tech, with CO2 was gassing the shrimp. The tall, narrow tank means little surface area and the floaters in there also limit that. My solution so far is an air pump connected to a cheap CO2 diffuser. It's easily hidden behind the logs and makes a nice mist of air bubbles that get dispersed by the outflow from the filter. I use an inline CO2 diffuser for the actual CO2 injection. Now I just need to find the balance between CO2 injection and air injection. I run the CO2 an hour before lights on/off and I run the air diffuser 24/7 so far. There isn't much surface agitation, but I think the dispersion of air bubbles should help with shrimp health.

Anyone ever run air in like this to a CO2 injected tank with shrimp? I think the theory behind it is sound, but I'm curious if anyone has experience doing this.

Here's a couple tank shots to leave you with.

(Ignore the giant drop checker, I have it in there as a double check for my smaller one until I narrow the CO2 level down, currently maintaining green/yellow on both with no visible stress to the shrimp)



Thanks for looking!

 

[ChemGuyEthan]

Unfortunately I will be tearing this down. I was on vacation and just so busy at work that I was never even home enough to notice it being overrun with algae... green thread algae to be specific. I've been trying for the past few months to get rid of it, nearly had at one point, but after my absence the tank had no chance.

I'll be moving what I can to a new tank! An ADA mini M! Here's the pic and I'll update with a new thread.