[carseatdust]

I'm glad they're having a good time in the dragonstone. I'd never thought about the surface of that rock being honeycombed with shrimp-sized cavities and food traps. That makes for a different way of looking at things.

Looking forward to a post-holidays update on the tank.

Cheers

 

[gjcarew]

One also molted. I wonder if that's due to osmotic shock or something.

I've found that new shrimp tend to "stress molt" after transport, even between similar water parameters. If they survive that though they are usually good for the long term.

Sent from my Pixel 3 using Tapatalk

 

[hlca]

I added 9 harlequin rasboras and 7 celestial pearl danios today. The CSPs are still in hiding, but the harlequins are already eating ravenously.

 

[hlca]

Here is a pic from today. Fish seem to be doing well, but I'm not sure they're all getting enough to eat. The shrimp are all hiding so I can't confirm how they're doing. I posted a question about it here.

 

[monkeyruler90]

Hey, very nice tank! I'm over here in Mission Hills, great to see another person on the forum. I've debated doing RO since the water is super hard here but so far things are growing okayish.

That sucks about the filter skimmer down the toilet, definitely a bit of bad luck

Tank is filling in great! that carpet looks lush, not sure if you didn't experience it or didn't post it but no algae at all?

 

[hlca]

Hey, very nice tank! I'm over here in Mission Hills, great to see another person on the forum. I've debated doing RO since the water is super hard here but so far things are growing okayish.

That sucks about the filter skimmer down the toilet, definitely a bit of bad luck

Tank is filling in great! that carpet looks lush, not sure if you didn't experience it or didn't post it but no algae at all?

Thanks! We're in North County. Algae has been pretty minimal -- just some I scrape off the glass once in a while. I use RO water and have a Twinstar reactor. Also 10 Amanos. So hopefully some of that combination has helped.

 

[carseatdust]

Looking great! That carpet is so lush. I really like the duotone color palette that's going on with the plants. Looks like some terrain is building up for the fish to explore too.

 

[hlca]

Well I lost two of the harlequin rasboras. They were the two smallest ones. There's no ammonia/nitrites in the tank. The deaths occurred about 2-3 days after my most recent water change. They were swimming funny all of a sudden and died overnight. I think what happened was that I rushed bringing the new water up to temp. My thermometer said there was 1 degree C difference and I was running out of time so I just added it. It was only a 35% change so I figured it was OK.

To rectify this, I purchased a heater and will heat my RO water in the future.

I also purchased some Bacter AE to provide some biofilm for the shy shrimp to eat. Hope that works and I can avoid any more deaths.

 

[hlca]

I saw 7 shrimp yesterday! They were munching on biofilm on the big rock. Big relief they are still around! Also getting better at feeding the fish. Instead of dropping food on the surface, I pinch the food and release under water. I'm not doing weekly water changes, but will probably do more changes soon since I bought a siphon to remove excess food. The plants eat up the nitrates so quickly, yet still grow well. I will need to do a bigger trim soon.

 

[hlca]

Well I lost a third harlequin rasbora this morning. I think it's because the water is too cold. I bought an Oase Filtosmart Thermo and will put it in this weekend. Will try to keep the tank at 73 -- it's probably around 68-69, which is based on the ambient temperature in our house.

 

[hlca]

Lost another. I put in the Filtosmart Thermo and set the heater to 73. I'm hoping that the remainder weren't affected by my bad water change last week. Will do a trim and water change tomorrow. Or maybe I'll leave it for next week to minimize any further changes. I dunno yet.

 

[carseatdust]

Oh no! Sorry to hear about rasbora number three. Glad you think you've found the cause, and a quick solution. I'd be keen to know how you find the Filtosmart Thermo (which model did you go for?) as they look like a great unit, and obvs the built-in heater is a huge boon.

Otherwise, great photo of the tank!

 

[hlca]

Oh no! Sorry to hear about rasbora number three. Glad you think you've found the cause, and a quick solution. I'd be keen to know how you find the Filtosmart Thermo (which model did you go for?) as they look like a great unit, and obvs the built-in heater is a huge boon.

Otherwise, great photo of the tank!

I went with the 100 model. The cabinet under the tank has a shelf so I can't fit a big filter in there. Plus all my lily pipes are for 1/2" / 13 mm tubes. The flow of the Oase is much higher than the UNS, but the UNS has more biofiltration -- almost double. I ended up cutting the middle sponge in half so I could use all of the media from the UNS.

I did a water change today in a very inefficient way by heating a bunch of RO water in the microwave and pouring it in my bucket to normalize the temp. Gotta get a heater for the bucket eventually. But hopefully everyone is happy. I might not have remineralized to the same GH so hopefully shrimp aren't too stressed.

 

[carseatdust]

Interesting! After loading up the UNS with media, I added a small powerhead (Hydor Koralia 240gph) to the 90L/20g long to compensate for reduced flow, as that seemed to be a likely factor in algae issues. I had been trying to pay attention to this in putting the scape together, but hadn't quite anticipated how tricky flow could be.

Doing water changes (tap water) this weekend, I had just been thinking that a spot thermometer would be really handy. I tend to go by touch, and inevitably worry about the variation. I suspect your amanos are going to be able to handle a little bit of GH change though, they're very hardy shrimp. Still, if you enjoy the precise measurement of things, this could all be good training should you wish to introduce some more sensitive shrimp down the line.