New betta/shrimp tank

Well, second hand! New to me. Have just given it a more thorough clean and descale after soaking in vinegar with paper towels, then going over it with a carefully angled razorblade.

Using phone to upload pics, then will switch to laptop for more detail (I'm such a luddite, and hate typing on phone!)



It's a cute little 30L/7g tank, came with a bunch of mini filters & a heater I need to clean up and test.

The light in the lid works, and is the main reason I was looking for another 5-10g tank for my new betta. The tank he's currently in is my 12.5g QT/grow out tank, and I know from long experience that no live plants can survive in it for long. Not even java fern or duckweed, which are unkillable in my other tanks.

So I picked up this one. Measures 29/27/39cms, so 30 Litres or roughly 6.7g, not accounting for hardscape & substrate displacement, so thinking of it as a 5g really.

Hope it's not too small for him... if I do find it seems too cramped for him, then I'll likely upgrade him to a ten and use this for something else. Will see how he likes it once fully set up and he's moved to it! But the 12.5g isn't one I want as anything but a QT or nursery tank - much prefer to be able to grow live plants in a permanent set up! This will also be a cute little kitchen tank.

I do have a black background I can cut to size as well.

So first photo is the light which is built into the front part of the tank lid.
The back part, I'm really curious about!









Following pics are the back part of the tank hood. Why I'm curious, they're clearly built this way for a purpose, and they look exactly like a mini-version of the in-hood filter box holders that are on my dad's ancient 57g tank. Where a pump would send water through the two huge boxes packed with media in the hood above the tank, then through outlet pipes back into the tank.

The pump on dad's old tank packed up long ago, I don't have the know how to rig a new one, but perhaps could get a small one for this? Except no media boxes came with this one - but no reason bagged ceramics, sponge and filter floss couldn't be added, right?
Here it is closed and opened:




And those holes look very much like a spray like outlet water return:


Will add some pics in next comment from my dad's ancient tank I've inherited and plan to tear down.

But especially those who've been in the hobby for a while and seen the type of in-hood filtration systems I'm talking about, or are good at rigging their own filters out of parts like @Essjay @GaryE @Oldspartan @Magnum Man @Back in the fold @Colin_T

Would love any ideas, tips and tricks! Especially with it being a nano tank, while it would be easy enough to add a typical bubble or internal filter, it would also be space saving and likely better filtration capacity if I could get a pump that would get this thing working again, right? Unless it would cost a bomb and be a nightmare...! But hey, never hurts to ask, right?

Rough pics from the ancient 57g that's stood here for must be close to two decades now. More than a decade, anyway. After removing the plastic cover, the gap in the hood where two filter boxes and a pump fit. Looks like the mini one to me:

And one of those boxes. I remember when it used to work, but was before I was into the hobby, and when the pump packed up, dad said he couldn't get the right parts to get it going again. But I know the boxes each can hold a ton of media!

Now I just run a canister filter on it, and an internal that's mostly there for flow and surface disturbance.
Filter media box:

That new aquarium you got is a nice one . The perfect size for a Betta . Those little filters in the lid work fine . They’re just a power filter situated in a place you usually don’t see them . I have one in a little 4 gallon Top Fin brand aquarium I inherited from my Daughter . It has really little filter pad / cartridges that don’t look like they would do much but you have to figure they aren’t filtering that much water either . I stuff the thing with quilt batting for floss , do my water changes and am happy that I have some circulation .

Currently testing heater & stingray elite 5 filter that came with it, temp from tap is bang on 70, can't see numbers on heater sadly, but at least it's a small tank to test it out in.

Stingray appears to be working! Trying at surface right now, but might be too much surface flow for a bettas liking, but can always play with the positioning and baffling with hardscape.

Black background added, now while testing heater & filters, the fun part.... Not... Rinsing substrate

And finding what hardscape I have that will fit a teeny tank like this and suit a betta... hmmm....

I've not seen a stingray filter in years! Looking forward to seeing what becomes of this tank

MattW said:

I've not seen a stingray filter in years! Looking forward to seeing what becomes of this tank

Click to expand...

Eeekk! Now there's pressure to make sure it's pretty!

Also came with 4-5 other mini internal filters that all need cleaning and testing, but I'm impatient, began with testing the stingray and it seems to be working, so testing the others can wait while I look at the pretties I want to add to make it a proper tank!

Back in the fold said:

That new aquarium you got is a nice one . The perfect size for a Betta . Those little filters in the lid work fine . They’re just a power filter situated in a place you usually don’t see them . I have one in a little 4 gallon Top Fin brand aquarium I inherited from my Daughter . It has really little filter pad / cartridges that don’t look like they would do much but you have to figure they aren’t filtering that much water either . I stuff the thing with quilt batting for floss , do my water changes and am happy that I have some circulation .

Click to expand...

Thank you!!
Was just lucky and came across it for sale when hunting on Gumtree for something better for Levi @Naughts you won the naming contest! Although I also think of Gainsborough as his surname, @TwoTankAmin

The lady agreed to deliver it, got to chatting, especially how she couldn't keep guppies alive, so wound up giving her about 20 guppies for her 60L tank since mine are homebred and not going to keel over within days like the store bought ones she kept losing. Was nice, she said it would be making her little girl very happy! Plus I got to make some space in my guppy packed tank, lol.

@Seisage Susan, the original girl who started it all off, is still going strong and looking great! Despite many batches of fry later. Shouldn't be surprised since she was a juvenile/young adult when I accidentally got her, but female guppies often look a bit worn after they've been churning out fry for more than a year, but not only can I still recognise her among the many others, but she still looks healthy and robust!

Levi:




@Back in the fold I'd love to use the hood filtration, but no pump for it, or containers for media... any chance you could get any pics of how yours is set up, or link the type of pump I'd need, could ya? If you happen to know! Or anyone else who knows!

Can't decide between dark or light sand - both aquarium safe, I have dragonstone that will contrast nicely with the space Unipac black limpopo sand I have (which is more a slate grey, not a dark black)

Or the light sand, either unipac silver I usually use in my pygmy cory tank, or Argos playsand like in the 22g.

But the dark sand contrast and pop for plants is appealing, and certainly not a problem for a betta. Might hold better when pushed back for scaping too. But too dark for a small tank without a powerful light, do you reckon @CassCats and @MattW ?

Eg: Previous set up with limpopo sand:


Or the 22g with argos play sand:






I was leaning the darker substrate, but never really scaped a tank this small, and especially since it has a hooded lid (although I suppose that could be changed in future too) maybe it's better to go with the lighter, light reflecting substrate? I dunno, need second opinions please!!

I find darker substrate shows the mulm and detritus less . Also found it contrasts well with darker leaf plants Bolbitis, Buce, Anubias, etc. Like in my 60L.

Dark is nice, bettas also like dimmer setups.

I'd throw some bright green plants in as contrast, to "brighten" the scape up. Anubias golden nana is perfect for that

Glad the votes were for darker substrate, since I couldn't be patient enough to wait for opinions, and went for the darker one myself!:

Not a final Scape, extra dragon stone to try to hold the non- waterlogged wood down. But a rough idea of what I'm thinking of, pre-planting.

Will be able to get clearer photos after dark when not so reflective.


Had thought of maybe doing a mix of a fake stuff in with natural, since I've only done scapes with natural stuff, but even if I removed a load of the wood and stone, not loving the bridge added

It's spider wood, came in a load of little branches inside a pack, one slighter large piece I already had, so I weighed that down with the dragonstone and poked in the spiderwood sticks to get an idea of how it might look.

Thinking I'll wind up keeping the brighter, more orange pieces of dragonstone in there, the darker ones were just to weigh down the wood.

But also thinking I'm going to need to tie/glue the spiderwood pieces to the main piece to make one larger piece... since they'll take forever to waterlog, I have no patience, and the slightest movement in trying to plant/remove the spare dragonstone is only going to send everything skew-wiff anyway....

Do have a single larger piece of mopani I could use, but that's more my impatience than anything!

As for plants - I'm firstly going to using some of what I have, I'm thinking l.sessiliflora and siamensis 53B in the background (especially since Bowie the pleco objects to where I had the siamensis in his tank, and uprooted it!)

Have a nice bright green anubius or buce I got last month that would poke into the woodwork and provide betta sitting leaves...


Some floating plant...

Oh, I have a lovely dark leaved crypt in my big tank, that can grow massive in the right conditions, but is a darker green/reddish, and is due for splitting and bound to have baby plants, so could go for that in the middle/towards the back between the brighter sessilflora and siamensis.

How do people attach riccia to things? Have loads of that, could try strapping some of that to a branch or stone or something. Tried gluing it to wood before but that didn't work too well.

AdoraBelle Dearheart said:

It's spider wood, came in a load of little branches inside a pack, one slighter large piece I already had, so I weighed that down with the dragonstone and poked in the spiderwood sticks to get an idea of how it might look.

Thinking I'll wind up keeping the brighter, more orange pieces of dragonstone in there, the darker ones were just to weigh down the wood.

But also thinking I'm going to need to tie/glue the spiderwood pieces to the main piece to make one larger piece... since they'll take forever to waterlog, I have no patience, and the slightest movement in trying to plant/remove the spare dragonstone is only going to send everything skew-wiff anyway....

Do have a single larger piece of mopani I could use, but that's more my impatience than anything!

As for plants - I'm firstly going to using some of what I have, I'm thinking l.sessiliflora and siamensis 53B in the background (especially since Bowie the pleco objects to where I had the siamensis in his tank, and uprooted it!)

Have a nice bright green anubius or buce I got last month that would poke into the woodwork and provide betta sitting leaves...


Some floating plant...

Oh, I have a lovely dark leaved crypt in my big tank, that can grow massive in the right conditions, but is a darker green/reddish, and is due for splitting and bound to have baby plants, so could go for that in the middle/towards the back between the brighter sessilflora and siamensis.

How do people attach riccia to things? Have loads of that, could try strapping some of that to a branch or stone or something. Tried gluing it to wood before but that didn't work too well.

Click to expand...

Sewing thread for riccia or just leave it floating for floating mats