Dbt85's Aquarium Log.

[DBT85]

curl up hose in bucket of hot water for 10 mins had to do that myself the other week when cleaning cat litter for the substrate!

It's on a reel bolted to the wall filled with water. I think I'll leave it lol. Tank filled back up now. Not as much of a pain in the backside as I'd imagined. tall bowl on the sand, shallower bowl on top, bour bucket into bowl so as not to ruin the sand.

Worked fine apart from a couple of times I missed lol

EDIT Thursday 19:00: Ok, I dosed earlier but I can't remember when lol. Just took some readings at 0.25 and 0.25 which is good, suggesting that maybe the Nitrites are keeping up with the Ammonia. consumption may have been slowed because the water was so cold. I put the 300w heater that came with the tank in as well to get it up faster.

I've now dosed 4ml, or 2ppm Ammonia approx. I'll test in 30 mins to check the ppm.

EDIT Friday 09:00: I think my Ammonia is at 0.25 and my Nitrite at 2.0 ppm. I'm going to try and test again at 12:00 to gauge how fast it moves if at all. Once again I'll be waiting for the Nitire to go before dosing again.

EDIT: Friday 18:00: I'm fairly sure my Ammonia has actually been at 0 ppm since 09:00 this morning. I've taken two tests since and the colour is identical and Nitrites are down so clearly no more Ammonia is being processed. Nitrite is now down to 0.5ppm. I think the test I did at 15:00 today was also reading 2ppm on the Nitrites (I keep the last set to compare). That would suggest that this mornings reading would have been higher. Reading above 2 seems quite tricky as the colours are similar. In future I'm going to always do a 50:50 if I get a bright purple to help narrow it down. The lower numbers always seem much easier to read.

I've previously predicted that it was taking 4 hours for my system to clear out 1ppm of Nitrite so in 2 hours I'm going to test again and see if that 0.5 is gone.

I think I got a bit excited early this week when my Nitrites had dropped off a cliff so suddenly. While Ammonia processing seems to be happening very quickly (wi'll be measuring that more accurately tomorrow) Nitrite is not so much. As it stands its been 24 hours since I dosed to around 2ppm (I think) and the Nitrite is still not clear. 2ppm Ammonia makes about 5.5ppm Nitrite. At 1ppm per 4 hours that should have been gone after 22 hours. So either the Nitrites are not working as fast as predicted, they took a little while to get going with the cold temps yesterday, or I didn't dose to the level I thought I did.

Every time I see any of my family or friends they ask if I have fish yet. Then look at me like I'm from Mars when I say no. Grrrr

EDIT: Friday 20:00: Nitrite is reading 0.25. Will test again in a couple of hours.

Friday 23:00: Nitrite is 0. Dosed 1ml. 1 hour later Ammonia reading is about 0.4 and Nitrite is about 0.15. I'm just saying these numbers since the colours seem to be in the middle. At those low levels before they colours are usually bang on. Dosing another 1ml now should see it through the night.

Saturday 11:00: Nitrite and Ammonia 0. Dosed to 1ppm again.

Monday 09:00: Tank cleared 4ppm Ammonia yesterday down to double 0s this morning. Dosed again. Looking like I'll be ready for fish come the weekend!

 

[DBT85]

Well with the tank ready for this weekend I've ordered a bunch of plants from eBay.

100g of Java Moss
50 Sagittaria subulata Dwarf Grass
50 assorted plants.

It's probably far too much considering the amount of bogwood I also have in the tank but I'm sure there are going to be some duds in the assorted selection so it's no bother.

£32 all in.

I also ordered some Malaysian Trumpet Snails as well as I like the idea of having them pootling about doing their business in harmony with everything else. I'll be keeping an eye on population to make sure that I'm not overfeeding and can always pick up some Assassins if things get terrible.

I've also finalised that I'm going to try and pick up 2m and 4f Pearl Gourami and a Pleco of some kind this weekend as my first fish. I'll be having a chat with the guys in my LFS for any other suggests since It seems Corys and Cardinals are not great fish to drop into a newly cycled tank.

In the meantime it's continued dosing. Then Friday after I've come home from my night shift, dropped the car off for its MOT and new tyres, gone to bed for a couple of hours, I can do a massive water change, add the plants and the final bits of bogwood and get it back up to temp in preparation for Saturday/Sunday.

So excited!

 

[Tizer]

If you got it all from Last Trading Post, then you will get a nice selection of plants. Also, the Sagittaria is all grown out of water and will probably be about a foot long when it arrives. Plant it up and be prepared to trim off all the leaves as they die off over the first month or two. New leaves will appear and be a lot shorter than they were before. Did all this myself a few months back About 5 off the plants died and rotted at the root, but about 10 of them sent off runners and new plants grew. Its good stuff

 

[Iiriva]

Oh wow, love the colors! It's going to look great! I really like the black tank with black sand against lilac wall and other black stuff.

I wish my tank was black too.

Oh, did I mention that I loved black? No? Sure?

 

[DBT85]

If you got it all from Last Trading Post, then you will get a nice selection of plants. Also, the Sagittaria is all grown out of water and will probably be about a foot long when it arrives. Plant it up and be prepared to trim off all the leaves as they die off over the first month or two. New leaves will appear and be a lot shorter than they were before. Did all this myself a few months back About 5 off the plants died and rotted at the root, but about 10 of them sent off runners and new plants grew. Its good stuff

Yeah I read something on the listing about that so thanks for the heads up It all arrived today and I've separated it a little and put it all in a bucket until Friday.

The MTS' also arrived so I've popped those straight in the tank. They were all dormant when I put them in so hopefully they all sprout leg and move from the small pile they formed when I put them in!

Oh wow, love the colors! It's going to look great! I really like the black tank with black sand against lilac wall and other black stuff.

I wish my tank was black too.

Oh, did I mention that I loved black? No? Sure?

So you like black then?

I wanted black as I thought it would look nice with the fish and the plants as the focus rather than white sand kind of standing out a bit.

Lots of pics to come over the weekend, one of the bits of bogwood I have is huge so that'll be a surprise for you!

 

[DBT85]

Today was planting, adding bogwood and 98% water change time. I used all of the Sagittaria subulata in clumps of three except a couple of spots where it was quite a lrge bit on its own. I ended upo not using any of the Java moss. Maybe I'll add some at a later date. Of the 50 assorted plants I think I used about 75%. Once they all perk up I think it'll look quite nice.

The bogwood was bought from someone on Aquarist-Classifieds for £30 for those two bits and another bit. There isn;t really room in there for the 3rd bit what with that massive one being as large as it is. Fortunately the big one its a nice interesting piece with a couple of sections that will allow fish to hide under. The other side is actually quite smooth and uninteresting.

It needs to clear up a bit as obviously it was a large change and there are in places a few bits of plant still floating about. I took out about 25l with the gravel cleaner which got most of the loose stuff off the sand.

The heater on the left will not be in the tank full term. It's only because I did such a large change and the water is cold. I've tried using the kettle but the tank just got filled with limescale chunks!

 

[Man of fish]

That looks really good

 

[smudge_]

fantastic tank mate!

 

[DBT85]

Well I managed to find a couple of interesting Plecos on my travels today, an L142 (LDA033) Snowball and an L002 Tiger. I couldn't decide which I wanted... so I got both . I've just added them to the tank proper and one found the bogwood and one found the glass. Lights are off as instructed by the shop to allow them to settle.

Nowhere had any Pearl Gourami today though so I'm going elsewhere tomorrow to see what I can find.

That'll be it then for fish until the tanks been running a month or two, then I can add some Cardinals and some Corys.

Pics tomorrow probably

 

[DBT85]

As some may have read, Barry the L142 Snowball Pleco died overnight After a post from another member in another thread I checked out the links and information provided and decided that he would have to go back to the store as we couldn't give him the home he needed (fast flowing high oxygenation). With that in mind I went downstairs this morning to see him dead on his back. The Tiger L002 is fine sucking on some bogwood.

I did a water test and found that my water was at A: 0.0 Ni: 0.0 Na: 10ppm. Knowing that the NA can be a bit of a pain to test I assumed that was wrong (it's about 40ppm from the tap here). Maidenhead Aquatics @ Croydon, the store I purchased from told me to bring a sample and they would give me a voucher for the money to use in store. They did their tests and they came out exactly the same which at least means my plants are consuming some of the Nitrate which was not what I expected.

Once that has been sorted and I had confirmation that my water was fine I headed to the MA@ Morden to collect some Pearl Gourami. They had about 15 in the tank, all maybe 5cm in length maximum. I asked the guy for 2 males and 4 females. He pointed out that it might be difficult to sex them at this age as the males have not developed their colour as much yet but he spent a good 5+ minutes trying to get what I had asked for. They are now about half way through their acclimatisation.

RIP Barry

 

[Flubberlump]

Aww poor Barry

Really interesting thread keep it coming

 

[DBT85]

Good news. Both Stanley (Tiger L002 Pleco) and Sydney (all 6 Pearl Gourami lol) were alive and kicking this morning. I was really nervous after Barry.

I've realised that the pearl Gourami love sitting at the top of the tank which is a small problem, since my tank is filled beyond the top surround! As a result all you can see of the Gourami at the moment is their tentacles unless you are sitting in the right spot. I'll be removing a little water on Tuesday so that we can actually see our fish.

The bag that the Gourami came home had a collection of poo in before I'd even added them to the tank. I don't know if that was stress related or just that it was their time. I've noticed several little red tubes of it sitting on the bottom of the tank already.

Also just ordered a timer and a digital thermometer.

I've been wondering about a small powerhead to give a little more flow but will need to look into that a bit more. The ones that say they are for for tank half the size of mine give a flow of more than my TetraTec Ex1200!

I'm also going to try and find a nice floating kind of plant to put at one end that will give the Gourami somewhere to hide under. All the plants from eBay are doing well so far. The three things which I THINK are Anubis (will get more pics and some confirmation this week hopefully) all appear to be doing ok. Because of the shapes of my bogwood I was able to secure the Anubis without using any string or anything. One looked very limp on Saturday (completely keeled over) but seemed to have a bit of a revival come Sunday lunchtime. Today the tank will get a full blast of light for 10-12 hours for the first time since the fish were added so the plants should benefit.

Oh yeah, and one of the tubes in my light needs looking at. It doesn't always come on unless I give it a nudge.

 

[BETTY BOO]

Today was planting, adding bogwood and 98% water change time. I used all of the Sagittaria subulata in clumps of three except a couple of spots where it was quite a lrge bit on its own. I ended upo not using any of the Java moss. Maybe I'll add some at a later date. Of the 50 assorted plants I think I used about 75%. Once they all perk up I think it'll look quite nice.

The bogwood was bought from someone on Aquarist-Classifieds for £30 for those two bits and another bit. There isn;t really room in there for the 3rd bit what with that massive one being as large as it is. Fortunately the big one its a nice interesting piece with a couple of sections that will allow fish to hide under. The other side is actually quite smooth and uninteresting.

It needs to clear up a bit as obviously it was a large change and there are in places a few bits of plant still floating about. I took out about 25l with the gravel cleaner which got most of the loose stuff off the sand.

The heater on the left will not be in the tank full term. It's only because I did such a large change and the water is cold. I've tried using the kettle but the tank just got filled with limescale chunks!

nice

 

[DBT85]

First pictures of fish.

This is Stanley the L002 Pleco. Between 2.5" and 3" long.

And these are all Sydney the Pearl Gourami. About 2" long. There are 6 in total but one was hiding.

My wife is the President of the Naming Committee lol.

 

[mattyeatsmatts]

My wife is the President of the Naming Committee lol.

HAHA nice tank though dude