My Planted Tank Journey

[paulc]

Just a side note.

I received some Purigen a while back and on the advice given by a well known online seller, I bought a tub of the stuff and some fine mesh bags. I put the Purigen into one of the bags and tested it in a bucket of water and the Purigen literally fell out of the 'fine' mesh. After emailing their customer service they have apologised and sent me 2 x 100ml bags of the stuff and told me to keep what I have.

Now thats good service

 

[Alm0stAwesome]

Lucky devil!

 

[paulc]

May hold off adding it though - the new wood has released som tannin and it looks kinda cool.

Still need some advice on my plant ideas (previous page - last post) if anyone's around

 

[paulc]

Journal Update

It's my birthday on Monday so I have decided to treat myself to a couple of Bolivian Rams. When I showed them to my 9 year old daughter she thought they were the cutest things ever and is already working on the names.

Luckily my not so local MA has them and they are willing to reserve some for me. MA also have an excellent selection of plants so I will pick some up at the same time.

 

[paulc]

Journal Update

Thought I would post some photos of the tank and its inhabitants.


Tank Shot


One of the peppered cory's


One of the dwarf Gourami's

 

[Alm0stAwesome]

Oh wow, everything is looking so good paul! What kind of tetras do you have there?

Great pics too!

 

[paulc]

Oh wow, everything is looking so good paul! What kind of tetras do you have there?

Great pics too!

Thank you AA, the tetras are lemon's.

 

[paulc]

Journal Entry

I have now sourced some Bolivian Rams and am going to take a look at the weekend

 

[minnnt]

Great choice of fish Paul. They're stunning. They seem to do well in groups too if this is something you're considering?

 

[Suleika]

Carbon is one of the best high tech planted tank media, Carbon doesn't take out the ferts. I'd leave it in if i was you and run it with the Purigen. I always do.

The JBL Carbomec activated carbon which we have bought comes with instructions which say that "... activated carbon should not be permanently used as a filter substance as beneficial substances such as protective colloids or nutrients found in modern aquarium fertilizers (JBL Ferropol) will also be absorbed".

I have also found this source, which states that "Carbon in planted aquariums should be limited, because many fertilizers contain minerals in cheleated form. These cheleates will be adsorbed by the carbon as organics".

What is correct? Our LFS has recommended activated carbon as a permanent addition to our external filter to remove any chemicals which may be present but we also dose Ferropol weekly.

 

[paulc]

Carbon is one of the best high tech planted tank media, Carbon doesn't take out the ferts. I'd leave it in if i was you and run it with the Purigen. I always do.

The JBL Carbomec activated carbon which we have bought comes with instructions which say that "... activated carbon should not be permanently used as a filter substance as beneficial substances such as protective colloids or nutrients found in modern aquarium fertilizers (JBL Ferropol) will also be absorbed".

I have also found this source, which states that "Carbon in planted aquariums should be limited, because many fertilizers contain minerals in cheleated form. These cheleates will be adsorbed by the carbon as organics".

What is correct? Our LFS has recommended activated carbon as a permanent addition to our external filter to remove any chemicals which may be present but we also dose Ferropol weekly.

I have left mine in as apparently it is only activated for a while after which it just becomes another media where beneficial bacteria can reside. Thats what I read anyways

Great choice of fish Paul. They're stunning. They seem to do well in groups too if this is something you're considering?

Hi Minnnt, They are stunning! I only bought two for now as I think my tank is rather well stocked. Not sure on sex at the moment but I'm not particularly bothered about breeding them and the general consensus was that two of the same sex are fine. If anything they are probably males.

 

[paulc]

Journal Entry

Yesterday I took a trip to an LFS in Broadstairs, Kent. I had not been to this one before but it had come highly recommended and they had several Bolivian Rams in stock

I have added two Bolivian Rams to my tank and both seem to be settling in very well. After adding them yesterday they did go rather dull loosing their yellow and red but by the evening they had coloured up quiet a bit. Im sure as they get older these colours will be amazing. Already they seem to have decided amongst them selves which half of the tank is theirs.

Whilst at the LFS I decided to get some more plants including some more Vallis, some water wisteria and Cabomba. I also picked up a lovely piece of ready soaked bog wood with some java fern on - perfect hiding place for the new Bolivians.

Pictures to come

 

[minnnt]

Sounds excellent paul!

Looking forward to the pics!

 

[paulc]

Bolivian Ram Pictures

Here are a couple of snaps - they are still very shy and hang out in the plants much of the time.





They do not seem to bothered by anything else in the tank at the moment. The Dwarf gouramis have had a look to see the newbies but that's about it.

 

[paulc]

Question on stem plants

I have added some Cabomba and Wisteria but the substrate really doesn't want to hold on to these stems. They are currently back in their bunches with their weights round them. They look good but I'm not sure if they can be kept like this permanently.

I had a look around for stem plant anchors and found some in the US but none here. So I had a look around at what I had and found some left over CO2 tubing. I was thinking that if you cut the tubing in half so that you have 2 semi circle halves, you could then cut slits in the tubing to push the stems through. The tubing is soft enough not to crush the stems and should not degrade in the water. You could create individual stem anchors or indeed use a longer length with several stems in to create a stem plant wall.

For larger plants that need anchoring, I have some spare suction cups. With these, i took off the bit that holds the airline and cut a cross in the centre of the disc.

Any thoughts - potential problems with this?