Updated: Another Tank Journal

[AndyTaylor]

Our Discus died, most likely due to stress of things changing in the tank, along with no other discus in the tank.

No offence, but your Discus died because you put him in an uncycled tank. Please read up on fishless cycling.

The tank looks great though...you need to add a lot more fast growing stem plants -hygrophilia or cabomba - for example before you increase the lighting or you will have a lot of algae very soon. Even if you take them out later you need them now....

 

[Peaches]

Our Discus died, most likely due to stress of things changing in the tank, along with no other discus in the tank.

No offence, but your Discus died because you put him in an uncycled tank. Please read up on fishless cycling.

The tank looks great though...you need to add a lot more fast growing stem plants -hygrophilia or cabomba - for example before you increase the lighting or you will have a lot of algae very soon. Even if you take them out later you need them now....

Actually the rest of the fish are fine, he was trapped in a corner while we were putting the big log in the other night and got VERY stressed by it. He was a single Discus that hung out with our Three Dot Gourami all day. He just needed a little more confidence and less moving around of his scenery.

The tank cycled very fast...actually the levels are all prime right now and the fish thrive.

If you look closely to the picture there's a Red Cobomba in the back there...and we did mention adding more plants.

Thanks for the comment!

 

[Themuleous]

Any comments on lighting? Is the 2.75wpg just too inviting for algae?

This depends, you going for a hig-light, fert dosing, CO2 injecting, masses of plants type tank? If so then 2.75 WPG would be great. But it would like this is going to be 'low-light' tank without all the hassel of EI, if so you only really need 1.5WPG, 2.75WPG will just cause you algae problems, as you wont have the plant grow to combat it.

What you hoping to achieve in the long run?

 

[DarkSeraph]

Well, it's been a long time. Our tank has settled down a lot, I've had a chance to experiment with the co2 to get it just right, as high as possible before the fish start gasping. Below is our water chemistry:

• PH: 7.0
• Ammonia: 0 ppm
• Nitrite: 0 ppm
• Nitrate: >0 ppm (slightly over)
• KH: 8.0 dKH (143ppm)
• CO2: 24ppm
• Temp: 80°F

The problem is that our plants just plain don't grow. We've gone through a number of different plants to see what will work for us, and not much is working. Here is a current picture of our tank:

Now here's a picture of what's dying:

1. Anubias Nana - recently started slowly dying
2. Don't remember the name, kinda tall with fairly broad leaves. We got it a couple weeks ago and it's been slowly dying since.
3. Red Crypto - We've had this for a couple months, and it's done alright, and has slowly started to decline
4. Very broad leaf, not sure what the name is. We got it a couple weeks ago and has been dyign since
5. Moneywort - We've had this for a few months, and it's done alright, but not great. I'm afraid it's slowly dying
6. White Ribbon - Couple weeks old, kinda died a little, doing ok now

Our java fern isn't doing so hot either. Not that you can tell, but there a bunch of grass in the foreground that isn't doing so well, very slowly dying...
Our Wisteria, amazon swords, cabomba, gold ribbon, and another unknown have done well.

Anyways, what's wrong with my damn tank?!? Everything is great, the only thing I can possibly think of is that the color on the T5's isn't the correct color (5000k or so is what I've heard suggested). So... any ideas?

Thanks for your help in advance.