600 and 280 gallon reset: getting back to my roots

[mrrobxc]

hey - looking good as usual!

are they monitoring household water consumption? can you drill a well ?

one thing i’m grateful for here in seattle -

i’m sure you’ll get it dialed in -need some huge outdoor hydro ponic sumthin to run your dirty water through ??‍

Thanks brother. I’m hoping my sump can become some type of nitrate sucking refugium to help with water quality and the bag of crushed coral will help keep minerals like calcium in the water. Hoping to get by with changing 100 gallons a month. But I’m afraid I got carried away with my stocking.

 

[dr exum]

Thanks brother. I’m hoping my sump can become some type of nitrate sucking refugium to help with water quality and the bag of crushed coral will help keep minerals like calcium in the water. Hoping to get by with changing 100 gallons a month. But I’m afraid I got carried away with my stocking.

did you look at nitrate reactors?

i have a couple - seem to help - i have ts-3 aquamaxx changes 110g per day

gl!

 

[mrrobxc]

did you look at nitrate reactors?

i have a couple - seem to help - i have ts-3 aquamaxx changes 110g per day

gl!

I don’t know anything about them but you have me curious. I’ll have to google and read about them.

 

[mrrobxc]

Tank is so much cleaner without the Royal Blue Hooks. Will have to thin this out more in a couple months and remove a pair of Loisellei.

 

[mrrobxc]

Some pics of two fish who usually lurk in the shadows.

 

[mrrobxc]

Some pics. Look closely for the Hoplias Curupira.

 

[mrrobxc]

 

[mrrobxc]

And some pics of the wolf pack school

 

[mrrobxc]

 

[mrrobxc]

Kronoheros Umbee fry feeding off the substrate at dusk. The parents do a good job of herding them around the tank to pick at detritus and aufwuchs from the surface of the wood, rocks, and plants and have surprisingly kept a lot of them alive despite their toothy tankmates. The other cichlids get a few here and there, with the Parachromis being the most successful. They do let the characins get somewhat close and the characins seem to know better than try to sneak a bite.

The Festae are showing up as two females and three males and the dominant male festae has been successful in carving out a territory for himself and allows the larger of the two females to get close. They parked themselves right in front of the territory belonging to the dominant pair of Parachromis Friedrichshtali.

The Black Wolf is showing some tattered fins. Likely from the male Umbee and the Male festae. It’s always out now but wears a jet black outfit, always hungry but wary of its cichlids tankmates.

The gold wolves are still hanging in as a group of four despite the dominant one being considerably bigger than the other three. I’m glad they continue to work as a group and make great dithers for their cichlids tankmates. As do the Leporinus who are now pushing a foot long and almost full grown. They work very well as dithers for aggressive cichlids and all are spotless/flawless as the cichlids completely ignore them.

It’s now one full year since I sourced these fish. They’ve grown quite a bit and are still working out. That said, the umbee pair still has a lot of growing to do and I can’t imagine they’ll continue allowing the other cichlids to have territories once the male hits the 16-18” mark. It’ll be all over once we get there.

This reset has been a welcome change from keeping Amazonian exotics and have allowed me to try keeping Umbee and Wolves for the first time. I’m hoping this coming year proves to be just as successful. Can’t wait until these umbee hit full size. I imagine once they’re full grown, only the characins will remain as tankmates.