Japes' 2010 Eartheater Work/Photolog
- Thread starter japes
- Start date
thanks japes. i went with the play sand. The bag said prewashed, and it looked to be very clean, so i added it to the tank, without rinsing, i used a pan like you did when adding water. My tank did not cloud, which is suprising, i still need to stir it. The tanks look great
Well lets start this post with this question. The tank was a mix of 3 different sands, 10kg of Coarser sand, which was a 5kg mix of two types, and about 6-7kg of "Double Washed" Play Sand from Bunnings (an Australian chain store) which I use in all my tanks. I'll start the tiny little worklog I did for this tank here.Eric A;3947676; said:
There's the two mixes there. Now one of the bags had been split and was taped up - didn't think much of it at the time, but then it had a very strong musky-sandy smell when I was washing it. Didn't think much of it at the time, continued washing, introduced to tanks.
To keep things short and bitter.. I believe that sand caused me to spend a whole day stripping and reassembling the tank. You'll see in my previous reply with some maculatus photos or something that they weren't happy with me because I had to rearrange the tank after bumping some stuff. This was a bad diagnosis. They were wrong because there was something quite wrong with the tank, and that night at midnight I decided to check on them with the torch. Quite probably a good thing I did, as earlier that day I had introduced another $150 worth of fish in the form of my wild Taeniacara candidi trio. The D. maculatus were resting on the substrate/leaves breathing heavily as they had been for about the last 8 hours - one was lying on its side still breathing. Tested parameters immediately as it's a new tank with semi-established media, light stocking, dosing with Stability, etc. Perfect across the board. Smelt the tank, same scent as that sand and quite strong. Moved the sickest maculatus immediately to my 6x2x2, as I don't have an established QT tank since all of the changeups - fish wasn't diseased, was a definite contamination issue so I figured it was safe.
Proceeded at midnight to remove and quickly acclimate all of the other fish in the tank to my 6x2x2, including Otocinclus. I could literally scoop the maculatus out with my hand with no struggles, I was in panic mode at this stage determined not to be heartbroken with a fish killoff after I spent the last of my "fish fund" on these fish. The T. candidi went into a net at the top of the tank as the females are tiny, about 2cm TL (less than an inch), and wasn't keen on my S. leucosticta possibly having a $50 snack, even though I'm sure they wouldn't. The most distressed D. maculatus went into another net but could not stay upright.
Unfortunately when I came out in the morning after the lights had turned themselves on, he was still the same, so I euthanised him. The T. candidi seemed a little stressed, but being in the net at the top of the tank with some 6-7" fish staring at you will do that. The D. maculatus were quite enjoying themselves while they dicked around in the massive driftwood setup in that tank.
So, here's where my worklog starts, photos from round 1, but since I had to do everything again, so be it. To save you the suspense, the euthanised D. maculatus was the only casualty and all fish are back in the 3x18x18 enjoying themselves.
Welcome to my office, yes it has a bed in it. Second photo is from the door. I do all of my work and most of my play here, so being able to swing around and gawk at my fish is unproductive but enjoyable. The new tank is on the left of the door in the first photo.
Oop, there it is. Lit by a 2x39W Hagen GLO T5HO Setup, filtered by an Eheim Pro 2228, heated by a 200W Hydor ETH Inline Heater which did run to Lily Pipes, until one decided to slip and smash itself. CAL Aqua 12mm return lily decided to hang itself; had it sitting up to provide some aeration, suction cup let go and it cracked on the top edge of the tank - luckily I was in the room or else I would have had half a tanks water on my already ruined carpet.
Then, being the gumby that I am, managed to break the already broken inlet setup - so back to standard Eheim stuff for the tank.
Obligatory level photograph, because I see a lot of people do it. Carpet is annoying for this I will admit. Front-to-back was more of an issue though.
Poisoni- I mean filling up the tank.
Full, floating driftwood. Substrate looks really good doesn't it. Skip that, day later, 7 or so hours of work, half a week passed, all Play Sand (surprise surprise
) but with the wrong Tetra...!
.. and this is it at the moment. Have my H. heliacus shipping to me on Wednesday, to arrive Thursday. Only 10, all he has, but it will do nicely. I currently have 17 Lemon Tetra in there at the moment and I feel it's too many, so 12 would have been a nice number, but 10 will do. Also need to pickup a D. maculatus replacement, which will be on Wednesday.
This was second day in the fully sorted out tank, not the greatest photos.
My doorway now. Three photos stitched very quickly together, hooray for 50mm!
50G Rio Tapajos (Teles Pires), Brazil - Flooded Woodland Biotope
36x18x18"
3x Taeniacara candidi (1M 2F - Wild Caught)
5x Dicrossus maculatus "Checkerboard Cichlid" (2M 3F)
10x Hyphessobrycon heliacus "Kitty Tetra"
5x Otocinclus vestitus
Quite happy with it at the moment, but still needs some tweaking.
For those who can't stand seeing tanks under 100G and fish under 5", here's some shots of the 6x2x2.
Still not happy with the scape of this at all.
Accurate body colouration! Hard to achieve with varying levels of light with S. leucosticta, even with post-processing.
I know you said you're not happy with the scaping of the 6x2, but I have to say that's a great looking tank to me! Perfect setup for those leucos!
So what happened with the sand? Was it poisoned in some way? You said its bag was taped shut. I wonder what could have contaminated it?
I'm looking for the "perfect" substrate right now. Your mixes are nice.
So what happened with the sand? Was it poisoned in some way? You said its bag was taped shut. I wonder what could have contaminated it?
I'm looking for the "perfect" substrate right now. Your mixes are nice.
OMG,
Not good with that sand - I can imagine what you felt when saw those dwarfs breathing heavily... From some time, I use only one type of sand - a quarz "decorative" sand that is sold in polish building markets as for use in gardens. It needs a lot of cleaning (dust, dust, dust...) but is very safe and does not influence water parameters at all. Both dwarf cichlids and young S. leucosticta in my previous tank enjoyed it. And it costs only a 3AUD/25 kilos.
About scapes - I'd rather wait till roots will sink and become darker - then both new tanks would look amazing.
Not good with that sand - I can imagine what you felt when saw those dwarfs breathing heavily... From some time, I use only one type of sand - a quarz "decorative" sand that is sold in polish building markets as for use in gardens. It needs a lot of cleaning (dust, dust, dust...) but is very safe and does not influence water parameters at all. Both dwarf cichlids and young S. leucosticta in my previous tank enjoyed it. And it costs only a 3AUD/25 kilos.
About scapes - I'd rather wait till roots will sink and become darker - then both new tanks would look amazing.
One more question to you, japes: as I see you use quite high efficiency pumps in your filtration. E.g. eheim with 5000L/hour in 6x2x2 - do you use them on "full throttle", or reduced flow? I'm gonna to buy eheim 2260 with 2000L/h for my 450Liter tank, and I'm affraid it is to much.
Good question. With the Eheim Compact+ pumps their headheights are quite low, and I think I worked out at head height that the 5000 would only be pumping about 3800lph. That could be wrong though, however I don't have it throttled (even though it is built into it).MBay;3961380; said:
Have the 2215 on my 125L cube throttled slightly, 2228 on the 3x18x18 at full stick, perhaps slightly more flow than 'd like in the top areas, but it's diffused by the driftwood and the leaves aren't getting washed around on the substrate.
