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PM's Low-Tech ADA Mini M (Rescape on Page 2)

Bacteria, fungi? Not sure but I soaked my wood for a week after boiling and had to scub it every couple of days and change the water in the bin as it got manky and had surface scum. Wasn't pretty and that was redmoor from TGM. I still got a bit of the white fuzz on the wood once it was in the tank.
 
I have just noticed rather a lot of fungus on the redmoor wood, water is still cloudy, perhaps slightly improved though hard to tell.

Would should I do about the fungus and cloudy water? Will the filter bacteria take care of it once it's more mature or what should I do?

I have some ADA Green Bacter as well as Phyton Git, will either help?
 
Try to remove the fungus from the wood and do water changes probably best course. Siphon water out with tubing and suck the fungus off that way.
 
hey, you should do daily large water changes on start up even in low tech, i currently change 75% of my new shrimp nano where there is also fungus on wood but no cloudy water. Water with a large amount of contaminants in it will never help the plants.
 
Hi all, here's the tank as it is right now.

8579803295_27aeda1ec2_b.jpg


As you can see the water has cleared up fairly well, I have been adding ADA Green Bacter and a little Phyton Git, just because I have it, not sure whether this helped the water to clear or not. There is still fungus on the wood and some mosses though I'm not overly bothered as I think it'll go when it's ready, and I plan to get my White Pearls and Clithon Corona soon enough. The Redmoor is still very floaty, hence the rock.

I was at my LFS the other day - Maidenhead Aquatics at Morden, and it turned out it that it was their last day of trade. It's part of the garden centre there in the National Trust park, and apparently they won't allow then to renew the lease. Typical, I just moved into the area and was really happy to find this place as they have an excellent choice of micro fish and dwarf shrimp. So I pulled the trigger and got 12 Ember Tetras while I could. I got 12 as they are very tiny and I thought they'd be more comfortable with a decent shoal.

They seemed very happy for the first 2-3 days, then I changed the bulb in my desk lamp to an 11watt spiral CFL 6400K, the tank looks much nicer in this light, though the fish look more washed out and I noticed that they seem to be hiding much more, (this is one reason I prefer shrimp, they just do what they are supposed to do)! My main issue is that they won't eat the Tetra Pro Colour I bought, I ground it up and they just spit it out. Absolutely no eating. Then I tried the frozen cyclops (as recommended at the fish store) and they won't eat them either. Any help with their diet would be much appreciated. Obviously I didn't feed them the first day and acclimated them for 90 mins and I have to say they seemed very happy for the first 3 days until I changed the bulb, not sure if that's made them less comfortable.

The bits floating in the water are the cyclops. I removed most of it after several minutes of them completely ignoring it.
 
Hey,..:) Loving the tank. I like the ADA xingu sand that you have there,...very natural looking. Are you still running the tank with the IKEA LED lights,... how long is the photoperiod for?
 
Damn :oops: ,..I just re read your post,..okay so you are having 11 watts of spiral CFL.
I am sorry. How long are you running them for?
I don't have any experiences with shrimps so I am afraid i am not much of a use there:oops:
 
I think changing the lamp from LED to CSF is a good move,..especially for the plants. In my son's old non co2 tank we just had a single T8 tube which we initially ran for 6 hours but after about a month when we started noticing plant melts & pale looking leaves, we toned it down to just 3 hrs a day in the evening & the plants picked up so nicely after that.
 
Hi all,

The plants are doing okay apart from the Bolbitis. It has a little algae, not much but the leaves are pretty much all beginning to decay quite badly. I am dosing as per Tom Barr's recommendations, I tested and found my NO3 very low (0ppm), so I doubled the dosing on KNO3. I have read that it's not the end of the world if readings on low tech tanks for NO3 come out very low, as I am dosing and have a fish load anyway.

Can anyone give me any tips? I have admired this plant for years, and finally got some, and it's not doing well.

Only real algae issue it on the glass, looks like a light dusting of short hairs if you know what I mean, though I don't have any snails yet to clean the glass. Got my White Pearls though :)
 
hey mate nice to see you got your white pearls. ive had bolbitus in my edge tank in my signature (and white pearls:) ) dont dose much maybe once a week and only time its attracted algae is when it was right under the light in the center personally ive fund it will grow slowly low tech but doesnt like much light without co2. as for your glass clean it yurself dude ;)
 
Hi guys,

I did a big clean, glass, filter, pruned melting bolbitius and sucked out the fungus on wood. I left the water out overnight to de-gas CO2 and did a 20-25% water change.

I would like to know whether this is detrimental to the plants, as if not I would like to do this about every 4-6 weeks to keep things as clean as possible, (25% WC). Rather than Tom Barr's suggested 50% every 3-6 months. At least until the plants take a stronger hold anyway.

So would this be a good or bad idea? Thanks.

Pics soon if anyone's interested ;)
 
Hi all,
PM said:
and did a 20-25% water change. I would like to know whether this is detrimental to the plants, as if not I would like to do this about every 4-6 weeks to keep things as clean as possible, (25% WC). Rather than Tom Barr's suggested 50% every 3-6 months. At least until the plants take a stronger hold anyway.
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I'm not convinced at all by "no water changes" for low tech tanks. I change about 10% a day, and I'd definitely look to change at least 50% a week, (probably OK as a single large change).
PM said:
Any tips on why my bolbitis is failing on me
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tim said:
only time its attracted algae is when it was right under the light in the center personally ive fund it will grow slowly low tech but doesnt like much light without co2
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It likes some flow, and I agree with Tim you may still have too much light. It does well for me low tech in very low light situations.
PM said:
They seemed very happy for the first 2-3 days, then I changed the bulb in my desk lamp to an 11watt spiral CFL 6400K, the tank looks much nicer in this light, though the fish look more washed out and I noticed that they seem to be hiding much more, (this is one reason I prefer shrimp, they just do what they are supposed to do)!
Click to expand...
Try some floating plants, it should make them feel a bit more comfortable.It would also allow you to use the "Duckweed index" as an indication of when to feed the plants rather than using modified EI. The plants you have are all ones which will grow on very lean feeding.
PM said:
My main issue is that they won't eat the Tetra Pro Colour I bought, I ground it up and they just spit it out. Absolutely no eating. Then I tried the frozen cyclops (as recommended at the fish store) and they won't eat them either. Any help with their diet would be much appreciated.
Click to expand...
Grindal worms would be my suggestion to get them feeding, they are very easy to culture and attractive to nearly all fish. Once you've got them eating the Grindal worms add other foods with them.

cheers Darrel
 
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