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Dou's Various Tanks (ADA 60P, Do!Aqua MiniM+Cube, 90x30x36, etc.)

I can finally share this! Rank 142 out of 2056 in this year's ADA IAPLC contest.

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I've been.. trying to clean up and make the whole den and whatnot more aesthetically pleasing so I haven't been keeping up much with various things. Lots of tanks in disarray, and tons of moving things around (stressssss). I already flooded my IAPLC 2018 tank (100x36x40) and am dying to share photos and progress as it has taken me almost 7 months to get to this point. For some people it comes quick... for me, it takes time. I learned from last year and did not flood early (saved me a lot of headache haha). Basically, I realized that I needed to commit further (and drove about 3-4 hours across the Canada/USA border to get more hardscape to do it). No excuses! It's great to see so many new scapes/tanks/journals (on UKAPS) - really inspiring and makes me want to work on my tanks as well. This hobby seems like it definitely is growing (albeit a bit slow here in Canada) - but I'm meeting more and more people who are into it and curious! Anyway... I have some other stuff to share:

60P Update - From day light to LED (.GIF image)
- Tangerine tigers are flourishing! I added some aura blue tigers as well and they are still alive. Hopefully they will throw some mixed green-ish coloured babies in a few months.
- I have some big fat otocats in here - just like the ones I saw at Sumida aquarium =D! This is by far my most successful tank.
- Water changes once a week (30% or so)
- Algae present on the glass walls here and there that I scrape off. I noticed that in areas where I neglect (less effort to suck up detritus) more algae forms. Suggestion: always try to suck up as much detritus as possible during water changes.
- Photo taken with a Pixel 2 phone. Holy smokes does it take nice shots with minimal effort!

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60P Work Tank Update:
- Mish mash of leftovers and whatnot from various friends and my own tanks
- BBA is officially DEAD in 6 weeks...AND green string algae destroyed from moss =). How..?
- Rescaped, sucked out as much detritus as possible (80% WC), removed all dying leaves from plants, added a couple new plants to increase plant mass.
- Water change every 3 days (50-60%) thereafter paying special attention to getting rid of detritus and any dead plant matter.
- Remineralize water each time, bringing TDS to 150-200.
- No additional dosing of macro or micro ferts (only water mineralization as per above)
- Reduce feeding to once every 2-3 days.
- Suck out the layers of dying BBA that have fallen off.
- At week 5 I spot dosed Excel everywhere I saw BBA (probably used around ~10 mL)
- Maintain water changes and reduced feeding regime =).
- If I had CO2, this process probably would've been much quicker.

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Nice work and pics, though the GIF seems really grainy. I really like your office tank - nice mishmash of plants.

I'm fighting BBA in my 60p right now that was likely introduced through a pot of bolbitis that I got from my local fish store. I didn't see any on there and I washed the plant thoroughly, but you know how it goes.

So did you do anything special to kill the BBA? I've tried spot treatments of hydrogen peroxide and excel, which seems to temporarily stun the stuff, but unless I mechanically remove it, which can be hard to do with lilaeopsis brasiliensis, it always comes back a week or so later. Very frustrating stuff to get rid of. I have an army (probably 100+ now) of cherry shrimp that clean the bottom of my tank, as well as a pig of a panda cory, so I wouldn't say there is much detritus in my tank. It might be a little overstocked though: 20 ember tetras, 3 harlequin rasboras, 2 ottos, a panda, 5 pygmy cories, and 100+ RCS.

Any tips on BBA removal would be great (this is a CO2 tank). :)
 
So did you do anything special to kill the BBA?... Any tips on BBA removal would be great (this is a CO2 tank). :)

Nothing special - I did exactly as I described haha. Just keep up with your water changes (more is better), remineralize, suck out as much detritus as you can (swirl the bottom of your substrate) & reduce feeding. Spot dose with excel where needed later on (with all the filters and everything off, I just used as much as I wanted to get every bit). This is just my suspicion from dealing with it so many times - but I feel like fish waste build up (even though you can't see it and your water is clear) plays a huge part in BBA... Even in my living room tank with TONS of plants almost everywhere, there is still some BBA here and there when I get lazy with WC (or don't do large enough WCs). I'm sure it's all about the WC and removing things we cannot see or test.
 
I find sucking up detritus tricky sometimes because all my RCS come out and try to clean the tube then get sucked up. ;). I switched to cleaning sand/soil using a 1/4 water line tube, which helps. But yeah, I think I’ll try doing more water changes; usually I do a 50% water change once a week.
 
I find sucking up detritus tricky sometimes because all my RCS come out and try to clean the tube then get sucked up. ;). I switched to cleaning sand/soil using a 1/4 water line tube, which helps. But yeah, I think I’ll try doing more water changes; usually I do a 50% water change once a week.

Haha well you gotta do what you gotta do! No BBA in the tank since I made the original post above which was like 3-4 weeks ago on my FB page.
 
Cool, going to give it a try: more water changes, better spot treatment. I might have to relocate some of those RCS...they are really getting out of hand lol. I'd put some in my betta tank (Mini M) but he'd probably eat himself to death (plus I'd feel back for the shrimp hehe.)
 
Cool, going to give it a try: more water changes, better spot treatment. I might have to relocate some of those RCS...they are really getting out of hand lol. I'd put some in my betta tank (Mini M) but he'd probably eat himself to death (plus I'd feel back for the shrimp hehe.)
You never know - every betta is different. He might completely ignore the RCS haha.
 
You never know - every betta is different. He might completely ignore the RCS haha.

Oh no, not my guy. He's one of those "oh don't worry about me mr shrimp ... I'm just coming over to look at you ... NOM NOM NOM". :D He's eaten about 20 shrimp in the past 2 months lol. I just keep telling myself it's mental enrichment for him to hunt them down. Most of the time they get away, but if I put too many in it'll be carnage hehe.

My betta is not as bad as the one my mom bought; her betta bites the heads off her shrimp and leaves them lined up (seriously) at the front of the tank.
 
Oh no, not my guy. He's one of those "oh don't worry about me mr shrimp ... I'm just coming over to look at you ... NOM NOM NOM". :D He's eaten about 20 shrimp in the past 2 months lol. I just keep telling myself it's mental enrichment for him to hunt them down. Most of the time they get away, but if I put too many in it'll be carnage hehe.

My betta is not as bad as the one my mom bought; her betta bites the heads off her shrimp and leaves them lined up (seriously) at the front of the tank.

What lucky bettas haha! Lots of stimulation =).
 
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