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7' refurbishment

Depending on the soil you’ve used beneath the gravel (can’t tell details from photos :oops:) daily water changes shouldn’t be necessary - especially on such a large water volume ... except for all the IF’s
IF you’ve a cycled filter
IF you remove any “going to melt” leafs
IF you’ve an algae crew (a shrimp horde in a tank this size, some Clithon snails, otocinclus etc)

Sometimes it’s just easier to do water changes ;)
 
Thanks for all the plant info alto, I'll just keep tiding up and hopefully all will grow back. Although I hope its not too fast as this is planed as low mantinace ☺.
I don't fully understand the what you are saying about the perspex could you please explain should I not use it and use something else?
The water change schedule I was using is
First week every day
Second week every other day
Third week every third day
Forth week weekend and mid week
Then just 50% once a week seemed to work well on the smaller tank. The plan with livestock is to add cherry's from my small tank Wednesday night. 10 amano shrimp and 10 thread fin Monday and if they settle OK after a month add 40 more of each. Then see if the fish population grows naturally.
Thanks for your help with all this much appreciated.
 
Just ve carefull when adding all those extra fish in a month, this is the stage i would be most concerned about as that will be a large increase in bioload. Sounds good though :)
 
Hi matt,

Thanks for the warning didn't think it would be that much of a load 15 liter of water per fish. Might do in 2 half's
 
thought I'd do a little video to hopefully show a bit more detail. Sorry about the narration I don't think George Farmer has anything to worry about :lol:

 
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hi guys quick update
I visited Aquarium gardens Monday to pick up 12 Amarno shrimp and get a bit of advise. I noticed that a lot of the smaller Anubis were melting, leaves looked ok but rhizome was gone. on Dave's advice i checked all rhizome and removed and replanted the good bits. I've also started doseing TNC carbon in the short term. watch this space
Crypt melt has nearly finished and i found this little plant doing its thing despite being upside down behind a rock so we know we have root growth:) i put him back as i found him so he might just carry on.
root.jpg

and a video of the Thread fin Tetra that were also added Monday
 
Been a little over a month since my last post so I'll do a quick update
lights are on 75% still 15:00-21:00 and the FX5 DIY thermo is still running only one 400W heater.
plant wise nearly everything is now growing after the initial melt especially the lotus
lilly.jpg

we have added a lot of small cherry shrimp from the small plant tank, 24 rainbow fin tetra, 30+ Amano, 6 ottos and 6 snails. lost a few tetra when they were added. a few amano in the heat wave, and the snails went missing on day one but i hope they will show up. the Ottos are all fine.
shrimp.jpg

I've started removing the Hygrophila polysperma 5 stems a week at water change, when these are gone i'll add some small rocks in that area. The only deficiency i can see is brown tips on the calamistratum.
whole tank.jpg


I've added a few small pieces of wood as well as some more moss and what i think is anubias barteri var. nana
anubias barteri var. nana.jpg


not really sure what else to add, any questions? suggestions i know the lilly is in a stupid place but i didn't expect it to grow :lol: might dot a few more in and remove the long stems.

thanks for viewing guys
 
Just posting this because I thought it looked cool. I accidentally left the cabinet lights on which is a multi coloured led strip, and the light was leaking up behind the cabinet.
IMG_20190818_042853.jpg
 
Nicely done!

Your cherry shrimp seem to be bent on tank domination :D

A comment re the red lily, I’d trim the long stem leafs - most lilies are very happy to switch over to floating leaf growth (underwater leafs will die back and new leafs will all be surface bound) and less easy to switch back
You can encourage smaller leafs by removing those that don’t suit

There’s an awesome scape that showcases Nymphaea lotus (unfortunately I’ve no recollection of how I stumbled across it and google didn’t help)
 
Thank you Alto we are happy with it. I might add a couple more lilies and I'll follow your advice and trim that one a bit. Your right about the shrimp my small tank has just as many . Any that get sucked up at water change go back in so I think this helps them. There were only 6 to start with.
I forgot to add these photos last night.
MVIMG_20190914_210224.jpg
MVIMG_20190914_210200.jpg
 
so little up date :( been having a few dead shrimp over the the last month Amano and cherry. Water parameters test OK so we thought it might be the TNC carbon so stopped dosing that, started feeding a bit more, and pointed up the filter out flow to ripple the surface. We are still loosening shrimp so I'm going to cut ferts next from 3rd EI to 1/4 EI. I'll report back but if anyone has any outer ideas ideas:(
 
Hi Darrel, waters quite hard I'm only a few miles from aquatrium gardens so tap water should be fine.

HI Matt i have a few times always it's acceptable.
 
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