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A Tale of Two Roma's

You don’t have issues with the bows torturing the shrimp?
I only have Amano in the tank that they are in but they don't seem to bother them.
I must admit i do get a bit twitchy when the Amano decide to do a bit of open water swimming, especially when the bows approach, but up till now I've never seen them go for the shrimps.
 
A Tale of Two Roma's.

The clues in the thread title. This is what I see without cropping photos.
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Journals should be warts an all. The tank to the left is bullet proof, the tank to the right is a PIA.

To the left.
20240324_171050.jpg


To the right.
20240324_171033.jpg


Cha cha slide...
Tissue culture Myriophyllum got uprooted on day 5, decided to let them float on the surface and got sucked into the Gyre. Here endeth the lesson with TC plants 😄

I've replaced the Guyana with Pogostemon heidelberg, i know nothing about this plant (there isn't a lot on line) but it's a rarity, so will likely die in my tank.

We mentioned flowers in previous posts, the echinodorus finally gave me some plantlets, 4 in total.
Stem un furled was around 1.5 mtrs.
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The babies.
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I'm assuming more daylight coming into the tank has signalled a "let's reproduce" message to the flora.
Here we have Schismatoglottis prietoi getting in on the act.
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Fauna wise we added a pair of Dicrossus Maculatus to the left hand tank. They seem to have settled in and slowly venturing out from the undergrowth. Not the best pics, but Dicrossus aren't the easiest to photograph.

The lad.
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The pair.
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Enjoy your evening guys.
 
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I always enjoy these Sunday afternoon/evening updates
Thanks, appreciate that comment.
Why’s the tank on the right such a PIA compared to the one on the left, do you know?
The tank to the right is far less forgiving than the other one.
Maintenance, keeping the plants (not pants) happy can sometimes become somewhat of a chore. Any issues I have regards plant health always seems to materialise in this tank; and finally we have bba, it's a constant threat in this tank, always lurking, awaiting an opportunistic moment to attack.

By contrast the other tank just ticks along and does fine with a trim every few weeks, there is rarely any sulking, it asks for very little.

I guess the reason for the difference in pace in these tanks is totally of my own making. I chose to feed it with higher (although modest) levels of light and i chose to include faster growing stems. The phrase "Be careful what you wish for" springs to mind.
 
Cheers @FrozenShivers

It's Sunday so should Update. Unfortunately there isn't a lot to Update, jungle tank's had a big trim, to me it feels bare.
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Dicrossus and the additional araguia doing fine, you'll have to take my word on this, I've no pictures.

We do have some critter pics though.

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That's a Dicrossus filamentosus female, not Maculatus.
 

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So with the holidays looming the second tank got the scissor treatment, I don't personally like how the tank looks after a big trim but it's essential considering it won't be trimmed again for 16 days.
How it looked before the cut.
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And after.
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The tanks will receive the usual care treatment whilst away which involves my eldest daughter feeding pre made food pots 3x weekly and dosing micro's every other day, usual macro dose will be given the day before I go when I do the final water change.

Side view of the above tank.
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Slightly worrying news is my trio of filamentosus are not 1m/2f, one of my suspected females is starting to get extensions on the caudal fin, the dominant male in the tank isn't showing any interest for now but I suspect once the other suspected male starts to show colour and the fin elongates more it won't tolerate it in the tank. Not entirely sure what my options are tbh, maybe add more females?

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Also whilst I'm posting I'll add a few pictures I got today of the maculatus in the other tank.

Happy tank keeping peeps.

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We're blessed in my part of Lancashire with soft water, some of it comes from our local reservoirs and some gets pumped to us from the lake district, tds from the tap averages 68ppm, it contains very little of anything. Is this of any importance? Probably not, just thought the information should be included to show there are some benefits to living up north.

I first got into fish keeping in the mid eighties after my brother left home and gave me his 4ft glass box; the inhabitants consisted of 3 silver dollars, 2 angel fish, a firemouth cichlid, 3 clown loach, a pictus catfish, a pleco, several tiger barbs, a couple of corydoras and a mass of Egeria densa.

Of course in them days we didn't have the world wide web to research things so we had to read books, along with the tank I was given two books, one was an a-z of aquarium fish, who's author I can't remember, the other one was this.
View attachment 179440

This isn't the original copy. I bought it for pennies last year to remind me of where the seeds of my planted tank bug probably originated.

Anyways, I digress...

Photos taken in February.
View attachment 179443

Plant health generally good but some issues starting to emerge, leaf tips on the cyperus helferi were turning yellow and attracting bba, was also getting some lower leaf melt on the siamensis 53b at the back of the tank. I swapped the positions of the hygrophila corymbosa from the left with the siamensis at the back, not sure why I did this....

Also added a jebao wm-5 wavemaker top right and doubled up the seachem flourish dose.

EBR from above tank.
View attachment 179445

Tank B.
View attachment 179448
Much more noticeable growth in this tank but having same issues with cyperus helferi and leaf melt. Added vallisneria spiralis tiger back right. Also added wavemaker.

Far right siamensis lower leaf loss.
View attachment 179450

Keith the Ancistrus.
View attachment 179449

Cheerio for now.
I had this book too, I bought it from the sealife centre in Norfolk in 1996. Wish I still had it! This is very nostalgic thank you!
 
This is very nostalgic thank you!
No worries mate. If you want nostalgia maybe give this thread a read.
 
No worries mate. If you want nostalgia maybe give this thread a read.
I was just looking this up on Google too, I think I spent hours reading then re-reading those books
 
So with the holidays looming the second tank got the scissor treatment, I don't personally like how the tank looks after a big trim but it's essential considering it won't be trimmed again for 16 days.
How it looked before the cut.
View attachment 217696
And after.
View attachment 217697

The tanks will receive the usual care treatment whilst away which involves my eldest daughter feeding pre made food pots 3x weekly and dosing micro's every other day, usual macro dose will be given the day before I go when I do the final water change.

Side view of the above tank.
View attachment 217699

Slightly worrying news is my trio of filamentosus are not 1m/2f, one of my suspected females is starting to get extensions on the caudal fin, the dominant male in the tank isn't showing any interest for now but I suspect once the other suspected male starts to show colour and the fin elongates more it won't tolerate it in the tank. Not entirely sure what my options are tbh, maybe add more females?

View attachment 217700

View attachment 217701

Also whilst I'm posting I'll add a few pictures I got today of the maculatus in the other tank.

Happy tank keeping peeps.

View attachment 217702

View attachment 217704

View attachment 217703
that "female" is definitely turning out to be a boy.
 
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