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CBRO's First attempt at a planted tank.

cbro

Seedling
Joined
24 Nov 2009
Messages
9
Hey all.

This is my first attempt of keeping fish/a planted tank, although I have limited exposure to the hobby through my brother and dad who are both pretty keen. With my brother's help and advice I have a nice little planted tank up and running. Here's the journal. Any comments/criticisms/advice etc would be welcome of course. It's about 1 month old now...here's the story so far (as soon as I remeber how to post photos on this forum :) )

Looking forward to hear what you think....
 
To post pics, you have to upload them to a site like flickr, photobucket, etc. copy and paste the IMG URL from there. Or you can just click the "Img" button when posting a reply and insert the URL from where you hosted your pics between the coding here :)
 
Ah, thanks aquaticmaniac, I'm now ready to show some photos.
Sorry if these details are vague:

Tank: 20cm X 20cm X 30cm
Lighting: Wave Solaris 18W
Filter: Niagre 190 Power Filter 3W
CO2: Adding some 'EasyCarb' every day

About 1 month ago we started with this kind of layout...

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After planting,and having to temporarily weigh the wood done with a couple of stones, tying some moss to the wood with cotton we got to (perhaps should have let the water settle a bit before taking this photo...):

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First signs of animal life with, what I think, are snail eggs. A bit dull for some perhaps but made me smile to see some life while the tank was settling before adding fish later on. You can also make out some slate which will hopefully get covered in moss eventually:

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About 4 weeks after initially setting up the tank- 13 fish from the genus Microrasbora (I'm sure someone will kindly remind me the species name :) ) and a few shrimps were welcomed with open arms to the tank, I've also added a few more plants and been trimming the back:

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In this close up you can make out the Hemianthis ?cuba? thats taken off quite well, I have since planted a but more of this as it seems to be doing better than the grass in the font left of the tank.

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And that's where were up to so far.
Any help with latin names would be great (my brother has told me the names dozens of times, I should have wrote them down :)

If I've forgotten to add some details let me know. And thanks in advance for any comments.
Cheers,
CBro
 
Hey C, nice to see you post something finally. I think the fish are Bora maculatus, I could be corrected on this. Nice close up shots of the animals. That random piece of HC has grown so much better than the hair grass, will be nice if you can get it to spread over the whole front area.

Could you maybe re-size the images ("for message boards" on photobucket) as my weedy internet connection took ages to D/L the photos. When you've re-sized you just need to copy the link and replace it in your post. I suspect other people may also struggle with this.

Keep up the good waterchangeeasycabodosinstemtrimmin work, T
 
Photos re-sized. Thanks for the heads up on that. My internet is quite good so didnt think to resize them.
 
Hi CBro,
Just read your journal and looked at the pics. Good close ups - like the snail eggs :) . Please post a close up or side shot of your filter assembly. My bubble -bee shrimps keep hiding ,perhaps the red variety as you have, are bolder , must get some - perhaps from Tbro who's breeding them well.

Malbros
 
hi CBRO,
great looking set up there! :thumbup: my new kitchen tank will be the same-ish as this.
how are you finding the wave Solaris light? I'm looking at getting one for my 12x10x8 opti white.
any chance on a update so far?? cheers bud!! :clap:
 
C´mon C, I want an update, or I`ve got no excuse but to get on with some work :lol: How are the Clown Killies settling in ?
 
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As you can see it's grown a fair bit since last time. I find the light works really well- i'm adding easyCarb every day and the plants are growning fast. It's just the right size for my tank i think. Thanks for the comments!

This is a shot from a week or two back, i need to do some trimming- looking a bit wild in this photo. Ill aim to put some more up to date photos on this weekend. With the new fish :) they've settled in very nicely.

You can see in the photo below- the moss on the wood is growing nicely. TBRO has told me to cut it a bit to encourage it to grow thicker...ill give that a go when i find my scissors.

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Ill tidy it up a bit and put some more on soon.
 
It's lovely that, really really nice.

Two things, I'd suggest you give the moss a good hard trim. It'll come back bushier and more compact (unless it's stringy moss, then it won't). Secondly is there any posibility of getting a few cuttings of a hydroctyle specie? If so it could be entwined round the wood and out of the water like how ivy does teresterially.

A really pretty tank, keep up the good work!
 
Hey C, the boras look perfect in there, the moss is really pulling the scape together. I know it's painful but Garuf is right trimming the moss will make it even better. Personally I would ditch the floating plants, unless you're really attached to them as the roots obscure the view. Some close ups of the other plants would be nice - T
 
I agree with you there, T. Lose the floaters. I didn't want to say anything, I've been meaning to limit my negativity ray gun. :lol:
 
The floating limnobium laevigatum is a great plant when the tank is maturing but it always tries to take over the world. More light will help keep your stems bushier and more compact.
 
Thanks for the comments! I agree about the floating plants...they grow so fast! I can't believe how fast their roots grow after trimming- i think ill ditch them. Ill give it all a good trimming and update with photos!
 
Thanks aaronnorth. Following garuf and tbro's suggestion the floaters have got the boot. And there has also been some serious trimming going on....didn't realise how tricky the moss would be to trim...and once it's trimmed it sinks and makes a mess. :(

There are about 8 clown killies that have been welcomed into the tank. The male is looking very proud of his new abode.

Here are a load of photos, first one is a little out of focus, only realised after uploading to the computer...and batteries had run out on camera, you know how it is. (sorry if it this takes ages to load).

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Malbros asked for a side picture of the filter a while back- sorry its taken ages to get it on...and yes weakest link is on :)

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The handsome new clown killie.

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This corner is slowly growing...

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One of the female zebra killies have a nosey...

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Do you think it's worth trying to cut back the grass in the foreground to encourage the hemianthis cuboidis to spread?
 
The trick is to fold the moss between your finger and your forefinger and with the other hand snip snip snip. The other way is to use an airline to suck the moss up while you cut.
 
Good savage trimming C, the clown killies look cool, the male looks like a Chinese dragon. Definitely better without the floaters. hopefully you will be rewarded with a good tight stems......
 
Hey C, how about some update photos, I know things have been growing!
 
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