Sorry for not posting in a while. Have been changing jobs and houses and concentrating on keeping the family together. But I thought I would post today a quick post as over the last 12 months I learnt some more stuff again using my eyes.
So I, as I imagine many let the tank go. I watched over time. The things I did that I believe were wrong were as follows:-
- I got complacent about the weekly water changes. Live started to take over so that when it came to water change time I was busy or decided to defer it to the next day and then it was the working week.
- I let the ferts regime slip. I would run out and could not be bothered to make some more up as it meant boiling some water and waiting until it had cooled and then measuring out the relevant doses etc
- Fastidious cleaning of the tank. On the occasions I would change the water, I literally changed the water and changed the white flossy filter material. Maybe squeazed a sponge or two.
- Stretched the feeding. Usually I do every other day. But might do 3 days etc.
- When the FE ran out I would turn the lights off for a few days until I got the local FE supplier. Combined with point 2 with lights on no wonder plants suffered.
So what did I observe when I cleansed my soul of laziness and came to my aquatic senses?
Well I did a major water change and clean 4 weeks ago and saw the effects of the above.
Fish were mostly all there but no sign of any Amano shrimp. Snails had gone. A couple of my daughters Platy's were no more.
Moss of which you can see in the previous picture had gone wild, had actually died underneath the green top layer. This causes lots of bio waste.
Any grass carpet I had was gone.
Lots of leaves with algae on.
GULP!!! Slapped myself in the face to jolt myself back into reality and into the hobby.
- I pulled out both the big branch with the moss growing on it and another piece with java fern growing on it and was very sad to see so much build up of silt, much and stuff. Poor fish. (felt very guilty at this point)
- I majorily trimmed back the plants, saved any bits of moss that I could.
- I cleaned up the branches and tied back on remaining moss firmly to the main branch.
- Then a major major water change. Sorry fish it was for your own good. Along with a major hoovering of the tank subtrate to clear up the silt and detriaus.
- Cleaned the glass, internal pump inside and out.
- Squeezed a number of the sponges and changed the Purigen for some fresh stuff.
- Made up the Ferts
- Took some fogbit from my shrimp tank which I had also let go and which was growing bigger than I have ever seen (growing out of the tank towards the light, amazing) and added that to my main tank.
2 weeks later and more major water changes, plants seem to be responding. Fish appear to be happier. The tank look crystal clear again.
Last week I went to the LFS and treated my daughters to 3 Tuxedo Platy's and myself 4 Colbalt Blue Gourami's (staged over a week)
The buzz and hubbub in the tank is amazing. Fish swimming around lots, eating nicely. Anubias is sprouting new shoots, moss is slowly growing.
Back on the road to recovery.
So what did I learn. Simple
CO2, Ferts, Intense light, water changes and cleanliness are king. Get it wrong and the tank starts to suffer and you spiral out of control. Luckily I have this forum to thank for the help in understanding the rough basics and for having a 180l tank which I believe slowed down the effects of poor routine and maintenance.
Onwards and upwards. Might even get some rock and change the layout soon.
I will update my shrimp tank on the appropriate thread.
Cheers for reading.
R