Weekly update incoming:
Things arenāt so good in the wild world of sports this week.
In the bigāun, since starting to use the new light, Iāve had a massive increase in staghorn growth to the point Iām losing a pint of moss a week just trying to keep things under check. I cut out as many old, slow growing leaves as I can but it seems largely uphill.
That said, in my experience, staghorn shows up when there is light and organics, within a couple of months it runs out of fuel and passes. However, with the change in lights and the large amount of wood I think things should stabilise in a couple of months if I just keep plodding on. I suspect by then Iāll have no moss left though.
Iāve had luck killing it with excel in the past so Iām dosing 5ml daily but it doesnāt really seem to be doing anything.
Maybe a blackout or h2o2 treatment is needed.
The flatāun also went all wobbly the last 10days. I missed a water change, tinkered with the co2 and cleaned the filter which was clogging and induced a massive diatoms bloom which turned the tank into a brown sludge fest.
I have now added shrimps and nerites to combat that.
My plan had been to get the hc and hairgrass to be basically grown in, what with shrimps propensity to unplant and nerites burying themselves but the plants were just not doing much to outrun the diatoms, so in they went.
And wouldnāt you believe it, the shrimp promptly unplanted half the hc.
While their buddies the nerites decided the bottom pane had the best dinner on it and did their best land shark impression to unplant a further third.
Insult to injury, the massive amano I put in decided the best show of indigence was to throw itself out of the tank and into the window sill with the cactusā.
Iām sure youāll agree, a less than suitable amano habitat.
Also staghorn is attacking my moss in this tank too.
The farm has gone a bit wobbly too. I removed 1/2 of the stems to try some new rotalas (colorata, giaos, Laos) all of which didnāt make it through the transition. The results being I have had a staghorn bloom, a thread algae bloom and diatoms. Only 1 of which Iāve managed to get under control.
I ended up topping the 55 and putting in a handful of stems just to fill it back up.
Things in the 55 are pretty good really, just need to get in there and thin all of the moss and put a bit of shape back in the rear.
Iāve got a small amount of rhizo that has attached itself to the tiny bits of coral moss so Iāll have to h2o2 that.
Having all this moss floating around Iāve been chucking it in my quarantine tank.
So, hereās what Iām thinking, I have 3female and 1 male tucano. And some very large female green neons that are in said tank. Maybe I should try and make some more?
Anyone who knows their onions with breeding can chime in and advise, Iāve never had too much luck with tetras.