So update for my first scape. Took the Seiryu stone out and replaced with Staurogyne Repens to act as a boundary between Eliocharis Mini and the piece of driftwood. After cutting down the Limnophila Hippuiroides they are starting to turn a nice red colour.
I replanted my crpyts and added some Helanthium Quadricostatus and Ludwigia Rubens Red. Lastly, I took all of my Eliocharis up as I’d planted it way too thick and this wasn’t giving the runners enough space and all competing with each other so it was growing but not as fast as it should be. Re planted it with more space and less of it, so hoping now the CO2 is stable that this spreads and a lot quicker.
I added some zebra nerites in and although they have left some small white eggs on the driftwood, they have done an amazing job cleaning up. Also, I added another 5 amano’s taking them up to 9.
I will add a couple of pictures of the tank later when the lights are on.
I did two weeks of 70% water changes every 3 days as had quite a bit of Green and Brown algae. I added a Twinstar Steriliser as well to help combat this and added some Seachem Purigen into the filter. I moved to two 50% water changes which I’m in the first week off at the moment. I will be doing another week doing this and maybe then move to one.
Found the water changes miles easier using an Oase water pump to get the water back in, I use George Farmers method using a bucket and dosing the water before it gets put back in and this is far easier. I was really struggling with this using a hose pipe straight form my tap and finding the water was changing temp mid water change and therefore causing stress to the fish.
It’s been a huge learning curve for me, regarding planting, lighting, planting locations, water quality, maintenance, water changes, additional sunlight and light from the room (which I think caused the green algae and BBA). A lot of which I’d have been stuck if it wasn’t for this forum. So I thank everyone for all their help as the plants now seem to be growing well and some great plant growth. I guess it didn’t help it was a rescape and I had to do this when all the fish were present.
Lighting is at 60% and on between 4.15 and 10.15 so only 6 hours. I’m unsure if I should up this at all now the CO2 has been stable for over a week. I have read that every 5 days to up the percentage and over a period of 4 weeks move the photo period up to 8 hours. Something I’m still unsure of.
It’s made my passion for scaping even more so and has led to me also creating my second scape in a 60P tank at the moment and hoping to do the hardscape and planting having learnt a lot from my mistakes, feedback on here and reading peoples journals or questions and also from watching videos on YouTube during lockdown.
I think to where I’ve come starting with a BIORB (yes massive mistake) a few years ago, to a decent starter tank the Aqua One Nano which I have now, to upgrading for a wedding present to myself an Aquascaper 1200 next year (Already cleared it with the missus).
I’ll leave you with a couple of pics of my Male and female Apistogramma Borelli. Well proud of these. I’m still overstocked and need to either sell or return 8 glass catfish and two female apistogramma as I’ve one Male and 3 females (very lucky guy). Once those numbers are down I think I can leave the tank to grow and just wait to transfer them to the 1200. Another thing I’ve learnt, less is more and again this is from feedback on here. It’s easy to get carried away creating a community tank and seeing different colours of fish or fish for different levels of the tank but sticking to just a few species makes the tank a lot healthier and also the fish. All in all a lot of lessons learnt, and that’s coming from a teacher.
