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The CHI(LL)

Looking good ☺ I understood it is better to plant hairgrass in smaller separated sections to allow for more growth - however for me even with doing this ... I couldn't understand why it WAS ALL DEAD! I think it can take a while to get its roots going & then new green visable growth on top... even still - I thought it was messy looking & ugly & removed (no patience) & was surprised at the amount of root growth. Anyway, what I'm saying is there's probably more happening where you can't see & if you can bear I read (think it was Mick.Dk) mentioned you can remove individual dead blades by wiggling carefully free but trying not to pull the whole lot out? (Too little patience myself & too heavy handed ☺☺☺). Hairgrass is painfully slow low tech so good luck with pressurised co2 - I hope it carpets more successfully for you ☺
 
Manisha said:
Looking good ☺ I understood it is better to plant hairgrass in smaller separated sections to allow for more growth - however for me even with doing this ... I couldn't understand why it WAS ALL DEAD! I think it can take a while to get its roots going & then new green visable growth on top... even still - I thought it was messy looking & ugly & removed (no patience) & was surprised at the amount of root growth. Anyway, what I'm saying is there's probably more happening where you can't see & if you can bear I read (think it was Mick.Dk) mentioned you can remove individual dead blades by wiggling carefully free but trying not to pull the whole lot out? (Too little patience myself & too heavy handed ☺☺☺). Hairgrass is painfully slow low tech so good luck with pressurised co2 - I hope it carpets more successfully for you ☺
Click to expand...
Yeah... I'm not very patient as well... :bored:
 
DAY 16 - Two Problems to freak out about...

So... I just finished today's water change and I found two more problems I have to deal with.
  1. I found a small snail on the water lettuce...
  2. I saw some Rhizoclonium algae...at least that's what I think it is after comparing with the ones on this Algae Guide
I'll be on the lookout for other invaders and I'm hoping that adding CO2 next week (equipment on it's way) will give the plants an advantage against the algae.

I also got new lights today see if I can get Eleocharis parvula and Mini to revive from the ashes.
 
kadoxu said:
DAY 16 - Two Problems to freak out about...

So... I just finished today's water change and I found two more problems I have to deal with.
  1. I found a small snail on the water lettuce...
Click to expand...
What kind of snails are they? I welcome ramshorns in my tanks, they're all full of them. Prolific algae eaters!
 
DAY 18 - Last week updates

So on day 16 I freaked out a bit, but haven't seen any snails or more algae evolution since. The only thing I did was slightly overdosing Liquid Carbon in the last 2 days to put the algae in check.

Last week I changed the lights. According to PAR measurements, these new lights should double light intensity when compared to my DIY LEDs. Hopefully this (in addition to CO2) will help Eleocharis to revive from the ashes.
IMG_20160910_110425.jpg

It was week 2, so I've been doing:
  • 50% water changes every other day
  • lights on for about 6 hours (when it's sunny early in the morning, those rare days, I believe the plants get a bit less than 1 hour of direct sunlight from the window across the room)
  • EI regime
    • Macro nutrients 3x a week
    • Micro & traces 2x a week
  • Liquid Carbon every day.

Water chemistry is changing daily as follows:
  • PH is changing between 8 and 8.5 (I want to bring it down to 7.5-8 range, hopefully adding CO2 will do it for me. Liquid Carbon affects PH, but not enough)
  • Free Ammonia (the toxic one) ranges from 0.001 and 0.040 depending on the time of the day (plants are doing a great job).
  • Nitrates are only tested 2x a week, but has been stable and under the danger zone.
These are the readings for last week:
week 2 readings.png
I still have to find a way to keep temperatures stable when doing water changes (I am currently using 4x 2L bottles).

Yesterday
  • Major water change
  • Major trimming on the background plants
  • Removed some water lettuce
  • Removed some dead plants behind the statue
  • replanted some bits of Eleocharis, removing the dead parts and replanting the green hairs in smaller chunks.
  • Cleaned the Marimo Balls
  • Cleaned and changed half of the cotton filter
  • Cleaned sponge filter lightly
I also learned that having an internal filter, specially like the one I have (filter opening is bellow) is a pain... a lot of the filtered junk goes back into the water when I remove it. I probably have to start rotating it to the side whenever I do water changes or a clean-up.

Yesterday I was way to hungover to bother to take a pic... :hungover: I'll try to remember to take one today...
 
Sodastream CO2 kit

Yesterday I got all my CO2 equipment:
  • Sodastream canister
  • Sodastream adapter
  • Used CO2 Art regulator with solenoid
  • Precision bubble counter
  • Bazooka Atomizer 50mm diffuser
  • 24h Plug timer
Put it all together and today I had it running:
  • ON 1 hour before lights on
  • OFF 1 hour before lights off
  • 1 bubble every 4 seconds
  • PH dropped to 7.8
Not bad for the first day, according to Tropica's website, with a dKH of 12, the PH should drop to 7.5-7.8 range to get a medium dosage of CO2. The drop checker solution was greenish blue by the end of the cycle.

This is week no 3, I'm going to start doing just 2 weekly water changes and try to raise light levels to 7-8 hours and keep the EI regime.
 
DAY 24 - I smell trouble...

This week I made a lot of changes... probably shouldn't have done so much in a short period.
  • Changed lighting
  • Major plant trimming
  • Slightly cleaned filter media
  • Replaced half of the cotton filter media
  • 2 water changes a week
  • Added CO2 injection
  • Increased lighting period to 7 hours
  • Reduced temperature from 25.5ºC to 24.5ºC

Staurogyne repens seems to have loved it and is growing well, Lindernia rotundifola has some new leaves growing, Eleocharis also seems to be finally picking up, Cardamine lyrata is growing fast as usual and the same goes to Dwarf Water Letuce.

Now, I'm having a bit of an issue with the Java Fern and Ludwigia palustris...
IMG_20160918_124429.jpg IMG_20160918_124511.jpg

PH drops to 7.6 when CO2 is on and goes back to 8.3 when it's off.
 
DAY 30 - Update

It's trimming day today. All the plants that haven't died are now picking up. I have a bit of algae in the small gravel, I'm thinking of leaving it as a welcome gift for future shrimp tenants. 🙂

I'm gonna trim Eleocharis and Staurogyne repens slighlty and give a really big cut to the Japanese cress.

A pic from yesterday
IMG_20160923_090127.jpg
 
Day 37 - Exciting week

It was a crazy week for this tiny tank... it seems it has an almost complete collection of algae species. I'm dealing with diatoms, green spot algae, hair algae (it's funny that my statue is now growing hair :lol:) and I believe there is also cyanobacteria in the mix...

So what did I do? I left it alone for a bit and started to plan for aquarium no 2! :lol: In the meantime, I got a EHEIM Classic 250 filter, inline heater and CO2 atomizer and put it to work in this tank. Overkill? Maybe...

The second thing I did was... getting a cleanup crew! So yesterday I got 3 Zebra Nerite Snails and 10 Red Cherry Shrimps.

I'm loving these little fellas.

Tomorrow is cleanup and water change day, so everything is a bit dirty today...
IMG_20161001_095050~2.jpg IMG_20161001_095231~2.jpg IMG_20161001_110508~2.jpg IMG_20161001_132747~2.jpg
 
Dude, I love your planning skills. I think you are doing very well!

That is some filter to run on this tank but lots of flow is good for planted tanks.

What's the PAR at the foreground substrate with both lights on?
 
Btw aesthetically, just remove your largewhite stones and replace with the moss balls. Just thinking out loud.
 
Cyanobacteria at this stage means you've done something wrong...good luck with that. 😕
 
Lovely nerites & cherries 🙂 algae woes, sorry to hear - perhaps reducing the light period & EI dosing may help? Deep clean & extra water changes also (just for fun!) Rebels suggestion of more mossand balls would look good actually & wouldn't show the algae as much... but your current design is Lovely too 😀
 
rebel said:
Dude, I love your planning skills. I think you are doing very well!

That is some filter to run on this tank but lots of flow is good for planted tanks.

What's the PAR at the foreground substrate with both lights on?
Click to expand...
I was a bit afraid about using such a powerful filter on such a small tank, but so far so good. I actually tried to reduce the outflow by closing one of the quick release taps, but whenever I do it, the tap starts leaking a little bit, so it's working at full speed now... lol

I think the measurement at the foreground was a bit on the low side, at around 30 PAR or something like that... I'll try to remember to take a few measurements tomorrow to confirm.

rebel said:
Btw aesthetically, just remove your largewhite stones and replace with the moss balls. Just thinking out loud.
Click to expand...
Manisha said:
Rebels suggestion of more mossand balls would look good actually & wouldn't show the algae as much...
Click to expand...
The idea with the pebbles is to (one day eventually) make a contrast with a green carpet of eleocharis...

CooKieS said:
Cyanobacteria at this stage means you've done something wrong...good luck with that. 😕
Click to expand...
I think it's cyanobaceria... but I may be completely wrong... lol

Manisha said:
Lovely nerites & cherries 🙂 algae woes, sorry to hear - perhaps reducing the light period & EI dosing may help? Deep clean & extra water changes also (just for fun!)
Click to expand...
I'm doing a deep clean & water change tomorrow. I'm hoping that the cherries and the raised water flow will keep them in check...
 
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