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The evolution and journey of time on UKAPS

Kalum

Member
Joined
8 Jan 2018
Messages
1,090
Location
Scotland
Just thought it would be funny to summarise my last couple of years since being on here and i've got a feeling 1 or 2 others might be able to relate...
  1. Trip to a chain LFS to buy an off the shelf all in one tank because i didn't want something 'bulky' with external filters while thinking this 60L tank I now have is massive
  2. Buy a bonsai
  3. Plan a tank with a 'path' of some sort
  4. Buy 4 plants and thinking I have a heavily planted tank while struggling to fathom how to 'fit them all in'
  5. Buy a couple of rocks and am shocked at the price of them as well as wood
  6. Buy an off the shelf all in one fert while questioning the need for EI as my tank is doing great because my plants are surviving after 1 week
  7. Dosing ammonia and using a test kit that gives varying answers 10min apart and getting confused and frustrated that a tank doesn't automatically cycle just because it has water in it
  8. Questioning why all of this is so hard these days because of the time I won a goldfish at a fair and dumped it straight into a tiny bowl when i was 5 and it lived 'ages'
  9. Plants start to show deficiencies, read up on EI, get confused, dose more all in one ferts with eyes closed and fingers crossed
  10. Tank cycled, eventually.....choose random fish which should be in a bigger tank and not ideally be kept together, but i'm oblivious so all is fine
  11. Sit watching my tank for hours admiring my new found 'aquascaping' skills
  12. 2 months on, MTS hits hard and I upgrade to a bigger tank
  13. Decide I am going to do things 'right' this time, buy cheap, buy twice and all that
  14. Decide to go high tech, co2, external filter, EI, the lot, exciting times
  15. All the gear and no idea, have everything at my disposal and all the brand names under the sun, but no coordination on how to make it all sing together
  16. Buy stupidly expensive rocks and manzanita prices are the norm and now fully justified in my head after refusing to pay more than £5 at the start
  17. Choose the hardest plants i can find to grow and get frustrated when they struggle since I am now a pro with all the gear
  18. Algae fest
  19. Buy a Chihiros Doctor but still have algae....confused but power through blaming everything else
  20. Give up and rescape after a few months, but....
  21. Finally start to realise that the best things in life are the simplest and unless you have a vast amount of time on your hands then chasing the 'show tanks' you see will unlikely happen
  22. Finally start to understand and not over complicate everything
  23. Realise that i've only been doing this for 2 years and to take my time and learn and enjoy
  24. Buy a python water changer and now do water changes for fun
  25. MTS hits again and buy a bigger tank
  26. to be continued....
 
I like to just think that's forward planning, i'm at my max (within reason) for the house i'm in at an ADA 75P and 45P in the livingroom, but house hunting for my next place will involve planning for a 1200 or 1500 tank for sure
 
I got to the end of 13 then picked things up again at 20.. I've never fancied a high energy set up. I don't feel like I can justify the pennies on them nor can I be reliable enough to remember to refill co2 canisters etc! Not sure I want to have to trim my plants every week either... but that's just me. Plents of low tech plants to keep me happy!
 
That's exactly where things have taken me over the past few months, back to basics and rather than throwing everything at it I've tried to keep it simple and run both tanks non co2 for a while

Saying that I'll be dipping my toe back into high tech shortly but with hopefully a bit more plant knowledge to make better choices
 
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