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Re: Tom's Bucket O' Mud - All change!

Well, I went away to Cornwall for 5 days, and arrived home last night to a crystal clear tank.

Chucked some pellets in this morning, and within 2 minutes there was a massive plume of mud wafting around the tank from the loaches :lol:

This tells me 2 things - firstly, I really should have washed the old sand again before reusing it, and perhaps it's time I bought a filter.
 
Re: Tom's Bucket O' Mud - All change!

Getting there... looking forward to external filter and inline heater arriving next week.

clearing.jpg
 
Re: Tom's Bucket O' Mud - All change!

Yeah ordered the 300w and some 16-12mm reducers.

Main plants are...

E. acicularis
L. brasiliensis and mauritania
M. pteropus 'trident'
Various crypts
Equisetum hymale
Hippuris vulgaris

Then a few other things in small amounts scattered around.
 
Re: Tom's Bucket O' Mud - All change!

Righto, quick video here. Tank is still refusing to clear fully, but figured I should document the start of the rescape anyway - hopefully when I'm next home at the end of September everything will be crystal clear!

All the carpeting plants are beginning their slow spread, which is very pleasing.

http://vimeo.com/47250435
 
Re: Tom's Bucket O' Mud - All change!

That is wonderful Tom. I agree with Alastair that is amazing visual depth in there. It looks more like the view into a pond than a fish tank.

What are those rasbora-like fish with the orange heads?
 
Re: Tom's Bucket O' Mud - All change!

Cheers guys. Yeah, I've spent a lot of time trying to come up with a scape I like which would look good from 3 sides, and in the end gave up and decided to maximise the perception of depth from a single view. It works really nicely in the flesh, but the cloudy water and low light makes conveying it on film quite tricky.

The fish with the orange heads are male Sawbwa resplendens (the females are smaller and plain silver). Really excellent fish for the planted aquaria.
 
Re: Tom's Bucket O' Mud - All change!

Just read the whole thing it's amazing to see how it's changed since page one. I would love a tank like this one day but the wife would never agree to that was hard enough to get a 100/40/50 into the living room decoration plan :lol:

Matt
 
Re: Tom's Bucket O' Mud - All change!

Just back from my final field trip... frankly amazed by how good the tank is looking after 6 weeks of only fish feeding and water top ups by flatmates. Everything is growing in nicely and there's nothing unsightly except a smidge of green spot algae to clear up, which I was worried about as I lowered the light 6 inches before going away.

However, the experimental pond plants have all died off, sadly. Should have listened to Darrel :p

So, needs a bit of a rescape to reintroduce some height to the back corners, but otherwise pretty happy so far. Will post more pics once my LEDs arrive and I've sorted a more elegant lighting rig next week.

bucketoct2012.jpg
 
Re: Tom's Bucket O' Mud - All change!

As ever, total neglect seems to be the way forward :p

Al, the halide covers the whole 3x3 (some fall-off in the corners) from about 2.5 feet above the substrate without too much spillage. No idea what height I'm going to need to rig the LED, hopefully not too low... will angle it from the front a bit if so, I think.
 
Re: Tom's Bucket O' Mud - All change!

That looks great Tom! The underwater planting is superb.

What is that big plant growing out of the water? Is it a Spathiphyllum?
 
Re: Tom's Bucket O' Mud - All change!

Cheers hydro. Yeah, just a cheap Spathiphyllum from a home hardware shop. It stayed really small for 2 years until I removed the other emergents and it finally got some light, and since then it's just gone bananas.
 
Re: Tom's Bucket O' Mud - All change!

Looking good BigTom.
Have you thought about trying something like H. Corymbosa? Mine routinely grows out of the water from the substrate 40cm below the surface.
 
Re: Tom's Bucket O' Mud - All change!

Right! Amazingly I've managed to get my blahblahblahblah in gear enough for a bit of a video update. Very happy with how things are progressing. Plants and livestock doing well, except for the Mexican gammarus which are being hunted with much enthusiasm by the Peacock gudgeons I added recently.

As you can see, the Hydrocotyle tripartita has gone berserk. Love it.

http://vimeo.com/54645045

Edit - Just noticed Quicktime has done its usual trick of making everything look dark and washed out - fixing now but will take a couple of hours to render and upload.
 
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