i have been thinking about writing a journal since i first got my tank, 4 months later i have decided to share my creations.
i have never really been interested in house fish, my dad had koi for years in the garden, some bloody big ones too. it was not until my brother got a tank and my little boy showed interest in it that i decided to get one for his birthday. now his birthday is not till november but it thought, get the tank, stick it in the garage and get it all setup. so i hunted on ebay and found a nice 40ltr with everything including fish going cheap, as it was close by i went and collected and put it in the garage, it was meant to stay there until my boys birthday.
i asked for 3" of water to be left in the bottom and for the filter to be left soaking in this water, it stayed like this for a day or two. The fish went into my brothers tank (come back to this later because it proved the catalyst to getting the tank in the house). i went to my lfs, bought some fert substrate and some live plants. at this point i had done little research on plants but knew enough about cycling to get my started.
so i through it all into the tank, as i thought it was not going in the house for a while i was not to concerned with how it looked and this is what it looked like, a bloody mess but it was a start,
i had two filters running trying to get rid of the dirty water from the fert substrate.
my plants looked less than healthy to
the tank stayed as is for about 3 weeks. i then noticed 3-4 tiny little fish swimming about, how the hell they got there i don't know. i can only assume they were in the water/gravel that came with the tank. Anyway 4 weeks had now passed and the fish in my brothers tank started looking, shall we say unwell. we tested the water and the ammonia was sky high. we had over stocked the tank by some way. i then had little choice but to take in 6 fish, 2 platies and 4 small mollies. we tested my water and to my suprise it was ok, 0 ammonia/nitrite but abit of nitrate.
the tank was still in the garage but i decided it needed to look abit better. 2 weeks later i bought more plants and put some bog wood in,
i also started adding JBL drops everyday for the plants
after redoing it the wife said it looked to nice and as it now had fish in might as well come in the house.
the plants started to look abit better but still not great. i also put everything in back to front, you can see the seems down the front of the tank. i changed the tank round again to put the seems at the back. i was also swapping filters at the time so had two in there.
now the right way round
it stayed this way for a few more weeks. added my own fish, these been 4 pygmy corries, 4 ember tetra's, 4 galaxy rasbora. it also has some cherry shrimp.
the mollies left home to my lfs (as nobody wanted them), the platies returned home to a bigger tank.
At this point i bought a non aquatic plant, that soon came out after great advice from this forum.
Finally i wanted a complete change, inspired my ianho's nano tank.
and finally added my betta this monday
through my tanks life the stats have always been ok, either by judgement or luck my water has been perfect.
Sessons learned from my journey, when adding water for the first time use a bowl/plate etc, saves you so much hassle time than trying to get your water clear, test your water, don't over stock and if you have plants make sure they have enough goodies to grow, oh get the tank the right way round when you set it up!.
In a tank my size i have small fish so i can have more of them with one bigger special fish.
the only thing i want to do is add a small external filter, boyu or resun for example and get rid of the internal to give me more room, maybe add a few more corries and rasbora.
Not really a journal, more a story.
We all find the shrimp and MTS snails the most interesting things in the tank.
i have never really been interested in house fish, my dad had koi for years in the garden, some bloody big ones too. it was not until my brother got a tank and my little boy showed interest in it that i decided to get one for his birthday. now his birthday is not till november but it thought, get the tank, stick it in the garage and get it all setup. so i hunted on ebay and found a nice 40ltr with everything including fish going cheap, as it was close by i went and collected and put it in the garage, it was meant to stay there until my boys birthday.
i asked for 3" of water to be left in the bottom and for the filter to be left soaking in this water, it stayed like this for a day or two. The fish went into my brothers tank (come back to this later because it proved the catalyst to getting the tank in the house). i went to my lfs, bought some fert substrate and some live plants. at this point i had done little research on plants but knew enough about cycling to get my started.
so i through it all into the tank, as i thought it was not going in the house for a while i was not to concerned with how it looked and this is what it looked like, a bloody mess but it was a start,
i had two filters running trying to get rid of the dirty water from the fert substrate.
my plants looked less than healthy to
the tank stayed as is for about 3 weeks. i then noticed 3-4 tiny little fish swimming about, how the hell they got there i don't know. i can only assume they were in the water/gravel that came with the tank. Anyway 4 weeks had now passed and the fish in my brothers tank started looking, shall we say unwell. we tested the water and the ammonia was sky high. we had over stocked the tank by some way. i then had little choice but to take in 6 fish, 2 platies and 4 small mollies. we tested my water and to my suprise it was ok, 0 ammonia/nitrite but abit of nitrate.
the tank was still in the garage but i decided it needed to look abit better. 2 weeks later i bought more plants and put some bog wood in,
i also started adding JBL drops everyday for the plants
after redoing it the wife said it looked to nice and as it now had fish in might as well come in the house.
the plants started to look abit better but still not great. i also put everything in back to front, you can see the seems down the front of the tank. i changed the tank round again to put the seems at the back. i was also swapping filters at the time so had two in there.
now the right way round
it stayed this way for a few more weeks. added my own fish, these been 4 pygmy corries, 4 ember tetra's, 4 galaxy rasbora. it also has some cherry shrimp.
the mollies left home to my lfs (as nobody wanted them), the platies returned home to a bigger tank.
At this point i bought a non aquatic plant, that soon came out after great advice from this forum.
Finally i wanted a complete change, inspired my ianho's nano tank.
and finally added my betta this monday
through my tanks life the stats have always been ok, either by judgement or luck my water has been perfect.
Sessons learned from my journey, when adding water for the first time use a bowl/plate etc, saves you so much hassle time than trying to get your water clear, test your water, don't over stock and if you have plants make sure they have enough goodies to grow, oh get the tank the right way round when you set it up!.
In a tank my size i have small fish so i can have more of them with one bigger special fish.
the only thing i want to do is add a small external filter, boyu or resun for example and get rid of the internal to give me more room, maybe add a few more corries and rasbora.
Not really a journal, more a story.
We all find the shrimp and MTS snails the most interesting things in the tank.
