Evolution Of A 19 Us Gallon

[lljdma06]

That's exactly what I have in my tank. It is only a minor problem. I still have some from when I returned from Thanksgiving, since my friend who was watching the tank wasn't dosing my ferts, and my CO2 wasn't up. I expect that I will have some more of that stuff and many new lovely species when I return from Xmas break. But this is, of course, my secret master plan to become a master cultivator of algae of various types. Think of it as a Dutch-style algae aquarium. And since I also take secret pleasure in cooking my fish (please refer to my royal heater screw-up in the Betta section), I think I will lay low for a while.

The pictures, as always, look wonderful, Bloozoo. Keep us posted, I always like reading your thread. I like the pearling pictures. Sometimes, I see that in my tank and it makes me happy. Great job!

 

[simonbrown403]

looking good, keep up the good work

What plans do your have for the tank then?

 

[zig]

bloozoo just make sure you are dosing potassium or k you want a level of 15-20ppm per week, its probably easy to overlook because you are getting the phosphate and nitrate from the tap water, but it is another macro nutrient and if its not being dosed it could be the cause of the staghorn as well.

 

[Bloo]

Its auctually staghorn algae bloozoo one of the easiest algaes to get rid of, its an indication that there is a shortage, all algaes are an indication something is out of balance but with staghorn its nearly allways the macros or co2, in your case obviously the co2, increasing the levels are all that should be needed to get rid of it, i dont think any fish will eat this algae but its easily removed by hand.

Other than the staghorn everything looks lovely and healthy in your tank, i hardly see a blemish on any of the plants.

bloozoo just make sure you are dosing potassium or k you want a level of 15-20ppm per week, its probably easy to overlook because you are getting the phosphate and nitrate from the tap water, but it is another macro nutrient and if its not being dosed it could be the cause of the staghorn as well.

Thanks for the heads up on this Zig - and great relief to hear that it's "easily" remedied. Though guess we should never underestimate the power of algae
By Potassium, do you mean Sulphate of Potash (sorry not sure ) )
Edit: just checked your pinned topic, and it is indeed. I have it, but with what and how do I test my levels ?

The pictures, as always, look wonderful, Bloozoo. Keep us posted, I always like reading your thread. I like the pearling pictures. Sometimes, I see that in my tank and it makes me happy. Great job!

Thank you

looking good, keep up the good work

What plans do your have for the tank then?

I really am not so sure yet. I find it a good learning curve at the moment to see what types of plants work in my water (which is quite hard with a gH of 15-19 at times). Ultimately I will be aiming for a Nature setup and something vaguely along the lines of what George has. I've always been a fan of green and black (which was reflected in my very early attempts with just the Vallis and black background - before I even knew about the planted section here, or saw George's tank) - but I won't start working on this until February. I'm away for Christmas and then just back for a few days before going on holiday for most of January. So I'm preparing for a nightmare on return and I'll probably have to face some nasty algae and other issues when I return.

 

[zig]

Hiya bloozoo

We dont normally test for potassium you need specialised testkits which are very expensive, so instead we just dose enough within the recommended range of 15-20ppm, normally if you dose kno3 and kh2po4 you will obtain all or nearly all of your weekly k requirement.

You are correct it is sulphate of potash, i did some calculations for you based on a 19 US gallon tank using Chucks calculator, add 40 grams to 500ml RO water and each 1m/l = 0.5ppm k of this solution, so you need to dose minimum 30ml per week, you can dose this in one go if you wish after a water change when you are dosing the nitrate and phosphate.

I did the above calculation for simplicity, you are not at maximum solubility either, so you will not have any problems dissolving the k2so4.

Do you have anybody to look after your tanks when you are away, its hard to know what to do if you dont (with the planted tank i mean)

 

[Bloo]

Thanks Zig - I'll just dose the potassium with my weekly water change then - starting tonight.

Unfortunately my tanks will be in the hands of (elderly) clueless (fish related) house sitters

George's advice (if I remember correctly!) was not to dose during the 3.5 weeks, halve the lighting & CO2 output, feed very sparingly and hope for the best ( ). I'm over filtrated anyway, so filter itself I'm not worried about.
And with my NO3 and PO4 at a constants (weekly, but not sure for what length of time that will remain) without EI dosing that bit "shouldn't" be too bad.

My other non-planted tanks have never been a problem (I go away for approx a month stretch each year) apart from a fair bit of algae - but even that's never been too bad. But this time things are quite different and I'm worried

Any other advice greatly appreciated !

 

[lljdma06]

Unfortunately my tanks will be in the hands of (elderly) clueless (fish related) house sitters

We are in the same boat. Except I'll be gone for 6-7 weeks and my house sitter is not elderly. I'll have a delightful algae garden when I return. I will follow the advice and reduce the lighting and CO2. So I will be monitoring this thread closely, Bloozoo, to see what I can learn. But my person is going away too, so I have to rely on timed feeders. At least I get to take my bettas with me.

Your welcome.

 

[George Farmer]

Sorry to learn of your algae - although as zig suggests it shouldn't present a long-term problem.

Best of luck when you go away - as I've said the reduced lighting, dosing etc. should work although I can't promise anything. I do know that if you kept up your lighting and CO2 with no water changes/NPK dosing then the consquences would be far worse.

With the reduced lighting etc. I imagine you'll come back to little plant growth but also little algae growth. It may be worth running a little experiment for a week before you go away.

 

[zig]

There isnt really a lot you can do if you are going to go away for a month or an extended period, the best thing is obviously reduce the lighting, you could also reduce the photoperiod if you wanted from say 10 hours to 7-8 hours or something like that although i dont know how plants that need highlight would react to lower light levels, they may just hang in there, although i would imagine they would become quite leggy in the process as they try and reach the light.

You should do a water change just before you go or as near as you can to departure time, id also be tempted to dose a little trace as well, other than that i dont think there is much else one can do other than keep the fingers crossed and report back so we can all learn.

During the summer i went away for a week and set the lights on timers, did a water change beforehand dosed the tank with the appropriate ferts etc and shut the door behind me, i came back a week later and realised that altough i had set the timers i forgot to switch the lights on and the tank had been in darkness for the week, everything survived although all the plants looked horribly droopy but within a couple of days they all bounced back, a blackout for a week did wonders for whatever algae was in the tank it disappeared.

 

[George Farmer]

i came back a week later and realised that altough i had set the timers i forgot to switch the lights on......everything survived although all the plants looked horribly droopy but within a couple of days they all bounced back, a blackout for a week did wonders for whatever algae was in the tank it disappeared.

That is interesting. I assume your plants had built up sufficient nutrient reserves over the period prior to your week away. Well worth remembering that for an established planted tank.

 

[Bloo]

I know it's been quite a while since a decent update. I wish I could actually give a decent one this time, but alas..... I have only recently returned from a month long holiday and my feet have hardly touched the ground. But seeing as a few of you were so nice to pm me to ask how things were going, I'll give the current status of my tank anyway

Before going away (for a month), I asked George (gf225) some advice on what to do with my tank while away.
All I had available to me was someone to feed the fish every few days. No topping up of tank and no plant feeds.

So I lowered the CO2 rate (by about half) and was going to shorten the light period, but quite conveniently one of my tubes blew just before going (Arcadia freshwater), so I figured I'd just leave it at that and hope for the best.
The day before I left, I did a major tank clean and some aggressive pruning.

I fully expected to come back to a huge ball of solid algae and a tank afloat with dead fish

To my complete surprise and utter astonishment, I returned to a very lush (albeit overgrown) tank with minimal algae and all fish a live and thriving My amano shrimp (I previously thought were dead) were very much alive and kicking and grown substantially.

This coming weekend I will do a decent prune and clean and refill my CO2 canister (which has now run out in the past week, but I can't get to the shop before the weekend again).

My water stats have also changed quite a bit.
I guess with the CO2 halved, it pushed up my pH which is now sitting at roughly 7.2 (or 7.4 not sure)
but my Nitrate is around 5 (very low for me) and phosphate almost non existent (previously anywhere between 2 - 5 - off chart! depending on my water supply)

I won't be too aggressive in change this weekend, as I don't want to upset the apple cart. But I will now slowly start working to a much lower maintenance / slow growing tank. Just need to put on my thinking cap and develop a plan for a nature set-up

Here's the jungle ! And also some male endler residents

 

[lljdma06]

YEAH!!!!

Your tank didn't explode, unlike mine, which did. Fantastic, I wish mine looked like that when I came back. But I had to rely on timed feeders, which is the kiss of death. No matter how low you set it for, it's still more than what I feed, which really encouraged algae and all sorts of crud. My filter also ran dry. I got the green algae under control, but I couldn't dose nitrates and my CO2 was hard to reestablish, so now I have BGA to contend with. I recently added glosso, but I think I may remove it and put it in my 10g, which has no algae, until I get the algae situation under control. It won't carpet there, but at least, it'll be free to grow without algae.

I'm really glad for you and look forward to your updates. Your Endler's, by the way, are gorgeous. And that is one big shrimp! Made me hungry!

 

[simonbrown403]

Where the fish i can honestly say its in better condition than mine, maybe i should go on holiday for a while god knows i could do with one.

What the plans for the future.

 

[George Farmer]

Welcome back Antonet, good of you to update us.

Wonderful to see such health after your time away, I'm very relieved for you. I would have felt bad if you came back to a mess.

Those Endlers are stunning!

Good luck with the prune, you're wise to go steady. If and when you up your lighting just keep a close eye on CO2 and dosing to prevent possible algae.

 

[Bloo]

Thanks lljdma06 - after your previous holiday disasters, I fully expected to come back to the same.
Yep, Mr Bamboo Shrimp is getting along fabulously - he loves the current from the spray bar. I felt quite bad actually and felt a bit like a mean parent taking a child's toy away - coming back from holiday the water level had dropped a few inches and the water actually sprayed like a little waterfall into the tank. He absolutely loved this and sat right underneath the flow with his little arms extended waving into the slightly turbulent outflow.
But alas I had to top up the tank and the stronger current disappeared

Simon, I really don't know yet (what the plans are for the future)
I'm going to sit this weekend and hopefully formulate something.

Thanks for your advice George I think going on holiday for such a length of time is always risky. But it probably taught me something too - not to fiddle that much and do anything too drastic (such as my weekly major prune and large water changes. I'm going to reduce both of these slightly over time to see if it has a more stabilising effect.

I hope to have a few more Endlers in the tank over time, but my (still resident) killifish are taking care of any fry at the moment - so even though my females have clearly been carrying a number of times, I've never seen any fry. They are really lovely little fish.

I'll report back again once I have my (future nature) plan formulated into an action plan !