380l Community Tank

[Ian H]

Right thought i would start up a little diary kind thing so after a couple of months i can see how far i've come ect

The tank is an aqua one 380L bow fronted tank, its running:

2 x aqua one CF1000's (my first canister filters)
2 x 200w heaters
4 x 40w lights (2 of which are red?)

It has a plain black BG and black gravel with a couple of plants:

1 Echinodrus mix
1 Echinodrus cordifolius marble queen
1 Echinodrus rosea
3 Cryptocoryne beckettii
1 Cryptocoryne Wendtii
2 Hygrophilia Polysperma
1 Lindernia Rotundifolia

It will also have some java fern in it along with some java moss and maybe riccia. It's currently in cycle process, about a week ago i put in 20ml of ammonia (9.5%) the ammonia is still reading high at 8 or more but it is working since the nitrIte is upto 1.0 (i thought that was quite fast!) I have a mature fluval 3 in my other tank (all the fish are going in this new tank) but i'm going to part cycle these filters before i add the fluval 3 and fish. anyways some pics:

not long after i got it:

a couple of days ago (not all the plants are in it)

i find it a bit strange though that i checked the nitrIte yesterday and it was only 0.25 and today it's upto 1.0! is that normal?

 

[paul_219]

Wonderful pics. The tank is gr8.

 

[Ian H]

Thanks

Can't wait to get them all in there

 

[Ian H]

ok just ran another test:

ammonia - 4
nitrIte - 2
nitrAte - 5

so all is going well

everything is happening alot faster than i though. I didnt expect to have such high nitrIte or even a nitrAte reading in such short time (i put 20ml of 9.5% ammonia in on 9/11/07) so over all im quite happy

although its all well and good that im getting readings, but since i put the 20ml of ammonia in i havnt needed to top it up so i guess its not going that fast

 

[SJ2K]

Looking good, thats a nice sized tank, hope to see it heavily planted adding any Co2/fertz etc?

 

[Ian H]

i've never been to great with plants to be honest i tried to get some low light plants as i dont have great lighting in there and i got some root tabs so i'll see how it goes. I was thinking of co2 but don't really know if its worth it for the amount it will cost

 

[Straydum]

hahaha! i like the ester island face thing there! if you're having problems with plants, you could get some plastic ones. doesnt look as good as live ones but it does the job

 

[Ian H]

yeah we were watching night at the museum and loved the dum dum so thought why not!! looks good hidden in all the plants too

Never been a fan of fake plants, if none of these work i'll just have a tank full of java fern since i know i can grow that

 

[Ian H]

well the cycle seems to be going well so far

ammonia: between 1 and 2
nitrIte: 5 or possibly more
nitrAte: around 40 maybe a bit lower

i'm going to add some more ammonia tomorrow and hopfully that will get processed quicker again a bit worried on how high the nitrItes are but thats normal i guess for a tank in its cycle

 

[Jonno]

woah your cycle is going fast - did you seed it with some mature media?

 

[Ian H]

woah your cycle is going fast - did you seed it with some mature media?

nope all brand new equipment and some plants i thought it was going fast too!! ammonia is down to 0 so now im doing a huge water change as suggested and putting in my mature filter and fish

 

[joecoral]

woah your cycle is going fast - did you seed it with some mature media?

nope all brand new equipment and some plants i thought it was going fast too!! ammonia is down to 0 so now im doing a huge water change as suggested and putting in my mature filter and fish

wait for nitrite to reach 0 as well before adding fish don't forget! where abouts in south wales are you from?

 

[Jules H-T]

wait for nitrite to reach 0 as well before adding fish don't forget! where abouts in south wales are you from?

Ian has got a mature filter in another tank that is already handling all the bioload of the fish that are going to be moved. No reason to delay- in fact it is important that Ian does move all his fish at the same time as his filter.

Nice one on the thread Ian, and nice tank. Look forward to seeing it up and running.

Ps. Cardiff is my home town, seems this is a boyo's thread.

 

[Ian H]

awesome, more welsh people than i though! i'm from the hole that is pontypridd

The move took about 3 and a half hours, a good hour or two was emptied the old water!!

looks good now i think, hoping all the plants stay alive

everyone seems happy in there too poor clownloach looks so sad on his own, he's trying to dance with the corys

 

[joecoral]

wait for nitrite to reach 0 as well before adding fish don't forget! where abouts in south wales are you from?

Ian has got a mature filter in another tank that is already handling all the bioload of the fish that are going to be moved. No reason to delay- in fact it is important that Ian does move all his fish at the same time as his filter.

that's what i meant, move fish and filter at same time, just wait till both ammonia and nitrite are 0

Tank looking great with the fish in though! Do i see 3 filters in there?