A tale of 4 tanks

[Wills]

So once the wood is completely obscured am I allowed to call it Dutch style
I am actually at a cross road now. I have enough Ludwigia to split and completely cover the left zone. So far I have intentionally left some bare sand to allow the pygmy cories some space. But in practice they love foraging through the undergrowth. In fact when the lights are out you could easily think the tank only contains boraras as (at times) everything else is hidden in the foliage

If the left side looked like the right that would be Dutch for me haha. You could fill that front left corner with S.Repens which would look cool but would fill the substrate for your cories bet they will still snuffle through the forest though haha

 

[AilyNC]

Gorgeous as ever. #4 is my favourite tank, the shape of the tank is great & it's looking amazing.

 

[seangee]

And then there were 2.
Its been a bit of a tough time for the tanks recently. At the back end of '23 I shattered my right shoulder blade and broke 5 ribs so for a long time minimal (probably much less than minimal) water changes and feeding was all I could manage and no plant or other maintenance. Then towards the end of '24 I got a new job which would be 100% home based so I treated myself to a powered stand-up desk. That meant the Office Space tank had to go, the inhabitents were relocated to the Flex and are happily co-existing with the shrimps. It was my Covid project and lived on my desk. Around the same time we planned a new floor for the downstairs of the house because of water damage - not fish tank related so I relocated the big community tank to my office which was unaffected.
Next to go was Thai Wonder. That one I bought as an emergency tank when my Sids started shredding the fins of my tetras - but I no longer have the Sids. I took that one down last night. Here is a pic from last week. The lambchops and BN have moved into the big tank. Here is the final pic of that one taken a few weeks ago. I also moved the HOB into the big tank to increase water flow at the surface.

The lambchops and cardinals make a really good mix although I can no longer call it my SA community. The BN is having a field day on the glass in her new home
The lid for the community tank has been a bit of a pain ever since I swapped out the light for an Aquasky so I finally created a new one that turned out rather well.

Since I was buying acrylic anyway I got a few extra strips - 2 to use as dividers in the substrate and 1 to create a baffle on the surface so that I can go back to having a darks side and a light side.
Things to do at tonights WC

• Stick the surface baffle in and move the frogbit to one side (above the anubias). I threw out the original anubias as there was a lot of BBA on them. Also I foolishly boiled the wood they were stuck to when I set up the tank around 10 years ago so it was starting to decompose quite badly. I just moved over what was in the tank I took down.
• Trim the spray bar so that it sits horizontally. I put the HOB back in last night and it looks a bit weird
• Replace the card backing on the rear wall

Things to do soon

• Replant the centre section. I cut everything back and removed loads but its quite tatty. I want to ensure the tank is stable and the added fish well are settled before I remove that volume of plant mass
• Top up the sand
• Wait for the frogbit to grow. I am finally clear of duckweed
• Top up the substrate
• Throw out the 20G - I've already caught myself thinking about things I could use it for

Here it is today

For now I think I will keep the flex but haven't decided on its future. Current thoughts are

• Keep it as is (ember tetras and neos) but give it a makeover
• Turn it into a shrimp only tank, move the embers into the big one and add caridinia - along with a makeover
• Turn it into a coral garden (SW)

 

[seangee]

Things to do at tonights WC

• Stick the surface baffle in and move the frogbit to one side (above the anubias). I threw out the original anubias as there was a lot of BBA on them. Also I foolishly boiled the wood they were stuck to when I set up the tank around 10 years ago so it was starting to decompose quite badly. I just moved over what was in the tank I took down.
• Trim the spray bar so that it sits horizontally. I put the HOB back in last night and it looks a bit weird
• Replace the card backing on the rear wall

For tonight I'll have to accept two out of three. The baffle did not stay stuck but I have a temp fix in place and will tackle later.
Also noticed that I should replace the blue film backing on the left with plain black card. You don't actually notice it in the flesh, but I don't have to move the tank again to get to it

Excuse the bubbles and mucky hand prints

 

[connorlindeman]

Theres something about neons that keeps calling me back. Your pictures make me want to get a big shoal for my 40g.

 

[seangee]

Wow the little BN has been busy. 48 hours later and the glass is chrystal clear. I've never had a problem with algae on the glass, although if you looked hard enough you could always find some. I only occasionally wipe the front wall with a sponge which means the tank looked very slightly dull (biofilm), but still good enough that everyone who comes in says it looks great. Suddenly it looks like a brand new tank - she's even cleaned the heater for me. I guess that's the difference with having a young one. Old Billy who was pushing 20 when he checked out was quite content to wait for the food to come to him . No doubt some will say its because she's a girl

Please note I'm not suggesting you rush out and buy a bristlenose to sort out your algae problems - getting the balance right is the fishkeepers responsibility and I don't think of anything in my tank as a worker. But its cool when everything works together, and I do love low maintenance.

 

[seangee]

Lots more bubbles and cloudy water, I have been ripping out and replanting
This time I am going to have some distinct patches of bare ground. So a row of ambulia along the left side and back 2/3s growing to the surface. Then a box of hygrophila siamensis 53b going up to half way. I'll plant one more row when I rip out the rest of the h.costata. I'm thinking of trying alternanthera rosaefolia in the gap between the box and the "dark side". Not sure how this will work out. In the past I was only successful with this in the office space tank. When I broke that one down I planted a couple of leaves in the nano and they are doing well in there, and ready to be split.
You can now see my surface baffle. This allowed me to drop the water level a bit. My temporary solution was to use the centre brace to keep the frogbit in the right half - but that meant I only had a 5mm leeway on the water height and plants were able to sneak under it. Most of the fish are not bothered by it but it did confuse the pencil fish initially. They seem to have got used to the idea now. Surprisingly her ladyship (the BN) is quite relaxed by all the changes. Old Billy the bulldozer used to go bonkers every time I changed anything and unchanged it for me .
I have removed the blue backing from the left side but not yet replaced it with black card. I kept it in place with silicone and can't easily access it yet to clean it off because the 20G is still next to it. No filter or heating but the lights are still on because that's where I am harvesting the h.siamensis cuttings from. Oh and I removed the flap from the feeding hole. It was designed for desks and was quite tricky to open and close with the moisture - and a bit small. I also removed the horizontal heater and put in a second eheim. This was an emergency purchase cheapie Amazon Chinese heater when the previous one died on Christmas Eve about 8 years ago. I really did not expect it to last this long but it was still working - although probably quite ineffective because the outer case was full of MTS.
I plan to finish the renovation at the weekend and then its just a case of waiting for stuff to grow. I'm still calling it low maintenance because its 6 years since its last makeover

 

[seangee]

And everything is in place. Hopefully I just need to let the dust settle and wait for stuff to grow. I caught her ladyship cleaning the alternanthera rosaefolia leaves for me, but she was remarkably gentle and hasn't uprooted anything (yet!). When I moved the HOB I literally turned it off and shifted it 3' to the right and left it attached to the smart plug. The cardinals have already learnt that when the waterfall stops it means that food is about to drop from the sky and all go rushing to the surface as soon as I hit the "feed tanks" button on my phone

 

[AquaBarb]

And everything is in place. Hopefully I just need to let the dust settle and wait for stuff to grow. I caught her ladyship cleaning the alternanthera rosaefolia leaves for me, but she was remarkably gentle and hasn't uprooted anything (yet!). When I moved the HOB I literally turned it off and shifted it 3' to the right and left it attached to the smart plug. The cardinals have already learnt that when the waterfall stops it means that food is about to drop from the sky and all go rushing to the surface as soon as I hit the "feed tanks" button on my phone

View attachment 363229

Still remember this tank with the jungle canopy of frogbit looking good

 

[seangee]

Still remember this tank with the jungle canopy of frogbit looking good

Eventually it turned a bit too jungle for my liking so I'm starting again. Less plants this time so I can stay on top of it. I won't do any splitting and only use cuttings to replace rather than spread. And I want the frogbit back now that the duckweed has finally gone. I will stick some anubias onto the ceramic pipe. That;s strategically placed because its where the water hits when I do a W/C. Tested today and does a great job, zero mess after adding 120 litres from the top.
I have also ordered an Aponogeton. As its no longer an SA tank I don't have to worry that its out of place . Yeah yeah - I know anubias isn't either, but everyone needs some of that!

 

[AquaBarb]

Eventually it turned a bit too jungle for my liking so I'm starting again. Less plants this time so I can stay on top of it. I won't do any splitting and only use cuttings to replace rather than spread. And I want the frogbit back now that the duckweed has finally gone. I will stick some anubias onto the ceramic pipe. That;s strategically placed because its where the water hits when I do a W/C. Tested today and does a great job, zero mess after adding 120 litres from the top.
I have also ordered an Aponogeton. As its no longer an SA tank I don't have to worry that its out of place . Yeah yeah - I know anubias isn't either, but everyone needs some of that!

"duckweed" dam nightmare! Im doing the same, just re scaped my 180 over the weekend and ordered some frogbit hoping for the best ive terminated the DW for good.

Plants are looking good, the rosaefolia gives a nice pop and your anubias is growing well

You adding any hardscape? Driftwood or rock etc

 

[seangee]

"duckweed" dam nightmare! Im doing the same, just re scaped my 180 over the weekend and ordered some frogbit hoping for the best ive terminated the DW for good.

Plants are looking good, the rosaefolia gives a nice pop and your anubias is growing well

You adding any hardscape? Driftwood or rock etc

Not for now. There is already some wood out of sight. I'm toying with a terrace along the back but I want to see how this works out.