stang1
A smile costs nothing :)
Money only burns holes in your pocket so you may as well spend it!
Broke My Livebearer Cherry! (lots Of Pics)
- Thread starter DevUK
- Start date
Money only burns holes in your pocket so you may as well spend it!
OP
OP
DevUK
UKAPS member
I spent a lot of yesterday cleaning out an old tank that has been sitting with murky water in it for several months, and cleaning out an old boyu external mini filter which was a bit gunky too. Then, washing sand/gravel, tieing moss and arranging wood. Anywho, after about 4 or 5 hours of toil, this is what I have to show for it:
Tank is 60x30x30cm making it ~54 litres. Just using plain silver sand and pea gravel (will be adding tropica root tabs when crypts go in).
Fish are the Snakeskins from above, but I've added 4 dwarf platties (so cute!) and 5 redline rasbora. The rasbora don't have much colour on them as yet but hopefully when they've settled and grown a bit it will come.
My plan is to fill the front right out by planting some crypts (wendtii, Parva, maybe undulata) along the edge of the wood strategically. I also want to plant some anubias sp. in the nooks. Hopefully the fern at the back will straighten out and grow how I want it. I also hope to plant some Crypt balansae in the back corner to give a nice long leaved flow effect..
I'll be adding some sylvia natans floating plants, and have them in the far left. Hopedfully this will give a shaded hiding spot with the roots that grow down. My worry is I don't have enough light for them though, but I guess I'll find out!
The basic idea is to have the long leaves flowing from right to left towards the open space.
(oh, excuse the moss, its just there as a bit of floating cover, though the dwarf platties have been eating the odd bit of hair algae off of it
)
Tank is 60x30x30cm making it ~54 litres. Just using plain silver sand and pea gravel (will be adding tropica root tabs when crypts go in).
Fish are the Snakeskins from above, but I've added 4 dwarf platties (so cute!) and 5 redline rasbora. The rasbora don't have much colour on them as yet but hopefully when they've settled and grown a bit it will come.
My plan is to fill the front right out by planting some crypts (wendtii, Parva, maybe undulata) along the edge of the wood strategically. I also want to plant some anubias sp. in the nooks. Hopefully the fern at the back will straighten out and grow how I want it. I also hope to plant some Crypt balansae in the back corner to give a nice long leaved flow effect..
I'll be adding some sylvia natans floating plants, and have them in the far left. Hopedfully this will give a shaded hiding spot with the roots that grow down. My worry is I don't have enough light for them though, but I guess I'll find out!
The basic idea is to have the long leaves flowing from right to left towards the open space.
(oh, excuse the moss, its just there as a bit of floating cover, though the dwarf platties have been eating the odd bit of hair algae off of it
)
helterskelter
Livebearer Specilest
Looking good Dev and good to see the fish are setteling well.
OP
OP
DevUK
UKAPS member
Lost one of the dwarf platties overnight It developed a white bottom lip which looked a bit damaged. Fairly sure it wasn't cotton mouth, didn't look fuzzy or anything. Poor little guy/girl. I hope the single platty fry I've found so far survives!
It developed a white bottom lip which looked a bit damaged. Fairly sure it wasn't cotton mouth, didn't look fuzzy or anything. Poor little guy/girl. I hope the single platty fry I've found so far survives!
invader
I'm a girl.
Those little platties are nice! Just out of curiosity, how can you tell the difference between a regular platty and a dwarf? 
invader
I'm a girl.
Now that I've seen that picture of Gill's, I think my lfs has them! Too bad I don't have a tank for them. One day!Those little platties are nice! Just out of curiosity, how can you tell the difference between a regular platty and a dwarf?
They are really quite cute, scooting up and down the glass as they seem to be doing. Its been discussed over in the livebearer section here.
OP
OP
DevUK
UKAPS member
Well, I spent 3 hours yesterday seperating off and planting Eleocharis (hair grass)!
Heres a pic of the new Endler tank now (former Guppy tank from last week!):
I bought the hair grass from a garden centre for £2. The pot is about 4" square and I've used about 5% of it for what you see in the photo! It took about 3 hours to seperate off enough hair grass and plant it, and its not finished
I've got some HC on its way so I will re-plant some of the eleocharis towards the back and make room for the HC up front. I hope it grows!
Heres a pic of the new Endler tank now (former Guppy tank from last week!):
I bought the hair grass from a garden centre for £2. The pot is about 4" square and I've used about 5% of it for what you see in the photo! It took about 3 hours to seperate off enough hair grass and plant it, and its not finished
I've got some HC on its way so I will re-plant some of the eleocharis towards the back and make room for the HC up front. I hope it grows!
invader
I'm a girl.
WOW! It's beautiful!Well, I spent 3 hours yesterday seperating off and planting Eleocharis (hair grass)!
Heres a pic of the new Endler tank now (former Guppy tank from last week!):
I bought the hair grass from a garden centre for £2. The pot is about 4" square and I've used about 5% of it for what you see in the photo! It took about 3 hours to seperate off enough hair grass and plant it, and its not finished
I've got some HC on its way so I will re-plant some of the eleocharis towards the back and make room for the HC up front. I hope it grows!
Seeing your tanks has inspired me to change my 125gl. I'm switching to black sand and getting branchyer (made up word) wood, instead of such bulky wood (as seen below).
OP
OP
DevUK
UKAPS member
WOW! It's beautiful!
Seeing your tanks has inspired me to change my 125gl. I'm switching to black sand and getting branchyer (made up word) wood, instead of such bulky wood (as seen below).
Thanks
The gravel in there is actually Eco-Complete substrate for plants. I have some Hagen natural black river sand (more like fine gravel) in my main tank which is a sort of dark grey colour and I think looks excellent, see below for a pic I like your tank, its huge! Branchyer wood can be expensive, the pieces in the pic below cost about £50, the two older, darker pieces were from Aqua Essentials and cost £30 I think (listed as "Large redmoor wood" - they sent 2 pieces instead of one cos I asked for specific shapes). The other lighter/redder one is from my LFS and cost £16. They had it labelled up as "Redwood". The bulkier looking pieces in the guppy tank are Sumatran wood and Maidenhead aquatics seem to stock this (supplied by a distributer called Unipac).
Anyhow, pic of my big tank (47gal):
OP
OP
DevUK
UKAPS member
I have endler fry!! I only see 1 so far, and the females don't really look like they are in the middle of dropping. I think it may have been dropped yesterday after a water change, one of the females was stressed out.
OP
OP
DevUK
UKAPS member
I like how you sneak that in a small font!
I count 2 now
Again, not sure if she's birthing now or if I just didn't spot the second one before, they're so small!
Gill
Store Manager Coalville Aquatics
I like how you sneak that in a small font!
I count 2 now
I did tell you on the Moby that he had some and I would buy all that I could find in the tank.
If I had the Money I would have bought that Huge peice of 3foot Bogwood he has ATM
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