Ideas For My 55 Gallon Tank.

[Snake42490]

Hey guys. well im coming to realize just by looking at my 55 gallon tank that i need to change the rock work. right now my fish are just starting to get there aggression towards each other and i can tell that the way i have my 4 rocks just isnt cutting it haha.. i want as many ideas as you guys can think. i would like to have a nice looking tank with some places to hide in. right now i have lava rock and limestone but it just seems like it would be weird adding more of these just how they look when you buy it. its not really meant for stacking i think.. so yeah

rock ideas. whats worked.
4 Red Zebras
4 Yellow Labs
4 Kenyi
6 Synodontis Petricola
1 Synodontis Eupterus
http/i103.photobucket.com/albums/m144/Sn...90/IMG_2055.jpg

 

[stang1]

Tufa rock is generally recommended for most Cichlid tanks as it helps raise the Ph. As it matures, it looks great and loses the pure white colour.
There should be a pinned thread with members pictures which will give you a better idea. Most Tufa rock is quite east to stack and with patience you should be able to get it nice and sturdy.

 

[Snake42490]

yeah ive been looking at all the pictures and stuff. im really not to worried about ph lol. our city water has a ph of 8.5 and i cant change it if i tried. i changed the rock setup around for the first time ever.. haha its really funny watching the fish. they seemed VeRY confused right now. all i can say is the kenyi are really showing there aggression right now. the red zebras are also. the yellow labs just took a rock in the corner to themselves haha. ill put some more pictures up and see if you guys think it looks any better than it did.

 

[WaterBender1995]

go to any landscaping place, you'll know them by the HUGE piles of gravel, sand, rock of all sizes.
I always took a wet sponge with me to wipe the river stone with so I could see the color of the rock when wet. then bring home and boil it in a big chili/bean pot, cool and stack how ever you like, your fish are needing piles like this to similulate the caves, nooks and cranies they like to hide in etc.

PS, when I looked at your picture, ALLL I saw was that ugly gray pipe glaring out at me. find some black tubing at a lfs and cover that up asap! it's yucky looking imo

 

[Snake42490]

haha. i completely agree with you on that one. i have been trying to figure out why rena would make such a great beautiful.. horrible looking pipe for there filters. good idea one the rocks. i will be checking that out tomorrow.

 

[parker313]

I definitely second that suggestion - that's where I got all of my rock today. They had whole collection containers full of a myriad of different types of rock. They gave me a nifty little wagon and I got to go out and choose any rock I wanted for only $.19/lb. It was actually fun! I came home, washed them all off and stacked 'em up. Our water here is pretty hard as well, plus I have aragonite sand, so I wasn't too worried about needing to find limestone, tuffa rock, or texas holey rock.

 

[Snake42490]

it seems whenver i want to do something the weather absolutely sucks haha.. its probably not a bad idea to go look at the rocks while its raining assuming they are outside?? never been to the rock place yet haha. well i added another huge piece of limestone to the tank and moved the rocks around giving way more room i think. im looking for my camera to see if you guys think it looks any better.. at least for now. crazy killer fish!

 

[dthoffsett]

If you google pictures of Lake Malawi, you'll see they live in huge boulder piles, and they seem to enjoy darting in and out of the various nooks and crannys. So, I'd just go check out the landscaping places, get a bunch of rocks and play around with stacking them. I've found it's easiest to use some string or something to mark out the perimeter of your tank on the floor, then arrange and rearrange until you get what you want. Then simply take a pic so you have something to refer to when placing the rocks in your tank. Having someone help makes for a faster set up as well. Good luck, and I'm looking forward to seeing what you come up with.

 

[Snake42490]

ok well this is what i did for now.. does it look any better then before?? i have some new rock but i dont think its what i exactly want.. we will see though

 

[dthoffsett]

ok well this is what i did for now.. does it look any better then before?? i have some new rock but i dont think its what i exactly want.. we will see though

Did you forget the picture?

 

[Snake42490]

i feel so smart right now

http/s103.photobucket.com/albums/m144/Sn...nt=IMG_3165.jpg

http/s103.photobucket.com/albums/m144/Sn...nt=IMG_3164.jpg

 

[Snake42490]

do you think i could add on from here or should i just bag all the limestone and lava rock with some other kind of rock?? im really up for anything allthough i love the looks of the lava and limestone rocks

 

[dthoffsett]

I'd definately add quite a bit more rock, you should have enough to stack them all. Wether or not you remove the rock you have in there is up to you.

 

[Snake42490]

ok so its starting to come time. i have some more questions now. im for sure going to swap out the limestone and lava rock and add some natural rock at our sand store.. i can get 5 gallon bucket filled with all the rocks i want for 5 dollars. so my question is. How many rocks can my 55 gallon tank handle? what kind of rock should i be looking for? how small how big? when i do get the rock. which will probably be next week.. not sure just because the hours really suck with school they are only open from 6 to noon.. so.. but yeah. when i get the rock what do i want to do with it to clean it? is it better to have sand or to have a natural rock for substrate? right now i have natural rock.. like in the pictures. second. should i be worried much about beneficial bacteria.. i know a lot of it is also on my substrate.. should i leave the stuff i have no in the tank while the new rock gets placed in.. or what? thanks seth

 

[Snake42490]

well.. i finally got my project done!! haha.. it took a while.. i cleaned every rock one by one................. that just sucked... does it look better than before?? i put a whole days work into doing it..

before
http/s103.photobucket.com/albums/m144/Sn...nt=IMG_3165.jpg

after

http/s103.photobucket.com/albums/m144/Sn...nt=IMG_3248.jpg