Life Of A 16 Gallon Freshwater Community Aquarium

[FISH-FRY]

Here are pictures and a short or two of my 16 gallon freshwater community aquarium through various stages of it's life.

If you don't approve of my methods then keep your opinions to yourselves and don't hijack my thread...Nothing to see here, move along.


Week 0 - 3 Neon Tetra added

Week 1 - 3 more Neon Tetra added

Week 2 - 2 Panda Corydora added



Week 3 - 4 Red Cherry Shrimp and 1 Siamese Algae Eater added

Week 4 - 2 more Panda Corydora, 3 Harlequin Rasbora and 1 Tracked Nerite Snail added

Week 5 - 3 more Harlequin Rasbora added and final stocking achieved

Week 6 - About a dozen shrimplets are brave and big enough to roam about. Lots of Corydora eggs have been noted along with some Tetra eggs. Time will tell if I get to see their fry.

 

[Jonty]

Nice piece of wood/root. I'm guessing you cycled your tank?

 

[josh lock]

that tank is really nice. very well landscaped

 

[RadaR]

I'm guessing you cycled your tank?

I hope it was before "week 0".
Otherwise that's too many fish in such a short amount of time.

 

[Sean W.]

i think it looks amazing!
















....but it needs a background

 

[FISH-FRY]

Thanks for the comments! I used wood replicas because I didn't want to alter the water chemistry or have that "fish peed in the tank" look.

I'm not big on backgrounds and will wait for the plants to grow and fill in the back. It may take a while since I don't feed the plants and rely on the Flourite and inhabitants to do the work. I also use less than 1W per gallon of light, 10 hours daily.

Week 7 - My filter was making noise so I decided to see if it was clogged. I found 21 live shrimplets, 1 dead one and an exoskeleton in there! I also found what appeared to be two Nerite snail eggs that are no longer around today along with three new ones that showed up today. I don't expect anything to happen with them because they apparently require a marine environment to survive. I saw one tiny snail yesterday and not sure where it came from since it's been over 3 weeks since I introduced the last plant and I rinsed and checked it for hitchhikers. It was about 1mm in size and really could not tell what kind it was. The Corydora continue to lay eggs but no fry have been noted. The eggs hang around a few days and then are gone. I haven't seen anything remotely interested in them either.

 

[fishmad135]

Really nice tank, i to am not a fan of backgrounds and i think it will look really good when plants have grown up the back.

nice tank

 

[FISH-FRY]

Week 8 - The one small snail I saw is still around and likes to keep it low and hides a lot. The family saw a larger, darker colored snail but no pics were snapped since I wasn't around to see it. I'm still on the look out for it. Doing 2 week ~20% water changes and will shoot for 3 weeks at the next interval. Things are going well and will probably post monthly pics since it's much of the same.

Really nice tank, i to am not a fan of backgrounds and i think it will look really good when plants have grown up the back.

nice tank

Thanks. I'm going to see how much thicker the floater will get and may play with planting some along the back to see how it looks.

 

[FISH-FRY]

3 Months - The two tiny snails I saw look like Ramshorn Snails and the other snail the family saw turned out to be two Bladder Snails. I'm leaving them be since they don't appear to be doing any harm to plants. I don't know how many RCS I have (at least 30 or so) but I did see one of the females berried yesterday. Oh my! It will only get worse as the young females come of age.

I rearranged the Tropical Hornwort because it was getting out of hand up top. I wrapped pieces under the tree trunk and it looks like I'll have to get creative again because it's starting to take over again. The Java Moss has been shredded by different creatures. I notice parts all over the place and I'm not too concerned as long as it's growing and not clogging up my filter.

I'm at week 3 today of no water change and I'm too tired to change it so I'll wait until tomorrow. The parameters appear fine so there's no real worry. I'm trying to get to at least monthly water changes but I'd like to do one at 3 weeks before I shoot for monthly goal.

This was week 10 before I moved the Hornwort around

This was week 11 after I moved the Hornwort

This was at 3 Months

 

[FISH-FRY]

It's been a while so here are a few updates.

Got rid of the SAE because he always chased the Rasboras away during feeding time. The SAE also liked eating the hornwort making it look pretty bad. The SAE was intimidated by the Pandas. The Rasboras now like to chase the Neons at times but nothing like the SAE. I now have three Otocinclus and no algae, but not like I had any after the initial setup.

Ramshorn and Bladder snails snuck in with the hornwort. I've seen up to six Ramshorns at once but don't recall seeing any recently. The Bladder snails may have knocked them off since they were spreading rapidly for a while but now I don't see as many as before.

The RCS are breeding like crazy and often find at least a dozen or so in the filter when cleaning. I've actually witnessed the Rasboras eating smaller ones whole with their big mouths. That's okay since it keeps the population down.

I've found that 6 to 7 weeks is about max I can go between cleaning and water cycling. My filter cartridges don't do well after rinsing them so I'm just replacing them every 6 weeks (rated at 4-6 weeks anyway) and it will cost less than $19 a year so it's no biggie...well worth the money rather than trying to rinse the filth off.




This was last month @ 6 months prior to a cleaning. Since then I've trimmed down the hornwort and thinking about getting rid of it because the needles make a mess.

 

[water_boy]

really lovely tank my friend, im a big fan of the planted look and also a nice stock list, not to dissimilar to some of mine

 

[~T~]

If you don't approve of my methods then keep your opinions to yourselves and don't hijack my thread...Nothing to see here, move along.

That's not really how a forum works mate

Great looking tank though I agree looks better without the background, im not a fan of them either they look so cheap. Hornwart grows like mad eh?