damienford
Mostly New Member
hi, ive decided to show some of my tanks off starting with my biggest tank, its 600lt and the stock is some what mixed but after a year of holding the current stock there all happy helthy and full of them selfs
so the tank its self is a home made tank, stand and hood ( lurnt a lot of things doing it and even now im still changing things) so the tank is 5ft long, 2ft wide and 2ft6" tall, made from 12mm thick plate glass with a 25mm thick bottem (3 layers of glass sealed together for added strength) for lighting ive used 1000k led multy colour LED strips for a dull lighting and to change the colour, then i have a 4ft T8 plant bulb along side 2x 2ft t8 tropical blue bulbs all on timers
the hood its self im curantly working on making a new one due to degsine flaws of my 1st one as i only thort i would need a small feeding hatch, i soon discovered that the lid needs a large opening just for day to day stuff
the tank has a fine gravel bottem ( even tho i have been advised agenst it, ill come on to that later tho) there is aprox 15kg of bogwood over 3 peaces all piled up one side and about 10 kg of ocean rock and about another 5-10 of mixed rock (slate, lava, tufa, marbel ect) and a few plants ( not many they all like eating them )
so the reasion i have grevel rather than sand is becouse of a few diff factors
1 the plecos loved the sand that much i was having to clean the filters daly and smoth it out after they finished digging throgh it only for them to get strat back to digging
2 becouse of the size of the tank and me not thinking when i built it, ive had to add an under gravel to the system to add filtration ( dident think about adding a sump and only enuff space for 1 set of pipes of canister filter)
3 although geo's are earth eaters and use substrate to clean there gills ive found with the fine gravel i have in there it dose just of good a job and becouse its gravel i can put live food into the gravel for them
4 i can put food into the gravel for them
5 i personly think having gravel is cleaner than sand espechily with an undergravel
the tanks ph has held of over a year at 6.8 and runs at a constent 26.5c
the fish stock list
1 geophagus simasusis
1 geophagus brisalenis
7 geophagus tapajos
1 geophagus abalos
1 frountosa
1 rainbow cichlid
1 striped talking catfish
2 spotted talking catfish
1 common pleco
1 gibby pleco
1 snowball pleco
5 clown loach
2 banded groumai
1 large male angelfish
4 wild angelfish
2 bala/silver sharks
1 (dont laugh) goldfish
also in there are breading pairs of :
golden saums
jack dempseys
keyhole cichlids
much to everybodys suprise having very large plecos in there hasent stopped things breading like crazy my lfs has actuly ran out of room becouse of the amount of jd's ive took down once and the golden saum seam to get the egg laying right look after them till hatching then just loose intrest and abanden the nest, at 1st i thort if could be becouse of the other fish in the tank but it was the same story when i seprated them out to there own tank so they got put back to the big tank
i know it dose sound like alot of fish but most are not fully grown yet, but they all have there own space and hiding spots there all feeding well and there is no agression in the tank maybe a little spat every now and then at feeding time but other than that there all happy
as for the other tank i have in the living room its a small 2ftx1ftx1ft3" tank just full of live barers a cupple others
they include
2 honey groumai *
2 clownloach ( to small for big tank atm) *
2 angel fish - 1 platinum, 1 koi/striped mix ( to soft to last in the big tank so had to move them )
10 neon tetra
5+ guppy *
5+ platty
3 sword tails *
1 lyre tail ( i think mollie not 100%) *
2 mollies *
5 peppered corys *
1 bronze cory
1 albino bn pleco
1 rubber nose pleco *
1 tiger pleco
50+ commen snails
50+ trumpit snails ( the clownloaches were put in there to solve the snail poblem)
i know this tank in very over stocked atm but we resqued all the ones with an * form belive it of not a cookie jar with an air line so there in the 2ft till we fix up the 6ft tank for them all, its not my fave tank, its not even well sorted out but, it was inherated from my gf grandad when he passed away so we have kept it as he had it with ruffly the same stock ( i hate the bright coloured gravel and internal filters but thats how she wonts to keep it and i get it)
ph of 6.7
temp of 29.5
there is also a maliwi set up in the bedroom and i have a snakehead tank set up in the kitchen
i would like to welcome your comments to what could be done to improve these setups
so the tank its self is a home made tank, stand and hood ( lurnt a lot of things doing it and even now im still changing things) so the tank is 5ft long, 2ft wide and 2ft6" tall, made from 12mm thick plate glass with a 25mm thick bottem (3 layers of glass sealed together for added strength) for lighting ive used 1000k led multy colour LED strips for a dull lighting and to change the colour, then i have a 4ft T8 plant bulb along side 2x 2ft t8 tropical blue bulbs all on timers
the hood its self im curantly working on making a new one due to degsine flaws of my 1st one as i only thort i would need a small feeding hatch, i soon discovered that the lid needs a large opening just for day to day stuff
the tank has a fine gravel bottem ( even tho i have been advised agenst it, ill come on to that later tho) there is aprox 15kg of bogwood over 3 peaces all piled up one side and about 10 kg of ocean rock and about another 5-10 of mixed rock (slate, lava, tufa, marbel ect) and a few plants ( not many they all like eating them )
so the reasion i have grevel rather than sand is becouse of a few diff factors
1 the plecos loved the sand that much i was having to clean the filters daly and smoth it out after they finished digging throgh it only for them to get strat back to digging
2 becouse of the size of the tank and me not thinking when i built it, ive had to add an under gravel to the system to add filtration ( dident think about adding a sump and only enuff space for 1 set of pipes of canister filter)
3 although geo's are earth eaters and use substrate to clean there gills ive found with the fine gravel i have in there it dose just of good a job and becouse its gravel i can put live food into the gravel for them
4 i can put food into the gravel for them
5 i personly think having gravel is cleaner than sand espechily with an undergravel
the tanks ph has held of over a year at 6.8 and runs at a constent 26.5c
the fish stock list
1 geophagus simasusis
1 geophagus brisalenis
7 geophagus tapajos
1 geophagus abalos
1 frountosa
1 rainbow cichlid
1 striped talking catfish
2 spotted talking catfish
1 common pleco
1 gibby pleco
1 snowball pleco
5 clown loach
2 banded groumai
1 large male angelfish
4 wild angelfish
2 bala/silver sharks
1 (dont laugh) goldfish
also in there are breading pairs of :
golden saums
jack dempseys
keyhole cichlids
much to everybodys suprise having very large plecos in there hasent stopped things breading like crazy my lfs has actuly ran out of room becouse of the amount of jd's ive took down once and the golden saum seam to get the egg laying right look after them till hatching then just loose intrest and abanden the nest, at 1st i thort if could be becouse of the other fish in the tank but it was the same story when i seprated them out to there own tank so they got put back to the big tank
i know it dose sound like alot of fish but most are not fully grown yet, but they all have there own space and hiding spots there all feeding well and there is no agression in the tank maybe a little spat every now and then at feeding time but other than that there all happy
as for the other tank i have in the living room its a small 2ftx1ftx1ft3" tank just full of live barers a cupple others
they include
2 honey groumai *
2 clownloach ( to small for big tank atm) *
2 angel fish - 1 platinum, 1 koi/striped mix ( to soft to last in the big tank so had to move them )
10 neon tetra
5+ guppy *
5+ platty
3 sword tails *
1 lyre tail ( i think mollie not 100%) *
2 mollies *
5 peppered corys *
1 bronze cory
1 albino bn pleco
1 rubber nose pleco *
1 tiger pleco
50+ commen snails
50+ trumpit snails ( the clownloaches were put in there to solve the snail poblem)
i know this tank in very over stocked atm but we resqued all the ones with an * form belive it of not a cookie jar with an air line so there in the 2ft till we fix up the 6ft tank for them all, its not my fave tank, its not even well sorted out but, it was inherated from my gf grandad when he passed away so we have kept it as he had it with ruffly the same stock ( i hate the bright coloured gravel and internal filters but thats how she wonts to keep it and i get it)
ph of 6.7
temp of 29.5
there is also a maliwi set up in the bedroom and i have a snakehead tank set up in the kitchen
i would like to welcome your comments to what could be done to improve these setups
