Hi, thanks for the welcome, as requested here are some pics of my aquarium from when I started at the beginning of May to present day. I do a 20% water chage every 2 weeks using Tetra AquaSafe, with weekly dosages of Easy Balance and Nitrate Minus.
First fish were 6 Yellow Tuxedo Platys, 3 male and 3 female, in hind sight I should have only got 1 male as I was unaware of there breeding tenacity.
A few more plants and a small temple.
As it is today, as the back of the aquarium is not against a wall, I tried making an A-symetrical view, with taller plants at each end going smaller in the middle. I intend to get rid of the plants on the right as they are really rubbish, they seem to break easy. I'll replace them with taller larger leafed plants to make for better hiding places.
I'll also be getting more clinging plants, I they they are pretty good, as well as the leaves being pretty close the top floats on the surface and I think I could do with some more floating plants for the Gouramis.
When my live bearers first bred I was unprepared for them and panicked and eneded up making a makeshift fry container, out of a used washed out curry tub, lol. Suffice it to say it was very successfull, then I went through a breeding tank but they escaped under the false bottom and out the vents. So I ended up getting a net. But after some advice from the local store I was told to leave it to natural selection so I do now and I still end up with loads of fry.
I've had a few deaths due to my inexperience, one major load were my Cardinal Tetras, I had 16 and they all died in the space of 3 days, I think it was a combination of high amonia and disease. All other deaths have been 1 at a time, I lost a couple of Mollies, and 3 Glowlight Tetras and 1 Armoured Shrimp. I had a couple of sickies, one of which I am glad to say I cured, unfortunately the other one died, that was one of the Mollies.
LIVE PLANTS - I have been making enquiries about converting to or even partially converting to live plants, but I was told that if I do then the air pump and airstones would be a redundent feature, as I only purchased them about a month ago I think I will leave that for another time. I was going to use plant pellet food along with Tetra PlantaMin. I'm really tempted to have a go at aquascaping, but considering it is already set up I'll have to think hard about what I will do, something loads of hiding places definitely.
ALGAE - I do get algae growth, but I wouldn't say it is out of control, at least I don't think so. While it grows on everything, my snails and plecs seem to take care of alot of it. Some leaves on the plants do get abit furry, and I was thinkng of using some sort of Algae growth treatment, but advice from the local store said he dosn't like using anything else other than the normal water quality treaments so I didn't bother. This was another reason why I wanted to convert to live plants as well, as they would help control that as well.
Mick
