Our Lovely Riccia Carpet

[Bex]

Well, after reading the pinned topic on how to make a lovely riccia carpet on slate, we thought we'd give it a go. We let it grow in some tank water for a week, spread it out nicely on our piece of slate, tied it down tightly with a hair net and some cotton. Sit back and watch it grow.

No.

Came home from work the next day and checked on the fisheys. "what's all this in the tank?" I thought. Looked down and the slate was bald!!! Hardly any left on the slate. All floating in our tank!!!

While I'm standing there, a naughty mollie came and ripped out a large lump of what was left and spat it out! Didn't even eat it! Now we have one hell of a mess in our tank. This stuff is really hard to get out once it is floating all over the place.

Really wanted a nice patch of grass in our tank but not sure whether we should try it again due to all the mess it made.

Any suggestions on how to keep it down and stop the fish ripping it up? The said mollie has now been evicted to our smaller tank but it might not just have been him.

 

[smithrc]

lol - Our bristle noses kept doing this

it should all float o the surface.. then net it and try again

 

[Bloo]

Yep - afraid that's what will happen with some bottom dwellers

One BIG word of warning though - especially with catfish with spikey fins etc: they can get stuck !

This twice happened to my catfish. Both times they had to be cut free from the net - and this took around 10 minutes. They were completely wrapped up in the net - despite being pulled ultra tight across the slate and riccia. Beware !

 

[Neal]

I found that out today, my bristlenose got caught in some cotton on my slate, and he'd pulled it tight around him and it was stuck in it's ( cant remember what they are called *embarrased* , where they breathe, i've forgot and my minds gone blank). I think it may have cut into him but i'm not sure, I had to cut the cotton, lift him out of the water and then pull it off him, he didn't struggle or anything. I thought he was dead actually but when I put him back into my main tank, he swam off to the filter where my bristlies usually hide.

Neal

 

[pseud]

^ gills?

My pearl gourami got caught in a hairnet. I didn't think she was gonna survive, but she made it!

 

[Neal]

That's the one, lmao, how pathetic am I! Anyway, it looked like he was bleeding but it was probably just his gills pulled back, i'm gonna go check on him now.

Neal

 

[Bex]

Blimey! Never thought about that happening! We pulled the net really tight as well.

Ok, well, I think we will give it another go. It was a bugger to net out though as we have a lot of circulation going in our tank cos of the hot weather and it was just all over the place. Even when we turned the flow right down it took forever.

I will give it one more go. Have to go get some more riccia though as what we salvaged wasn't enough to cover the slate.

I will bear in mind the fisheys getting caught up in it!

Cheers guys!