The Loach Motel, Under Construction

[tophat665]

Th'other week, I bought a 20 gallon set up with 7 assorted Loaches in it. 2 Weather Loaches, 1 Pallid Sand Loach, an Angelicus, a Yoyo, and 3 Striatas. I did the math and realized that the tank was overstocked from the get go, and that I was going to need more Yoyos and Angelicus to keep them happy, and that was going to take a lot of real estate. After Looking for a couple of weeks, I found a fellow unloading a 50 gallon breeder with the works for a reasonable price, so I brought it home, set it up, and started landscaping.

Here it is:

Pardon my crappy foto-skillz and sub-par camera.

It's got 10" Bubble wands buried under the pebbles to the left and across the back right (you can see the check valve). I'll be filling in the plants with cuttings from my other tanks over the course of this month. Right now, there are six feeder guppies in there cycling the tank.

Here are some closer shots:

The plantings to the left. I'm going to add a bunch more wisteria in the back left, and Cabomba and Hygro across the back, and a couple more of those nice crypts in front of that. You cant see from this angle, but theres a little beach in front of the crypt for staging bloodworms and such. Hoping that the java moss I have going on that red shale will turn into a nice little lawn.

Half flowerpots buried in the substrate. Again, you cant see the beach from the angle, but it's fine sand mostly in front of the pots. Going to try and encourage saggitaria to grow around that big rock, and transplant some Swords from other tanks in front of the filter intake.

At the moment, the lighting is a 34" t-12 and a 20" t-12. (18 & 30 watts, I think, both 5500K). The lights are on separate timers, with the smaller on half an hour more on each end of the cycle. The light cycle is 13 hours, counting a 2 hour algae rest in the middle. Substrate is play sand, followed by white gravel in the back, followed by Fluorite in places to be planted, pebbles over unplanted areas, then tan spectrastone gravel over the fluorite. Filters are an Emperor 280 and and old school Penguin 3 (I think). I am going to dose with Kent Fertilizers, but I am going to skip the CO2 in favor of running bubble curtains for the loaches to play in. If the plants have trouble, I'll start feeding them Excel.

What do you think? Am I going to have some happy loaches?

 

[n3ont3tra]

Wow, that sounds cool! Are you goiong to put any other fish in the tank?

 

[tophat665]

Wow, that sounds cool! Are you goiong to put any other fish in the tank?

I am undecided on that. The Striatas, the Yoyo, and the Angelicus (Botia kubotai, to remove any ambiguity) all do best in groups of at least 3, preferably 5. Ditto this particular species of sand loach, I think. (Nemacheilus pallidus)

For now, I am going to try and add two more yoyo's and two more angelicus. The Loach shaped loaches are all about 2" at the moment, so that gives the plants in the tank time to get well enough established to take on the larger bioload. Ideally I'd like to have 5 each of those, 3 of the sand loaches, the 2 Dojos, and a school of 6 or so smaller, peaceful barbs, like rubies. As is, though, I may end up putting in either 3 or 4 SAEs (if I can find them) or a male and a couple of female American-flag Fish (if I can find them), or, if worse comes to worse, a trio of sword tails (all for algae control, and I know, swordtails like harder water than loaches). And, in any case, that's really pushing it.

I already have a shoal of 5 striata in my 55, and I may add the three from this tank too. Really haven't gotten it scanned yet.

 

[BBrain]

Looking really good! I like the moss-covered half-pot caves. And I LOVE the photo of the Nemacheilus pallidus! Handsome fish!

One question. Have you run long bubble wands in a planted tank before? I haven't, but I recently saw a tank with a long bubble wand, and it developed a terrible algae problem. I understand that aeration drives CO2 out of the water, which the higher plants need to stay growing well. But algae then have an advantage over the higher plants, because they can sequester their carbon needs out of the water's minerals....which leads to an algae bloom.

If it's current you want for the loaches, how about a powerhead or two, with no aeration?

 

[tophat665]

Looking really good! I like the moss-covered half-pot caves. And I LOVE the photo of the Nemacheilus pallidus! Handsome fish!

One question. Have you run long bubble wands in a planted tank before? I haven't, but I recently saw a tank with a long bubble wand, and it developed a terrible algae problem. I understand that aeration drives CO2 out of the water, which the higher plants need to stay growing well. But algae then have an advantage over the higher plants, because they can sequester their carbon needs out of the water's minerals....which leads to an algae bloom.

If it's current you want for the loaches, how about a powerhead or two, with no aeration?

I have only run a bubbler after lights out in a planted tank, with CO2 injection during the "day". I have never (not in 20 years anyway) run one all the time in a planted tank.

I wanted the bubblewalls more for the look than anything else. I had not planned on adding any CO2 to the tank, as I had figured on it being driven out in the same way it would be driven out of a river tank, but I had considered using Flourish Excel if I get an algae problem. That adds the bioavailable carbon in a way that the higher plants can use, and, it is my understanding (though not my sure knowledge) in a form that surface agitation won't drive out of solution.

Correct me if I err on that last point, please.

If I do get an algae problem, the more I think about it, the more I suspect that swordtails will be my best option. There's a comparison of swordtails vs American-flag fish for algae control on The Krib and the swords seem to have the better of it. This with the understanding that I would be treating the symptom. The other thing I might do is limit the bubblers to the algae rest - but if I do that, I will need to rig a CO2 injector, something I was hoping to avoid with this tank (pipe dream? Prob'ly.)

 

[tophat665]

Well, it was Small Tank Maintenance Night , so I got more more plants (cuttings and plants that were't doing well) to add to the loach motel.

Starting to fill in a bit on the right:

Snapped this after the first light had gone off and minuted before the second shut down for the evening, so it's dimmer and pinker than the other pix.

There was a big ol' Crypt I was sold as a "Tropica Sword" when I was inexperienced and stupid that was so coated in snail eggs that I figured it was time to yank it. I divided it into about 6 plants. Added another stem of wisteria (more of that tomorrow when I do the 55 in the living room), and bulked up the Hygro and Cabomba. Also pulled an Ozelot Sword out of one of the tanks. The way it was positioned it wasn't getting anywhere near enough light, and it too was snail city. That's right in front of the big filter intake.

Added a dozen 3/4" guppy fry and another 2 dozen or more pond snails to help cycle. Suppose I ought to do tests. Well, tomorrow is Big Tank Maintenance day...

 

[BBrain]

Looking great! Nice variety of plants, too.

I had mentioned some of the effects of bubble wands, just in case you didn't know about their possible effects. Plainly, you are well aware of water chemistry and aquatic communities!

I'm sorry, but I can't confirm your understanding about Excell's carbon availability. I only know what I've read, and have no personal experience with Excell. But I may be trying the stuff some day, in my non-CO2 tank.

Looking forward to more photos of the "Loach Motel"! (great name!)

 

[tophat665]

Did the full battery of tests tonight:
Ammonia: 0+ (just the tiniest bit greener than yellow. Not nearly so green as the .25 ppm strip - the first one after 0)
Nitrite: 0+ (again, just a hair darker than the 0, much lighter than the .25)
Nitrate: Could be 40, could be 80 - to my eye, the test strip is identical.
pH: 7.4 (need to chuck a little peat in the filter)
kH: 2
gH: 14

It's only been running a week, but the biowheel on the Penguin 3 is from an established tank (it spent the night in a ziploc of aquarium water, but it was running the next day), and some of the bottom layer of gravel is also from an established tank. I think this might could be cycled.

I'll test it again tomorrow, and if I get the same readings, I'm going to pop the striatas and the yoyo over.

Added some more Bacopa to the right side. Starting to get some balance.

 

[QuotheRaven]

Just wondering is the substrate going to be sand?? Just thinking if the tank is going to be a Loach tank sand substrate would be best

 

[tophat665]

Just wondering is the substrate going to be sand?? Just thinking if the tank is going to be a Loach tank sand substrate would be best

I started with a base of sand, and left a beach in front of the flowerpots. I also left a smaller beach off to the left. Both are surrounded by small river pepples (in between navy and lima-bean sized). The rest of the tank has fluorite under pea gravel. So, it's sand where I am hoping they'll mostly make their home, and smooth stone and gravel in the rest of the tank.

 

[QuotheRaven]

I suspect the sand will merely spread throughout the tank and stay below the gravel...I may be wrong though

 

[tophat665]

I suspect the sand will merely spread throughout the tank and stay below the gravel...I may be wrong though

I've got another tank with the substrate done pretty much the same way. Gravel does get into the beach, and I need to go through with tweezers and pick it out every couple of months, but, on the whole, the sand stays were it's put.

 

[tophat665]

Tested again this weekend, and all is hunky dory. I removed all female guppys to the 20 gallon tank (leaving the males) and moved the Dojos and the Sand Loach over. I'll move another 2 or 3 this weekend.

In any case, took some pix...

With Flash:

Without:

A closer look at some of the denizens

 

[GuppyDude]

Thats looks great, loaches are possibly some of the most entertaining fish iv ever kept, they never stop. Dojo's are my favorite.

 

[mikster]

Nice tank you got going there, nice to see the progression, havent got any loaches myself, all i ever see in shops near me is clown loaches and they are too big for my tank and plus im about stocked with other fish now, if i get another decent sized tank though....