March 15th, 2008
So I finally get to have a larger tank! Due to budget limitations we get a 55 gallon Allglass Aquarium and a stand with a couple of glass tops. All of these pieces were sourced at different shops depending on who had the best selection and price for the item we were looking for. In this first photo the tank is set up with some of the old equipment from my 29 gallon tank. I had already upgraded the filter from an AquaClear 70 HOB to a Marineland Magnum 350 canister. Heres a pic…
Now after a couple of days of looking at this I decided that I really needed some new lights. So off to shopping I went. I found some very nice fixtures but the one I purchased was on sale and offers the ability to switch between 108 watts of output to 216 watts. To be honest with you once I saw what 108 watts of T5 HO lighting looked like I was very happy. My plants are probably very happy as well. Here is a photo with the new lights installed.
As you can see it is a very noticeable difference between the 40 watts of T8 lighting and the 108watts of T5 HO lighting. I am very pleased with this upgrade as I am the filter and tank size.
As far as acclimating the tank for fish I took a few steps to ensure a safe transition for the fish. I will go over what I have done at this point.
- Moved all of the decorations (and whatever was growing on them)
- Moved all of the plants (and gravel that came with them)
- Moved my secondary filter with used filter cartridge.
- Took out all of the bio media from my aquaclear 70 and placed it into my Magnum 350
- Brought over a little mulm for the bacteria to eat up
So far from day 2 or so I have had a slight haze in the tank. I believe it is bacteria attempting to re-colonize this new tank. My readings have stayed at a very predictable zero on all counts and the PH has been steady at 7.6 and temp has been at 79. All looks good at this point. The fish are happily swimming along and I have no out of whack readings. I am hoping the cloudiness clears up soon and I start to show some sign of Nitrate’s so I can rest easy that the steps I took were successful.
Until next time… Happy fish keeping!
Posted in Random Fish | 3 Comments »
June 10th, 2007
I just could not take it any longer and performed a water change. The gravel was getting pretty gunky and needed a vacuum job in a bad way. Also my GH readings increased by 2 points during this experiment as well. Not to worry though. No fish were harmed during this process and I have learned a couple of valuable things. I will list them below.
- Plants (especially horn wort) like to absorb ammonia, nitrites, and nitrates to the point where they become secondary issues for fish keepers. Then the primary issue becomes a build up of mulm in the gravel.
- During power outages the plants provide much needed 02 to the fish if a light source is provided like opening a window or a high powered flash light. It’s not a ton but will do in a pinch. I had 2 outages lasting 4 to 6 hours each and the fish did not seem to mind at all.
- Lighting is MUCH more important than I thought it was. Increasing my lighting to 2 WPG (watts per gallon) yielded high growth rates out of plants that did not grow much at all before the lighting upgrade and continue to do so. I am now the proud owner of a 10 inch tall Java Fern!
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Posted in The Great Plant Experiment of 2007 | 3 Comments »
June 5th, 2007
Ah it is so nice to see good plant growth. The photo above is from May 19th shortly after adding the C02 to the tank. Believe it or not this was my first attempt at having real plants in ANY tank I have ever owned. I had been reading about the many benefits of having real plants in a tank and decided to give it a try. I was so impressed with how nice the tank looked when I added these plants. Honeslty looking back on this photo it looks kinda sad to me. So I added plants, then researched C02 and lighting. The DIY C02 was first then I added better lighting. The lighting is nothing spectacular just a 30 inch dual tube fixture putting out about 2 watts per gallon.
Now the DIY C02 has a very sharp learning curve that I am still trying to master. I know it can be done and there is a wealth of information out there for me. Even though the learning curve is sharp it is very easy to get going. I have had C02 levels of at least 15 ever since I started except for one day it dropped to 6. In any event the plants seem to love it! The green is much richer and the growth is impressive even from slow growers like Money Wort. Fast growers like Hort Wort get way crazy and my Jave Fern has had a growth explosion! Below is a photo from today June 5th. So this will give you a nice idea of what 18 days on C02 can do!
P.S. I trimmed the Horn Wort a few days before this photo….
Posted in DIY C02 Experience | 3 Comments »
June 2nd, 2007
The great plant experiment of 2007 is going pretty well. Things started in early May when I added C02 to my 29 gallon tank. I added the C02 May 12th and have been working out a few bugs in the system since then. So far the C02 has aided my plants greatly in their color and development. The biggest shocker was when I noticed the Nitrates in the tank would not raise above 10ppm. It seemed that every time the Nitrates got up to 10 I would test 3 or 4 days later only to see the Nitrates at 5. So I let it ride to see what would happen if I left it alone. And so it began.
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June 1st, 2007
This is a great story… (alright not great.. Probably not even good.. 
)
I wake up this morning and get to doing my regular morning things. I go to my tank to turn off the moon lights and kick on the fluorescents. As soon as I flip the switch the power goes out in the entire house! So for a second I think I blew the house! LOL!! Turns out we just lost power at that exact moment in time. Pretty odd but made me chuckle a bit.
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