10 Gallon Photo-Journal: Trials, Tribulations, & Transformations

[bpswim90]

Mini-update!

My new lighting arrived today! It took a couple hours to assemble, but the new brightness is noticable. My bulb also has a color rendering factor of 92 (which is excellent), and I noticed this in the brilliance of the red of my tetras. With this and my CO2, the plants should soon be thriving and I can begin to add new ones!

By the way, on sunday I did get my 4 tetras (no shrimp though). They're currently all doing fine in the quarantine tank. I also purchased some malaysian wood and arranged that in my aquarium to replace the coral-like decorations (which I've placed in the QT). I'll have some photos on Friday or Saturday. It looks much different now than it did on my previous post, and I think you all will like it.

Later,
BP

[robyn]

when you first bought plants, you had some long strands of some kind of plant. it looks very similar if not the same as the plants sold here in south africa (that i currently have in my tank too) as floating plants but i c u had them rooted? could u please shed some light on this?

ps. the tank just keeps getting better and better

[bpswim90]

The anacharis? I'm pretty sure it can be grown either floating or rooted.

http://www.plantgeek.net/plantguide_viewer.php?id=110

Thanks for the comment.

[robyn]

ok, thanks. what plants do u use as floating plants?

[bpswim90]

I don't have any floating plants right now.

[bpswim90]

Mini-Update 2...

Forgot to post some pictures on Saturday. :P Here's what the tank looked like before I did a 3 day blackout and added in my 4 new fish.



I'll post again soon with some other assorted updates, and photo of what it looks like at the moment.

Thanks for reading.

[bpswim90]

*grumble*... cyanobacteria... *grumble*

[bpswim90]

Parameters:
Temp: 78 F
pH: 7.6
Amm: 0 ppm
Nitrite: 0 ppm
Nitrate: 5 ppm

So, I haven't updated in ages. Sorry. It's been stressful. Constant cleaning out of an invasive cyanobacteria. I should have gotten some photos of it. The stuff covered literally everything. Filter intake, heater, substrate, driftwood. Everything but the fish. And that's only after a week. Every week I would have to reclean the tank completely. The cyano killed off most of my plants. So finally I got fed up and did something about it.

First step: near-complete extraction of the green-stuff.


Yes, this was all in my tank. After just one week.


After the cleanout, I put the driftwood back in the tank and covered it with a garbage bag for 5 days. When I uncovered it, I did another water change to rid of all the dead cyano.

I then had to go out and find some potassium nitrate, because the lack of it in my tank is the reason I've been having the problems. Apparently this task is easier said than done. Potassium nitrate is in gunpowder and it's a controlled substance. So when we called around asking stores for potassium nitrate, none of them confirmed that they had it. Luckily, I had read online that chemical stump removers are nearly 100% potassium nitrate. So we settled for some stump remover which, if it isn't 100%, it's near that.

I purchased this yesterday. I also finally purchased a working nitrate test kit, and a commercial yeast CO2 system by Hagen. I didn't think my DIY system had effective-enough diffusion. My fish are actually quite amused by the diffusor, and often follow the bubbles as they float upwards.

Here are some photos taken last night:

Notice how the java fern and amazon sword are way smaller than they once were.


Some eggs(?) I found under a driftwood after removing the garbage bag. I'm not sure whether they are fish eggs or snail eggs.


Snail. There's a couple big ones and a couple small ones. I'm guessing they arrived on one of my plants.


Closeup.


Closeup 2. The fish in the foreground has an oddly curved spine.


And this is Mr. Bubbles. He's my sister's friend's betta who got sick back in December. He's doing much better now.

That's all for today. Hope you enjoyed it.

[mudskipper26]

i think that one fish with the oddly shapped spine has fish TB which is not good...can someone else confirm this?

[bpswim90]

So yeah, I haven't been here in a while. To sum up what's happened in the tank in the past months: One of my fish disappeared (probably died and got eaten by the other fish, perhaps the one with fish TB?), Mr. Bubbles died, at one point my light burnt out and my fish were living in darkness for weeks, I got a MacBook, and cyano is still at large in my tank, as well as another stringy algae-type thing.

Today's parameters:
pH: 7.5
Ammonia: who cares
Nitrite: 0ppm
Nitrate: 0ppm (<--that's why cyano's still here...)

Oh yeah, forgot to mention I haven't been adding the KNO3 in a long time. Or CO2 for that matter. So really, the reason this stuff is still in my tank is due to my own laziness. Forutnately, I've finally got a little free time now, so I'm hoping to do a little cleaning up. Planning on adding KNO3 daily (in the mornings?) and getting my CO2 back up and running. Also need to clean out the current cyano. Hah, I've got a lot of work ahead of me.

Today's pics:

[Zoe]

Oh no, algae problems >< You can use an eyedropped to put some hydrogen peroxide directly over the driftwood etc... it will make removing the algae a lot easier.
Also adding some plants like java moss, and stemmy plans like hygrophilia sunset should help combat the algae problems you're having.

I've noticed in most of your pics, that the water level is quite low. Is there a reason that you keep your water level low? Note that you're losing a lot of gallons, a good 10-15% of your tank volume, by keeping the water level low. This also concentrates any waste in the water (the water evaporates, but the other stuff doesn't, if you know what I mean).

Good luck with the cleanup Lots of work ahead, eh? Don't worry, it will get better!

[bpswim90]

No, there's no particular reason why it's low... other than my own laziness. I cleaned it out last sunday and when I filled it with new water it didn't go all the way to the top. However, my probably isn't waste, it's a LACK of waste. My plants are sucking up all the nitrates faster than they can be created, and this leaves an environment where cyanobacteria seems to thrive...

So I just finished creating my KNO3 solution. I followed the instructions here: http://www.csd.net/~cgadd/aqua/art_plant_nitrate.htm except that I'm using a gatorade bottle (approximately 500 mL). So this week I will add 2mL of this solution each day and hopefully my Nitrates will rise to a desirable level. I also just set my CO2 system back up (cleaned it out, filled it with water, sugar, yeast).

Things are getting back on track... And now that you've mentioned it, I may go and top off my tank.

[Zoe]

Cyano is weird stuff... I had a plantless tank just coated with the stuff. Hydrogen Peroxide helped, but it's obviously not a solution - just an aesthetic bandaid

[bpswim90]

Quick updates. My mom accidentally killed all (we think) of the goldfish in our pond by running the hose in it for too long and not using a chlorine remover. Yes, that includes the two fish I raised for some time. It's sad, but it happens.

My own tank is still doing alright. A couple weeks ago, I added more plants to further absorb nutrients and (hopefully) compete with the cyano. So far it's been working pretty well!

Today I did a thorough cleaning and fertilized. I'm trying to stick to a fertilizing schedule, to ensure the health of my plants.

The color of these photos isn't 100% accurate (a bit too green), but they're close enough:




BP

[JustOneMore20]

Fertilizing is the way to go if you want to beat and prevent cyano. Absorbing all the nutrients (nitrates in particular) is actually the cause of a cyano outbreak in a planted tank, usually. You'll want to watch the nitrate readings if they regularly bottom out and add in nitrogen or some form of nitrates.