New year, new puddle

A place to keep us informed of the goings on in your tanks. - Tank Logs.
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Martinspuddle
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ahulleman wrote: Fri May 08, 2020 20:41 pm
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Very late reply lol... I now too have a 40-100 ltr spongefilter for my 64ltr tank in conjunction with my interpet CV2 filter that came with my aquarium...
You said that when your new filter was "matured" you squeezed the content of the old filter in to the new one...
Did you mean simply squeeze it in to the water near the new filter to absorb the bacteria? (n00b question lol)
As i do want to remove my CV2 filter in a few months as its ugly and has a large footprint lol.
You squeeze the content of the old filter in to the new one to help start the process in the new filter media. Then run the two filters together until the new filter has matured enough for the old filter to be removed, usually 4-5 weeks. ;)
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Martinspuddle
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It's a messy job but someone has gotta do it! :grin:

This aquarium has very quickly become like the previous one... very, very WILD! :woo: Oh well, wasn't really the original idea but so far except for the Black Rudy Barb incident times four, but all is well in the four foot tank.

The life that I'm noticing though is amazing, this seems to have increased particularly since I introduced the Coconut husk. The large colonies of Infusoria buzzing around the leaf litter, small worms, as well as small brown leaches and as for the Neocaridina shrimps, there's more than ever. These shrimps are all but wild form, the adults have learn't to keep clear of the fishes now and smaller individuals not very easy to see but occasionally I do see large colonies of shrimplets among the leaves and botanicals. :]

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Water stability seems to be holding it's own with the ACME Co Modulator General Hardness disrupter unit or peat filter to everyone else and dGH is hovering around 12-15 depending on when waterchanges have been carried out. The tapwater runs between a pH of 7.8 to 8.2 and a dGH of 17 still, so has some baring on the water parameters for the first few hours after a waterchange.

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It is a very messy aquarium, there's no deigning it. Slit is everywhere, a Barb or Danio chasing another inmate near to the litter or substrate then there is a cloud of slit but I will say it soon does clear and doesn't cause any adverse effects to the water column that I can register on any of my water test so far. While running normally, without any disturbance this aquariums water is very clear other than the obvious tanned looking though the tank from one end. The downside is I found I am giving the sponge filter a squeeze out every twenty one days or so both cleaned in turn, so today was the left filter next time the other. Picture below is of two 2 gallon buckets of aquarium water after I have clean out one sponge and whats more that sponge is still dripping out large amounts of the brown stuff when I put it back into the tank! :dodgy2: On the upside does the garden plants a lot of good, so it doesn't go to waste.

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By the way, has any of you ever tested the nitrate and ammonia levels from slit water out of your filter? I did ...the scale don't got far enough! :grin: ...and in case your all now thinking, what on earth is Puddle's water parameters like today...

pH 7.2

dGH:13

dKH:15

NO2: 0ppm

NO3: 20-25ppm

NH3/4: 0ppm

I must get a new TDS meter that could lead to some interesting results I think. :grin:

Talking of interesting, I've giving up trying control Black brush algae and leaving it to it's own devices, looks great waving back and forth covered in slit. This algae is growing across most if not all the wood and the botanicals but not the decaying leaves or the plants and having seen this in underwater footage taken by Ivan Mikolji of slit filled streams in Venezuela I'm coming the conclusion this is normal. As for types of green algaes I don't have many, this is somewhat disappointing, so in the pursuit of algae excellence I have increased the light photo period by two hours every day ...wish me luck. :cry:

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Click to enlarge both images

Typical females, always have get into the picture. :mad: Oddly quite often the lily leaves as you can see in the above image on the left is always pearling and no, I am not adding any CO2 into the aquarium, so goodness know why this plant continuously does this and not the Amazon Swords but it can't be doing any harm.
Last edited by Martinspuddle on Sun May 17, 2020 17:50 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Andys temperate tank
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It does look natural Martin. Does the black algae stay short or will it get out of control?

Also when a plant is pearling is it giving off tiny oxygen bubbles? If it does then surely it's a good thing.
64l kitchen tank: 16 golden tetra.
5ft 425L: 7 blue angel fish, 30 rummie nose tetra, 20 black neon tetra, 1 longfin bristlenose plec, 2 corydoras sterbai, 2 SAE.
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Martinspuddle
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The BBA stays short and if I'm honest hasn't got any worse.

Oxygen bubbles is not a problem, just puzzles me why only that species of plant?
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Gingerlove05
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Pearling is plants giving put enough oxygen that it causes oxygen bubbles to form :) it’s obviously a happy plant :D
I think a few of my java ferns have done it after a good water change, although its hard to tell if its just trapped air bubbles from the water change, but it has gone on all through the evening before :)
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Martinspuddle
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Well new arrivals came today from @Staffylover and I must thank her first for sending me these fish to rehoming them. ::thumb::

So she sent three Black Ruby Barbs and a juvenile Bristlenose catfish. Staffy tells me during this lockdown these fish have been kept in a holding tank with no health issues so I decided no need to quarantine and all seem fit and well. So well, it was quite funny. While acclimatising them, I noticed my two remaining female Ruby's taking interesting in the new inmates in the bag. My two female Black Ruby's are a lot young and smaller than Staffy's larger female Barbs and as soon as the new male saw what was swimming around the bag oh boy did he turn deep crimson and black, swimming up and down inside the bag, look at me, look at me!

He reminded me of Shaggy's song 'Boombastic' ....Mr. Lover Lover, ummm ... I'm Mr. Lover Lover, haha girl. My two young females Barbs where like two excited teenage girls outside. :dodgy2:

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Anyway, all are in, Mr. Lover, lover is strutting around the aquarium and all his ladies are now ignoring him .... as for the little Bristlenose catfish, well you all know how much decor, botanicals, and leaf litter I have in this aquarium ....he or she is in there somewhere! :grin:
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So glad they arrived safely, bet the male can't believe his luck, he was a bit hen pecked by my two fat females poor chap, at least he can't have been too stressed by the journey if he was able to show off straight away, thanks for taking them I'm pleased they were able to go to a good home :grin:
500l - Africa river - https://www.aquariumforums.co.uk/viewtopic.php?t=6873
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Lovely fish! Hope they settle in well for ya!
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Ric
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Nice ones! Just make sure you keep those alive @Martinspuddle . None of that "unexplained death" stuff anymore :P
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Martinspuddle
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Ric wrote: Fri May 29, 2020 14:52 pm Nice ones! Just make sure you keep those alive @Martinspuddle . None of that "unexplained death" stuff anymore :P
I have been assured that Scully and Mulder are on the case. :cry:
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