H2Ogal's Photo Thread

  • Get the NEW AquariaCentral iOS app --> http://itunes.apple.com/app/id1227181058 // Android version will be out soon!

H2Ogal

Betta Be Good to Me
Mar 16, 2010
1,213
0
0
Memphis, TN
Real Name
Deborah
Having passed my one-year anniversary on AC, I thought it was high-time to start a photo thread, beginning with a look back at my first "main" tank, a 20g long.

In March 2010, I snagged a deal on CL. Only $200 for all this! If I'd known then what I know now, I would have spent my $200 on the equipment I ended up buying to replace most of this stuff, lol!

1_haul.jpg

In any event, it made for a nice tank with pool filter sand and a sexy piece of driftwood I got for cheap from an eBay seller.

2_planted.jpg

Yeah, that PFS was reeeeeeally bright.

3_sand.jpg

Adding rocks and gravel helped.

4_rocks.jpg

So did all the poop from a school of otos — and my fabulous blue ramshorn that had hitchhiked into the tank back when it was still cycling!

5_inhabitants.jpg

Sadly, numerous novice mistakes (and one killer betta) later, all five otos and my lovely ramshorn were gone. Being pretty upset, I just let the tank sit for a while with its burgeoning population of MTS. Fast forwarding a couple more months, and skipping over a tale of many harlies bought and lost, I decided that I really disliked several things about the whole set-up.

So I recently got a new stand ...

1_stand.jpg

... an Eheim 2213 canister filter ...

2_stand+filter.jpg

... and a 29g tank!

3_blanktank.jpg

The sand, you'll notice is no longer white. It's Red Flint PFS, which is a beautiful mix of tans, browns, reds and black. I absolutely love it.

More pics to come of the planted tank. And current inhabitants. ;)

2_planted.jpg 1_haul.jpg 5_inhabitants.jpg 4_rocks.jpg 3_sand.jpg 2_stand+filter.jpg 1_stand.jpg 3_blanktank.jpg
 

platytudes

AC Members
Nov 4, 2006
3,450
0
36
Panama City, FL
Real Name
Nicole
Looks great! $200 was not bad at all considering you got a nice stand, tank and light with some useful accessories. I think you did quite well for yourself :) Your tank looked beautiful, can't wait to see how the next incarnation goes.

Oh, and the white sand never stays white for too long...eventually it will lose that reflectivity.

I personally like to separate the tank into two halves when I aquascape, and make two clumps of plants on each side. I'm not really a purist when it comes to mixing artificial and real plants, so I have been known to use realistic plastic plants for my background...since I just barely have enough light to squeak by in most of my tanks!

I leave a big open space in the middle which I usually scatter rocks, gravel, leaves, etc. on. All the sand is sloped from front to back (with as much as 3" of substrate in the back sometimes) and I make it highest on the left and right sides, with a dip in the middle. That way all the poop and everything else just falls right into the front and center, where it's easiest for me to siphon it out :D
 
Last edited:

Rbishop

Administrator
Staff member
Dec 30, 2005
40,727
452
143
70
Real Name
Mr. Normal
Awesome stand....
 

H2Ogal

Betta Be Good to Me
Mar 16, 2010
1,213
0
0
Memphis, TN
Real Name
Deborah
progress we all have to start somewhere. the new stand looks really nice. keep us updated
Awesome stand....
Thanks, guys. The stand is the "Lincoln Park" from Petco. It only comes in the one size, but lucky me that's the only size I needed. Fits very nicely in a room with black office furniture and a mahogany piano. It's assemble-it-yourself furniture, but rather brilliantly packaged and went together perfectly. My favorite detail is the closed back with a high cut-out for cords and hoses. Since I have a large and obstinate Siamese cat that gets into and chews on everything, that was the feature that sold it for me!

Looks great! $200 was not bad at all considering you got a nice stand, tank and light with some useful accessories. I think you did quite well for yourself :) Your tank looked beautiful, can't wait to see how the next incarnation goes.

Oh, and the white sand never stays white for too long...eventually it will lose that reflectivity.

I personally like to separate the tank into two halves when I aquascape, and make two clumps of plants on each side. I'm not really a purist when it comes to mixing artificial and real plants, so I have been known to use realistic plastic plants for my background...since I just barely have enough light to squeak by in most of my tanks!

I leave a big open space in the middle which I usually scatter rocks, gravel, leaves, etc. on. All the sand is sloped from front to back (with as much as 3" of substrate in the back sometimes) and I make it highest on the left and right sides, with a dip in the middle. That way all the poop and everything else just falls right into the front and center, where it's easiest for me to siphon it out :D
Platy, I wish I'd been able to use either of the light fixtures that came with the original set-up. That was the first replacement I made, lol!

Interestingly, I'd done something similar to what you describe with the hardscaping on the first tank, creating a sort of river of rocks running through the middle. I started to do something similar with the new tank, but didn't like how it was going. I added the largest rocks I have, but none of the gravel from before.

------

By the time I planted, I was really pushed for time and had a bunch of fish I had to get back into the tank. So the arrangement's pretty rough. I expect it will change a lot over the next few months. For one thing, I want to add more wood that will fit with what I have and take advantage of the height of the tank. (The HOB is gone, having served a couple of weeks in concert with the new Eheim to get the canister BB established.)

4_planted.jpg

The original wood. Still sexy as hell, if you ask me, and shrimpies luuuuuurve it.

5_CU1.jpg

I love these flat rocks, even if I have no real skill at rock arranging.

6_CU2.jpg

Some new wood, providing a handy cave for kuhlis to come. Unfortunately, it keeps trying to fall forward, which will make seeing said kuhlis-in-a-cave a challenge.

7_CU3.jpg

And more pretty rocks. I've shoved these around a lot since (mostly trying to prop up the kuhli cave) and cannot get them adjusted again to any way in which I like them. Argh!:nilly:

8_CU4.jpg

As you can probably tell, this is an Asian-themed tank. I'm keeping to Thai species with the fish, but the plants and inverts are rather more SE Asian/pan-Asian. Plants include various crypts (many of which have melted but will, I hope, reappear), bacopa monnieri, compact hygro corymbosa, nymphaea stellata, rotala rotundifolia (or indica, only Mother Nature knows for sure), and limnophila sessilifolia (a surprise freebie with a recent order from Crispino Ramos) that is growing crazy-fast!

It is very pretty.

16_limnophilia1.jpg

But I'm wondering if I should have planted it behind the bacopa and rotala. :rolleyes:

15_limnophila2.jpg

4_planted.jpg 8_CU4.jpg 7_CU3.jpg 6_CU2.jpg 5_CU1.jpg 15_limnophila2.jpg 16_limnophilia1.jpg
 
Last edited:

H2Ogal

Betta Be Good to Me
Mar 16, 2010
1,213
0
0
Memphis, TN
Real Name
Deborah
Who is Crispino Ramos?
Cris sells plants here on AC. I got the limnophila with a huge bunch of narrow leaf java fern that's made my betta so happy she's been blowing bubbles. Or maybe it was the giant marimo balls I got from Bob/Mgamer that inspired the bubbles ... Either way, her tank's increasingly full of plants and needs a serious rescape, lol! Pics of all that to come, of course.

looks like you are off to a good start with that 29!

any plans for the 20?
Thanks! I'm looking at selling the 20g tank and stand (along with all the stuff I still have from the original haul). As much as I'd love to keep it, I really have nowhere to set it up. Plus, I don't like that iron stand, which has a bigger footprint than the tank and sways. So, I'd need a new stand, light, filter, substrate, plants, rocks ... :nilly:

Beautiful tank!
Thanks! I'm really having fun with it. :)
 
zoomed.com
hikariusa.com
aqaimports.com
Store