Finally giving my 55 the overhaul it deserves

[Digital]

Great ideas for your setup! Sounds like it's going to be really nice. As far as the fish, I'd do Kulhi's and Corys. Then cardinals, rasboras, black tetras, bleeding hearts, angelfish and a couple kissing gouramis.

I'd do java moss growing off parts of those wood you got there, amazon sword, java fern, some jungle val, and some hornwort or another type of thin leaved plant incase some fish want to much a lil.

Btw, I have the Canon 350D, and I love it. You'll love taking pics of your fish with it!

 

[Digital]

Boy, now seeing that sand, really makes me want to switch over or just do a community tank! I've never even thought to do sand in freshwater. It really gives it a nice effect!

Is it more difficult to get the plants into the sand as compared to gravel? I'd do this for my goldfish tank, but I like the way my black gravel matches the stand and tank borders, and also matches the black leather couch that it's behind / in front of.

Black sand would just not be as cool I don't think! That sand just looks pure, black sand would just look dark and mucky. Light colored sand looks nice and pure. I like that. Very simple, but also not seen to frequently. Only serious hobbyists seem to have it.

 

[Digital]

Your tank is starting to look fantastic! Your unidentified plant looks very much like my cryptocoryne wendtii. You can check out this link as well: http://www.plantgeek.net/plantguide_viewer.php?id=80

Here's mine:

Your tank is quite nice as well, that river style gravel is a nice look! Nicely planted.

 

[gatotsu77]

im switching from pool filter sand to a very fine white sand and i was wondering what was your techniche with adding the sand.

did you leave the fish in there? and how long did it take for it to settle down?

I bought several rubbermaid roughneck storage totes, 3 14 gallon totes, and 2 18 gallon totes. They're exceptionally tough, and hold water without any worry of leak or breaking. I siphoned off about 10 gallons (of 55 total) into a separate storage tote, and kept that by itself. I then siphoned off another 10 and slowly caught all of my fish and transferred them into that container. I placed all of my old fake plants on top of the water to give them some cover so they'd feel less stressed out. I then siphoned off the rest of the water, scooped out the old substrate, and started scooping in the new stuff. I got the tank about 60% filled, did some heavy dechloring, and then started adding the 10g of water I set aside of pristine tank water. After that, I got my fish back into my tank, got the rest of the water back in there, and placed some pantyhose over the filter frames for both of the filter pads in my emperor 400. I left the canister set up as I normally would. I fired them both up, and within 24 hours, the emperor 400 with pantyhose COMPLETELY cleared any remaining silt. (My girlfriend spent 3 hours helping me rinse the 50 lbs of sand that went into my tank to try to minimize silt once we filled it) In all, the fish were out of the tank for just over 2 hours. Their water dropped from 82 degrees to 79 degrees, since I had my window open to keep it cool in my room while lifting all of the gravel/sand/water. Back breaking work that is... :angryfire:

 

[gatotsu77]

Great ideas for your setup! Sounds like it's going to be really nice. As far as the fish, I'd do Kulhi's and Corys. Then cardinals, rasboras, black tetras, bleeding hearts, angelfish and a couple kissing gouramis.

I'd do java moss growing off parts of those wood you got there, amazon sword, java fern, some jungle val, and some hornwort or another type of thin leaved plant incase some fish want to much a lil.

Btw, I have the Canon 350D, and I love it. You'll love taking pics of your fish with it!

I'm loving my new cories, though I'm really sad about the one that died. :-( I'm definitely planning to get a lot more cardinals, probably bring their school up to roughly 15. (I had 20 a long time ago... got an ich breakout from an improperly quarantined fish and lost 19 of them)

The 300D is a great camera for aquatic photography. I have a basic 28-90mm F3.5-5.0 by canon and a 180mm tamron f3.5 macro lens. I'll work on getting some good macro pics of my tank... its been a while since I busted out the big lens for my fish's sake.

Boy, now seeing that sand, really makes me want to switch over or just do a community tank! I've never even thought to do sand in freshwater. It really gives it a nice effect!

Is it more difficult to get the plants into the sand as compared to gravel? I'd do this for my goldfish tank, but I like the way my black gravel matches the stand and tank borders, and also matches the black leather couch that it's behind / in front of.

Black sand would just not be as cool I don't think! That sand just looks pure, black sand would just look dark and mucky. Light colored sand looks nice and pure. I like that. Very simple, but also not seen to frequently. Only serious hobbyists seem to have it.

I'm loving the sand... its absolutely beautiful. All things considered, it wasn't THAT much effort to make the switch... but having a willing girlfriend certainly made the work load easier. :-D

Its really easy to get the plants into the sand... whether or not the loaches decide to keep digging them up, we'll soon find out.

I have to agree on the black sand... sometimes it looks fantastic, like with cichlids... but with community fish, lighter sand is the way to go. I got the quickrete medium (30 grit) sand from home depot... the 50 lb bag cost me just over $5. You've got to rinse it lots, but its worth it.

Your tank is quite nice as well, that river style gravel is a nice look! Nicely planted.

Thank you. :-D I plan to add a lot more plants too... going to order some watersprite, java moss, pennywort, banana plants, some more hornwort, and perhaps even some amazon swords.

 

[gatotsu77]

:rofl: :rofl:

This makes me really amused.:grinyes:

Haha... glad you enjoyed it. Sadly... I was seriously freaked out until I realized it was just sand... -_-

The sand looks fantastic. I love how the fish show up against it.

Get more cardinals!

Glad you like it. I'll be posting more pics soon. I boiled the smaller piece of driftwood tonight, so I may put that in the tank and get pics up tomorrow. I plan to get 10-15 more cardinals, so they'll be nice and plentiful. :-D

 

[Lupin]

Great ideas for your setup! Sounds like it's going to be really nice. As far as the fish, I'd do Kulhi's and Corys. Then cardinals, rasboras, black tetras, bleeding hearts, angelfish and a couple kissing gouramis.

No kissing gouramis please. In a 55g, two 12-inches monsters is cramping.

 

[gatotsu77]

No kissing gouramis please. In a 55g, two 12-inches monsters is cramping.

Haha.. I'm done with gouramis. I had 2 opalines... one male, one female... that was a nightmare enough. That's why I'm sticking with only one angel too... one big centerpiece fish with a lot of schooling fish around it. I think that will look nice.

 

[Coler]

nice work ! tank & fish look great

 

[Digital]

Its really easy to get the plants into the sand... whether or not the loaches decide to keep digging them up, we'll soon find out.

I have to agree on the black sand... sometimes it looks fantastic, like with cichlids... but with community fish, lighter sand is the way to go. I got the quickrete medium (30 grit) sand from home depot... the 50 lb bag cost me just over $5. You've got to rinse it lots, but its worth it.

I'm just trying to think about how say black sand would look with my imported orandas, I'm sure it would look good, but just a bit weary as to changing a crap load of gravel from a 90G, that I bought a little over a year ago. Also, I'd like to see how your plants stay anchored. My small orandas 4" have a feast with my plants in the 37G and they are pretty vicious with tearing off their meal! hahhaa So.... in turn, I'm thinking, a 7-8" oranda would just leave plants flying everywhere in sand...

But you have given me a idea. Next tank, community tank, sand.

Home depot sand? Never in a million years would I think you could use that. I'd figure you'd get a lot of chemicals or something from their mixture that may be harmful to the fish.

I think my next tank will be a 75G community, where I can do a aquascape w/o goldfish tearing it up whenever they like!

Oh, and the dedicated girlfriend, I think we all need one of those especially when doing stuff like that for the house, cause yeah, the aquariums are a nice way to put other life in the room, that is very beautiful and pleasant to view!

I expect to see more pictures!!!! :headbang2: