[DISCLAIMER] THIS ENTRY IS LONG. I don't expect you to read it all. It's for my benefit as a journal more than anything, and keeping it here in public seems to get me extra-motivated. Thanks for any comments though.[/DISCLAIMER]
So I'm setting up my 29G as a glass cat tank. Some of you are already aware that this is my first little project I'm embarking upon, so consider this the "official" thread. Before getting into things, I'll just throw up a few pics so you can see where I'm at.
This is the tank now, on day 15 of cycling. You can obviously see that I've gone white cloudy, though you should have seen it before yesterday's 50%. The white cloudy water has really stressed me out, but after a lot of reading around here, I am putting up with it without altering the water at all except for 50% water changes every Tuesday and Friday (with chlorine neutralizer of course). The smell was a little rancorous, but is going down overall.
My filter arrangement at the moment is this 50G penguin filter with biowheel, which has been on since the beginning of cycling, and the added 20G penguin biowheel I put on yesterday. The reason I added the 20G, besides extra filtering, is to have a cultured biowheel ready at any given moment for my 10G QT. I have been fairly careful about adding fish without LFS water, and acclimating them in a sidecar specimen tank with drips of my tank's water over an hour, but I want to QT the glass cats since the only place that has them is local Petsmart, not the classy LFS. Besides, I need to get serious about having a QT available at a moment's notice.
The powerhead is to create currents for the cats at the mid-level, but not shooting across the entire tank. It creates a little area that my Danios appereciate zipping through. I also got this CO2 monitor to check my levels and decide how much extra CO2 I might need as a I add more plants.
Here's the brazlian pennywort, meant to give some top cover, along with my java ferns that are strapped down to some cheese. The cheese is going to go when I get a nice fat piece of driftwood, probably an African piece, since I hear they don't need slate. Some java moss will help round that out hopefully. The anubia nana is crazy happy, and has gotten about 1/3 bigger since I got it.
I've got three loaches, one seargeant major, and two yo-yos. They are staying after the glass cats move in, since they're my ground crew. They go nuts for this cave, which seems to be their base of operations. They hang out in it during the day, and return to it often at night. It may be the one piece of cheese I keep after I do some actual aquascaping. The driftwood in the back will also probably stay, but will be moved up front. I'm also planning on moving the cave to the back corner, where it will hold gravel behind it with some val. spiralis rooted in the thicker medium. May as well do something useful with such a big hunk of stuff if I keep it...
These tetras are the big question mark for me. When the QT is established, I'm going to move everybody into it while I get the cheesy decorations out and add a lot more plants, including val. spiralis along the walls, the big-*** driftwood on the right with the ferns and some more moss attached, some dwarf water onions, a couple crypto undulatas, and some pistia (water lettuce) added to the top for a bit more cover. I'm going for val along the edges, some healthy but pruned plants up front, and plenty of swimming room in the middle.
After the aquascape project (once the water clears and the cycle is fully underway), the loaches are definitely coming back in, and the danios are definitely on their way out, grown and happy back to LFS. I worry that the danios' speed will flip out the glass cats. But do I keep the tetras? That's the question, and is a group of five enough to keep them happy? Some say yes, some say no, and both are adamant. Suggestions are appreciated. Budrecki also metioned the 2 - 5 otto's will help with algae, which I will probably do, after more reading.
:read:
So I'm setting up my 29G as a glass cat tank. Some of you are already aware that this is my first little project I'm embarking upon, so consider this the "official" thread. Before getting into things, I'll just throw up a few pics so you can see where I'm at.
This is the tank now, on day 15 of cycling. You can obviously see that I've gone white cloudy, though you should have seen it before yesterday's 50%. The white cloudy water has really stressed me out, but after a lot of reading around here, I am putting up with it without altering the water at all except for 50% water changes every Tuesday and Friday (with chlorine neutralizer of course). The smell was a little rancorous, but is going down overall.
My filter arrangement at the moment is this 50G penguin filter with biowheel, which has been on since the beginning of cycling, and the added 20G penguin biowheel I put on yesterday. The reason I added the 20G, besides extra filtering, is to have a cultured biowheel ready at any given moment for my 10G QT. I have been fairly careful about adding fish without LFS water, and acclimating them in a sidecar specimen tank with drips of my tank's water over an hour, but I want to QT the glass cats since the only place that has them is local Petsmart, not the classy LFS. Besides, I need to get serious about having a QT available at a moment's notice.
The powerhead is to create currents for the cats at the mid-level, but not shooting across the entire tank. It creates a little area that my Danios appereciate zipping through. I also got this CO2 monitor to check my levels and decide how much extra CO2 I might need as a I add more plants.
Here's the brazlian pennywort, meant to give some top cover, along with my java ferns that are strapped down to some cheese. The cheese is going to go when I get a nice fat piece of driftwood, probably an African piece, since I hear they don't need slate. Some java moss will help round that out hopefully. The anubia nana is crazy happy, and has gotten about 1/3 bigger since I got it.
I've got three loaches, one seargeant major, and two yo-yos. They are staying after the glass cats move in, since they're my ground crew. They go nuts for this cave, which seems to be their base of operations. They hang out in it during the day, and return to it often at night. It may be the one piece of cheese I keep after I do some actual aquascaping. The driftwood in the back will also probably stay, but will be moved up front. I'm also planning on moving the cave to the back corner, where it will hold gravel behind it with some val. spiralis rooted in the thicker medium. May as well do something useful with such a big hunk of stuff if I keep it...
These tetras are the big question mark for me. When the QT is established, I'm going to move everybody into it while I get the cheesy decorations out and add a lot more plants, including val. spiralis along the walls, the big-*** driftwood on the right with the ferns and some more moss attached, some dwarf water onions, a couple crypto undulatas, and some pistia (water lettuce) added to the top for a bit more cover. I'm going for val along the edges, some healthy but pruned plants up front, and plenty of swimming room in the middle.
After the aquascape project (once the water clears and the cycle is fully underway), the loaches are definitely coming back in, and the danios are definitely on their way out, grown and happy back to LFS. I worry that the danios' speed will flip out the glass cats. But do I keep the tetras? That's the question, and is a group of five enough to keep them happy? Some say yes, some say no, and both are adamant. Suggestions are appreciated. Budrecki also metioned the 2 - 5 otto's will help with algae, which I will probably do, after more reading.
:read:
