Backyard tree trunk VS store bought

CWO4GUNNER

CWO4GUNNER

USN/USCG 1974-2004 Weps
Apr 18, 2009
4,270
1
0
69
Bullhead AZ
cwo4gunnerguscgretired.blogspot.com
I was at two LFS today trying to find a decent piece of driftwood for a decent price, to place in my dreary black painted Koi tank in an attempt to dress it up. All that was available were spindly piece of driftwood for $12 and $27, real dumb looking pieces. So I gave up and on the way home through the desert in my Jeep I noticed all the dead Mesquite trees and remembers I had on in the back yard a small tree truck I pulled out 2 years ago that never made it into the trash. After being in the 115F AZ sun for 2 years all I did was saw it to size, rinse it off and shove two rocks inside the root ball to weight it down. It been neutral buoyant in the corner of the tank now for 2 hours and the slight red tannin is all in the water. Although the PH has dropped from 8 to 7.6 the Koi seem to love nibbling on it, best of all it was free.
Treetrunkbackyard004.jpg

Treetrunkbackyard001.jpg
 
Nice - most of the driftwood I currently have in my tanks is "wild caught" as well. Free is for me!
 
I was given a piece of wood to make into driftwood by my Dad the other day. My husband baked it at 450 for 30-45 minutes, and boiled it for about the same amount of time. He left it in the pot for about 8 hours and it sunk. I have paid about a hundred dollars for the pieces of wood I have in my tank, and this piece looks very similar to all the pieces I have. I was telling my hubby, we are gonna have to start taking wood gathering trips, and see if we can make this hobby pay for it's self. I figure if I can find wood in interesting sizes and shapes and make it into driftwood, I could sell it for half of what the LFS charges and still make a large enough profit to pay for food, conditioner, and other miscellaneous equipment needs. I like that piece of wood. My husband and I tend to get the darker chunkier pieces of wood, but I would love to have something that is shaped like yours.
 
For me it was procrastination that for once paid off. A small 2 year old tree the I tried to transplant to the back yard but died. Not wanting to have allot of weight to carry to the trash can I shook the root bulb off and then let it dry out for next weeks trash, that was two years ago LOL. Suddenly it became valuable. The African driftwood I have bought for reasonable prices at Petco (30 miles away) is not always a practical trip but the chunky pieces I did buy I boiled and drained 8 times to get almost all the tannin out. This back yard piece I figured not being a big tannin leecher and having sat for two years in 115F heat, 10% humidity, and exposed to the highest UV rays in the nation, cannot harbor much of any bacteria. So i just rinsed, weighted, and placed it inside.
 
Gunner --> Martha Stewart would be envious of your crafty work ! It's a good thing :)
 
Believe it or not it more about function then fashion for me even though with the right background (Errrr!) and plant arrangement these woods look great they seem to sort of stabilize and medicate the tank. Ironically with my ultra hard and high PH water this piece has done the best job bringing the PH down to a stable 7.4 and the fish are going nuts over it mouthing it way more then my store bought pieces. From now on when I take my quad out in the wilderness I'm bringing back some specimens that are strewn in the seasonally dry river beds in the desert.
 
UPDATE: Comparing both twin 80 tanks you can see how that back yard blond wood stump had more tannin then expected. I don't think I'm ever going to boil any new wood pieces again, maybe microwave to kill bacteria but that's it. None of my other pieces I boiled the tannin out of put a dent in my high PH of 8-9, but this home piece brought the PH down to a stable 7.2 in 24 hours and although you would think that would stress the fish, the fish are more at ease then I have seen them in this new tank, leisurely swimming and eating well and no more shining off the sand. Maybe tannin has some healing properties and a special way it lowers PH safely.
TwinTanksCompare003.jpg

TwinTanksCompare001.jpg
 
Put a mesh bag of peatmoss in your W/C bucket for 48 hours, that'll help bring the pH down so you won't up your tank pH too much.

Jen, try tying some pieces of moss of java moss or java ferns to your driftwood, let it grow out a couple weeks, then mark up the price!
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
AquariaCentral.com
Top Bottom