ed seeley

Tank's looking amazing, been looking at it on the aqua esentials site too!
Sure you'll get the algae under control soon. Platys are great algae eaters too and might be good to put in early with the shrimps and ottos.

What's happened to the Anubias congensis? I remember you moved it so it's leaves were out of the water, but can't see it now. I've just ordered one off Richard and was thinking of doing similar to you with it!

I'd be very, very wary of putting hatchets in an uncovered tank. I kept them for years and they are great, but I've found them dead on top of cover glasses after they lept through a small gap and had one kill itself when it jumped into the cover glass. Every time they get even a little spooked they jump a long way out of the water, or try. Think you'll find them on the floor, up to 3 metres away!

Mud Pie Mama

Yes! Definately agree, you're off to a fantastic start with the tank.

I have a few, what I hope will be very helpful hints for your stocking.

Just a few thoughts about this fish selection:

1.) TAKE YOUR TIME! Look at a lot of the other ADA tanks and see how selective they've been in the stocking of the tank. You have a Porsche or Ferrari of a set up for your fish tank but your fish stocking list is Ford of Chevy!

2.) From what I've read hatchet fish are BIG TIME jumpers. A very bad choice for an open top tank.

3.) If you have a passion for the livebearers, just choose one: Platy OR Guppy OR Molly. A tank full of livebearers can be constantly hectic.

4.) With the tetras, again, select just a single variety and get a big school. With a medium size tetra you could do 12 or 15.

5.) When I'm selecting fish to stock a new tank I like to look at fish which fill different rolls and have contrasting appearances

Different Rolls: I.e.., Swims near surface (guppies, platys, rasboras) another which prefers mid water (tetra, rainbowfish, angelfish) and low or bottom dwelling, (corydora OR Dwarf cichlid - i.e.., German Blue Rams, Apistos, Checkerboard Cichlid). If one of my selection likes to scatter all around the tank - a loose shoaling fish - then I try to put in at least one variety which sticks together - a tight schooler - i.e.., Rummynose tetras or rasboras.

Contrasting Appearances: One, I look at body shape. If my top dweller is long, torpedo shape (think of Zebra or White Cloud Mt Minnow) then for the middle I'd look at more rounded - silver dollar shaped. Perhaps Emperor or Congo tetra. (Of course you can do it the other way; Round shaped on top, long in middle - Harlequin rasbora for top, Rummy nose for middle. Then Two, I also look at mature sizes. I don't want a community tank of all two inch fish. I try to get a contrast in sizes, small - one inch, medium - two inch, and larger - three to four inch size.

Please don't think I'm being snooty, my tanks are ALL bargain basements. I just try for fish which look really well together and sustain my interest for the long run. There's nothing worse than daily being dissatisfied watching a fish that's oh so happy and healthy in your tank and wondering if they have a short life expectancy!?! Because now you've seen those great schoolers in a plant club buddy's tank and wish you had room for them. Its easy enough to change your plant choices in the future; however, its much more difficult to change your fish. It's one thing to put all your Ludwig repens in the compost bin to now grow Ludwigia sp. 'Guinea'; but for most of us, it's another story if it's a tank full of zebra fish you no longer love.

fredyk

so true.
Mark

SUBORPHAN

there must be too much nutrients in the AquaSoil because the only thing i am dosing at the moment is 7ml of BrightyK and 15 drops of Green Bacter per day. and about a week ago i changed the lighting regime to T5 48w(3hrs)--MH 150w(3hrs)--T5 48w(3hrs). From what i read in another post here this noon burst regime is apparently meant to be good.

i would have bought some elatine from Bigstick120 but unfortunately he is in US and i am in UK.

SUBORPHAN

Thank you. Amano recommends that after the third week one should start dosing Step1. so if the nutrients are still high does that mean that i still wait for a bit longer? the tank is just entering in the fourth week.

i think there is only a few strands of HC that are still surviving. quite a lot of it melted away. i guess it was to fragile for the unstable conditions of the first couple of weeks.

SUBORPHAN

cheers, mate. Congensis unfortunately is half dead. i guess the heat of the MH was too much for it. so i had to remove it. might get another one soon to plant under water.

thanks for the advice regarding the hatchets. do you know any other peaceful surface fish?

SUBORPHAN

Mud Pie Mama, thank you very much. your advice is really helpful. it has made me look at the planning stage of fish population in a different light.

i will have to et the encyclopedia of fish out and study the different types. Amano's tanks usually have only one type of fish in them (mainly tetras) but i do quite like a variety of them(shapes, sizes and colours).

Ajax

I doubt adding Step 1 would have any affect on your algae. It is just a trace elements fert, so I think you would be safe to add it. Your algae really isn't that bad. I've seen a couple of start ups now that the whole tank is filled with 3 different types of algae. Once you add the shrimp & the o-cats it's probably gonna disappear quick.

As for the fish, Amano definitely matches the fish to his layouts. If you look closely it seems that the more wild looking layouts with numerous plant species he usually has a few different types of fish. Whereas the layouts with moss, anubia & ferns he tends to stick with a single type of fish. I also notice he use fish with brighter colors in those layouts.

ed seeley

I've got 12 Nannostomus eques now in my tank now that spend most of their time up at the surface. They are very cool!
They don't seem to be jumpers, but i've got a lid and some floating plants in the tank! Maybe someone else can offer advice who keeps them in an uncovered tank???

I'll probably keep my A.congensis under water then for now! Thanks for that!

SUBORPHAN

i decided to move the co2 diffusor at the fron right underneath the inflow pipe. ow the co2 goes straight through it and into the filter. hopefullly this will increase the co2 absorption. What do you guys think? this move has another positive aspect because it allowed me to move the outflow pipe in the middle and now the background plant are growing vertical. before when the pipe was near the back corner because of the strong flow it was making the background plants grow sort of horizontally which wasnt very pleasing visually. here is a pic: