ObiQuiet

Purpose:
Since my main (living room) tank is a low-light Walstad community tank, I wanted a way to learn about higher-light plants, LEDs, fertilization, etc. Also, wanted to be able to keep the non-communal male betta. And, turn a dead spot on the kitchen counter into a focal point.

It's been in operation just over 2 months, and so far is popular with visitors and the kitchen's owner (my wife).

Tank: Standard 10g glass.
* I used white electrical tape over the black rim, which actually looks better than any painting I could have managed.
* The bottom rim has stick-on felt pads to make it easy to pull the tank out from under the cabinet.
* Pump/filter: Hagen Elite Mini
* Backdrop: a painted glass cutting board, attached top & bottom with velcro. Not the background I would have chosen, but compromise is a critical in every part of this hobby, isn't it? I may add a backlight to see what that looks like.
* Substrate: a thin layer of white sand

Lighting:
* Lighting: 15w T-5 plus a 20w halogen hockey puck under-cabinet lamp. This is one area I want to experiment with, with LEDs.




Plants:
* All planted in separate glass vases, to make adjustments and experiments easy. Soil topped with black gravel.
* Amazon sword (plugging along)
* Rotala Indica (growing moderately)
* Ludwigia Repens (growing moderately)
* Marsilea quadrifolia (stretching upward quickly)
* Sagittaria Sublata (hanging on)
* Dwarf baby tears (too early to tell, likely need to increase lighting)
* Anubias barteri (very slow)
* Porto Velho (?) (grew fast as a tall, thick stem, then a burst of new leaves after pruning, now very slow)
* Duckweed lemna minor, as a safety buffer.

Current Inhabitants:
* A male betta
* A Peppered Cory (lonely)
* An Oto (also lonely)
* A (fine on his own) Nerite Snail

Current Dosing:
* API CO2 Booster 1ml x 3 / week
* Monopotassium phospate, 1 mg / day

Maintenance:
* Vacuuming and 50% water change one per week.

Current challenges:
* This tank is naturally unbalanced, since it doesn't follow any of the standard methods. There's an algae that tints the sand green, and grows under the pots. It's under "control", though I don't know why and am afraid of it taking off.
* Eradicating pond snails. I support the local snail populations in my other tanks, but I find them undesirable in this one.

mudboots

It looks kind of cool like it is with the individual plantings in the glass jars. Melinda (my kitchen boss) thought it was pretty cool too, and pointed out that she likes the baby tears in particular. She said it was "cute"

Later,

Darren

Sjb1987

very neat...i like the glass jar idea as well...your pond snail could be a nice escargot..just a joke... i agree with the pond snails in the kitchen would be undesirable...nerites ok

ObiQuiet

Thank you for the comments! "Quaint" is another description I hear, along with "odd".

ObiQuiet

Update:

I doubled the florescent lighting last week, and started to get algae on/in the sand. So, I've changed the lighting cycle to include a siesta, 3 hrs on, 2 off, 4 on. I also dumped in a bunch of duckweed from the main tank -- hasn't done well before, but might now.

Moved the betta out of this one, to a new Aqueon 8, which is a very nice kit for that purpose. I think he's happier by himself.

Pond snails are under control now.

Since this kitchen tank is serving as my quarantine, I put some newly arrived Galaxy Rasboras in it. They're doing fine, though shy.

However, within a week of adding the new rasboras, the peppered cory suddenly fell ill. He'd been fine in this tank for 5+ months, and seemed to be feeding normally that morning. About 20 mins later my eye caught him zooming around stiff and upside down. Seems like he couldn't bend, nor turn over. Within an hour, I euthanized him.

At the same time, the oto that shares the tank has developed a markedly "sunburned" snout, top and bottom. I've had that fish for about two years, and it has been in this tank since the beginning.

Not sure what to make of these coincidences, but good thing it's a QT tank. I suspected TB coming in with the new fish, but the symptoms of that disease are so vague I can't call it that.