My 10 gallon planted RCS tank

11664 Views 33 Replies 8 Participants Last post by Chris., Sep 2, 2009

Chris.

Discussion Starter · Feb 11, 2009

3

I don't have my RCS yet, but they will soon be here from epicfish. I can't wait!

Here are a few pics of the 10gallon I just took. For now I only have my bully, Molly in there with several plants.

This is a "goldfish crackers" plant that I pulled from my yard, along with the cave that I made for the shrimp to hide in; at least until the plants fill in.

To the left of the cracker plant is another from my yard. In the back-center is another small plant from my yard that has leaves shaped like hearts. We'll see how these plants do submersed. Money wort plantlet on the edge of the front. E. Tennellus pink just above it and another piece of e. tenn. just above that algae wafer. (Apparently the molly doesn't like the wafers so much.) Java Fern is tied to the artificial rock.

And the Amazon sword with the bully taking a glamor shot.

Hopefully my shrimp will be here soon to give some more life to this tank! Gonna hook up a diy co2 reactor soon to encourage plant growth. Lighting is done by two 15W spiral CF bulbs rated at 6500K for 10 hours a day. Trying to keep the water temp around 80 degrees. Substrate is Flourite Black. I'm in the process of moving my 20 gallon tank from my girlfriend's house (the reason I set up the 10 g). Used about 6 gallons of water from the 20 gallon along with a filter I had running on a 5 gallon to get it cycled quicker. Everything is stable. I also used the substrate from the 5 gallon, so that had plenty of bacteria in it for the new tank. I will eventually set the 5 back up as an isolation/hospital tank. Let me know what ya think! I'll be updating this thread as my tank changes! Hopefully within a couple days there will be 6 amano shrimp and 20 RCS in there!

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Bert H

· #2 · Feb 11, 2009

Are you planning on keeping that sailfin in there with the cherries? IMO, there's nowhere near enough plant cover in there for him not to make snacks out of all of them in short time.

Keep in mind you've put in there fairly slow growing plants, and/or possibly terrestrial plants. In a newly set up tank, this could cause problems. My 2 cents.

Chris.

Discussion Starter · #3 · Feb 12, 2009

the molly may go back into my 20 gallon but a couple of my guppies will have to go in the 10g if he does. You think he will snack on the shrimp? I've never seen him be aggressive towards anything but that one guppy. What plants would you recommend for the tank? I can get some java moss relatively easy, and there is a tiny bit of singapore moss in there...hoping it grows a lot soon.

Bert H

· #4 · Feb 12, 2009

What plants would you recommend for the tank?

I would put some fast growing stems in there during the maturation process. Check out the plantfinder here on the site for lots of good info.

Chris.

Discussion Starter · #5 · Feb 12, 2009 (Edited)

5

Well, thanks to your advice I took some more echinodorus tenellus and some moneywort from my 20g and put it in here. Also removed the terrestrial plants. I also just purchased some e. vesuvius and Najas sp 'Roraima'. Really hoping the najas grows quickly. I just fed them in these new pics. I'll take more pics when the grass grows.

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Chris.

Discussion Starter · #6 · Feb 12, 2009

Is it okay to use some aquarium salt in a tank with shrimp and snails in it? My nitrites were a little high yesterday so I did a 25% water change and put 1 Tbsp salt in there...should I do a 50% now to get most of that salt out?

Chris.

Discussion Starter · #7 · Feb 14, 2009

How do you tell exoskeletons from dead shrimp??? Just found like 5 clearish shrimp. a couple of them were torn in half so I'm assuming those were just from molting of a couple. Is there a definite way to tell if one is dead or if it is just old "skin"? All of them were in the little shrimp cave I made for them to hide in.

Valthenya

· #8 · Feb 14, 2009

If it doesnt look like a live shrimp then its a molt believe me i've found a dead shrimp and i've found molts and the molts scare the poo out of me sometimes.

Chris.

Discussion Starter · #9 · Feb 17, 2009

Thank you. Yea i'm used to finding dead ghost shrimp. these are the first rcs I've ever had. When they die, do the bodies turn pinkish like ghost shrimp?

I'm getting some good growth from my money wort and the e. tenellus. Some of the leaves are even turning red on them.

starrystarstarr

· #10 · Feb 21, 2009

yes when they die they will turn the same color as dead ghost. but most of the time they get eaten up pretty fast.

Quetzalcoatl

· #11 · Feb 21, 2009

Chris. said:
Is it okay to use some aquarium salt in a tank with shrimp and snails in it? My nitrites were a little high yesterday so I did a 25% water change and put 1 Tbsp salt in there...should I do a 50% now to get most of that salt out?

I don't know about shrimp but salt will kill plants.

Chris.

Discussion Starter · #12 · Feb 21, 2009

I stopped adding salt and even cut the back of the filter to remove the carbon from the filter media since I did a little reasearch and stumbled onto a bit of info that carbon removes the nutrients your plants need to thrive. They have been doing a little bit better since then as well.

tonbrencat

· #13 · Feb 24, 2009

I like you multi-colored rock-looks good on the black substrate

Chris.

Discussion Starter · #14 · Feb 24, 2009

thank you, I just wish I had a good way to clean the algae off of it. Using a coarse pad just leaves blue stuff all over it. I see guppies peck at it a lot though. Mainly the juvenile ones. This tank is still a WIP. I just got my 20 gallon moved in from my girlfriends house and rescaped it. Waiting for the parameters to stabilize again so I can put my fish back in it. They are ALL in this 10 gallon right now. Talk about crowded!

tonbrencat

· #15 · Feb 24, 2009

I have a small rock that looks a bit like that one you have and the only way I could get it clean from algae was to bury it in the substrate for a week or two-a lot of times I would just bury it half way and flip it over ever two weeks so I could enjoy the color.....

Chris.

Discussion Starter · #16 · Feb 25, 2009

2

thats an idea, I may try. The tank looks a little different now. Not ready for full pics of it though. Here are a couple pics of the shrimp. Their color has really come in!

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Chris.

Discussion Starter · #17 · Mar 11, 2009

the algae is almost completely off of the multi colored rock now. I guess shrimp, an IMS, a two otos did some work on it! Plus a little excel dosing. lol

Chris.

Discussion Starter · #18 · Mar 19, 2009

4

here's a little update on the shrimp tank. Water finally cleared up and I put a toms rapid filter on there in conjunction with the other hob to keep the ground clean. Also got my pressurized CO2 up and running for both tanks!!! I'm stoked about that!

here is a crappy macro of my berried rcs

apparently my neons don't like bloodworms anymore but the rcs are taking to them!

And my co2 setup. Using an industrial single stage regulator, that I modified to work with paintball. The blue manifold is an old vaccum manifold I had from when I turbocharged my honda. It came in handy when I need to go down a size in hose from the regulator to the gang valves.

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Chris.

Discussion Starter · #19 · Mar 31, 2009

so, I was looking in my shrimp tank today and I notice this LITTLE guy. He must be a neon tetra fry. He's in a tank with my shrimp, juvenile guppies, and neons. He's the only one I can find for now.

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Bert H

· #20 · Mar 31, 2009

Chris. said:
so, I was looking in my shrimp tank today and I notice this LITTLE guy. He must be a neon tetra fry. He's in a tank with my shrimp, juvenile guppies, and neons. He's the only one I can find for now.

My money is on it being a guppy, not a tetra.

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