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I gave up on the idea of using an acrylic tank after the one I had ordered arrived with great big gash in the lower left hand corner. Have no idea how it got there. I assume it left the seller in usable condition. These things happen:
![Wood Rectangle Flooring Floor Wood stain]()
But, it left me with a bucket full of plants and four Borelli cichlids on their way from a dealer in Alabama. So, I relied the only thing I thought I had any control over - my junk closet. And, from there I pulled out an old war horse from the 1980s, a 30 gallon long glass tank complete with flourescent light hood. Imagine my surprise when the light and ballast still worked!
Not knowing exactly when the fish would arrive, I immediately went to work mineralizing the soil. I did it the quick and dirty way - in the tank itself. Basically, anything that floated after I added about three inches of water got skimmed off (and put into the "dry" storage pot.)
The water was a nice dark chocolate soup at that point so I was rather anxious to put a cap on it. The STS I chose had some welcome and unwelcome surprises. Among the pluses was the fact that it soon became apparent that a 50 pound bag no longer seems the white elephant that it once did six months ago. I must have gone through about 10 pounds just covering the bottom of the tank by an inch. Another pleasant thing about STS is that it feels very soft to the touch when inserting the plants; I could barely tell where it ended and the soil began. The apistos should have no problem sucking it into their mouths.
The bad part was how much dust comes out in the rinsing. It was absolutely soupy and showed little sign of really coming clean. I remembered @dwalstad 's advice about not overdoing the rinsing (some of that dust may have denitrifying potential) and stopped when the soup became a mere broth.
Luckily, I had plenty of floaters on hand. Didn't need to cull them this week. Just transferred half the ones in my porcelain bowl:
![Motor vehicle Hood Plant Rectangle Wood]()
Next went the newly sprouted red lotus. It seems happy to be in water:
![Plant Water Terrestrial plant Underwater Aquatic plant]()
Next was the lovely but diffident lily that started me on the road to dirt eight months ago but which I hadn't fully seen since the bowl got taken over by lotuses. This was a good move for it since (apparently) it no longer had any pads:
![Twig Wood Tints and shades Rectangle Flowering plant]()
Then, as I continued ferrying water (5 gallons at a time via a bucket) from my bathroom to the tank, i stopped and looked at it and thought to myself "Gosh, if I were a Borelli cichlid, that would look perfect right about there." The water was nearly halfway up the tank. They're bottom swimmers. They're territorial. For them, its' about length and width. Height, not so much. So, I stopped about here:
Front:
![Water Plant Vertebrate Pet supply Organism]()
Back:
![Plant Light Nature Organism Pet supply]()
I'm agnostic at this point. According to the seller, the fish won't be shipped out before next week. I have time to decide. It looks murky now, but I'm assuming things will settle down in short order, if algae doesn't become a problem.
Ammonia tests out at:
![Liquid Fluid Wood Flooring Gas]()
What would you call that? About a 1 ppm?
But, it left me with a bucket full of plants and four Borelli cichlids on their way from a dealer in Alabama. So, I relied the only thing I thought I had any control over - my junk closet. And, from there I pulled out an old war horse from the 1980s, a 30 gallon long glass tank complete with flourescent light hood. Imagine my surprise when the light and ballast still worked!
Not knowing exactly when the fish would arrive, I immediately went to work mineralizing the soil. I did it the quick and dirty way - in the tank itself. Basically, anything that floated after I added about three inches of water got skimmed off (and put into the "dry" storage pot.)
The water was a nice dark chocolate soup at that point so I was rather anxious to put a cap on it. The STS I chose had some welcome and unwelcome surprises. Among the pluses was the fact that it soon became apparent that a 50 pound bag no longer seems the white elephant that it once did six months ago. I must have gone through about 10 pounds just covering the bottom of the tank by an inch. Another pleasant thing about STS is that it feels very soft to the touch when inserting the plants; I could barely tell where it ended and the soil began. The apistos should have no problem sucking it into their mouths.
The bad part was how much dust comes out in the rinsing. It was absolutely soupy and showed little sign of really coming clean. I remembered @dwalstad 's advice about not overdoing the rinsing (some of that dust may have denitrifying potential) and stopped when the soup became a mere broth.
Luckily, I had plenty of floaters on hand. Didn't need to cull them this week. Just transferred half the ones in my porcelain bowl:
Next went the newly sprouted red lotus. It seems happy to be in water:
Next was the lovely but diffident lily that started me on the road to dirt eight months ago but which I hadn't fully seen since the bowl got taken over by lotuses. This was a good move for it since (apparently) it no longer had any pads:
Then, as I continued ferrying water (5 gallons at a time via a bucket) from my bathroom to the tank, i stopped and looked at it and thought to myself "Gosh, if I were a Borelli cichlid, that would look perfect right about there." The water was nearly halfway up the tank. They're bottom swimmers. They're territorial. For them, its' about length and width. Height, not so much. So, I stopped about here:
Front:
Back:
I'm agnostic at this point. According to the seller, the fish won't be shipped out before next week. I have time to decide. It looks murky now, but I'm assuming things will settle down in short order, if algae doesn't become a problem.
Ammonia tests out at:
What would you call that? About a 1 ppm?
