shadoh

Yeah, I ripped the actinic blue lights out because I thought it was mainly for corals. Mind you, I could use them to simulate dawn/storm/twillight/moonlight

LOL... Yeah, I meant algae... If only the hair grass would take off. Getting lots of new shoots, but needs to get thicker to be a proper carpet. I started both bottles of CO2 at the same time. Learnt my lesson and now alternate the changes to one per week. I am thinking the amount of light may be my problem. I think I will put the 2 Actinic blue tubes back in and stagger the lighting with timers. It is the only thing I can think of.

Hey Matt, Growth rates are great. Everything is pearling away. I have recently had another big outbreak of hairgrass, so have been manually removing it and spot dosing with 6% H2O2. Not dosing the tank, as the whole idea of this substrate was that it didn't need ferts. No signs of defiancy. Using 2 bottles of DIY CO2...

Welcome to the forum. Sounds like you'll fit in well There is a thriving little community of WA betta enthusiasts who I am sure will make themselves known to you :)

Loving those goldies Is JP's girlfriend a Black Orchid? Nice looking girly. What type of wood are the branches in her jar?

Did you get that one on facebook?

Jennie, both Paul and I use sand in our wild tanks the substrate we use can be found here As long as you don't go with the super fine play sand and get the propegating sand, you will be right. You can find it at bunnings (I use the brunnings brand in the yellow bag - you find it near the potting mixes and seed raising mix) Paul found it was cheaper to go to the local landscaping supply store and get the sand from there... You'll have to ask him what to look for and prices. Plant wise, if you go for low light plants (java fern, crypts, val, mosses etc), you don't have to worry about fancy lighting. You may have to add a DIY CO2 setup like Adam posted above, but it is dead easy to do. Also do a google search on natural planted tanks - yes, they use soil (you can also use the sand substrate above for a natural planted tank), but you can cap it with just about any gravel you like. The whole idea is that it is low maintenence once the plants have established themselves and it is a cheap option. You can use gravel alone, of course, but will need to use fertilizers to obtain good growth and healthy plants. At the higher price end, you can get something like aquasoil that looks more like small rounded black gravel than actual soil. Bear in mind that this does break down over time.

What were you doing up at the crack of dawn Matt Love the look of this tank. I cant wait to see it filled and stocked. It will look like a mini version of the tank in Jodis shop :)

Sarah, I am so sorry to hear that. Feliz and Hambriento

Hey Jim I'll just take the storage box off the shelf above and remove the shelf.

Thanks Les! Will be doing another set to use as bookshelves in the office :)

Thanks @Busman, What are you talking about? The barracks are in my office... remember? :P

What chiller? Are you talking about the black thing next to the shelves? That's one of my stereo speakers Don't think I'd need a chiller that big for the tiny tank I have set up (small tank second shelf...) Besides, you told me I wouldn't need a chiller... :)

Well, I finally got around to setting up the "new" shelves. Top shelf is a display tank. Second is another display tank and my soon to be shrimp tank. Third shelf is storage. Fourth has my spawn tanks (with new spawns set up). And bottom shelf is for aged water. There is so much more room in there now. I can't believe I didn't do it sooner

Looking good Wayne! :D

Any spawning behavior? Did you keep the corys in there?

Sick of looking at your tanks mate. Let it die... :rofl:

Very nice mate :D

Well, that's my wild adventure over just checked on the female and she had died. She was fine a few hours ago. I don't know what went wrong. I was meticulous about making sure the tank was cleaned out properly. The only thing I can think of is that there must have been some residue. What else could it be? I am gutted. Going to continue with the fishroom overhaul and reassess this at a later time.

In an effort to turn lemons into lemonade, I've decided to do a revamp of the fishroom. I have had one of those snap lock shelving units slowly rotting away in my carport. The shelves were made of chipboard and had swelled with moisture and the galvanized metal was covered with some kind of scale like growth. I had planned on tossing it when we have the next hard rubbish collection day. Last night I noticed that the current shelving I am using in the fishroom is overloaded and starting to buckle. My thoughts turned to the shelving unit in the carport and how I could fix it up. This morning I pulled the old shelving unit apart, took to the growth on the metal frame with a wire brush to clean it off, then headed to the hardware store to collect some pine to replace the chipboard shelves and some stain and spraypaint. Here is the result. I like it so much, I might make another one to use as bookshelves in the office...

The girl is fine. She wasn't showing any sighn of being sick. Mind you, neither was the boy...

Killies would be good. I am looking for something new to try...

I was pretty careful to clean the tank several times to make sure, but you never know... I would have thought the female would have died too if that was the case. Bad blood worms? Then again, why is the female still swimming around? Just thinking out loud here... Had temperatures in the mid 30's last couple of days. And I know temps in the fishroom are around the 40 deg mark. Could it be the heat?

Well, no point putting pressure on now and there will be no more videos of green spaghetti. I just went to feed the pair and the male had died sometime last night. Female looks fine. I will keep an eye on her throughout the day :(