Newness

New lights, new gravel, new wood, new location and some new fish... and yes some new "plastic" plants (for now).

The crpts (foreground plants) have already melted and will take some time to regrow.
The driftwood is awesome. Tank is still cloudy from the new sand but will clear up over time.
I added 5 new peppered corys yesterday to help churn the sand.


During the breakdown and move, I setup an old 10 gallon tank in my daughter's room. She likes it and wants to keep it running. Yesterday she picked out two platys to add to it. I am also keeping my panda corys in this tank.

Under Construction

Here is the last shot of my tank before big changes:


I have already changed the lighting. Removed the very high output (VHO) T5 ballast and replaced it with a normal output (NO) T5 ballast. The change in heat produced by the bulbs is night and day.
I have a large piece of drift wood soaking in the tank now, getting water-logged. It is a interesting piece, I just hope it is not too big.

Grounded

My aquarium has been grounded from light for 3 days because of bad behavior. The blue-green algae is out of control despite my best efforts to stop it. I have done all the research and taken all the recommended steps and it just won't stop. MAKE IT STOP! So for now I am killing it off with a 3 black-out.
Soon, I plan to redo my aquarium. I will switch to sand for a substrate, remove the CO2 injection and remove the T5VHO lighting. I don't like the T5VHO lights, they just run too hot and the room they are in gets extra warm because of it (not a good thing in Phoenix). I plan to move to LED lighting, low power, low heat. I also ordered more driftwood.

Suckage

My tank sucks... no matter what it turns into a blue-green algae soup. I have it on a 3 day black-out to kill it then I plan to reduce the lighting to survive until I do a re-scape. I plan to replace the substrate, I think that may be the cause.

Trimming Day

Big clean out of Wisteria today.
Trash pile on the bottom, keepers on top.

Another update

Some progress has been made in the algae war. I have starved them from nutrients and there has been a big reduction in algae, but the plants are suffering as well. I have resumed nutrient supplements now... but I need to order a new kind of supplement to do it right.

Duckweed usually grows like a weed, but not in my tank. It all died off. Maybe the lights are too hot, or maybe my Endler's live bearers eat the roots.

Speaking of Endler's, there are way too many babies in my tank now. Here you can see a few:

My pandas:



My dog, giving me the evil eye:

Duckweed

A good i-friend gave me some good advice on algae control. I cut my lights back to 7 hours a day and got some duckweed from a local pet shop (3 bucks for a small portion!!!) to help control nutrient and light levels.
Cross your fingers.

I Grow Wisteria

A quick little update. Things are heading in a good direction. You can see from the pic, the wisteria is growing like a weed. I have decided to let it as I hope it will out compete the algae.
Here you can also see the crypts beginning to recover on the bottom right of the tank.

Secret Plans (shhhh)

Met with a fellow tank keeper that I met online and he gave me a few plants and fish. He had a really neat tank, a 20g long. I have been trying to make secret plans to get one for myself (but don't tell my wife).

One fish he gave me was a little tiny baby bristlenose pleco (long fin). I hope it is a boy.


No full shots yet... the plants are not well. The crypts have all melted with the addition of CO2 and need more time to recover.

Tank shot - CO2 installed. You can see the white diffuser in the left corner and the drop checker on the right side. I HOPE the next photos will show good plant growth and reduced algae problems.From a distance it does not look so bad right? But up close... blech.The underside of my aquarium... also a mess right now, but I plan to screw the power strips to the side of the wall and do some cable management. Note the yummy looking filter tubes.

Why yes... that chromed CO2 regulator IS sexy!

Oh, here is my dog wondering what I am up to.

CO2 Stuff

Ordered all my stuff today from greenleafaquariums.com. Called the guy on the phone and had a chat about CO2 equipment and his insight was very helpful. Also ordered new T5 bulbs.
Everything should come in next week. YAY!
I'm excited about this step, I have always envied those amazing green aquariums, but wanted to avoid the complexity and cost of CO2 injection. But now with CO2 I should be seeing HUGE improvements.

Giving Up

My low tech planted aquarium has continued to uglify itself despite my efforts to make the low tech approach work. So... rather than having an expensive eye-soar in my room I've decided to give up on low tech and go high tech.
I am currently researching pressurized CO2 injection systems and plan to begin purchasing parts this month. It "should" resolve a lot of the problems I have with algae and slow plant growth.

More to come...

Additions

Staghorn algae is now under control. How did I get rid of it? I have no idea...
I had to remove the Amazon Sword plant as it had outgrown the tank and yesterday I filled in that spot with a new plant. Did a major cut back of the Wisteria as well.

It will take a week to grow back and look filled in:
Also added a new fish:

Make it stop!!!

Planted aquarium FAIL.
Since the last update I have continued to have algae problems. If I am able to clear up 1 type, then another type of algae takes over and round and round we have gone.

Here are some samples of my lovely algae. My tank is sooo purdy.


Good news? Well... at least my plants are still fairly healthy and the fish are all very healthy. So on to plan B. CO2 injection.
Tonight I rigged up a DIY CO2 bottle with a 2L pop bottle, and tubing. My plan is to have a 2 bottle rotation so that CO2 flow stays somewhat steady. If this makes a world of difference I may have to turn my back on low tech and pony up for a high pressure CO2 injection system.

Progress

The tank has made some good progress in the algae battle. With the addition of an internal ultra-violet sterilizer filter the water clarity is much much better. I got pretty desperate with the algae and added "Algae Fix", a liquid that is reported to kill algae but not plants. I tested it in my 5 gallon aquarium first and it did not harm the plants. It did a good job of killing off some algae in my 50 gallon and the plants are no worse for it.

Algae Battle & Surface Scum

Just a quick update... the algae battle continues as well as surface scum. I hate both of them. The good news is that plants are still doing very well (and the fish too). I am cleaning out algae maybe twice a week now and have to surface skim with a pop bottle almost everyday.

Aquarium Shot
Full Stand/Tank/Hood
Algae Problems

How I Feel About Algae

Disaster

I returned from a week of vacation to find my tank in complete ruin. Hair algae, beard algae and blue-green algae everywhere and even the water is green. I cleaned out some algae last night but it was already so late I could not do more. Today I have no time to work on it as well and this week at work will be crazy, so perhaps I can work on it a bit every night.

I was too panicked at the time to take a picture.

All I can think of is that the automatic fish feeder was dumping way more fish food in than I wanted. All the fish had very fat tummies so this is probably the culprit.

Sigh... and things were going so well.

3 Weeks - Bristlenose

At 3 weeks most of the water sprite has been removed. The wisteria has grown in to replace it, which looks and smells better (water sprite has a foul odor).

My girls' favorite fish, the bristle-nose pleco. The video is more enjoyable if you make little munching noises with it.

My Coralife power strip with built in day/night timer broke after only 3 weeks of use! It would no longer switch to "night" mode. I could not find any warranty information so I opened it myself and found it easy to fix. There was a small wire running between the timer and the casing that had moved to block the mechansim that toggles the day/night. After moving this wire it worked again. I need to tape it down so it does not happen again. I would hate for this to happen during a vacation and come home to algae soap. While it was open I also realized that this unit does not offer any surge protection, so I picked one up this weekend.

2 Weeks - Betta Wars - DIY Cooling - Golden Ratio

2 weeks photo
The narrow leaf chain swords are beginning to chain off siblings.


I added 4 more female betttas and my "harem" is now complete. The first few hours after adding the new females were pretty intense and several of them suffered some torn fins. Things have calmed down now and they have all figured out that there is plenty of territory for them all and that they can avoid/leave a confrontation rather than fight it out.

I found what may be the ugliest female betta ever and just could not pass it up. I added her to the tank for her "uniqueness" and character. The girls have named her "Cracker". I don't know what genetic experiments preceded her, but I think it is safe to say they failed.



A few more of the bettas. From left to right we have Buttercup, Crystal and Dragon (renamed from Princess because she is the real trouble maker).

My canopy was getting too hot. I measured the temperature at 105 degrees one evening, and I would think it gets higher than that during the day. I have been looking online at fan solutions and they are overpriced and I just have not been able to make myself buy one. Its pretty obvious that all the solutions are just computer case fans with an AC/DC adapter. So I grabbed a case fan I had here at home, found an old unused AC/DC converter (12v) from an outdated cell phone and spliced the two together. Fan worked, no fire. So I used some velcro tape to attach the fan and try it out. With in few minutes the canopy temp dropped by ~12 degrees. Not bad! Since this worked I am going to add a second fan and find a more permanent/secure way to attach the fans.

As as side note... when I was drawing up the basic plans for the stand and hood I was concerned about getting the proportions balanced. I have seen aquariums with over sized canopies or stands that are too short/tall and they don't look "right". An idea came to me from my myfamily.com website. My brother (a dentist) mentioned that veneers are done with the golden ratio in mind - DING! That was the answer to getting a balanced looking stand/aquarium/canopy. So I used the golden ratio based on the height of the aquarium to determine the height of the stand and canopy. You can't go wrong with the golden ratio.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Golden_ratio