xmamx

Keep their tank about 25 - 26 ish and the clowns have not had itch since i got them over a year and a bit ago. The two goldfish dont seem to mind as well, will eventually move the goldies into a pond or may switch to a full cold setup as the goldfish look great in a fully planted tank as they stand out really well against the plants and i really like some of the orandas etc. My camera is a fuji finepix slr 4900 which is only 4 megapixel of sorts. Most of the brand name digital slrs are quite good, i am in two minds weather or not to buy a better one or to get a compact camera as slrs are very bulky to carry around but i do like the fact you can change lenses and use manual focus with slrs as the compact cameras cant focus properly on my tank.

Cheers, my clowns were out and about so it didnt take to long to get that pic. My camera has a burst mode where it takes 5 pics really quickly which makes it easier to get some good pics). The otto and the rainbows are in another tank and yes the goldfish and the clowns are in the same tank, its been like that for over a year and a half and no probs they get on quite well and sometimes swim around each other. Got quite a few other fish in there also with a oversized filter so my stocking level works well.

Just playing with my old slr digital camera, need to buy a better one. My personal fav is the pic of the otto. Here they are:

I have 3 clowns ranging from 6cm to about 12cm. Only one of them likes putting holes in my plants and that is the 7cm one, he pratically destroyed a large sword i put in the tank. Eventually they will find a favourite plant, well mine has and its the mouses ear (liked the leaves at first and now likes the stalk which is fine with me as i dont see the damage as much now). My only solution to the holes in plants issue was to get more plants, lights, co2 and give him to much choice and make the plants grow faster. Seems to have started working. Also on a side note, my clowns have decided to go into hiding again. They have been hiding since last friday when i removed a 20cm pleco from my tank. It seems they dont want to leave the tank either so are hiding ehehheeh hopefully they come back out.

Think you can pick up metal halides for around that price range. Probably a 150Watt one might work (not sure about spread of light width wise but should reach the bottom). The only downside is you would need to hang above your tank from roof or make up a frame of sorts. Hans should be able to help you as he seems to know quite a bit about Metal Halides.

Its a shame to hear about your fish dying. I would probably strip down the whole tank as something isnt right. The blackbeard algae is a pain to get rid of (only way is to do a full strip down or use flourish excel (very pricey but good). May also pay to look into getting another filter as you filter may not be working up to scratch and therefore your ammonia is still high. Normally when i test for ammonia the result is clear with no colour (i use a nutrafin test kit). Are you on tank water (rain or bore) as i have read somewhere that rain water can be high in phosphates which is good for growing algae (someone correct me if i am wrong). So my suggestions are: 1: increase yhe amount water changes and maybe change up to 40 - 50% if need be to get your ammonia reading to almost nothing 2: see if you can find a new filter, even second hand one off trademe 3: do a full tank strip down and throw out all plants etc with black beard on them and give the tank a good scrub. Leave the filter though. Maybe keep %50 of the water though as you dont want to change all of it (the only downside is that the blackbeard will be in the water so it will move to clean tank but at least it wont be established) 4: run both filters on the tank as you can never have enough filtration sometimes. 5: even better option see if you can get another tank with filter, cycle it up and move your fish into that. Then strip down your aqua one tank and clean and maybe change gravel as well. Then once the other tank is stable move the water, filter and fish back into your aqua one. Hopefully it gets better. Cheers, Xmamx

I bought a CF1000 about a month ago and it came with bioballs (packaged in a plastic bag). They are supposed to go in the bottom. They will rattle about a bit for a couple of weeks until the filter gets settled and then it will be quite quiet. This thread has heaps of details about the CF1000 http://www.fnzas.org.nz/fishroom/viewtopic.php?t=21723 Cheers, Xmamx

Well i finally made both the moss walls. The following pics are of the second one with Xmas moss in it with no backing behind it (need to put some on to make it not so see through). To make the walls i cut the green mesh to size and cut out bits to fit around bracing etc. I then tried to glue the suction cups to the mesh but it did not hold so i ended up drilling holes through the top part of the suction cup and then threaded the nylon through the hole and tied it to the green mesh. Once i did that i cut the shade cloth to size and then threaded nylon through and tied it to the green mesh in enough places to seal it. I then put the moss inside, and threaded it all up and washed and put in my tank. The larger wall for my main tank had about 3 handfulls of java moss in it so i managed to leave no gaps where i only had a handfull of xmas moss for the second wall so i had to spread it out a bit more. The java moss wall is starting to slowly have bits of moss coming through the mesh which is good as i made it last weekend. Here is some pics of the second wall on my newly planted tank setup.

I just made a couple for both of my tanks. If you look at the thread in the DIY section http://www.fnzas.org.nz/fishroom/viewtopic.php?t=24496 it advises what materials i used. It all depends on what you can find really as far as mesh is concerned. It took a little while to make my moss walls as i threaded the nylon through to make it sealed so the fish could not get inside. I will post a couple of pics on the other post. Here is a tutorial on how to make them also. http://www.aquamoss.net/How%20to%20create%20a%20moss%20wall/How%20to%20create%20a%20moss%20wall.htm

Ill say they must have been big mice. I have chopped some of the leaves off at the stems and hope they will grow some roots so i can have a few more plants (think thats how i did it last time). Thanks for your help guys.

Thanks alan, The second picture is apparenlty call red sawtooth, or dragons tounge. I found the scientific name but left it at work. It is a non aquatic plant like you advised. As for the third picture, i have had it quite a while and all leaves on it have been grown submersed. Since i got more lights it has been growing leaves quite fast which is good as the algae takes hold pretty quick on the leaves which is a pain and my clown loaches love the big leaves (pretty much destroyed it when i first bought it but it has come back to life). Bought some phos-zorb today to see if i can slow down the algae a bit as the SAES & Oto dont seem to worry about the algae on the big leaves. Are you sure it is mouses ears, as i saw some in the shop and it looked different. I may have to chop the stalk and replant as it is starting to get quite tall. Also with the last plant, all leaves come from the single stalk, the two lower plants are seperate plants (3 plants in total).

Cheers for all the replys, I bought some shade cloth from mitre 10 mega and i am going to use fishing line to attach it to the green large mesh i bought. I also bought some suction cups from $2 shop that are used to hold xmas lights (50 in a pack). I will have to thread the nylon through the rubber top part of the suction cups to attach them to the mesh as the glue gun didnt hold the rubber very well. I have cut the green mesh to size and cut certain parts out to fit around tank bracing etc, nearly ready to put the shade cloth on the mesh and suction cups and then will put the moss in and put in the tank. Cost so far: $2.50 for large green mesh from palmers (a metres worth) $2.50 for the shade cloth (about 1.2 metres or so) $0 fishing line (allready had some) $2 suction cups $$ lots for the time heeheheh The good thing is that i will be able to make 2 walls now. One for my 2foot 100 litre main tank and one for my other 2 foot shallower tank (about 50 litres or so). I have loads of java moss in my main tank so that wall will be java and in my new planted tank i will be using xmas moss. Saying that my java moss in my main tank looks like xmas moss as it gets lots of light. When i moved some to my little dark tank it grows more spindly like the pictures of java moss on the net. I Finally sold the last of my apple snails from my 50 litre tank and now i can put in new substrate and plant it up yay. I will post some pics of my progress in making the moss walls if ppl want to see how it goes.

Can someone help id these plants for me: 1: got from animates a couple of years ago 2: the red plant with jagged edges. Its quite a different plant, unable to find anything like it. It apparently came from a plant lfs supplier though. 3: got it a while ago from lfs in johnsonville, thought is was mouses ears but when i saw some pictures of mouses ears it didnt look the same. Your guys help would be appreciated. Xmamx

Cool might check the warehouse again and also might check if they have some fish nets and give those a try (on the xmas moss wall that is). Cheers

Cheers guys, I had a look at spotlight but did not see anything that really suited. I think they may have the cross stitch mesh which is white and apparently that might work. Really want black as it will blend into the back of the tank better. As for fish net stocking, i really need a more rigid type of mesh that will stay in place at the back of the tank better.

I recently got a CF1000 also and the bio balls are rattling on mine also. Its in a cabinet so its not to noisey but still slightly annoying. I also had a leak around the priming cap when i got mine (brand new filter) and it therefore let air get into the filter which made it noisey also. I ended up taking the rubber o ring off the priming cap and putting some plumbing tape around the centre bit (just a little bit) and then put the o-ring back on and it is not working like a charm, no leaks at all. I might have to see if i can find some more bio-balls like Ira advised.

Does anyone know where i can get black mesh similar to the stuff in this Moss wall tutorial http://www.aquamoss.net/How%20to%20create%20a%20moss%20wall/How%20to%20create%20a%20moss%20wall.htm as i am going to make a xmas moss wall for a small planted tank i am going to setup. I got some stuff from the garden centre and it is green with square holes about 1.5cms which is a bit to big for what i want, i really need some finer stuff that has holes around 6mm - 8mm and preferably black. I tried bunnings, palmers, california garden centre, mitre 10 without success. Can anybody help?. Thanks, Xmamx

Thanks guys for your input, Hans if you could get me a price on a Metal Halide setup that would be cool, be good to see how much i would need to pay. The other issue with metal halides is that i rent and the house has a 12 foot stud so dont really want to hang it from the roof, has anyone made a hood type setup for Halides? and what would be suitable for a tank that is 60cm l x 45cm w x 55 h. I currently have 3 x 2 foot doubles lights with mostly 18watt bulbs in them (covers the top of the tank nicely) and my micro swords pearl slightly (i think i am just impatient and want the plants to grow faster ehheeh). I read that the WPG rule doesnt apply if you multiple your lights ie. 6 x 18 = 108Watts, as the initial wattage is still only 18watts. My tank is brighter with the 3 doubles though.

What are everyones thoughts on Compact Fluorescent Lighting kits or light hoods. I found a website in the states that has kits, a 2x55watt kit (2 foot) is about $220 NZ but you need to make a case for it. http://www.ahsupply.com/index.html Does anyone know if there are cheaper kits around? How do they compare to Metal Halides? These are a lot slimmer and dont have the same amount of heat so can be put into a light hood setup which would be quite good. How is their water penetration compare to MH's? Does anyone in NZ make these kits?

I have a 100 litre tank at 24 degrees. It has two goldfish, a pleco, clown loaches and some small tetras and SAE's. It has been setup like this for over a year and a half with now problems other than my pleco chasing my goldfish when the goldfish trys to eat the plecos food. Will eventually need to get a bigger tank as goldfish, plecos and clown loaches can grow quite big (good excuse to by a larger tank heheh).

I have 2 sterbai corys in my tank with 2 gold fish (one of them is about 15cms long) and other fish (guppies, white cloud, sae's, clown loaches, tetras). Never had any issues with the gold fish eating other fish as the bigger they get the slower they get. I have the temp set to about 24 to 25 and they all do fine, has been setup like that for over a year and half now. Slowly increase the temp over a week to the temp you want and then you should be fine getting any type of community fish for your tank.

I have quite a few plants and my goldfish dont touch then. It depends on how much you feed them really. I feed my fish twice a day morning and afternoon. I have baby tears, amazon sword, cabomba, java moss, java fern, anubias (i think), red melon sword and some other plants. Its the clown loachs you have to worry about (apparently its fun putting holes in the leaves of all your good broad leaf plants). So if you plant it well and feed them enough (not to much as they will eat and eat) you can put lots of plants in your tank. You just have to watch that you dont start to like growing plants more than fish hehehe. As for vtec8u i saw some cool plants called fibre optic grass in animates yesterday and it they advised it suited cold water. When it was used in a tropical tank it went brown due to the heat of the water. It would look great along the back of a fish tank as it was quite tall.

Forgot to say about plant growth. Java ferns growing quite a few more leaves (not loads but more than usuall) Red melon is growing faster (full leaf about every 4 - 5 day estimate) Cabomba (growing well but a more spindly, quite different from when i bought it as it had really fine leaves that were denser when i first got it). Sword growing ok but not fast enough to stop my clown loach destroying it (want it to grow faster than he eats it hehhehe). Other plants are growing better but not a drastic change in growth as such

Hey thanks Roski i was hoping no one would notice it, oh well hope it works well for you. I ended up setting up a DIY yeast setup with a 2 litre coke bottle with a check valve on it so i can place it under my tank (has been ok up to now - Touch wood). I have run the output into the top of my shark internal filter and it seems to do a good job of breaking up the bubbles. I usually get more bubbles when i come home as i turn the heater on to warm up the lounge room and therefore heats up the yeast also. I also put some dead coral in the tank to stabalize the PH to a higher value as well as it was sitting quite low. It now sits around 6.0 - 6.2 or so. Strangly though when i lowered my filter more towards the bottom of the tank to get more dispersion of the CO2 my fish started to breath from the surface which means there was to much CO2 apparently. Most ppl seem to think you cant get enough from DIY yeast to do this. I only did a 3/4 fill bottle with cup of sugar and 1/3 teaspoon of yeast and bit of baking soda as i wanted the mix to last longer as opposed to more CO2. Also running a bubble wall from 9pm to 7am to disperse the gas at night. Also my black hair algae is getting a bit worse on my java fern so i may not have enough light (might get an SAE to clear it up - cheaper than flourish excel). I am running both light hoods, ones a double 2 footer at a total of 36watts and one single with a grow lamp at 15watts, so in total 51watts for a 100 litre tank (problem is my tank is quite deep at 53cm high with water up to 40cm's. Also dosing about 1ml of flourish once a week. Anybody else got black hair algae when using CO2? and does anybody else have issues having a high tank and getting enough light to plants. The problem is that my tank is only 60cm wide so cant go higher wattage lights for the length.

thanks guys, i have turned off my bubble wall to see if the plants grow a bit better as the bubbles may have been dispersing the co2 faster. Will see how it goes.