38L planted tank

[Ice222]

Now that my sis has gone overseas and can't tell me off for getting yet another tank, I've now setup a new 38L sitting in my living room :happy1:. Tank is 500L x 250D x 300Hmm, and only has 3 Upside-Down Catfish, 1 Sparkling Gourami, and 4 CPDs at them moment mostly cause I had to boot them out of their original tank to make room for this slightly bigger one. Plants are various bits from my other tanks: Java moss, java fern, twisted val, green lotus, ambulia, congo fern and lilaeopsis. Anyway here,s a pic of the newly setup tank. I'm hoping that once the catfish settle in, they might let me get some decent pics of them. Still a little shy atm, but they sure seem to be out a lot more when in this tank.

Decided I like long tanks after all. Compared to my other tanks, I think this one looks deceivingly bigger even though it's actually the same size/volume.

Can't wait till everything grows in. Thinking of moving the lotus to the left a bit and putting it a little further back, and might get some water sprite, or something else easy and bushy, to go in front of the val so you don't see so much of the bg. It might also be nice to get something more for the wood, like Windelov java fern (or more congo fern, but that stuff's expensive and temperamental). What do you guys think? Anything I should change or move around? Once I relocate my 4 CPDs and Gourami, I'm thinking of adding some other fish in. Thinking of putting some 'odd' fish. May give glass cats, hatchets or Kuhli Loaches a go. Just kinda want something that even non-fishy people will think are interesting for once :roll:.

[Ismart120]

Glass cats would be cool, not sure about how well they'd fit though.

[Ice222]

Glass cats would be cool, not sure about how well they'd fit though.

Yea I was thinking that. I know they'll eventually get too big for the tank, so it'll depend how quickly they grow. I have a much bigger tank that they could go in eventually, but I probably won't be doing anything with the big tank till the end of the year when I have a break.

[ally07]

Looks good! Would you consider splurging a bit?? lol.. I was just thinking that having one of those internal filters with the built-in heater attachment would look so much cooler than having a sponge filter and a normal heater. They are, unfortunately, ridiculously expensive haha.

[Caryl]

Yes, you will have to move the lotus as it will grow very large and take over!

Are you able to move the left side log back further and a little more to the centre? It is hard to tell if it is back as far as it can go. That would make the tank look like it had more depth and possibly hide the filter a bit more.

Sprite would certainly grow quickly and be used to cover the heaterstat.

[Ice222]

A filter+heater combo does sound cool I'll have to check it out at a store and see if I'd like it first. I haven't actually seen one before, and I haven't heard much about them. I have the same Eheim heater in my other similar sized tanks, so it makes it easy to keep the parameters of all my tanks fairly similar, unless if it looks awesome I probably won't change it.

As for my lotus, I have one in my other tank been here a few months and it seems to be staying small? Maybe it's cause I've got no ferts in that tank, but I've also heard that you can 'train' tiger lotuses to stay more compact by cutting the extended leaves. Is that true? Also the wood is as far back as it goes. the most I could do it rotate it counter clockwise for about 1 inch so that it angles backwards a bit more. Hard to find small but branchy pieces of wood like this in shops, been on the lookout for better pieces.

As for stocking I'm still considering Marbled hatchet, scarlet badis or perhaps furcatus rainbowfish? Not a true oddball but definitely odd looking all the same. Think I need to go for another browse at the LFS to see what catches my eye.

[Caryl]

My lotus stays small for ages (also no ferts) then suddenly takes off shooting huge leaves to the surface. It then flowers and dies back again to repeat the process. You can cut off the longer stems. Lighting has an effect on their growth, or size, too.

I am not keen on the filter/heater combo mainly because if one dies you have to get a replacement, either another combo (and double up on the bit that didn't die) or another piece of equipment in the tank. I prefer to be able to replace each separately.

[Sophia]

Looks good. I didn't even notice the sponge in the back there till someone mentioned it. The val will eventually obscure it when it starts putting out runners.

I had a lotus in my tank a bit smaller than yours about half way back on the same side, it didn't get too big. Yours will grow up and hide the heater a bit if you leave it there.

Scarlet badis would be a nice little splash of red snooping around the lower area. I like the furcatus rainbows too but have read mixed reports about their temperament. How about some boraras brigittae? They would be your tiniest fish and you'd get some orange in the middle area of the tank. There are some at HFF at the moment too. How small can the fish get - will the catfish eat them or are they herbivores?

[Ismart120]

If you wanted to go slightly odd ball, you could turn it into a puffer tank, from my understanding, the tank would be a good size for it

[Ice222]

The only puffers I've kept before are the freshwater ones, and they would be far too aggressive to go with the upside-down catfish. Puffers are pretty neat, but unless if there are any that could get along with the catfish, I won't consider them until the catfish outgrow this tank.

In other news, one pygmy cory in one of my other tanks just randomly dropped dead overnight. Can't really tell what killed it, no signs aside from looking pale. I guess it could've been velvet since that can be hard to see. Keepign a close eye on my other fish now. Esp now that I've got my lovely betta in with them. He seems happy though, built a nice bubble nest yesterday :happy2:.

By the way, are red tail red eye puffers as aggressive as dwarf puffers? Any one had experience keeping them in a non-species tank? Did a little googling and seems some people are able to keep pygmy cories with them so I'm just wondering if anyone has firsthand experience. My tank's probably too small to have more than 1 puffer, but I wouldn't mind having just 1 puffer if I could keep some other fish, like my upside down catfish, in with it. Haven't seen them for sale recently though.

[Ice222]

Tuesday I added Chocolate Gourami which I bought mostly on impulse, I was thinking "it's a gourami how different can it be?" so the only thing I thought to ask about was how big they get. Oh how wrong I was :facepalm: . Came back home with one, popped it in the tank (acclimatizing first) and read up on it, everything I've found has been 'they drop like flies', 'they make discus look positively hardy' etc.

The one I have is still doing fine -for now - it looks happy enough, is eating plenty, and gets along with the tank mates but I am not counting on it to last that long. A lot about my setup isn't ideal, since these fish apparently need constant perfect conditions :nilly:. My PH's neutral, the temp is at 25C so JUST within range for them, not a species tank, no peat only driftwood, no floating plants, plus the worst is this tank is newly setup (although the filter and a bit of media came from an old tank). Basically the only thing I'd be doing right for them is that I have soft water, I'm just lucky my tapwater comes out soft. If it does somehow manage to do well though, I may be keen to get a 2nd one, because I really like the look of them. I think I'll name this first one 'guinea pig' :-?.

Wednesday, my windelov arrived in the mail, had a few ramshorns in it, but was a really nice sized bunch. Took the wood out, put it on the table, tied the plants on and found a little upside-down cat on the table . it gave me such a shock! Picked it up with my hands and plopped it back in the tank, observed it for a long time and thankfully it was just fine. Fed everyone a round of bloodworms as a kind of appology but somehow the upsidedown cats weren't interested in them at all :dunno:.

Today they only got NLS pellets for dinner, but it was amazing! First time I've seen them come out to eat from the surface. Plus remember the ramshorns I mentioned earlier? I watched one catfish hunt one down and eat it from the shell! I swear it was more vicious than the dwarf puffers I had once. Since they're finally coming out, I really hope it means I'll have pics soon, they're like the most amazing fish to watch :happy2:.

[the-obstacle]

I love upside down cats. I hope they do turn out to be good snail hunters.

[Ice222]

The Upside-Down Cats are still being shy little buggers, at least they're only being shy when I am anywhere near the tank since I see them happily swimming about when I glance over from the computer :roll:. I manged to get some okay pics of the other residents today though, so I thought I'd share. Added some scarlet badis earlier in the week. I think I have 2 Males, 2 Females, and one of uncertain gender. Having some problems with my Java ferns as you might be able to see in the pics. They went brown pretty quickly, only about 2 days after popped the new ones in, and my old ferns (ones that have been around in my old tank for are year started going grotty too. I'm thinking that they may be unhappy with the ferts somehow so I'm going 0 ferts until they all settle down.

Anyway pics:

Chocolate gourami - Still alive and kicking, also not as shy as I thought they'd be.

I think that's a female Scarlet Badis. Not feeling 100% sure on this one since I have another that looks almost white)

One of the males (the other one is prettier, but likes to hand out with the upside-down cats near the filter)

[Jennifer]

That's a subordinate male Dario, the females don't have that striping. The fish look nice and healthy.

[Ice222]

That's a subordinate male Dario, the females don't have that striping. The fish look nice and healthy.

Thanks! Hmm I read that females can have some red stripping too but had a hard time finding any example photos of females, let alone any with some red. The one in the photo looked like it could be a pale male to me, but it's got quite a brownish hue that males it look quite different and I remember reading that females are often more brownish? It's just so hard trying to sex fish without good photo or real life examples to learn from. Even the lightest one I have has some red stripes and I'm quite certain that one is female, since it just doesn't have any kind of sheen to it and somehow looks different.

I'll try to put a pic up tomorrow.

[Jennifer]

I will try to get a pic of my female but it might be a few days. I have had females before and they all have looked the same, very while, more round in the body and with virtually no striping. They do tend to be a little pink but I think it is more due to the tissue under the translucent skin!

[Ice222]

Here is the pic of what I think is a female. The base colour of the body's incredibly light, and it's fins are basically colourless, but it does have quite red stripes. Can any one confirm if this is female? Since I am hoping I do have at least 1 female .

Also thought I'd post a pic of my favorite male badis.

[Jennifer]

Here are some pics of mine. She was stressing with me hovering over her but usually doesn't have those red spots. She's quite a bit more round in the body compared to the male.

[Sophia]

the spots look like freckles :love:

[Ice222]

Been awhile since I've last been on the forums. In the last month, pretty much all the plants in my tank had melted due to me treating the tank with Furan . I had an outbreak diseases in the tanks (In the end I'm not even sure what it actually was since all fish that died seemed to have different or no symptoms. Also had a second tank that was being treated, and now I have no more red tiger lotus, val's all melted and both tanks are basically bare :tears:. Also had 2 badis and an oto die, one of the badis was a really scrawny male the other is the only female, so now I only have 3 of these remaining.

Finally replanted the tank today with water sprite I bought off TM and ambulia cuttings from my aquaone tank. Hopefully I can get some twisted val soon (I really like that plant), and try find another red tiger lotus that doesn't cost a small fortune like the ones on tm atm. Getting a 3ft Hagen T5 unit for my double tanks this friday too, the 2ft one I've currently got will probably be moved to this tank for a nice lighting upgrade. Surprisingly the lilaeopsis didn't died during the ordeal, but hadn't grown at all either, hopefully the upgrade will do them good. I like planted tanks, can't wait I have proper looking plants again. Fingers crossed nothing bad will happen this time.

[Sophia]

:spop:

jcwang on TM sells nice twisted val, I always recommend his, I've bought heaps from him. He's in Mt Albert too. :thup:

Sorry to hear about your lost fish

[Ice222]

Still having issues with windelov (detailed post in plant section), but aside from that things seem to be going better. Recently got new lights for my other tanks, so this tank got the old 60cm Hagen Glo as an upgrade, all the plance except windelov now seem to be doing better . There's new growth in my lilaeopsis, the ambulia's growing really fluffy and compact and the fish seem to enjoy having plants too. The only downside is that I'm not getting diatoms, but I'm guessing that will rid itself soon enough.

Picked up a Aqua clear HOB for the tank, as I found the sponge created too little flow for my liking, especially since I intend to get it planted densely once things grow in. What I like most is that despite the original filter still being in the tank, the upside down catfish seem to be slightly less attached to it, add in the new light (ie. I can crank up the shutter speed to catch these quick buggers) and I've finally manged to get some pics, sorry about the grubby glass, it's those diatoms I've mentioned:

Also I sometimes see flashes of red in the gourami, like in this particular photo. Reckon he's a boy? I might name him Truffles :sml1:. He likes to chase the other fish when I'm not looking, but seems he's never quick enough to catch them.

[Jennifer]

Truffles is a great name! :gigl:

[Sophia]

Truffles :sml2:

[Ice222]

Hmm couldn't save the remainder of the fern, plus 1 more badis has now died, and a 2nd has been missing, so I think that's mostly likely dead too, as it's been looing unhappy for the 2 days leading up to it's disappearance. Now I have 1 badis left, I'm keeping my fingers crossed nothing will happen to the little guy.

No idea why they're dying, water parameters are fine, ie. 0 Ammonia, 0 nitrite, nitrates are low, but that usually seems to be the case for most of my tanks. The only symptoms I could see was that the 1 that died got rather skinny, then started to sit in one of the upper corners of the tank, before sitting on the substrate, breathing but not moving, then on it's side looking bent and dead. When he was in the upper-corner phase, he'd be near the surface, staying there for basically a whole day. It didn't look like he was gasping for air, and the gills didn't look particularly red, basically there's nothing externally wrong with it that I can see. With the missing badis, it didn't get any skinnier, but it did the same thing: it sat in one of the upper corners for hours, and the next day I found it sitting at the bottom looking clamped, and went missing that night when I tried to check on it. I noticed that the one that died had it's tail nipped, but that was after it started looking a bit glum so I don't think that's what killed it, unless if it was indirectly killed that way (eg. stress from being chased a little). but that seems strange, since they seemed to dodge the gourami really effortlessly.

Oh, and they're not starving from what i could tell. They don't really eat the pellet food like the other fish, but I have been chucking daphina in the tank, and I've seen them go after planaria/some other tiny critter I could see on the glass. 4/5 badis dead, and 1 and a half CPD deaths in this tank and I still don't know what they're dying from. It's so jinxed that I think this thread will eventually get booted to the diseases section :facepalm: