Starting new Betta tank

[Josie 302]

Just ordered 25+ RCS from ebay!  W00T!!!!

[Josie 302]

Oh I just thought of something...do I need to buy special food for my shrimp?

[Kiara1125 78]

Nope! You can get some by Hikari which they love, but I had a 10g shrimp tank running for 2 years and, honestly, I stopped feeding them after the first month. They thrived on algae and I started with 18 of them. Two years later and I had over 300 shrimp. xD

 

This is the shrimp food. Feed in extremely small amounts. Like, the smallest pinch you've ever pinched for fish food! xD

http://www.hikariusa.com/diets/crustaceans/shrimpcuisine/

[Josie 302]

Got my RCS today!  Unfortunately they were supposed to come Saturday but the post office messed up and they didn't deliver until today.  The shipper included about 30 or so, and only 19 lived.  I am really hoping they can reproduce quick, before they all get eaten.  They are really cool and I like them more than I expected.  I love how they zip around the tank.  I also did get a new nerite snail last week because I couldn't resist and also because my tank is getting algae now.  This snail is way more active than my first one, so I am pretty sure the first one had something wrong when I brought him home.  The white glowing stuff around the spider wood is getting worse, even though I keep wiping it off!  Will the shrimp get rid of it?  It looks so awful  I did attach some java moss onto the tree, hopefully if that glowing stuff ever goes away it will grow!  Here are a few pics:

 

White glowing tree (you can see a little shrimp under the branches):

 

Nerite:

 

And another little shrimpy:

[Kiara1125 78]

My fiance said that he gets that white stuff with every piece of wood he puts into a tank. It should take a few weeks to go away, but I'm unsure if anything will eat it.

 

I'm sorry aoubt your RCS. Hopefully everything will turn out ok! As for reproduction, you should see berried shrimp (shrimp who have laid eggs and are carrying them around) and/or shrimplets in about a month.

Edited March 10, 2015 by Kiara

[Josie 302]

My fiance said that he gets that white stuff with every piece of wood he puts into a tank. It should take a few weeks to go away, but I'm unsure if anything will eat it.

 

I'm sorry aoubt your RCS. Hopefully everything will turn out ok! As for reproduction, you should see berried shrimp (shrimp who have laid eggs and are carrying them around) and/or shrimplets in about a month.

 

Thanks, I did read that the white stuff was normal, it just looks so gross so I can't wait for it to be gone.  Depending on if my betta likes eating shrimp or not, I may end up just ordering more since now that I have them I do think they are really cool.  

[Josie 302]

Hey all! So my 5.5 gal sprung a leak. I am upgrading to a 10 gallon tonight! I would really like another fish or two, any suggestions? I am thinking neon tetras, platies or mollies. Any input on compatibility and space issues would be appreciated

[Kiara1125 78]

No mollies, they get too big and are aggressive. Platies and neons are great! You can go with either of those and into a 10g (along with the betta and RCS) I would say that you could fit in about 5 platies or neons. If you go platies, I would highly recommend 1M:4F. I tried 2M:3F before and the males still harassed the females. You could bump it up to 6 and go 2M:4F and it would be fine. Just make sure the betta doesn't pick on the platies.

[Josie 302]

Tank Update:

 

So little Babe the betta ate every last one of the RCS.  I am a little disappointed since I actually enjoyed the RCS more than I expected.  As mentioned earlier, my 5.5 gallon sprung a leak last night, so I had an excuse to upgrade to a 10 gallon!  I ended up getting some tankmates for Babe too-I bought 5 neon tetras and 2 dalmation mollies.  Unfortunately I made the trip to the store before I realized Mollies might not be a great fit  Of course, like so many fish related things, it depends on what you read and who you ask.  So far everything is going great, but I plan to closely monitor how the fish interact.  If the mollies are too aggressive I will just have to trade them for platies.  The new tank is pretty sparse so far.  I got rid of the tree thing because the slime was covering all of the plants and many of them died.  Also because the tree blocked a lot of light and so the plants that were under it died.  I am saving up to make a large order from planted aquariums central so I can redo both my tanks.  My plan is to make a lawn out of microsword, get some more anubias nana petites for around/in front of the rocks, a moss covered log, and then some background/midground plants.  I will probably stick with mostly anubias and java ferns since those are the plants I have had luck with so far, but I will maybe throw in a few background plants that I haven't tried yet.  I like plants that have green and white on the leaves so I will probably get a couple of those.  Also I plan to get a black background, new LED lights (the same kind I have on my GF tank), and new substrate.  I will probably go with either tahitian moon sand or eco-complete, I am not sure if one is better than the other.  I just know that I do not want flourite!  It made the water way too cloudy.  And once I get this tank more densely planted, I might try RCS again.  Maybe with his new tankmates the dynamics will change and Babe will decide he does not have to destroy everything that moves !

 

Here are some pics:

 

 

 

[Hidr 4,961]

I have never seen or had an aggressive molly. Yes they can get large. But they are great for taking care of unwanted algae. More plants will go a long way to help with your overstocking.

My 60 gallon is over stocked but I have never had a problem with over stocking my tropical over planted tanks.

Until you get a lot more plants and several fast growing plants do water changes every couple days.

Edited March 24, 2015 by Hidr

[Josie 302]

I have never seen or had an aggressive molly. Yes they can get large. But they are great for taking care of unwanted algae. More plants will go a long way to help with your overstocking.

My 60 gallon is over stocked but I have never had a problem with over stocking my tropical over planted tanks.

Until you get a lot more plants and several fast growing plants do water changes every couple days.

Thanks, I love dalmation mollies and I couldn't pass them up once I got to the store!  I am glad you have had good experiences with them.  Now that I have been researching more it sounds like they get bigger than I thought.  I have 10x GPH filtration (aquaclear 20), so I am hoping that will help since I am a little overstocked.  I will definitely keep up on water changes until I get this tank planted!

 

Does anyone have any opinions or advice on substrate?  Will tahitian moon sand work okay if I put some root tabs in it?

[Hidr 4,961]

My planted tropicals have dirt under gravel.  

[Josie 302]

Just regular old dirt???  Maybe I could give that a try.

 

The other thing I was wondering is about KH.  Does anyone know if 100 ppm sounds good for my tank?  My tap water is only 60 ppm so I will probably have to add some baking soda.  Also do I need to worry about GH?  I have never tested my water for GH before.

[Hidr 4,961]

I never test for that.  I use organic miracle grow. Here is a good place to read about starting a dirt tank.  

http://www.aquaticplantcentral.com/forumapc/el-natural/

It takes time to learn how to make this work for you.  Most important don't move your plants once planted. And I can't seem to totally stop the water changes so still do once a month at least.

Good luck

[Josie 302]

Sorry for another update so soon, but I was so excited about the new tank that I ended up going to Petsmart and stocking up on a bunch of plants!  They also had this bag of National Geographic gravel, but it is actually in between the size of gravel and sand, so I thought it might be perfect.  So far it is great, it doesn't cloud the water, and it is large enough that it won't get in the filter.  Here is a list of the plants I have in the tank:

 

-Dwarf Hairgrass

-Anubias nana

-Anubias nana petite

-Anubias afzelli

-another Anubias, I am not sure what species

-Amazon Sword

-Wisteria

-Windelov Java Fern

-Marimo moss

 

For some reason in my area I just can't find microsword!  I decided to give the dwarf hairgrass another try, and I separated it into about a million tiny pieces.  I also tore up a couple of little deformed moss balls I had and attached it to the driftwood-hopefully someday I will end up with one of those cool moss covered logs!  Also not sure yet if I want a background or not.  Oh and I did see one of the mollies try to bite Babe's fin, if I catch this happening again I think I might have to bring them back to the store  And without further ado...pictures!

 

 

 

[Hidr 4,961]

Looking good but you still need  fast growing plants.  water spirit.  Duck weed,  horn wart.  

Edited March 25, 2015 by Hidr

[Josie 302]

Do they sell those at petco or petsmart? I might have to order them online.

[Josie 302]

Just ordered some frogbit online! )

[Josie 302]

I just added watersprite and hornwort to my frogbit order, so I should be good to go now!

[Daniel 5,668]

I never had much luck with hair grass until I decided to grow it in high light with co2. That's not to say it can't be grown in low tech (it can), but I kept murdering it. Moss makes for a good low tech carpet.

[Josie 302]

I never had much luck with hair grass until I decided to grow it in high light with co2. That's not to say it can't be grown in low tech (it can), but I kept murdering it. Moss makes for a good low tech carpet.

Yeah, I am not sure if it will work out. I keep dosing it with excel, but time will tell. Have you had any luck with microsword lawns in a low tech tank?

[Daniel 5,668]

No I haven't, but I know of people on other forums that have. Helanthium tenellus (pygmy chain sword also wrongly known as echinodorus tenellum) should definitely grow. The plant is a total weed and thanks to the way it creates runners kind of grows indefinitely underwater. Out of water it will flower instead, but that's another thing all together.

Edited March 26, 2015 by dan in aus

[Josie 302]

Awesome advice. I will definitely keep it in mind if the dwarf hairgrass doesn't work out. If I were to use moss as a carpet, what type would I get?

[DawnMichele 6,045]

Your tank is GORGEOUS!!!!!!

[Josie 302]

Your tank is GORGEOUS!!!!!!

 

Thank you!!!