Regular Member Shahbazin Posted January 4, 2017 Regular Member Share Posted January 4, 2017 We went to buy some cat food & litter this afternoon, & somehow came home with a 10 gal. tank & a new betta as well. I had my daughters with me & one of them fell in love with this pretty blue & white betta.... OK, my old 10 gal. betta tank has been set up for a long time, & I fishless cycled my goldie tank - obviously, I can't do a fishless cycle with this tank since we already have the little guy, but I was looking for some thoughts on what I've done so far with set up & supplies. I got an Aqueon Quiet Flow 10 filter - I took about a 4x6" (really old grungy) piece of filter floss out of the Aqueon filter on my established 10 gal. (I don't use cartridges in it, just pieces of floss stuffed in the holder), & wrapped it around that little cartridge floss/charcoal thing in the new filter. I also tossed in a couple of big moss balls, & a rock with algae growing on it, into the tank. Is this enough to get the cycle going well? Or should I add one of those liquid start things? It's got rounded gravel substrate, silk plants (until I can order some real ones), & an Aqueon Pro 100 heater (I have a Pro 50 in my other 10, but according to Amazon, they don't make that size anymore; according to the chart, it's OK for 10 gal tanks, just at the higher range, but we run our house fairly cool in winter). Glass lid, ordered an LED light. Rinsed everything out, double dosed Prime. I ended up running back to the store to get a stand, since the table I'd thought to put it on wasn't as study as I'd believed it was, upon closer inspection. Pics in the morning, I started setting up in the evening & finished at 1 AM. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Admin koko Posted January 4, 2017 Admin Share Posted January 4, 2017 I think you did great hun Cant wait for photos 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Regular Member Shahbazin Posted January 4, 2017 Author Regular Member Share Posted January 4, 2017 The new tank (betta is hanging out on left side) - no light yet: Betta without flash: With flash: Apparently, his name is Moomoo. For Moon, but different. Or so says his 10 year old owner. The whole set up is in a corner of our kitchen, so I got the stand that it said was for a 20 gal. tank, since the 10 gal. stand looked sort of flimsy & had no shelves -our 1950s house has no storage areas to speak of, so we needed to not lose the shelf space. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Admin koko Posted January 4, 2017 Admin Share Posted January 4, 2017 Wow looking great hun 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Regular Member Morgan'sMiracles Posted January 4, 2017 Regular Member Share Posted January 4, 2017 Prettt betta! Looks like a delta butterfly maybe? Sent from my LGL62VL using Tapatalk 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Regular Member Shahbazin Posted January 5, 2017 Author Regular Member Share Posted January 5, 2017 Prettt betta! Looks like a delta butterfly maybe? Sent from my LGL62VL using Tapatalk Thanks! I think so - he was just labeled "Butterfly" but he's got quite a bit of finnage. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Regular Member Mr.B Posted January 5, 2017 Regular Member Share Posted January 5, 2017 He's beautiful! Congratulations. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Regular Member Hidr Posted January 5, 2017 Regular Member Share Posted January 5, 2017 Very handsome betta. Tank looks great too. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Regular Member shellbell4ever Posted January 5, 2017 Regular Member Share Posted January 5, 2017 Congrats on the new addition,he is Gorgeous i love his name and his set up looks great! Sent from my SM-G360P using Tapatalk 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Regular Member Shahbazin Posted January 10, 2017 Author Regular Member Share Posted January 10, 2017 Yay, my live plants arrived today! I got Moomoo a narrow leafed anacharis, a green foxtail, some Brazilian pennywort, crypt. parva & crypt. wendtii red. Plus since his light came last Friday, I got a better pic of him: And one narrow leaf anacharis went to Cee: 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Admin koko Posted January 10, 2017 Admin Share Posted January 10, 2017 I would live in there 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Regular Member DawnMichele Posted January 10, 2017 Regular Member Share Posted January 10, 2017 Your tank and Betta are beautiful. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Regular Member GothSpice Posted January 17, 2017 Regular Member Share Posted January 17, 2017 Gorgeous fish, quality setup! Seriously, he lucked out! 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Regular Member Shahbazin Posted January 18, 2017 Author Regular Member Share Posted January 18, 2017 Thanks for the comments! So far, so good - I'm still watching the parameters closely, as I had a slight ammonia reading after 5 days, but I just put in a little Prime each day I saw that, & 4 days later, it was gone. Never any nitrites. Did a big water change a few days after that. Still not seeing nitrates though, which worries me - with the tiny bioload & the live plants, maybe the plants are absorbing it? I'll keep a close eye on it. I did add a mystery snail last Thursday. I also added an ornament for "Fluffy" (the snail - my kids named him, too) to hide under. Current set up, with Fluffy in the front right corner: 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Regular Member AquaAurora Posted January 20, 2017 Regular Member Share Posted January 20, 2017 (edited) Test BEFORE lights turn on in the tank for the day, plants won't absorb ammonia/etc when there is not sufficient light for photosynthesis. Your betta looks lovely, keep in mind he's a marble (has the marble gene) and his color is unstable-the blue will take over the white in time example: march 2016 several months later (dark blue scales and fins-look green from above) Need to take an update photo of him, but now only the head is white. Edited January 20, 2017 by AquaAurora 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Regular Member shakaho Posted January 20, 2017 Regular Member Share Posted January 20, 2017 Actually aquatic plants absorb ammonia day and night. http://www.bookmasters.com/marktplc/images/BiolFiltration_BookWebsite.pdf Nitrate absorption requires more energy, and decreases at night. Aquatic plants usually don't bother with nitrate until they have cleaned out the ammonia. Unlike the nitrifiers that oxidize ammonia to produce energy, plants use ammonia to make amino acids for making protein -- for growth. In a heavily planted tank, the plants should out-compete the nitrifiers for ammonia, so nitrite and nitrate production may not get high enough to measure. While most goldfish can tolerate high nitrate levels, nitrate still has some toxicity, so I fail to see why people want it in their tanks. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Regular Member Shahbazin Posted January 20, 2017 Author Regular Member Share Posted January 20, 2017 Thanks for the info, Shakaho! And I wasn't actually wanting nitrate in & of itself, just that I was using it as a marker of whether a tank was cycled or not. Looking at my fish chart, the disappearance of trace ammonia also coincided with the addition of all the live plants (gone 3 days after I added them). So I'll just keep checking on things for a few weeks, but this reassures me that my tank may have already reached its healthy equilibrium. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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