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A few shots of the No-entry PRL I won from a generous local hobbyist’s RAOK

Photos taken 24 May 2017

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Day 74 Update (24 May 2017)

After flip-flopping back and forth trying to decide if I wanted to fill the tank with shrimp or cories+tetras, fate decided that I would win a local RAOK and receive some PRL.

Here are some of the changes since the initial update:

added several varieties of buce from buceplant

added java fern from LFS

had to treat the tank with fenben very early on due to hydra

added a mesh bag of soil to the filter to drop the pH to 6.5 -- I still want it to go lower, closer to 6.

Admittedly, I haven't been paying much attention to this tank in terms of upkeep. If you didn't notice, a lot of detritus has accumulated on the surface of the white sand, and there's various algae growth on the buces, especially on the ones in the middle of the tank where the light is more intense.

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Day 3 Update (14 March 2017)

Updated my sidebar-- you can find this project’s specs there. Click on ‘Dennerle Display Tank’ to view. Or click here

Only two days have passed since my first post about this project, so there there haven’t been many developments. Despite that, there’s still quite a bit to comment on.

My water is still not within acceptable parameters for Taiwan Bee shrimp. They’re currently reading:

pH: 6.8 (Target = <6.5)

gh: 7 (Target = 4~6)

kh: 2 (Target = 0~1)

TDS: 149 (Target = 130~160)

ammonia: 0ppm

nitrite: 0ppm

nitrate: 0ppm

I’m not worried about cycling since I’m using media from a cycled tank, and shrimp have very low bio-loads. I think I might need to add some more aqua soil behind the spiderwood/lava rocks so that the tankwater will further buffer to reach a pH below 6.5. Not entirely sure why my gh/kh are so high; may just need to do additional water changes. 

Some other thoughts:

Looks like Bolbitis heudelotii is going to take a while to adjust. I purchased tissue culture of it so it has been grown emersed-- I will have to wait for it to grow into its submersed form. Hopefully algae doesn't overtake it before it has time to adjust.

Some of the spiderwood is releasing a layer of slime again. Hence I’m growing impatient while figuring out why my parameters are off-- I really want to add the shrimp ASAP so they can eat the slime. 

-- But as with most situations I find myself in within this hobby, a little patience really does go a long way. I’ve learned that it is best not to rush and make drastic changes before doing thorough research and considering all your options. I would rather take a few weeks to figure out this problem than attain instant gratification by adding them now and risking their health. 

Hopefully by the next update, you will get to see my lovely reds.

See you guys next time!

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12 March 2017 - Day 1 of the Dennerle tank

New project!

Picked up a Dennerle Scaper’s tank from a fellow hobbyist not too long ago. I’ve wanted to create a scape using spiderwood and sand for the longest time, so I figured I’d give it a shot. Took me around 8 hours to scape (that includes time used to wrap mosses/buces/ferns to the hardscape).   Since it was my first time using spiderwood, I didn’t know that it took several days (sometimes several weeks/months in a few people’s cases) for the wood to sink! It also released some kind of slime and a lot of tannins, staining the water and making it slimy. 

Right now it looks like there’s a bit TOO MUCH going on, but hopefully the bolbitis heudelotii and java ferns in the background will grow out in the coming weeks to soften up the mid-back where there are a lot of intersecting and wild branches. I also tied willow moss to those branches in that section to soften the look.

I plan to move my red Taiwan bee shrimp into this tank.

Thanks for reading. I’ll post specs of this project soon! Can you guys guess how many pieces of wood are in this scape?

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30 November 2016 A few more macro shots featuring 1&2 Blue Bolt, 3 Aura Blue Tiger x Crystal White Bee, 4 Aura Blue Tiger and Yellow KingKong

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28 November 2016

Macro shots of a Blue Bolt taken on a new phone

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28 November 2016

More macro shots of a Blue Bolt taken on a different phone

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14 November 2016

Took a practice shot with a cellphone macro-lens attachment I picked up... the focal length is way too small (could only get decent shots of shrimp that are literally 15 mm from the glass).

Pictured is a shrimplet that hatched roughly 2 weeks ago from a Blue Bolt mother... who is the daddy?!

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29 October 2016 Feeding time in the 10 gallon tank, featuring Yellow KingKongs, Aura Blue Tigers and an Auratai (aura blue tiger x CBS) Can you spot any shrimplets?

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16 September 2016

Received 6 Crystal White Bee shrimp (Caridina cantonensis sp. ‘White Bee’) earlier in the evening. Drip acclimated for 5 hours and added them to one of the cubes. 

Upon entering the cube, they immediately started to graze. Love how active they are! One of them panicked and has been hiding in some moss ever since. Hopefully that one adjusts to the tank soon... 

Their white coloration doesn’t seem too strong right now-- perhaps from the stress of going through shipment.

Hope to get these guys established ASAP :)

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14 September 2016 Another shot of the berried mama aura

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13 September 2016

Guess who’s berried!!!

My lone female aura blue (Caridina serrata var. ‘Aura Blue’) molted sometime during the night. Saw my lone male CWB (Caridina cantonensis sp. ‘White Bee’) doing the ‘mating dance.’ Sure enough my aura blue got berried a few hours later!

Moments like this bring me such joy :)

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Photos taken 12 September 2016

Here are a few photos of some of the latest additions to my tanks!

1 Blue bolt

2&3 Shadow Panda

4 Black KingKong and Panda guest-starring Assassin snail

5 Assassin in the spotlight

It was pretty difficult to capture crisp images since these critters are always on the move. It probably doesn’t help that I used my cell phone to snap these. In any case, I just wanted to share these photos with you. Wish you guys could see these in person!

Hope my post doesn’t look too much like an advert... not intentional!

I have some Crystal White Bees coming in soon... stay tuned!

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10 September 2016

Photo of some of the shrimps I picked up earlier in the evening

Sorry for the lack of updates! The 2 cubes are finally cycled and I picked up some nice Taiwan Bees a few hours ago. I’m currently drip acclimating them and will drop them into one of the cubes pretty soon. 

Here’s a list of the new shrimp I’ve acquired since the last update:

+ mischlings, aura blue tiger, crystal white bee, auraxcbs tibee, red tibee, fancy black tiger, fancy red tiger, panda, shadow panda, blue bolt and black kingkong

Stay tuned. Should have update photos up in the comings days

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20 July 2016

Got two 12″ Aquamaxx cubes!

A single Current USA Freshwater LED+ is used to illuminate both tanks.

Going to fill them with water tonight to get the cycle started. Will be picking up some queen moss for the lava rocks from a fellow hobbyist on Saturday.

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12 July 2016

Moved most of the java/taiwan moss to the back to create more open space up front. 

Also swapped the Current USA Freshwater LED Plus with one of my Kessil A150Ws. For reasons you will find out about pretty soon... :)

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12 July 2016

Moved sponge filter to the back-left corner for easier maintenance. Also added a breeder box as I’m expecting to receive quite a few different species of shrimp in the near future (Aura blues, CWS and maybe some RWs specifically).

Added a lot of needle-leaf Java fern and hygrophila pinnatifida. The additions pretty much completed the sprouting tree stump look. Moss health has improved drastically! (They were browning at one point...)

Thinking about getting rid of the duckweed as a lot of little bugs/critters are proliferating on them...