Reply With QuoteDone liao.
Making an island is a good idea if the tank can be seen from 3 sides. You can search and read some of the golden ratio reference to have more idea. I found this article is very good one:Originally Posted by chesterchuen
http://aquascapinglove.com/basics/ge...ed-aquascaping
And ya, you can create your own journal, too. We will follow on that to spam. Hehe.
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Done liao.
Plants have been growing very fast these days and I really feel itchy hand trimming it off. Just like home, fish tank also need to be maintained and clean up, so that owner can feel the comfort.
Before:
And after:
Echinodorus tennelus 'green' tends to crawl every where and quite difficult to control.
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Looks really good! But what is that white piece thingy, at the bottom right of tank in your bottom pic? The long grass can simply snip off just like that ah?
Oh. That is the Four Leaf Clover plants that I have bought and it is still in the ceramic ring (white colour thing). I am finding a place to plant it so just put it in the tank in the meantime.
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Just a note, for Echinodorus tennelus its better to trim them at the base of the leaf blades (like with other echinodorus/sword plants), and then let new leaves grow out again. If cut in the middle the trimmed leaf will just stay that way with a short blunt edge, so it looks abit wierd.
If you prefer a tall grassy looking plant that doesn't shoot out runners across the substrate and tangle amongst other plants, consider replacing the Echinodorus tennelus with Blyxia Japonica, that plant stays in one spot (its actually a stem plant that looks like a grassy plant), trimming is simply cutting off side shoots, much easier to maintain and control in an aquascape.
Hi UA,
Thanks for your suggestion. You are right. Echinodorus tennelus keeps shooting the runner across the substrate and tangle among other plants.
I will find Blyxia Japonica to replace it. Now I remember you have mentioned it in one of your post previously, that was one of the reason you replace this plant.
Normally where do you get Blyxia Japonica? I don't know if place like Seaview has it or not. May be I can ask in the forum to see if any AQers have it.
I actually got my Blyxia Japonica from Seaview.
They are sold in tall packets filled with water (its a fully aquatic plant, no emersed form) and usually hung up on the plant retail racks. Just have to look for them.
Alternatively, many LFS also stock them in net pots submersed in plant retail tanks. Those are usually much easier to ID.
Ah, I see! I will look for it next time I visit Seaview. Too many of them at that session. Thanks UA!I actually got my Blyxia Japonica from Seaview.
They are sold in tall packets filled with water (its a fully aquatic plant, no emersed form) and usually hung up on the plant retail racks. Just have to look for them.
Alternatively, many LFS also stock them in net pots submersed in plant retail tanks. Those are usually much easier to ID.
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I cannot believe in my eyes seeing this today: One of my Amano Shrimps tried to bully my Oto catfish! The Amano climbed on Oto's back and tried to grab/drag the Oto away! I straight away interfere quickly because the Oto looked panic and tried to escape from the grab.
After that Oto looked stun and stay at one place with the fins down.
I also noticed the Amano acting so strange these days as it went wild damaged lots of plants leaves. Are they hungry or something? Have you ever experienced that?
My 2 otos died with some scratches on the bodies. So I am now in doubt if they got bullied from the Amano. So sad.
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Wow that's odd. I have Amanos living with Tetras and i havent observe such rowdy behavior before. They do climb onto the back of my Apple Snails to feed off the algae on their shells though. But havent notice any rowdy behavior.
However i do note that when i drop crustacean food pellets they all change from calm feeding to feeding frenzy the moment they smell the pellets. Running and swimming all over the tank till they picked one up and munch on them.
I have observed similar behaviour in yamato shrimps before too, they literally swim up and try to climb on the fishes. I notice that they are simply trying to forage for food and just checking the fishes, but due to the shrimp's larger size, it also ends up harassing and stressing small fishes.
Their larger size and appetite for algae also means they need more food to sustain themselves. If a tank is mostly clear of algae, they will turn to actively scavenging for food, which probably puts them in "harassment mode".
If they are starting to disturb other livestock, i guess you could shift out some of the yamato shrimps to reduce the numbers or just feed them abit more. It should help to re-balance their requirements.
The other alternative is to just replace the yamato shrimps with smaller dwarf shrimps like cherry or malayan shrimps, those smaller shrimps don't bother fishes as much.
Agreed with UA. I also noticed they have a big appetite for food, irregardless whether its algae or pellets. The more i feed them the more they poop. I even see them digging my substrate to scavenge for any scraps of algae. That said, my Tetras are a little hard for my Amanos to catch onto due to its speed, but my baby Apple Snails can become a target due to algae fragments on its shell. Luckily my snails aint too bothered by it's presence.
What i do to feed the Amanos, i slightly overfeed the Tetras but dont overdo it. Just a tiny amount of overfeeding. As my substrate is black silica sand, i can see the coloured food pellets. After 1hr they are gone, presumably consumed by the Amanos. The food i bought is fit for both Tetras and Shrimps, will show you next time.
Thanks Chesterchuen and UA for your comments. And I think you are right, the Amano seems like very hungry since I have an army of horned nerite snails in the tank, clearing all the algae. They might starved for food and eat the soft leaves of star grass. And they also hunt for slow fauna like Oto or Snails. I see them checking on the snails everyday but since snails has their housing shell, they do not really bother, just go in and close the shell. I saw one time the Amano tried to pick the dead snail out of shell and bring the body to their cave, too. For those fast fishes like Tetras or Danio, they are fine.
Nevertheless, I think that is the bright side of Amano that they will scavenge all the unwanted rotten things in the tank, too. That is good for the tank and environment.
I fed a slice of blanched zucchini last night and they all come to graze on it whole night. They are calming down now and back to the cave when I look for them this morning. And as usual, my Oto seems like sleep on the zucchini slice.
So I guess, the algae source in the tank is much less now and need to feed them additional food more frequent. The sign of starving is they start to damage the plants. Lesson learnt through the hard way.
And ya, I might transfer the Amano to other tank soon, if I still see them naughty harass other fishes.
Good day to all!
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Hi All,
I have a question on CRS breeding matter. I have put in my tank few batches of Cherry Shrimp but never seen any shrimplet.And I can only see few shrimp appears time to time. I don't know if any matter that will affect shrimp to breed? Any experience to share?
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Are you referring to CRS (crystal red shrimps, caridina species)? or RCS (red cherry shrimps, neocaridina species)?
Oh. Sorry about the term, UA. I am referring to Fire Red Shrimp (neocaridina species).
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From my very limited experience, my 1st batch 10 pcs of rcs are dying day by day after introduce them into my 1ft low tech tank. After 2 weeks, it left with 2-3 shrimp only. Then i top up another 20 shrimp and same thing happen. After another 2 weeks, the shrimp count is less than half. Before this, the tank was dosed with seachem excel for carbon supply for plant. Then i decided to stop dosing excel and shrimp count seems settle down. Few weeks later and one ocassion day, i saw one mosquito larva like creature in the same tank. At first i thought it was mosquito larva, then have a deep thought on why the fish dont eat them. Then on second look, found it was shrimplet. Till now, the tank has bred over 40 shrimps and number still growing. Luckily, i have quite a few fishes to control the population. Else the tank will be over production with shrimp.
So from my very limited experience, these could be the factor for breed rcs:
- cherry don't like excel (the label on the bottle also mention abt it)
- stable ph level (or rather water parameter), my tank is low tech tank so ph is not swing as high as high tech tank with co2 injection
- acclimation when introduce to new environment
- transition (subjective) to new environment
- predator in the same tank
Please take it as a grain of salt if does not apply to you. I'm still learning too. 😄
Thanks for your advice, Dreamer!From my very limited experience, my 1st batch 10 pcs of rcs are dying day by day after introduce them into my 1ft low tech tank. After 2 weeks, it left with 2-3 shrimp only. Then i top up another 20 shrimp and same thing happen. After another 2 weeks, the shrimp count is less than half. Before this, the tank was dosed with seachem excel for carbon supply for plant. Then i decided to stop dosing excel and shrimp count seems settle down. Few weeks later and one ocassion day, i saw one mosquito larva like creature in the same tank. At first i thought it was mosquito larva, then have a deep thought on why the fish dont eat them. Then on second look, found it was shrimplet. Till now, the tank has bred over 40 shrimps and number still growing. Luckily, i have quite a few fishes to control the population. Else the tank will be over production with shrimp.
So from my very limited experience, these could be the factor for breed rcs:
- cherry don't like excel (the label on the bottle also mention abt it)
- stable ph level (or rather water parameter), my tank is low tech tank so ph is not swing as high as high tech tank with co2 injection
- acclimation when introduce to new environment
- transition (subjective) to new environment
- predator in the same tank
Please take it as a grain of salt if does not apply to you. I'm still learning too.
That is true that I dose Excel daily to my tank, too. I didn't know that would affect the shrimp breeding.
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I have checked the Seachem Excel bottle and it is said "Excel is safe for invertebrates such as shrimp".
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