Low maintenance tank - indirect SUNLIGHT!

[Cmlee]

How do you raise a goodly-sized colony of good (beneficial) bacteria?

Any good book an fishkeeping will teach you about bacteria. There's no need to delve into advanced bacteriology.
You only need to know about 'good' and 'bad' bacteria and try to raise a goodly-sized colony of good (beneficial) bacteria.

Once you succeed in that, you will also need to watch out for chemicals that destroy your bacteria because bacteria are very fragile creatures.
They take a long time to build up, so one must take great care to ensure they survive well.

Bacteria are poison converters, so in that sense they are more important than even any expensive exotic fish acquired.

[tetrakid]

How do you raise a goodly-sized colony of good (beneficial) bacteria?

You may wish to tale a look at this article...
http://www.aquariumadvice.com/tips-a...ishless-cycle/

The most common mistake of beginning hobbyist is not allowing enough time for the bacteria build-up.
It is important to wait it out. But many beginners also tend to buy a host of chemicals to add to their
cycling tank, which may retard or destroy the build-up process by killing off the delicate bacteria.

[Cmlee]

Hi the link doesn't work. My tank has been running for more than a year how to increase good bateria?

Not Found
Apologies, but the page you requested could not be found. Perhaps searching will help

You may wish to tale a look at this article...
http://www.aquariumadvice.com/tips-a...ishless-cycle/

The most common mistake of beginning hobbyist is not allowing enough time for the bacteria build-up.
It is important to wait it out. But many beginners also tend to buy a host of chemicals to add to their
cycling tank, which may retard or destroy the build-up process by killing off the delicate bacteria.

[Urban Aquaria]

Beneficial bacteria colonies in aquariums are usually limited by available surface areas to live on, so even if more bacteria are added, they don't have enough space to live and the population is restricted.

Increase the amount of surface area or add more higher quality bio-media for bacteria to live on, they will naturally multiply to occupy those additional areas and increase the tank's overall bio-load handling capacity.

[felix_fx2]

Now then I see the pictures.
Looks like 2 tier, bottom tier no direct light?

I managed to grow simple crypts on lower tier.

How was your last few months? The heat quite immense, I lost quite abit of livestock to heat wave & mad algae due to neglect from work.

Sent from my SM-N910G using Tapatalk

[tetrakid]

Hi the link doesn't work. My tank has been running for more than a year how to increase good bateria?
Not Found
Apologies, but the page you requested could not be found. Perhaps searching will help

Lol, you too ganjiong for my reply clicked too fast.
have corrected the link. Please try again. Very useful info.

[uklau]

Now then I see the pictures.
Looks like 2 tier, bottom tier no direct light?

I managed to grow simple crypts on lower tier.

How was your last few months? The heat quite immense, I lost quite abit of livestock to heat wave & mad algae due to neglect from work.

Sent from my SM-N910G using Tapatalk

Yes, bottom tier without direct sunlight. The reflected sunlight is also super powerful.

I planted some crypts when I started the tank but all melted. Now, the entire tank taken over by Sagittaria. More like a pond than a tank now because can only view from top. No indication of mission livestocks.

Bacopa & Hygrophila are also growing well. Java fern, moss & Anubias overshadowed by Sagittaria & died. Hair algae is already part of the tank since day one, forming nice carpet.

Now, just set up the upper tier. Battling algae daily. I'm using red top soil with the black garden soil. Experimenting the cheapest suitable substrate

[uklau]

I'm struggling to get the upper tier new outdoor tank to stabilize by reducing that little direct sunlight using styrofoam. None of the plants is growing. Bacopa, Java fern, crypts & echinodorus are all dying.

Algae is growing super fast. The only creature that's growing up super fast is the ram horn snail. All Yamato & nerite snails bye bye within a week. Is ram horn snails much hardier than the rest of the creatures?
ImageUploadedByTapatalk1439960138.864190.jpg

[Urban Aquaria]

Sounds like you probably got certain types of algae that hitchhiked in with the plants into that tank, and the algae managed to establish and grow fast. You may need to do anti-algae treatment to help combat it.

I had this experience before too, 2 outdoor tanks with similar setup and same exposure to sunlight, the first tank didn't have any algae issues... while the second tank was full of algae, i eventually narrowed down the cause to a bunch of plants from LFS that i "assumed" were clean and didn't put them through anti-algae treatment/quarantine process. Ended up i had to de-comm that tank and set it up again with clean treated plants, after that no more algae issues.

Yeah, ramshorn snails are much more hardy compared to yamato shrimps and nerite snails.... ramshorn snails have primitive lungs and breathe atmospheric air, thats one of the reasons why you see them periodically move or float to the water surface, they are storing pockets of air in their shells to use for breathing when they are submerged (sort of like a scuba diver). Because of this feature, ramshorn snails can live in oxygen depleted adverse water conditions that other livestock cannot survive in.

[uklau]

@ UA, thanks for the insightful post!🏼

[Cmlee]

Anyone knows why some ramshorn become brown or darker in colour when they grow bigger?

[Urban Aquaria]

Anyone knows why some ramshorn become brown or darker in colour when they grow bigger?

Those that turn darker or brown as they grow are usually the normal type (brown seems to be the dominant default color).. whereas the red ones will stay red, and blue ones will stay blue (if you keep them separate).

If you keep the red or blue ones together with brown ones (or if they were mixed and mated in the LFS tank), most of their offspring will also tend to develop the default brown coloration.

[Cmlee]

I only have red ones (no mix), but some of them will become brown when growing up. Any idea?

[Urban Aquaria]

I only have red ones (no mix), but some of them will become brown when growing up. Any idea?

That means those were most probably offspring of red ramshorns that also mated with brown ramshorn, so their colors didn't stay red.

If they were pure red ramshorn, they will stay red throughout.

[uklau]

Hygrophila Difformis emerged leaves look like peppermint leavesImageUploadedByTapatalk1440135514.880546.jpg

The white flower is from Sagittaria Subulata

[tetrakid]

That means those were most probably offspring of red ramshorns that also mated with brown ramshorn, so their colors didn't stay red.

If they were pure red ramshorn, they will stay red throughout.

You may not believe this, but in my experience, my pair of bright yellow/black horned nerite snails' colours turned dull and faded out, especially the parts of the shells that grew bigger in time. I suspect that the type of diet or type of algae they eat have caused their color to fade. Snail breeders may know the secret/s to it though.

[Urban Aquaria]

You may not believe this, but in my experience, my pair of bright yellow/black horned nerite snails' colours turned dull and faded out, especially the parts of the shells that grew bigger in time. I suspect that the type of diet or type of algae they eat have caused their color to fade. Snail breeders may know the secret/s to it though.

For your case, that effect is mainly due to shortage of essential minerals that the snails require to build stronger shells, hence the new shell growth tends to become dull and faded.

Its quite a common occurance in home aquariums because those snails need alot of minerals and most tanks don't really supply much of it (unless its a dedicated hardwater snail tank which dose alot of minerals and add lots of mineral rich foods).

[tetrakid]

For your case, that effect is mainly due to shortage of essential minerals that the snails require to build stronger shells, hence the new shell growth tends to become dull and faded.

Its quite a common occurance in home aquariums because those snails need alot of minerals and most tanks don't really supply much of it (unless its a dedicated hardwater snail tank which dose a lot of minerals and add lots of mineral rich foods).

I believe shifu UA is correct about requiring mineral nutrients. Culturing snails in indeed a specialized field too.