Creedmoor Aquatics

My 3 year coin finally arrived!! I keep these on my desk in the office to fidget with.

The Easy Plant LEDs have extension brackets so they will always fit the next size up, so a 16" light would be no problem on a 20" tank. I think it comes down to what kind of plants you want to grow. If you're looking for a lot of red or white plants (poor photosynthesizers) or growing a carpet of dwarf baby tears, etc maybe the extra lumens of the larger light would be useful. Otherwise I'd say the tank is small enough and short enough you should be just fine with a 16", and will probably want to turn the brightness down anyways.

60 gallon cube tank with 2x 24" Easy Plant LEDs, both running at 100%, for 12 hours per day

Looks like Hydrodictyon Reticulatum

I'm just in love with these purple males, I do not see the likes of them online.

Those look great! I think I'd have to pick Pseudomugil Furcatus as a favorite, with Gertrudae Aru II as a close second.

Thanks for sharing, Cory!

There's a notable sexual dimorphism in the color of these White Clouds. The males are significantly more purplish in the body, versus a more coppery color in the females. The shrimp have been doing well with the Repashy Soilent Green, but I thought I'd give the Repashy Community Plus a try for the WCMMs. The good news is the shrimp love it, the bad news is these WCMMs won't eat anything unless its floating around in the water column. I could probably use it as a powder food, but I was interested in the gel food for its clean-feeding properties.

I've been interested in learning more about white (sometimes called platinum?) plants. It seems like they're white because they lack the normal amount of chlorophyll, used in photosynthesis, which would leave them slow-growing.

Wouldn't it be great if they fluoresced under a black light?

A drawback to the cork board used to float the emmersed plants has been tannins and generally increased cloudiness. I've been resistant to the idea of a canister filter since the start, but I decided I wanted to use Purigen and filter floss to really polish the water, so I broke down and bought a SunSun HW-3000. I chose it for being budget friendly, having a built in UV sterilizer, and a DC pump that could be turned down for reduced noise (currently running at 530 gph). I pulled the AquaShine UV sterilizer out of the tank and will be bringing it home for my new 55 gallon. The new filter was pretty much immediately effective, and after 36 hours had produced clean, clear water.

Today I used a large plastic bottle with the neck cutoff, then inverted and stapled back into place, to make a shrimp trap for the Bloody Mary shrimp in my 60 gallon office tank. In total I trapped 296 shrimp, of which 17 were culled. I bagged 50 to bring home for my new 55 gallon tank, and the remaining 229 were returned to the tank. I certainly did not trap all the shrimp in the tank, particularly the mothers with eggs and the smallest juveniles seemed less adventurous and eager to enter the trap. In fact I did not trap a single berried female though I spotted quite a few in the tank. On the other hand, I did manage to cull the shrimp I had specifically noticed in the tank and wanted removed. Of the 17 culls 1 would have passed for a Blue Dream, 2 could nearly have though they had a few red spots, 4 were a very dark, nearly black blue, 3 were an equally dark red, 2 were outright dark chocolate, and the remaining 5 were red but with very little color. Overall I was pleased with the results which seemed to justify my estimates of 500+ shrimp in the tank, as well as the overall quality of the Bloody Mary line, with 5.7% of the shrimp culled. This being my first culling I have no real baseline, but would be interested to know what other people with experience have seen.

I was setting up a new 55 gallon tank with two sponge filters with the Easy Flow kits and I almost made a real disaster! The water had a ton of dissolved gasses in it and the glass and sponges were covered in bubbles. The sponges ended up floating up and bobbing around in the water with the Easy Flows swinging around and sometimes over the edge of the tank, shooting water out! Glad I caught that before too much of a mess was made. Turned off the air pump and let the bubbles dissipate, then squeezed the air out of the sponges for good measure before turning the pump back on. Good to go now.

How much API aqua essential did you use?

Hi Ohad, Have you tested for ammonia? I am surprised there are 0 nitrates-- how large was your water change? Is your tank very heavily planted? How large is your tank, and how much API Aqua Essential did you use? Does your local municipality/water provider provide any information on the use of chlorine/chloramine? Do they alternate between these two products?

I pulled out all the Helanthium Tenellum 'Dwarf Chain Sword' in the tank today, and trimmed back the Pogostemmon and Diplidis. The Helanthium had really started competing with my crypts for space and was making the midground look messy. I've got a little crypt popping up near the front glass. I'll let it grow a bit more before I pull it up and replant. Took a few quick videos of the shrimp all coming out during the water change. I don't quite know why a water change makes them so active, but haven't noticed any ill-seeming effects. Something I've never really put any thought into before now is what the heck is that carpeting plant in the foreground? I've searched through all of my purchase history, and can't find anything except Dwarf Chain Sword/Helanthium Tenellum This plant is tiny! It only grows to 1-2 cm in height and spreads by runners. I think when I planted it I sort of assumed it was Dwarf Chain Sword and would eventually grow taller, but it is obviously some other species.

I'd first figure out how you're going to get your refills. Who you'll be buying your CO2 from and how they handle refills-- some places will refill your tanks on the spot and others want to swap them out with pre-filled tanks. If its the latter you definitely won't want to buy brand new tanks, or a size of tank they don't normally carry. I personally refill my CO2 tank with dry ice. Its cheap, easy, and doesn't require driving all the way to the welding store. That said, while if done correctly its perfectly safe if done *wrong* (overfilling the tank) its incredibly dangerous. I use an Aquarium Co-Op regulator but bummer they no longer sell them. Too hard for Customer Service to support people who don't understand how to use CO2. Basic features I'd be looking for in a regulator are Two-stage; stepping down from the high pressure tank to a low pressure regulator you can then fine-tune Integrated solenoid to turn off CO2 with power switch (that you can set on a timer) Expandable manifold to potentially add future aquariums. Even if you can't imagine a second aquarium in your current space/setup, five years from now you might Precision valve with bubble counter-- its so much easier to fine tune when you can count the bubbles

I used to use them when I had platies and guppies and stick them to the glass but while it was fun to watch the dogpile at first the novelty eventually wore off and I stopped. I had no real issues with them.

I have never had to deal with the green shrimp fungus, but I would be highly skeptical of using Pimafix. Pimafix is just Bay Tree Oil. It can be used to treat *some* fungal and bacterial infections, but API makes no effort to identify which infections Pimafix is effective against. It is also considered a 'weak' antifungal. Anecdotally, I have seen many online posts indicating Pimafix had no effect on the green shrimp fungus.

If I can't get them to stick I also considered getting a $20 magnetic stirrer and using that to really get the freeze dried foods soaked through and through before adding to the tank. Haven't tried it, but its an idea!

I soaked them in my Aquarium Co-Op Measuring Glass, and then dumped it in in front of a powerhead 🙂 In future I'll stick the dry cubes to the glass like Sera O-Nip tabs. Once they get wet they don't really stick.

I tried feeding my new white cloud mountain minnows both freeze dried brine shrimp and freeze dried tubifex worms. I learned they will eat both easily, but will not eat from the surface. The food has to be floating in the water column to attract their interest!

An update for the tank has been a long time coming! Some quick thoughts before I jump into the exciting changes.. The tank in general has been very stable, water chemistry has been easily managed, and all in all the automation I have in place (Kasa WiFi timer power strip, JeBao WiFi auto-dosing pump, Aquarium Co-Op Auto-Feeder) is working really well. At this point all I'd really like to add is a timer on the light switch for the office lights for my new emmersed plants (which I will get to in a minute). My co-workers have really enjoyed having the tank, they stop in daily to check on the shrimp and see how things are doing, and also to constantly pester me to finally add some fish! I did have some minor mishaps with a blown power switch taking down the tank for a few days, but it was quickly returned to service. Afterwards I struggled with cloudy water, which you will see in some of the photos below, but it has really cleared up in the past week and I think we'll be back to normal soon. In anticipation of adding fish here in Q1 of 2024 I wanted to add even more plants to the tank, so I recently got in some dwarf water lettuce and red root floaters, and added one of those semi-floating plant corrals to section off a portion of the surface for the floating plants. The portions I got were super small! but they've now acclimated and started to multiply. I expect in a few months the corralled section will be fully covered. I also wanted to add some emmersed plants along the back wall of the tank, but I couldn't find a commercial solution that did exactly what I was looking for. Ideally I wanted a 24" long, and approx 6" wide floating platform with holes for plant baskets, but the hydroponic solutions I found didn't quite match up to the dimensions I was looking for. Instead what I went with was a large board of natural cork that I cut down to size, and then drilled holes in for the baskets. This has worked pretty well and I'm generally quite happy with it. Emmersed plants that were added: Microsorum Pteropus 'Java Fern' Echinodorus sp. 'Red Rubin' Echinodorus sp. 'Big Bear' Selaginella Erythropus 'Ruby Red Club Moss' Elocharis Vivipara 'Umbrella Hair Grass' Anubias Barteri The Java Fern, Anubias and Elocharis were pretty hardy, but the Echinodorus melted back during the transition. It being winter time the humidity in the office is very low, and I don't think the new plants very much cared for it. Nonetheless, the Echinodorus seem to be recovering with new shoots having cropped up this week. Its a bit of a mess right now but I think it will look really nice once the plants acclimate and grow in. I'm really looking forward to the Elocharis at the back to grow out, it should get quite tall! After very, very long consideration of what species of fish to add to the tank (probably nine solid months of pondering), I considered and rejected a number of options. I was really leaning towards Cherry Barbs or Black Ruby Barbs, or both, but wasn't quite comfortable risking my shrimp with either of them. A number of tetras were considered and rejected as my pH runs about 7.5 with medium gH and kH levels, and I didn't want to risk the tetras not adapting well to the harder water. Again, I'm only in the office three days a week, so I can't always keep a close eye on them! I was starting to lean into Rasboras/Boraras, but really wanted to do something that would be large enough to show up on Teams calls with my colleagues, and also was looking for something 'new' to me. Ultimately I landed on... A European strain of Longfin White Cloud Mountain Minnows! I bought 25 of them which were delivered two days ago, and they are looking great! They range from a dusky red to almost a deep purple, depending on the lighting, and have a bright neon lateral line that my photos don't do justice. My understanding is that these are still juveniles with a bit of growing out to do, and I'm looking forward to seeing how they appear as full adults. Please enjoy the photo dump below. I tried to get photos of the males flaring their fins for their courtship/dominance displays but they're fast and auto-focus on phone cameras is such a pain.

For biological filtration coarse sponge material seems to strike the best balance of providing surface area for beneficial bacteria to grow without being so dense it becomes completely clogged. In a well balanced aquarium biological filtration is often the only filtration you really need. Chemical filtration would only be needed for removing unwanted contaminants, or possibly meds if you accidentally overdosed. As evidenced by the number of people using fertilizers we often want more chemicals in the water not less. Fine filter floss is the superior mechanical filter if you really want to 'polish' your water to get it crystal clear, but it has the major drawback of needing to be replaced often as it is easily clogged. If you go back to old videos of Cory setting up his 800 gallon tank he discusses filter floss in some detail, but as I recall he echoed it being an amazing filter material but the maintenance offsets the usefulness in the long run.