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Charose

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  1. LadyBurrito started following Charose
  2. Charose
    20% every other week, I keep heavily planted and lightly stocked tanks
  3. Charose
    I haven't had one get that far, but I've found them on the other side of the room from my tank before. I wonder if yours got there on it's own or was transported by accident?
  4. Charose
    I have two tanks with fluval stratum, one with eco-complete, and two ponds that have safe-t-sorb in planter baskets. The safe-t-sorb has the best texture for planting into, the stratum seems to produce the best plant growth, and I dislike the eco-complete since it is too course and hard to plant into. Down the line i'll probably re-do those tanks, mix their substrates together and use as a nutrient layer under a sand cap.
  5. Charose
    I feel like this is optimal for planted tanks, though I have my two fluval stratum tanks with just the aquasoil. I might mix the aquasoils with some gravel and cap with sand when i refresh those tanks down the line.
  6. Charose
    Raccoons suck.
  7. Charose
    Third raccoon visit this week 😞 I had a little garden decoration with LED light eyes on it near the pond which I have discovered has run out of battery. Maybe that was doing an ok job deterring them. Also our motion activated floodlights have been turned off in the backyard for a few weeks. I'm thinking the main thing I can do right now, other than fix the night lighting situation, will be to remove my planters so that the pond is deeper and has less shallows for the raccoon to sit in, but this pond liner has built in shelves so no matter what it'll have a place to fish from. If I need to put a net or cage over the pond my marginal plants will have to go. Anyone have success with this?
  8. Charose
    Thanks! I wish I had my real camera ready for the picture, felt like I better get it back in the pond sooner than later. Yea, that raccoon also got into my screen porch last night and knocked over a jar I had set up for holding fry in, weird. Probably left the door ajar yesterday, but surprised it went inside considering there is a motion activated flood light at the door which certainly was triggered. I don't have any grand plans for raccoon proofing, would rather not put a net over the pond since I'd have to remove the bog plants I assume. I'm not sure if it's able to capture and eat the adult fish I have in there. Any tips and tricks are welcome 🙂
  9. Charose
    Babies, shrimps, and Raccoons, Oh My! I've added a few red cherry shrimp, without expecting to ever see one again, but also hoping to have an unlimited supply of deck shrimps! I actually have seen them feeding around the pond which is super exciting and reassuring that the pond is relatively healthy. Hope to snap some better images in the future. The medaka fry are really thriving. I was concerned to see the largest adult females going after the fry, but there seems to be a ton of larger fry along with accumulation of tiny ones, so they must be getting fed enough and have hiding spots amongst the plants. I chucked a bunch of limnophila in the rear of the pond near the coconut hut and filter, hoping fish may find some refuge if needed. I keep spotting what appears to be a male who floats at the top of that plant surrounded by fry. Perhaps they have a nanny to keep them safe? Spotted this fry in a droplet this morning. Plants are doing well, I'm glad I took some photos of the merged growth peaking out because I had an uninvited guest over the weekend 😞 Hopefully the raccoons don't make a habit of climbing into the pond and yanking up half of the plants. Post-raccoon
  10. Charose
    I actually just set it in the pond in the pot I purchased it in since the instructions said to place it in cup filled with water. Having had them as a kid, I don’t recall ever having one survive long. The depth was a little much so i filled a nursery plant pot with some of my pond substrate and sat it inside on the the planters, keeps about 3/4 of the pot in the water and the plant is never totally submerged.
  11. Charose
    Well the medaka sure are prolific! Tons of fry, hoping the parents don't eat them all, but they seem to be able to escape well when an adult goes after them. The floating plants provide a decent refuge for the fry, unfortunately I removed some of the over grown floating plants and the adults become very interested in going after the fry all of a sudden. I'm feeding hikari first bites along with micro pellets twice daily and may add a third feeding of extreme nano pellets for the adults since the females seem to be hungry all the time. Venus fly trap looks like it's about to flower! Banana plant lily pad amongst the water lettuce.
  12. Charose
    FIRST EGGS SIGHTING ALERT
  13. Charose
    Also, the pond filter sponge and media gets mucked up pretty quickly. I wrapped a Co-Op coarse sponge pad around the filter intake and secured it with zip ties. Seems to work well so far catching large stuff that ends up collecting around the filter intake. I hope the sponge also provides extra surface area for beneficial bacteria to colonize.
  14. Charose
    Big day over here, I added half of my medaka to the pond from QT. I haven't netted fish in a tank in a long time, like years, plus my quarantine tank is fully planted, so it became a high anxiety situation, but I was able to pull out the largest fish and get them acclimated to their new home. Aquatic Arts had a shipping snafu that resulted in me getting a second shipment of fish a week after my first batch had arrived. The second batch were significantly younger and smaller, so I'm letting them grow up some before moving them outside. I may also leave them in the quarantine tank until I need to use it for medicating fish next time. I wasn't prepared to have 14 fish in a relatively new, but cycled, 10 gallon aquarium. I also wasn't prepared for the med trio treatment to crash the cycle and it not return a month later. Fortunately, medaka are very hardy and mostly did well. I lost the smallest fish I had, it was very thin and died three weeks after receiving. Anyways, the pond is still struggling to fully cycle it seems, there is always a small amount of ammonia, which is what my quarentine tank is doing too now, so I figured I might as well try and lighten the bio-load of the tank and see if the fish help get the pond cycling.
  15. Charose
    Ziploc container plant farm cheap plastic measuring cup can hang on aquarium, useful for fish collection and acclimation, mixing dry reagents with tank water for easy addition, plant trimming sessions, etc.... baby bottle drying rack is now my drying rack 🙂 cleaning supply tote for holding supplies and food, makes it easy to carry between rooms where my tanks are
  16. Charose
    I have seen fish in ditches but think they're probably just mosquito fish which the local mosquito control department puts out. Lots of brackish water around me, so I think I could collect mollies and some cool catfish if I looked. If I can get the ricefish to breed out there I'll be extremely satisfied. I also hope to throw cherry shrimp produced from my colony out there if it ever gets producing 🙂 Ultimately I want to see how well the setup survives over the winter, which are pretty mild here. Would be great to have a self maintaining pond for a few years. If the ricefish produce, I hope to set up a few ceramic bowl mini-ponds to keep on the screened porch, inside, or give to friends as gifts. If they don't, I know someone local who has a breeding colony of Least Kilifish, those might be cool to put in there and will be winter hardy for sure. I also wanted the pond generally for growing plants, locally collected ones and the ones I've gathered in my aquariums. Tons of aquatic plants in my region to explore. Really cool to see the plants growing more naturally and to their fullest potential with flowers and interesting emersed growth. The fish as well, letting them live a full life is exciting.
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