dangerflower

Welp my tripartita Japan melted faster than I've ever seen a plant melt before 😂 Within about a week it had pretty much disappeared. What's your general water parameter situation in the tank you have yours in? I'm thinking the 80 degree water in this tank was not what it wanted.

I found the Co-op website when I was researching for setting up my first tank. Later on I saw the forum come up a lot when we I was googling to troubleshoot problems I was having, so I did a lot of lurking and reading old posts before I finally decided to join. It's nice to have a space to just nerd out about fish 🤓

I don't know that this would have anything to do with the almond leaf, but I've seen my shrimp get the zoomies like that when they're hungry, or when they're trying to mate. Maybe they liked the tannins and it got them feeling feisty?

It might be staghorn algae? I'm dealing with a bloom of it in one of my tanks and it looked similar to that when it started growing.

Oh bummer! 😭 It's understandable though. I'll probably end up buying a few because there were some I was really looking forward to getting eventually!

Got things all rearranged in the tank the other day! It looks a little awkward right now, but I think it's going to look nice once the pearlweed settles back in and starts getting taller in the back corner. I sliced off the tip of the big anubias, one node with four leaves and one little root, and stuck it to a bit of hardscape. Hopefully it takes, and the main plant doesn't rot! I used an xacto knife so the cut was pretty clean. "What the heck are you doing to my house??" 🤔 I needed a few random items from the Co-op, so I impulsively ordered a hydrocotyle tripartita 'japan' -- which is a plant that I've always wanted to try because it's so delicate and pretty. It sounds like it's happier as a high-tech plant so I don't have high hopes. I'm going to plant it in the foreground around those rocks, but I'm letting it float for now to get used to my water first. I also never realized until I saw it in person, but this plant kind of looks like tiny cilantro 😅

Bladder snails never seem to get as out of hand for me as the mini ramshorms do. Those little jerks are a problem.

Thank you! Nursing him back to health has been such a gratifying experience, and I'm really proud of how well he's doing. ❤️

I don't think any tank is too jungle 😂 but it looks great and your plants all look super healthy!

Thanks everyone! 🥰 Managed to get a picture of the buddy making a sneaky bubble nest in the back corner of the tank. He's an old man so it makes me so happy that he still feels good enough to make bubble nests sometimes. (I promise that 72 degree reading on the thermometer is incorrect - it's running out of batteries) Gonna pull out that water sprite and get to work on a small rescape this afternoon!

This silly title popped into my head as I was writing this and wouldn't leave so here we are. I wanted to start a journal post for my 10 gallon planted betta tank, which has been running since January 2021. This was my first tank, and it's evolved so much as I've learned and grown as a fish keeper. The tank is heavily planted, and currently home to Doctor Sparkles the betta, a colony of blue velvet shrimp, and one enormous nerite snail. When I joined this forum, both this tank and the betta were in bad shape, so I didn't get the chance to show it off. Doctor Sparkles had a severe case of fin rot that he has fully recovered from (thanks to the help of folks on this forum!) He's like a whole new fish now. Here's a recent picture of him -- it's much easier to capture how good he looks now in video, because he's always zooming around, but his fins pretty much grew back completely and he's a very happy buddy. Here's the tank a few months ago, when it was looking really nice, but a little dark and moody in this photo. And here it is today, looking a little less nice because that water sprite is dying back. I think the water is probably too warm for it. I have a minor rescape idea that I'm going to be doing soon though. I'm planning on taking out the water sprite, and moving a bunch of that pearl weed to that empty back corner, where I'll let it grow a little taller and just take over that spot. I'll probably leave some pearl weed closer to the foreground and keep it trimmed (because I do like the look of it as a carpet) but I'm also going to leave the front more open, and place a few smooth rocks with java moss attached, and some more leaf litter. My anubias is also getting huge and growing up against the glass, so I'm going to try propagating it for the first time so that I can add more of it around the tank. The current plants in the tank are: one amazon sword (the first plant I purchased, and I think the only survivor from when I first started the tank), one anubias barteri, one sad water sprite, pearlweed, a few small crypts (lucens I think?), java moss, red root floaters, and salvinia cucullata. I've tried a lot of plants in this tank and the sword, anubias, and pearlweed definitely seem to be the most stable. I did not realize when I first started out that it would be hard to keep plants in the 80 degree water that bettas prefer. Here's an older photo of the first time I did a rescape on the tank, when i moved to a new apartment and had to break everything down. And the humble beginnings 😅

My Betta also flares at his nerites 😂 I think as long as he's only doing it sometimes, it's fine, and it's probably a good source of exercise and mental stimulation for him. But if he seems obsessive about it and you see him flaring at the snail all the time, it could be a source of stress.

I really love pearlweed as a low tech carpeting plant. It's not a true carpeting plant -- it doesn't send out runners, but you can keep it trimmed short and replant the trimmings to create a beautiful dense carpeted look. And it would probably help lower those nitrates since it's a fast grower.

I was thinking of trying salt baths. The treatment I've been seeing recommended the most as I've been researching this appears to be malachite green (which is what's in Ick X, if I'm not mistaken?) mixed into food. Ingestion seems to be important for treatment because it sounds like this organism gets pretty deeply into the shrimp's tissues. But it doesn't sound like the treatment is always effective 😕 I'm wondering about the idea of treating the whole tank by feeding medicated food? I know Ick X is relatively safe since it's part of the quarantine trio, but I don't know how effective it would be to do this. This infection apparently isn't visible until it's progressed very far so I'm definitely paranoid that it's lurking in other shrimp in the tank.

Okay the hinge / light interaction has been driving me crazy since I set up my first tank a year ago and I've been wondering if it's just me because I never heard anyone talk about it 😂 I keep my light toward the back of the tank so that the hinge strip doesn't block the light and so that the panel will stay propped open...but that means that the front of the tank is shadowed and I hate it. Is this how everyone places their lights? I can't see another way to do it but I've always assumed I was doing something wrong, haha.

Ugh. My cursed 10 gallon continues to be cursed (I've posted about plant deficiencies and a columnaris scare in this same tank...it has been weirdly unbalanced and full of problems the whole time I've had it). I just noticed bright green nastiness on the undercarriage of one of my neocaridinia shrimp. I know what it is - "green fungus" or Cladogonium ogishimae (or Ellobiopsidae but what I'm getting from googling is that that name is incorrect?). I also know that it's nasty. This is a newish shrimp, part of a mixed color pack of neos I ordered online. I was irresponsible and didn't quarantine before mixing them with my other shrimp, but it's been long enough now that I don't think I would have caught this in quarantine anyway. I don't see any signs of infection on any other shrimp in the tank so far. I've been reading about treatment and it sounds tricky. I've removed the infected shrimp, and I'm probably going to cull it and watch the tank closely for any further signs of infection 😕. There are two berried females in there right now so this is really a bummer. From what I'm reading it doesn't sound like there's a way to treat the whole tank to get rid of this. I'm curious if any folks on here have dealt with this and have any advice. Also, what is standard practice for euthanizing a shrimp? Does the clove oil method work on them?

I just had two crypts in one of my tanks do this to me after growing well for months. I was doing some maintenance and realized that the plants had turned into a pile of sludge 😱 I knew it was common for them to melt shortly after planting but I guess it can happen at any time if something changes in the tank that they don't like. I'm guessing for mine that I wasn't feeding them enough, or that they weren't getting enough light because I had let my floating plants get a little out of control. Do you use root tabs at all? I know crypts are heavy root feeders. I panicked and pulled mine out of the tank because they looked so gross, but the roots were healthy so I probably could have saved them. Maybe try cutting back the unhealthy growth and adding some root tabs?

I picked up the tank yesterday! So excited about it. It's just going into a closet for storage for now but I'll probably start casually shopping for hardscape soon. Maybe once I actually begin working on it, I can turn this thread into a journal for the project (is it possible to move threads to other sections?) Also I just want to say that I love how supportive and encouraging this forum is 🥰 thanks for all the cool ideas!

@nabokovfan87 yesss! I love all of this. Those are definitely some good fish options and I had forgotten about green neon tetras, they're really cool. What kind of cory is that? It's gorgeous. Do you think there would be enough space in this set up for groups of all of those fish pictured?

Ooof that is SO gorgeous!

@Fish Folk thanks for that link and the inspiration! Those set ups are so gorgeous. I'm so torn between wanting to do full botanical with dark water but also wanting plants... obviously if the water is too tinted plants aren't going to be able to survive, but I'm sure there's a way to find a balance. @Henry the fish keeper I like that idea! Cherry barbs are so cute. Do you have any suggestions for blue centerpiec fish that are appropriate for this size tank? I'm starting to think the idea that I'm going to be able to wait until fall to set this up is pretty silly. I don't even have the tank yet and I already spent all day excitedly researching fish 😅

I'm forever trying to wrap my brain around gh / kh stuff. It can be confusing! My tanks have a stable but low kh of 2-3 (I assum we're talking about number of drops with the API tests). It seems to be enough to keep the ph stable even though it's really low. If you're monitoring everything and it's staying stable, I want to say it's fine? The snails would probably benefit from some extra calcium supplementation in their food. Seachem alkaline buffer will raise your kh, but it also raises the ph a lot. I use it sometimes in my shrimp tank because crushed coral wasn't having any affect Is that gh just coming from your tap water, or did you add something to increase it? I accidentally wayyy overdosed one of my tanks with shrimp minerals for a while and my gh got really high, and I did notice my plants suffered during that, but it was higher than yours.

After saying for months now that I absolutely definitely wasn't going to get more fish tanks, I saw a really good deal on a 20 gallon long tank and stand that someone was selling and I'm probably going to go for it 😅 I'm sure this is a relatable feeling for lots of y'all. I'm not planning to actually start setting it up until fall probably. Spring and summer are super busy for me with my garden, and I'm already planning a big project to redo my mini pond. But I want to start daydreaming about stocking this tank! I'm thinking a want to do a botanical style tank, lots of leaf litter and some tannins in the water, and definitely lots of plants. The substrate is going to be sand (which I'm going to need to do some research on because I haven't used sand before). I want to keep it relatively lightly stocked for ease of maintenance. I like th idea of having a few groups of nano fish in there. Some fish options I'm interested in for this are corydoras (I was thinking pygmy corys but it looks like a 20 long could safely house a group of regular sized corys?); Sparkling gouramis; honey gouramis; teeny rasboras like chili or green neon; CPDs; neon or black neon tetras. Obviously I'm not talking about putting all those fish in there! Those are just different options I'm considering. The one I know for sure I want is a group of corydoras. I just think they're so adorable. Would love some help brainstorming different species combinations and stocking amounts for a set up like this. For example, if I wanted to do sparkling gouramis, how many could comfortably be kept in there? Also open to suggestions for other stocking ideas, since this is all very much in the theoretical stage at this point 🙂 I am still a novice fish keeper, so hardy species are preferred. Thanks folks!

Just want to make sure I'm reading this correctly - you're saying you're no longer considering the Betta and rasboras if you go with the colder set up, right? A Betta would absolutely suffer in temps that cold. I have a cold tank with Japanese rice fish neocaridina shrimp. I do keep a heater in there set to 70. I find keeping a heater in the tank keeps temps more stable and prevents big fluctuations...and my room temp is usually in the low 60s in the winter and I felt that that was just too cold for my plants. I think a lot of folks do cold water set ups without heaters though.

That's so clever! What plants grow well on it?