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An Aquarist's Journey


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  • 3 weeks later...
On 10/19/2021 at 3:51 AM, H20CultureLabs said:

Here's an update on the Bucephalandra. Attaching them to a sponge filter works great! The growth i have been getting from having them recieve nutrients directly from the sponge filter has been awesome! A Matten-filter wall of Buce would make for an incredible filter and display!

Oh, dear! How can I pass a suggestion like that up? I have my Java ferns growing happily in my sponge filters. Walls, give me walls! Forget fake backgrounds! Thank you! 😀

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This morning I wanted to make an ode to floating aquarium plants.  I know some do not find them aesthetically pleasing, but their are like a cheat code for nutrient export that our salty breathern wish they had. I find them essential for any overstocked or new aquarium to provide instant nutrient export and algae control. If you haven't tried floating plants, I highly recommend them!

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On 9/15/2021 at 11:28 PM, H20CultureLabs said:

@AtitagainThank you for your kind words, I am happy to answer your questions. I sell both fish and shrimp, generally on aquabid

. 1) Your up and running 6 months now right?, any wish I would’ve or minor changes you would make if you started over?

-Yes it has been up for about 6 months now.. Since I am always tinkering, when, not if, I do it over again I will use Gladiator shelving instead of wood. I think this will make it more functional and easier to assemble/disassemble. A cleaner look, too.

2) Are you using slides as much as anticipated?

Yes! More than anticipated actually. It makes it so much easier to clean, plant plants, and catch critters!

3) what’s the clearance between bottom tanks and cross brace for top level? Looks 3-4” any issues with that?

I believe its about 4in. No issues since the aquariums slide out.

4) what is the overall footprint? Closed then open?

Is approximately 60inx27in if I remember correctly. The aquariums add about another 16ish inches when pulled out.

I do have a show tank that I have not posted about on here before since it is in a state of being redone. It is a 180 gallon rimless planted. Here is a picture of it when it was at its "peak" about a year ago. Its a slice of heaven for a lucky group of danios and white clouds. I'll be posting more pics of it in the future when I get home from my trip since it is almost ready to show off again.

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Very nice!

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  • 2 weeks later...
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  • 1 year later...

It has been a great while since I posted on here. I've had a lot of changes, new city, new state, new job, new aquarium rack! I've been busy making the aquarium rack even bigger and better, more pics and stories to follow. Thank you everyone for your patience as I stepped away from the forum. 

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  • 4 months later...

Oh, where to begin? Apologies for those who have been following this blog, you may have noticed that it has gone by the wayside. That is 100% true, but my hobby has not. A cross-country move, a job change, and a new member of the family have all kept me busy but I have been continuing to work on my aquarium breeding projects, nonetheless. What I have not had time for until recently was a chance to document it all.

First the bad news, most of the fish that I had perished during the cross-country move after Tatayama the crayfish was able to rupture the bag he was being transported within the cooler full of aquarium fish causing a flood inside of the cooler. This asphyxiated most of the fish that were being transport because the fish were in breather bags, and being flooded by water caused the small amount of oxygen inside of each bag to deplete quickly during one of my 10 hour driving legs without me noticing.

I hate to admit it, but I lost my wild-collected colonies of Elassoma, both the Evergladei and the Gilberti. I also lost all of my white clouds and most of my wild-collected Lucania goodei. Further, many of my propagations of the Pink Panther cryptocorynes were also lost during the move. Fortunately, my Celestial Pearl Danios made it as did most of my bucephalandra.

Despite these losses, the move represented a fresh opportunity for me to take my breeding rack to the next level. As much as I enjoyed the rack I'd made with 10s I had located a metal shelving rack that was long enough to support 20 gallon longs. As much as I enjoyed the rack system I built for the 10 gallons, it was clear to me that utilizing steel shelving like the kind seen in garages would be a much better and more effective solution, as well as easier to transport. The issue with this shelving is that it is not deep enough to support larger aquariums; this changed when I located custom shelving solutions that were offered by Menards and I purchased enough components before I left Ohio to build my own 30 inch deep steel shelving system.

 The original design of the rack is the picture attached, there were some modifications made before the end but the same basic concept was applied. The 20 gallons would be mounted on cabinet slider trays just like the previous 10 gallon ones, but these would have to more robust and longer. Further, I wanted all the aquariums to be connected to a common sump system and a common error system but also have the flexibility to disengage each individual current from the system as a whole. The idea was to make the very most efficient use of floor space within the garage I had access to. Over the next several days I'll be uploading pictures and continue documents how this journey began and how it is going today.

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Like all good projects, this one first started with plywood. I was able to source a couple of really nice Birch plywood sheets from which I made the shelving that replaced the standard wire shelving that came with the steel shelves. This allowed me to create very strong shelves of a standardized size within each steel shelf. As you can see in the pictures strength was very important as not only would these shells be holding up a 20 gallon aquarium each but they would also be having to hold up a 20 gallon aquarium while being pulled out away from the shelf which would create a moment and therefore more stress upon the plywood. Fortunately, three quarter inch plywood is extremely strong when utilized and worked with correctly and therefore this was not a concern.

You can see how the plywood was shaped so that it could hold each cradle that the 20 gallon aquarium would eventually sit in. These cradles were affixed to the steel shelves utilizing stainless steel bolts and the plywood shelves themselves were affixed to the steel shelves utilizing thick steel brackets to provide a large margin of error. You can see in the photo of the steel beam that I was able to use high quality drill bits to drill holes that allowed for these steel bolts to be a fixed. And in the final picture you can see the cradle pulled out away from the shelf in that it fits nicely and is very strong.

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First, congratulations on the new family member!

It's a tragic story and very unfortunate about your losses that you encountered, especially with your NANFs.  @Fish Folk just brought in some Elassoma from the outdoor tub and we've been admiring them.  Perhaps that's a future resource for you to recover some of those when you are ready for them.  I think there's probably a ton of us here so interested and enjoying discovering a lot of these Elassoma and other beautiful native fish!

The project seems exciting, hoping for the best for you in the journey to recover everything back to prime condition.

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@nabokovfan87 Thank you for the thoughts and the sentiment. @Fish Folk does have some very nice Elassoma and I am happy to see another have excellent success with them. Fortunately, in a few weeks I will have another opportunity to return to my collecting point for my E. gilberti and maybe find the E. okefenokee that have eluded me. I will certainly post about this next collecting adventure when it happens!

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  • 1 month later...

A few days ago I was in the Tallahassee area on business, and was fortunate enough to get to make a quick detour to Wacissa Spring. This is a beautiful and well-known collection point for the Elassoma gilberti, also known as "Gilbert's Pygmy Sunfish". Collecting here was fairly easy so long as you didn't mind getting a wee bit wet. I was able to do it with a small hand dip net that I bought from Walmart with a small bucket. There are numerous species at the spring which are worth collecting; gambusia including a melanistic form, Lucania goodei killifish, dwarf crayfish, ghost shrimp, and a myriad of aquatic plants. In addition to the Gilbert's sunfish I also collected some Vallisneria and Anacharis for my own use. The springs themselves are gorgeous and are well worth the trip even if you are not collecting fish for their natural beauty alone. It is a piece of Florida that few people associate with the state; the numerous clear springs and waterways which make up the natural places which can be found and enjoyed by looking for the large natural areas along the state's Gulf Coast. The water itself, thanks to the sandy, loamy bottom is a gorgeous crystal blue and reminds me of wading in a large aquarium.

 

There are some individuals who have posted Youtube videos of themselves collecting here. If you go, I implore you not to over-collect as some of them have. From experience, you only need a few Elassoma to build a nice colony of them. This place is a treasure and we should keep it that way. 

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