Wolfenrook’s Fishy Journal

Camera practice

Nymphae

 

Ch ch changes!

Well, we have made a lot of changes since my last entry on here.  Not only have we switched from DIY yeast to a pressurised CO2 system, but we have also completely replaced the lighting with an overtank lighting unit with 4 39 watt T5 tubes for a total of 156 watts/over 4 watts per gallon of lighting.

For the CO2 system we purchased a full 500g set, with solenoid and glass diffuser, from Lunapet(aquariumversand) on Ebay.  Then instead of using the 500g bottle we bought a 2kg CO2 fire extinguisher for £22 from a fellow member of the UK Aquatic Plants Society (UKAPS) and are using this instead.  We I are also using a rhinox style glass diffuser instead of the one that came with, as when I tested the Spiro style one that came with the kit the gas leaked out before the tube helix anyway and the bubbles were bigger than those given off by the unit from Hong Kong (Advance Aquarium Store, again on ebay.).  Instead of using a bubble counter (the helix on the spiro style diffuser is supposed to double as a bubble counter) I just counted the bubbles as they entered the diffuser, doing this I was able to get a nice green colour in my nice glass CO2 drop checker (also from AAS on ebay).

The new lighting we purchased from another ebay store called EQJ Trading.  It’s a nice attractive unit that was very easy to fit.  Previously we were hesitant to use overtank lighting as we have kids and a cat, we got around this by purchasing some 4mm acrylic sheets online and fitting these as a cover inside the tank, as you can see in these pics:-

Full view of the tank, including the luminaire.

Home made condensation cover

The lighting actually seems less bright, but this is most likely because of the additional blue tube (10,000k).  The lamps in use are 2x Osram Lumilux T5 HO 865s, 1 Aquamedic Planta and 1 10,000k tube (the unit came with 4 of these, 3 of which I replaced with tubes I had already).  The plants will be the ones to tell us if the lighting is up to spec, it should be if not it will just be that the light is too high above the tank.

Anyway, here is a pic of how the tank looks now, complete with all the new plants that we added (3 pots of dwarf hair grass, 1 potted echinodorus red flame, 1 echinodorus cordifolius marble queen, 5 stems of water wisteria, 5 stems of mexican oakleaf, various mosses and a clump of riccia).  It’s looking more lovely than ever, especially as we also recently added 12 neon tetra and 10 cherry barbs.

Wol

DIY CO2 up and running now.

Our DIY CO2 is up and running now.  I have 2x 2 litre cola bottles set up at the moment, filled 1 week apart to stagger refills.  These each have a none return valve attached, and are then attached to a T valve, this then is piped to a lime wood air stone placed by the filter inlet.

It’s doing a much better job than the commercial systems were, with much more CO2 getting made, and no blockages of pumps or ladders to interfere with diffusion.  My drop checker is staying a nice shade of green, indicating that it is providing plenty for how things are running at the moment.

We’ve also just switched to using Tropica Plant Nutrition for the trace fertilisation.  It’s only been a couple of day, so I am hoping the plants are still getting used to it as they aren’t pearling nearly as much as they were with the Aquamedic Ferreal +Spureal, despite TPN been one of the highest rated commercial ferts on the forums.

Ade

Trying a new fertiliser

I’ve taken delivery of some Ferreal+ Spureal aquarium plant fertiliser this am.  I’ve not used this before, so I’m going to monitor how well it works.  Previously I have had good results using Dupla Plant24 and Dupla Plant combined, but having to buy 2 lots used to get a bit expensive.

Ferreal +Spureal is manufactured by Aquamedic, the leaflet states that it contains iron, manganese, molybdenum, boron, zinc and cobalt.  It’s a weekly additive, and the reccomended dose is 10mls per 60l of water.  As such, although I bought a 100mls bottle for testing purposes, I would recommend purchasing either a 250ml or 500 ml bottle for larger aquariums, as a 100 ml bottle is only going to last me about 3 weeks with some left over.  Not ideal really

Wolfenrook