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Okay, the water parameters have changed a little bit (on their own). The pH is now 6.5, which is ideal, and the GH is 12°.

I planted the back with Hygrophilia, and it looks really cool. I would take a picture, but I seemed to have lost my digital camera (actually it's not lost, it's misplaced). But I'll try and post a photo as soon as I can.

I took the pearl gourami out, because she was looking sad and decided to stop eating. Now that I put her back in the main tank, she happy again and bossing the other gourami around.

To take her place, I bought a a group of four Corydoras concolor, and they are really cool. They look great and are constantly swimming around, playing, and looking for food. They aren't very shy either and rarely swim away when I approach the tank.

I still haven't gotten the pencilfish, even though I ordered them. They might come this Tuesday though, as that's when my LFS gets the fish in. Hopefully they will come.






Last edited by cORY aDDICT at 09-Jan-2005 20:26

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I'm not your neighbor, you Bakersfield trash.

5-6 :0

How many of them would you want? I can order some more of them if necessary.

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I'm not your neighbor, you Bakersfield trash.

Sure thing.

I'll check, though the next time I work is on Saturday. And the LFS is about 65 miles away from my school, so with the traffic and everything it would take about three and a half hours to get there after school.

I will check on Saturday and let you know how it goes... Though I'll need your help packing them (I've never shipped fish before).

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I'm not your neighbor, you Bakersfield trash.

laws at cory:

God almighty, would you?

If at all possible, etc.?

I got them at the store I work at. Where else?

They were imported as "Red Arc Pencilfish". We still have some left at store, so I could possibly ship some of them...

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I'm not your neighbor, you Bakersfield trash.

Freaking beautiful.

I would seriously give like, 15 bucks per fish for a school of those. Where'd you manage to find them?

I have six... Hopefully three males and three females.

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I'm not your neighbor, you Bakersfield trash.

Awsome! love the pencilfish. how many do you have?

Okay... New pictures. Here is the tank:




Look hard and you'll notice some reddish blurs... Those are the pencilfish! I got them last night and they are doing really well. The males are bright red and the females are whitish with iridescences. They are constanly chasing and flaring their fins at one another - very active fish. It's really funny to watch.

Here are some close-ups of the pencilfish. They were intrigued by the camera flash, so I was able to get some pretty good shots of them (too bad my camera doesn't do justice to anything's colors).





















That's it for now... How do you guys like them? I will post more pictures if they decide to spawn.


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I'm not your neighbor, you Bakersfield trash.

it looks great

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''All the clown fish and yellow tangs in the world cant save you now!''

Okay, I found the camera.

Here is an updated photo of the tank:





And here are the things living in it:



Four Corydoras concolor...


A couple large ramshorn snails...


And a few planaria that just crawl around on the algae...



What do you think so far?[/font][/font][/font][/font]

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I'm not your neighbor, you Bakersfield trash.

I have 10 gallon in my room, and until today I only had one goldfish in it. I knew that when I got him he would outgrow the tank, so I knew I'd have to get rid of him one day. I had been thinking about what I wanted to do with the tank once he was gone, but until I saw the Red Coral Pencilfish (Nannostomus mortenthaleri), nothing really appealed to me.

So I took my goldfish, who was now about 4" long (not including his fins), down to the LFS so he could have a bigger home. I did not want him to be sold as a feeder, or even be sold at all (that's how attached I was), so I could still see him all the time. There were two choices - one was in the turtle tank, where he would have guppy-eating duties, and the other was in a pond, where technically the fish are for sale but nobody ever buys them. I decided when I got to the store to put him in the pond, because it was much bigger than the turtle tank. When I put him in, I could not believe how happy he was to see other fish. He had spent most of his life alone, as there was no way I was going to put two goldfish in a 10 gallon. Anyway, long story short, he's a much happier fish now.

Now back to the tank... I'm setting it up to breed these beautiful pencilfish in. I'll start a thread about that once I actually get the pencilfish. Now I'm just worried about getting the tank right, both in water parameters and with planting it and everything. Pencilfish like very soft, acidic water to breed, and I am doing the follwing things to get my 7.8 pH, very hard water to be like that...

- Peat granules in the filter
- Large piece of driftwood
- Double dose of "Instant Amazon"

Do you think this will be enough? I'm trying to get the pH down to about 6-6.5 and the GH and KH to both be around 3°... I added all those things this afternoon, and here is how they have affected my water so far:

pH: 6.8
GH: 15°
KH: 4°

I'm getting closer, but I would still like to lower the GH. I have a feeling that's the lowest the pH will go with that degree of GH...

Now on to the appearence of the tank. Pencilfish do not usually eat their eggs or their fry, but I still want to have adequate hiding places for them. I have seen pencilfish eggs and they are tiny, so I'm assuming the babies are as well. I have read that they like fine-leaved plants to spawn on, so I am going to have plenty of those. Here are some before and after pictures of the tank (BTW: I know it has a lot of algae... That was to help reduce nitrates despite weekly water changes)

Before


After


And here's one with more detail but less light...


So what do you guys think so far? I'm going to put a black background on the tank as soon as I can get to the LFS again. I need more plants in it too, mostly fine-leaved plants that like low to moderate light and do well in soft, acidic water, but I'm open to any suggestions. Thanks in advance![/font][/font][/font]

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I'm not your neighbor, you Bakersfield trash.

Cory Addict I did something similar *curses gravity*...

Anyway have a look in home depot too if your LFS isn't carrying them (I figure you'd be able to easily find out when the shipment would be in but if you dont wanna wait ). Anyway home depot (the one near me anyway) carries a wide selection of flouros, even some 6500k ones, other ones are maked daylight but dont have the cleaner light that a 65,000 k bulb produces.

^_^
Current [link=Contest Rules]http://www.fishprofiles.com/files/forums/Aquascaping/44382.html?200412022138" style="COLOR: #EB4288[/link][/font]

The bulbs are kind of a long story (but not too long)...

I had always used incandescent bulbs in the tank, because there was just a goldfish in there is fake plants. I new that when I planted it, I was going to need fluorescent bulbs to support plant growh. So I went to the LFS and bought two dalylight power compacts to put in. I have lots of experience with these bulbs and I know that they are good with plants because I use them in many of the plant tanks at work.

So I went to go screw them in, and I took them out of the packaging and put them on the side of the tank. I got one of them in okay, but as I was taking out the second incandescent bulb, I accidentally knocked the other fluorescent power compact off the stand. Some how the bulb had enough inertia to hit the wall and shatter as it fell, rendering it useless and a waste of $8. So I just screwed the old incandecent light back in for the time being until I could get back to the store. The lighting I had in the first picture was one fluorescent and one incandescent.

So I went to the store the next day, and of course they just happened to be all out of the daylight bulbs. So I was trying all the different compact fluorescents, there was a pink one, a blue one, and some other one I think. I thought the blue one looked better in the tank I was testing them on. It looked basically the same as the daylight one that was also in that tank, but only a bit darker. Only when I got home and tried it on my tank (because my tank's water wasn't as tannin-stained as tank I tried the bulb on) did I find out that the bulb really was blue.

So, that's my story... I'm going to change the blue bulb as soon I get to the LFS again if we have more daylight bulbs. But they are all fluorescent bulbs in the tank right now. I know better than to use incandescent bulbs with plants.

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I'm not your neighbor, you Bakersfield trash.

Hi,
I think the fish/water problem is pretty much "handled"
in the earlier posts. My concerns are with the plants.
In your first picture there is an incandescent bulb laying
along side the tank, and it would appear that only one
bulb is lit in the tank. In the second picture there
seems to be a blue light on the left side and a white
light on the right. Assuming that both are incandescent,
for good plant growth, and a reduction in some of the
algae, you should toss those bulbs and purchase two
of the screw in flourscent bulbs. You can get them from
nearly any hardware store. Read the labels on the packaging
and purchase only the ones that say SUNLIGHT or DAYLIGHT,
do not get the "warm white, or reading" lights.
The new lights should be on for about 10 hours/day for the
plants, and I think you will see appreciable results within
a couple, three, weeks.

Frank


-->>> The Confidence of Amateurs, is the Envy of Professionals <<<--

I think the water parameters are stablizing... I just tested the water this afternoon, and the pH is still 6.8, but the GH is at 14&#176; now.

Hopefully the GH will go down a bit more.

The new issue of AFM mentions the Coral Red Pencilfish (and also calls it the Cardinal Pencilfish), and says that it is an "intermediate" fish to breed. It talks about them in the Small Fish article.

I think I can handle "intermediate"...

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I'm not your neighbor, you Bakersfield trash.

RO tends not to be as efficient as a process as DI in water purification; not all salts are removed through the former. In turn, whence exposed to air, DI water will be slightly softer and more acidic than your RO system. However, DI water also tends to be quite expensive and unless you're truly devoted to breeding, there's no real need in buying the stuff. As for fine leaved plants, pencilfish are not surface spwaners but are egg scatterers, therefore, fine leaved plants should be used as natural mops, holding the eggs so that the hungry mouths of the parents can't reach them. As stated, java moss is great for this, as is a regular rag or mop (aquarium safe, of course. Another option would be the breeder boxes you can purchase at almost any LFS. They tend to stress the spawners out more than usual, though.

As long as you got only one color of marbles it would still look good. The benefit of marbles over gravel is that they are uniform and provide equal spacing. Gravel will actually move around until the point that it is tight.

In a short tank the dwarf sag should do well. The only problems ive had with it is when tank depth is over 18 inches.

Crypt Balanse is a good plant, however it is not as fine leaved as your pencilfish would desire. But i cant think of a good alternative.

Buying Ro water and mixing it should prove to be stable. But over time the cost can rise. Dont plan on the mixture yet ... play around with the mix until you get your desired parameters. Might want to let it sit around for a day in a bucket to make sure that you are getting an accurate reading.

I have 5 5 gallon buckets that i keep constantly full of water for topping off tanks and water changes. My 10g actually loses more water per volume than any of my larger tanks, so might not be a bad idea to keep it around (unless you have young kids).

Bdadawg