17 gallon Alpine newt tank.

[Chinadog]

No, compared to some adults I saw recently they are nowhere near fully grown. there's too many of them for the size of the tank tbh, I don't suppose you want any female apuanus, do you?

 

[Stupot1610]

I'll send you a PM :happy:

 

[whiteblaze11]

Love the square tanks! I am thinking about doing a row in my rack at home with 3 square 27 gallon tanks from marineland for future newt builds!

 

[Chinadog]

I wish I'd have gone for something bigger like 27 gallons, I kept six newts in the end, but I wish I could have kept more.

 

[Chinadog]

I've been starting to get eggs from my apuanus over the last few weeks, even though they are way under a year old! I'm not sure if they are fertile yet, but I still find it amazing how quickly they've grown and matured!

 

[jbherpin]

Over the last few days I've been working on a new tank for my I. a apuanus juveniles. I wanted to give the plants some proper substrate to grow in, but also an area where I can feed the newts and easily clean up without disturbing the plants, so I split the tank 60/40 along its length with a divider that I decorated with bits of slate. This gives me a good amount of organic compost topped with play sand for the plants and a clear area with just sand at the front for feeding, although I might remove the sand from the front and leave it bare depending on how I get on with it.
I planted it with Hornwort, Rotala, Vallisnaria and Java ferns, they look a bit sorry for themselves at the moment, but hopefully they will fill out over the next few weeks and the tank will be as green as 'Castle pyrrho' next door.
I'm really pleased with the slate covered divider, if the tank was a bit bigger I think I would have decorated the back glass with them as well, but the tank isn't huge so I just bought a stick on background, that way I can maximise the amount of water in there.

I love your rock wall concept! Very visually appealing to me! Well done! Thank you for sharing

JBear

 

[Chinadog]

I thought I'd finished with the apuanus for the time being as the eggs I was sent by friend got fungus and I let my group of young adults go to a another friend who was looking for some, but recently I came across two tiny morphs from the eggs that I thought had all died!
I guess it was meant to be. I was sorry to see the others go really but I knew they would be spoiled rotten in their new home. The two babies can be the founders of my own Alpine empire!
If they are a pair that is. 8)

 

[Davo]

I found larvae from the same batch of eggs in my daphnia tub earlier today, I will sort you some out to keep them company. I will be in touch once they have morphed.

 

[ChristineB]

I always love pictures of that beautiful tank, thanks!

 

[Chinadog]

I always love pictures of that beautiful tank, thanks!

Thanks for the compliment! I'd kind of forgotten about the tank in some ways. I've been using it to rear some T. cristatus for the pond and just let the plants go nuts, but its high time I cut them back so I can see what's going on. Who knows what else might be lurking around in there undiscovered!

Cheers Davo, that would be awesome! Especially as alpine babies seem to be strongly biased towards females, I'm just not lucky enough to end up with these two being a pair.

 

[Parodiusgamer]

Love the tank! Looks great

 

[CaudataCam]

I love this tank so much! I also love alpines so much too! I have 2 currently and they are so fun to watch swim around and waddle around on the floor of the tank.

I had a few questions regarding alpines actually. I was wondering if there is a certain male to female ratio that should be taken into account with them? Right now I have 1 of each so I'm not worried, but for future reference is there a recommended ratio? Plus about how many can you house comfortably in a 29 Gallon? My 2 are in a 29 Gallon and it seems a little empty for them.

Sorry about some of the egg losses. Hope everything else goes fine!
-Cameron

 

[Chinadog]

Glad you liked it! Although I've had to re think it just lately as I've had problems on and off with the ph dropping. I hung on thinking it might sort itself out once the plants got a proper hold, but no, any plants that needed to actually root into the substrate never really grew much. I think the organic compost I used must have been the problem, so after I had a group of baby T. verrucosus in there tearing up the place I decided to strip it down and plan something else. Its up and running, so my alpines aren't homeless, but there's no substrate at the moment.

As far as male to female ratios go I've found groups of baby Alpines (apuanus) to be heavily biased towards females so its never been a problem for me. the males don't seem aggressive in any way so it probably doesn't matter that much. I would say your 29 gallon would easily house 8 adult newts, if you have both sexes in there at the moment it won't be long before there's larvae everywhere anyway, Alpines are very good at colonising any available water body, even puddles and road ruts in the wild!

 

[dannyyyallenn]

Sweet tank. Love the idea of the slate divide for a feeding area. Looks nice. I have aquasoil as a substrate and it gets tricky at feed time every once in a while and sometimes I wish I had some barebottom areas. Your other tank looks fantastic as well. Looks like the plants grow just fine even in cooler weather? My tank has never gotten higher than 70 degrees F since I set it up and I was worried my plants might not grow too well. I have a satellite plus pro lighting system and plenty of nutrients. Hopefully mine can end up like yours haha.

 

[Chinadog]

I actually think that for cold water newt tanks its all about lighting. I don't use extra fertilisers or Co2, but I buy the best lights I can and it seems to work most of the time. Not all plants will tolerate the cool conditions, I just try stuff I like the look of and see what happens, sometimes even tropical types can do well, just slower than they would in warmer water. I think picking plants that suit the set up, rather than trying to alter the conditions to favour other plant species is easiest.
Most of the stuff I've tried seems to grow very well in the sand, and who knows, maybe the sand wasn't the problem for the stuff that didn't!
I'm sure if your lighting is good and you go with whatever species seem to suit your conditions, you'll soon have to start composting all the extra growth.