Photo: Putting together Fish's New bachelor Pad.. Pic HEAVY

[MereB]

So it's almost time for Fish to move out of his nursery and into his very own "apartment"

He will be living in our lounge room right next to MY chair so I can sit here and watch him.

So here we go. Fish's new tank build blow by blow

This is where he will be

This is my chair... and my baby boy

The foam base.... ok so it may be a little bit of an overkill :lol:

The tank (14.5x14.5x14.5) an ex shop tank so the glass is a bit scratched but we got it for free so I won't complain too loudly

The substrate. River sand that has been put through a kitchen sieve to remove the bigger bits of gravel

Took me 10mins but finally got it cleaned

And into the tank

The plants I selected (minus the 2 javafern covered hides) but I didn't use the bigger sword of the dark fern on the bit of wood. I wanted it to be minimalist so I could find him to feed him each day

Decorated and filling her up front view

1 Side view

Until I decided I wanted to be able to see into the hide at the front from my seat and flipped everything over

This morning I decided I didn't like the lilliopsis along the back, it wasn't quite big enough so replaced it with some chain swords

And finally how it looks right now with it's background and light in place
From the side

and front

And what I'm hoping will be his preferred hide :happy:

Let the cycling begin!!!!
So what do you all think?
I still need to put a spray bar on the power head filter to reduce the flow and siphon out all the black muck off the sand but I have a few weeks to do all that
Hubby is going to clean his big canister filter out tomorrow so I will run this filter in the bucket he rinses his filter in for a couple of days to REALLY get the bacteria going and to speed the whole process up considerably.

 

[melfly]

Hi
Your tank is looking really nice

The plants look good. He'll be so excited moving in!

(The sand is a bit deep at the back, just remember to give it a stir once a week or so to stop gas bubbles building up and making the sand black and the chemistry bad.)

Well done, cant wait to see Fish in there!!


Mel

 

[capital G]

Looking good, I really like the hide.
Same as above about the sand, don't want it going black and ruining your water!

 

[MereB]

Thanks guys. can't wait to add him
The filter has been seeded now and about a Liter of filter water and dislodged bacteria was also added to the tank last night and so far all the levels are looking good.
Ammonia is dropping beautifully (been almost 24 hours since the seeding) I'm getting almost no Nitrites and Nitrate is VERY slowly rising so it looks to have done the trick.

I've been doing sand based tanks for about 10 years now and NEVER had a problem with gas bubbles or detritus or it effecting the water quality. It's all in how you clean it and if you only ever suck the muck off the very top you will always have troubles. Invest in a GOOD aquarium gravel vacuum (a piece of hose or airtube on it's own is NOT going to do the job) and learn how to use it and you will never have a problem.

The live plants roots will also help keep any nasties down as well as keep the sand from compacting and creating oxygen deprived zones and the last little trick is to add some blackworm (They aren't in this tank yet). They will happily live and breed in the sand forever as long as your water stays good and will act like earthworms do and keep it all healthy They also make a tasty snack for whoever is in there and when your axie has eaten enough for you to think you need more then you add more... while he's not looking of course

My adults tank has sand almost that thick all the way along the base and has actually been one of my more stable tanks.


:rofl: Hubby has tank envy over my little cube and wants me to re design his main display tank for him :rofl: so that is tonight's project. We've been out and bought a beautiful bit of desert stone today so it should be fun! I LOVE setting up and planting out tanks. Not bad for a girl who couldn't stand the though of putting her arm in a fish tank 10 years ago. :lol:

 

[capital G]

Oh I didn't know that about the Blackworms. Ive been feeding them to my axies for awhile now, and saw a fair few worms still alive cruising around in the sand. Good to know there actually doing something positive

Good luck with his tank! I'm sure it will look nice.