[kylith]

Escargantua, the golden apple snail.

I'm on your anubias, eating your algae


Omnomnomnom

[vibe666]

well, the poor seahorses both died within a couple of weeks.

everything else in the marine tank is thriving so i've no idea what happened to them, unless there is still something in there that i can't see (even after clearing out the two aiptasia anemone's that i found) that might have stung them.

in slightly happier news, i seem to be finding new things popping up in the tank almost daily at the moment.

here's some of what i've had appear in the marine tank that i didn't (knowingly) put there.

here's a red mushroomy thing that seems to be doing quite well.



some kind of centipede type thing that turned up the other day.



and what i assume is a sea cucumber, or possibly a radioactive cornish pasty.



here he is on the front glass, giving it stacks but not really getting anywhere!

you'll have to excuse the audio, i had to change it due to my wife's habit of constantly talking whenever i'm trying to make a video of something.


can anyone else see this vid? it's not displaying for me at all.
here's the link just in case: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_eyXBmTiDWs

here's a black slug of some kind.



and a green/yellow slug/snail thing, that i seem to have two of.



and a pretty amazing video of my starfish asexually reproducing a clone of itself!



yes, it was news to me too!

incidentally, starfish are excellent at keeping the sand clean in the bottom of the tank as they are great burrowers.

it's pretty cool when they burrow into the sand, so i'm going to get a time lapse of him/her/it doing that and post that up the next time i catch him doing it.

[Bebo stunnah]

3 on the left are my Golden White cloud and the 2 on the right are half of my regular White clouds, lost one the day after I got him, got stuck in the filter outlet

Here's one of the 2 weather loaches, the other one seems a bit held back recently, he (not sure of the sex of either of them) jumped across the back wall into one of the filter chambers, one with the pump in it, didnt realise he was gone until I noticed there was only one showing up for feeding. he seems to have a slightly crooked back now

[Sleepy]

Nice to see another white cloud keeper

[kylith]

Got some new driftwood. There's two bits there, wedged in.


And got some sterbei corys. They're my first corys, and I'm all excited about them.
I got 6, but only two wanted their picture taken

[Draupnir]

Will that gravel be a bit harsh on the Sterbai?

[kylith]

I've gotten differing reports online, with some people who claim to be cory specialists saying that barbel degredation has much more to do with water quality than substrate.

As you can see in the swap shop I'm looking to swap the gravel for some sand. In the mean time they're under close observation.

[Peteemax]

Originally Posted by kylith

I've gotten differing reports online, with some people who claim to be cory specialists saying that barbel degredation has much more to do with water quality than substrate.

As you can see in the swap shop I'm looking to swap the gravel for some sand. In the mean time they're under close observation.

You can pick up some aragonite sand in your building providers fairly cheap. Just give it a good wash.

[kylith]

Originally Posted by Peteemax

You can pick up some aragonite sand in your building providers fairly cheap. Just give it a good wash.

Might be a silly question, but how would you go about washing sand? Obviously I can't put it in a colander and rinse it because it'd just pour through the holes.

I dont' think I'd go for the aragonite sand, from a quick google it seems like it'd push up my ph, which isn't something I'd need.

[Peteemax]

Originally Posted by kylith

Might be a silly question, but how would you go about washing sand? Obviously I can't put it in a colander and rinse it because it'd just pour through the holes.

I dont' think I'd go for the aragonite sand, from a quick google it seems like it'd push up my ph, which isn't something I'd need.

I just half fill a 10 litre bucket with the sand and rinse it throughly.

[fred funk }{]

This is my new 260 litre Tanganyikan tank. It's not finished yet and I have a large internal filter in it that I'll be taking out when the external filter is mature. I'll be hiding the two heaters too. I'm not happy with the layout of the rocks so I reckon I'll rearrange them at some stage.

I'll be adding some more fish over the next couple of weeks. In it at the moment are 7 Multies, 1 leilupi, 4 Cyps, 1 Pleco and four golden apple snails.

[Peteemax]

@fred funk, i think the rock layout looks very good and natural.

[Bebo stunnah]

Originally Posted by kylith

Might be a silly question, but how would you go about washing sand?

The way they do it in water treatmen plants (with the crap from rivers/ lakes) is they reverse the cycle, so if ya got a large container and blasted the sand so its all suspended, all the debris should rise to the top and the sand, being denser will be at the bottom. Then just pour out the water, you may need to skim the top of the sand if you're not happy with it, but the sand underneath should be clean!

this might help

[vibe666]

that's actually how i clean my sand in my marine tank from time to time, although i just drain out a percentage of the old water using a gravity vacuum pump and then use fresh marine water in a large container that i put above the level of the tank water and run the vacuum pump in reverse so the end of the pump that would normally be in a bucket is in the tank.

the water coming out of the hose agitates the sand directly under it and separates the grains and mixes it all up, releasing any detritus into the water.

then it's just a case of doing that in small batches and cranking up the filter to full power and letting it clear the water before continuing one the water is cleared again.

also, having a starfish or two helps as they bury themselves in the sand and eat all the crap that is left there, mixing it up in the process.

[Bebo stunnah]

Found my minnow showing off yesterday, the same day I lost a golden minnow and my last dojo