pepetj

Hi

I've been working in my heavily planted Oscar tank. 145USgal (121UK).

Hope you enjoy it, it runs mostly in the middle section of the tank. I turned the three HOBs, the airpump and one light strip off .



Pepe
Santo Domingo

MissMTS

Wow your tank looks great! How do you keep your oscar from uprooting all of your plants. When I used to have one, he moved everything in the tank around so much I just gave up, lol.

pepetj

It's been lengthy process since I set that tank up in late July 2008. A lot of observation and learning to test their limits carefully.

I went from very low light tank (0.25WPG) to mid-high (some areas have 2-3WPG other reaches 4.5-5.5 WPG) in a span of six months, and still working on it.

My rule of thumb in this project is: it's their tank, not mine.

They need open swimming space, and at least a couple of territories: one for spawning and another one for resting. Figuring out those two, I've been working around these areas.

The hiding spot is heavily surrounded by Hygrophila difformis; the spawning slate rock is covered with surface floating plants, the catch is I did this with their help: I noticed they moved the free-floating water hyacynths to that area so I just reinforced that.

Pepe
Santo Domingo

agabr123

it looks amazing!!!

pepetj

Thank you. I love that tank (and then the others as much!)

Pepe
Santo Domingo

Amanda

Beautiful tank!!

Master Snake

<---That's what I want to do in your tank! Great job!

babyblu

AWESOME tank. AWESOME!!!! I especially loved the grand entrance by the Oscar. I kept saying, "where is the Oscar" and bingo! there he was. Gorgeous.

To have an oscar tank again is my dream. What kinds of other fish are in there with him and what are those tiny things scurrying about on the bottom?

WTG. That is a wicked tank.

I have to laugh at the plant comment. LOL. I had that issue with my oscars too; every morning I'd get up to plants outside the tank and couldn't figure out how that happened. LOL.

pepetj

Thanks

Actual stocking:
1 year, 2-4 months old male Tiger Oscar
7-8 months old unsexed Tiger Oscar
2 pairs of Convict Cichlids (11 months old)
1 pair of Pink Convict Chichlid sub-adults (3 months old)
17 Silver Dollars (9 are likely 10 months old, 8 are likely 6 months old)
1 pair of Angelfish (1 year old)
1 pair of Firemouth sub-adults (male likely 6 months, female 4 months)
6 Kenyi (2 dominant males, 1 subdominant male, three females, ranging from 1 year 2 months to 11 months old)

plus:
some Kenyi fry, some Convict fry

The tiny things in the bottom are mostly Convicts fry with a few Kenyi fry (Convicts adopting Kenyi fry is common among one of the parents Convicts)

Filtration:
Main: Three AquaClear 110 (sponge, bio-ceramic, activated charcoal), one of them has the output falling into a tray with 18 large sized Indian Almond Tree Leaves.
Secondary: Two Resun BF-200 (internal Wet/Dry) each with a 5W UV Sterilizer (one JBL, one Tetra).
Back up: AquaClear 50 powerhead with pre-filter (mid-level water movement through plants).

ammonia 0, Nitrites 0, Nitrates barely register (likely 5ppm) courtesy of water hyacynths, 7.5dGH, 5.0dKH, pH 7.2 (overlapping Kenyi and others needs). Temp ranges from 24-28C or 75-82F year around (no heaters, I live in the Caribbean at sea level).

Pepe
Santo Domingo

mikey079

love your silver dollars. i had a few of them but they moved to my friends tank. just couldn't let them feed on my plants anymore

aquarist48

Looks GREAT!

jack--sos

it looks great! i love the silver dollar school, how do you stop them eating the plants?

pepetj

Well, trying Silver Dollars was not my idea. I felt encouraged by this article written M Nielssen at oscarfishlover.com, a very nice site from UK I am also part of:

http://www.oscarfishlover.com/index....r-Dollars.html

I became interested in Silver Dollars thanks to Barbrella at the time I was making my mind to go into Oscars (that's documented in a thread from June 2008). They were not available locally. The first SD I ever saw was a lone adult in a tank with Cichlids; since I knew by then they were schooling fish I passed.

When they became available, I got nine of them (some were infested with ick) as babies. I placed them in a 30 gal breeder tank so they could grow safely. Then I purchased eight more as a gift for my best friend but he couldn't keep them so I ended up with 17.

As they grew up they chomped all plants. Water lettuce? gone. Hygrophillas? gone. Vallisneria spiralis? not a chance! They even hit badly upon the new roots of Anubias barteri!

However I am kind of stubborn. I kept introducing plants and figuring things out. I noticed that when I reinforced feeding them with spirulina (they never ate veggies treats, maybe I'm a bad chef... go figure!) it longer for the plants to disappear. So I ended up using Spirulina as the main food and used protein rich food as complimentary.

Once they reached the 2.5+ inch size (or shall I say diameter?) they went noticeably easier on plants. I cannot affirm this, but I have the impression that the older they get they get by with the food we provide.

They do nibble some of them from time to time but since I've had success in plant keeping by upgrading light system, dosing ferts properly, and very important: I use clay pots so most planted tanks keep their root system safe.

Maybe I ended up surpassing the "negative" effect they have on plants due to plants growing faster than the nibbling. Their impact is barely noticeable (with a few exceptions: small vallisneria varieties and the parrot feather); in the end it's likely the Silver Dollars are helping me by "trimming" the plants.

Pepe
Santo Domingo

namehater

wow! that is an amazing tank. i can honestly only dream of having a tank of that stature. theres not one thing that i dislike about your tank, the stock looks good, your tank has a nice balance of active and not so active fish, your plants are perfect, the layout is perfect, there is just nothing bad to say!