My 50 gallon tropical community tank

[MrWaxhead]

Hey my first post here glad to have found another fish site. I am currently undergoing a test on my 50 gallon, I have pretty much stopped ferts and am using well fish poop hehe. I now only dose iron once a week right after my water change, and trace bi weekly.
Tank is c02 enriched 6.4 ph, 2.5kh, 3.5gh, 0 ammonia 0 nitrite 5 to 10 mg/l nitrate. With 3.7 wpg of 6500k lighting on a 10 hour cycle. And I only do a 5 gallon water change once a week to keep a healthy level of bio load for my plants and it seems to be enough to keep the fert levels up and the toxin levels at nil. I also run two filters each capable of running this tank on there own but back off there flow rate as not to over filter and remove all the nitrate etc.
It was set up july 11 of this year with mature filters and clipping from my 29g tanks.

Here is it on my last day of full ferts
Aug 11 07


And 15 days later the only change I made was I added flourabase where the tennulus was planted to aid it in spreading and absorbing bio ferts from the water. And I trimmed the riccia and tied it down onto some rock caves on the far left. That whole area of riccia and java moss is tied to a system of caves for my corries to play in/
Aug 26 07


Aug 29 07


Sept 01 07 Photo taken early in the day so pearling was at a minimum. As, my tank was due for a prune so I wanted a before shot.


Sept 07 07 Photo taken early in the day so pearling was at a minimum. Again for pruning details.


With several very large prunes along the way.

Tank inhabitants are as follows.
18 Cardinals
10 neons
6 glowlights
8 zebra danios
3 pearl gouramis 1m 2f
my clean up crew.
4 peppered corries
1 SAE
7 japonica shrimp
unknown amount of snails hehe

and the following fish that will soon be going into my sons tank and will be replaced 7 more cardinals to bring there total to 25
2 white skirt tetras and 3 coloumbian blue red tetras

[Bill]

Wow, that is really superb! I wish I could have so many plants in my tank, I have like less than 1wpg :P I really like how you've aquascaped it, and the lighting is great.

[capekate]

Beautiful planted tank! I love all your cardinal tetras. How did you get them all to survive? lol.. they are such sensitive fish. You have done a great job with your tank..and have wonderful hiding places for the fish in all those plants.
~ kate

[MrWaxhead]

I just made the pics a bit smaller hehe, I just noticed they did not resize on this forum and were massive.

And thanks to both of you for your comments, and as far as cardinals I find they are actually pretty hardy fish as long as your tank is mature (ie not in a cycle) and ph is low and kh is low. And in a planted tank, I personally think cardinals are one of the most attractive fish you can add, they just seem to tie everything together.

I also float them for a very long time before adding them, I usually take about two hours with a small hole cut in the top of the bag and I dip that hole in every 15 minutes to let some of my water in there bag before cutting it right open and letting them swim out on their own. I also never add more then 6 at a time. I added my 18 in three stages a week apart and did not loose any.

[Mike]

Wow! That's a stunning display. Very nice job.

Mike

[MrWaxhead]

And bill, I searched out your tank and its very nice looking as well, and just to let you know there are many plants you can grow in low light. I used to have a low light 29g planted tank, with lots of bogwood with java moss, java fern, lace java fern and anubis. The nice thing about that tank is it was very low maintenance and did not require fertile substrate as they are all water filtering plants, and don't even get planted in the substrate, they were all tied to bogwood.

And yes I planted this tank with hiding and the fish in mind, the left hand side was all basically planted with corries in mind, its all find sand and hollow rock caves under the java moss and riccia. And the right hand side with the java fern and lace java is all planted on a knotted twisted pile of wood with the plants tied on about 3 inches up leaving like a mangrove of wood under them for the fish to swim through.

[capekate]

I started out with about 17 very young cardinals from a breeder that 10 or more of them were lost due to my own mistake. (The heater was left on too high.) After introducing them later on to the 55g, I bought four more. I lost two of them. I am now down to the six that I have had for awhile and hope they do ok. The water is at its best due to the sensitive discus I have there and hope that at some point I will be able to add more cardinals. I really do love how these little guys truly school together and they look so nice in a planted tank. Thanks for the advice on acclimating them! I will try it out next time...
~ kate

[MrWaxhead]

Nice I hope all goes well with adding more, You are actually running the exact mix of fish that will be going into my next tank.
I am in the process of starting to build my next tank as I have a cnc router at work, so I plan on building a 8x2x2 240 gallon acrylic tank and two 50g tanks for wet dry trickle filters (that will be hidden under it) for my theater room.

And my planned stocking is discus and probably about 200 cardinals both of which are easily my fav two fish. I am sure hydro is gonna love me for keeping that tank at 81 degrees hehe
I plan on building the tank into the screen wall, and having a drop down screen for my projector over it, so while watching movies the screen will cover the tank as my screen 120 inch so 8 feet wide. So it will cover the tank perfectly and the light from the projector will not bug the fish while movies are on, and while the screen is up I will have a even better screen to view (the fish)

[COBettaCouple]

love the tank - sounds like we have another DIY guy here at fishlore.

[capekate]

Originally Posted by MrWaxhead

Nice I hope all goes well with adding more, You are actually running the exact mix of fish that will be going into my next tank.
I am in the process of starting to build my next tank as I have a cnc router at work, so I plan on building a 8x2x2 240 gallon acrylic tank and two 50g tanks for wet dry trickle filters (that will be hidden under it) for my theater room.

And my planned stocking is discus and probably about 200 cardinals both of which are easily my fav two fish. I am sure hydro is gonna love me for keeping that tank at 81 degrees hehe
I plan on building the tank into the screen wall, and having a drop down screen for my projector over it, so while watching movies the screen will cover the tank as my screen 120 inch so 8 feet wide. So it will cover the tank perfectly and the light from the projector will not bug the fish while movies are on, and while the screen is up I will have a even better screen to view (the fish)

That sounds wonderful! And I love the idea that the fish will be behind the screen and not bothered by the lights. Do you plan on having the speakers near the tank? I know now that the fish hear very well and hope that any surround sound will not bother them too much?
~ kate

[Howeyg]

wow 200 cardinals that will look stunning i

[BoSox Fan7]

THat is a wonderful tank i wish i could have one like that

[MrWaxhead]

Hey hey, betta yes I am a DIY junkie I love to tinker, even my projector in my theater room was DIY, I built it from plans from lumenlab they are a amazing website for that type of thing my current one is 1280x1024 but i plan on building a 1920x1200 and forcing it to 1920x1080 for a 1080p unit.

And Kate yes there will be speakers in that room, but I am framing the tank into that wall with 2x6 framework and will insulate it then a layer of styrofoam sm, so there should be no problem with noise to the fish. I am doing it that way for noise and for heat issues, I want to be able to insulate the tank as much as possible for minimum heat loss. The tank will be flush with the wall, so only the front face will have heat loss issues.

[MrWaxhead]

Oh and again thanks for all the kind words, and bosox, going planted is actually fairly easy and the fish love it. You just have to decide what level to do it at, at lower light levels you are limited to what you can grow, but you can grow stuff very healty, just much slower which can be a very good thing. Some plants in high c02 and light will grow several inches per day, and become a trimming nightmare hehe.

[Allie]

That's awesome...I am defiantly getting more neons.

[MrWaxhead]

Also I don't see anywhere on these forums for swaps or giveaways, so if there are any Canadians looking for plants I will have the following from my tank around sept 15, I am doing a trim today but I will need those trimming for other spots. But I will have roughly the following amounts on my trim next week.

PLANTS AND AMOUNTS: About 6 to 10 twelve inch stems of Ludwigia mullertii (red ludwigia) and a substantial amount of riccia (probably enough to start about foot square plot of riccia)

CURRENT TANK SETTINGS: They are in a 6.4 ph 2.5 kh tank with about 3.7 wpg tank atm, and grow extremely strong fast and algae free, but I do have snails if you are concerned about them, I personally like having them in my tank.

Basically if anyone want any of those plants, let my know and I can ship in Canada as you can't ship cross border. I have stryo lined fish boxes that I will put the bags into and ship away, you pay the shipping and they are yours.

The riccia really required high light and c02 to survive, but if you have those it will grow and pearl like mad. The ludwigia stems will do just fine in lower light, they just will grow slower and not be as red.

[Tom]

Wow, that is an amazing tank.
Tom

[voiceless_kat]

Your tank is beautiful, everything looks so healthy!! I am curious about your comment that you only change 5g water weekly, and I ask because I am preparing to set up a 55g tank ( must mention I won it, and it is my first community tank, so you know I am inexperienced)..and I am fretting about water changes since we are on a well, and must haul water. I was thinking 25% once a week is a lot of hauling, but 5g is so manageable...would that work with a tank that has both live and silk plants??

Val