Blyxa normally turns golden under brighter lighting. Not much can be done except for maybe putting it under some 'shade'. I too have problems with P. Stellata stunting but I thought it was due to my DIY CO2 not being too constant.

BTW, did you enter the ADA competition?

Thanks RuslanJamil,

Unfortunately, this tank did not make it to this year ADA competition. Still work in progress, maybe next year.

Here an additional update picture, taken using half of the tank lighting.

Tied some Fissiden sp. to the main branch. Hope I tied it correctly. This is perfect, IMO, since Fissiden sp. is very very slow grower, no need to trim, at least in 4-6 months time. Not much information on the net about this Fissiden sp. Tried using java moss before, but too many debris during trimming, and sinking debris, may I add.

The driftwood on the right, the more I look at it, the more weird it looks, planning to replace it with other driftwood with branch pointing toward to the front. Soaking the driftwood right now.

An empty space behind the Tonina sp. 'belem' actually planted with short cutting P. Stellata. I will give it one more try, before maybe move the Tonina fluviatilis behind the Tonina sp. 'belem' instead.

Best Regards

Hi Nafish,
Again in my opinion your plant looks lovely and most of your plants are growing very well. Do you have any problem with hair algae in your tank? My tank begin to start to invade with hair algae (on the foreground of the glosso) after I came back from a 5 day hols. Anyway, I would like to experiment the dry ferts once my tank is stable following your foot steps. My fishes casualty are high too. Can't find the reason. I am still comtemplating on showing pictures of my tank in the forum but really not up to the standard yet as my photography and aquascaping skill still sucks.

regards

Hi callisto168,

So sorry to hear about your fish. Normally the main culprit is the level of ammonia and nitrite in the water. But sometimes fish just died for no apparent reason. Maybe due to the stress, or maybe the fish already have some sort of disease when you bought them. This is what happened to my boesmani rainbows in this tank. After that incident, I am lucky not to get dead fishes anymore.

After a long holiday, it is normal to get some sort of algae in the tank, due to neglect on fert dosing etc. The most I get is green dust algae which I can easily wipe clean using the magnetic scrapper. Usually before I go for a long holiday, I turn off 1/3 of lighting, because nobody around to dose ferts. CO2 as usual. Ligthing and CO2 on a timer. Anyway, hair algae always associated with CO2 issue, lack of it or not stable amount of it.

About showing your setup, we are here to share, learn form each other, at the same time hopefully we can improve our skills on underwater gardening. I am also sucks at this, but we have to start from somewhere...

Best Regards

nasfish, the green dust algae you mentioned..actually is the spotted algae. normally it is due to high lighting.

Hair algae growing due to imbalance lighting n co2. you can kill the existing hair algae. try to remove by hand. Increase the co2 and reduce the flow rate of your filter.

Thanks dom,

I always thought that green dust algae (GDA) is quite different from green spot algae (GSA). GDA something like dust or thin film usually on the glass. With GDA, we can easily wipe if off. But GSA is hard, circular and bright green spots, difficult to wipe it off unless scraping with a razor blade.

Interesting suggestion from Tom Barr to cure GDA as I quote his statement in this link : -

"The cure is deceptively simple:
Leave it the heck alone.
Do nothing, let it grow, do not wipe the glass, after about
10-20 days, the film will produce patchy thicker patterns and
parts of the film will fall off. At this point you can go in and
clean it off. I've done this in 9 tanks now(100% success rate) and several
other folks have reported success and no return of the alga
after a long bout.- Tom Barr"

Explanation why this works is GDA is zoospore, very tough, can reproduce asexually, once GDA goes through it's 'spore' stage, it is not an issue anymore.

In short, leave the GDA alone, typically 10-18 days, then wipe it off.

Also interesting to read his somewhat simplified statement on algae issue :-

"You'll note over the years I've shown that: BGA=> NO3
related(easy to cure with blackouts/NO3 dosing), BBA=> CO2
related, GW=> NH4 related, Staghorn=> urea/GW related, Green
spot algae=> CO2/low PO4 related, GDA=> life history stage
related.- Tom Barr"

I am going to try his suggestion on GDA cure.

Best Regards

For me, the dust algae is the easiest to deal with. Just add a few mollies if you really want to get rid of it quickly. If not, like Tom says, it normally goes away after a period of time... how nice if all algae was so well behaved.

Thanks RuslanJamil,

As far as I know, and from my experience, mollies are good at eating black hair algae, not GDA. I have see this myself. And if only they are really hungry.

Best Regards

I hate my tap water. Sometimes, the tap water is yellowish, sometimes it is crystal clear but with foul smells. I had lost fishes due to this. That was years ago. Not anymore since using this Diamond Water filter :-

See how dirty is this ceramic cartridge (left side) after using it for only 4 days. See the difference (right side) after the ceramic filter cartridge cleaned.


I do a simple chlorine test on the direct tap water and filtered water.
You can see (left side) that the chlorine test gives somewhat yellow color to indicate quite a lot chlorine present in my tap water. Using filtered water (right side), non-detectable chlorine present, the filtered water is crystal clear.


In short since using this water filter , I have reduced my fish lost. No need for water conditioner (anti chlorine) either. And absolutely good for human consumption too. I feels more healthy now! as my fish are too

Not promoting, just want to share. Can use other brand of water filter. Like to attack problems at the source, that is all.

Best Regards

Hahahahaha

How much water can these thing give u!

It would take forever just to fill up ur tank.....

Imagine a 4 ft tank will take at least ....i thk ......about 4 hour.......
hahahahahah

Correct me if u done it in a faster time....

But true, our tap water is killing our fish and plant...

I'm using RO water as well for my tank.... took me around 1 hour ++ for a 1.5ft tank........darn long.......

With these water, u have a better water quality.....but of course lack of certain mineral.... sign.....