Atya gabonensis shrimp

I keep 3 A. gabonensis shrimp for some time now and they seem to thrive well. I see them filtrating particles from the water at all times. They don't move much. Once they have found a good spot they stay there to feed. I have found that they prefer strong water flow. It is important to say that my tank temp is approx 29-31' Celsius and they seem happy with it.

Some crustaceans I keep in this tank

Atya gabonensis shrimp (3 of them)
2x Tylomelania patriarchalis (Sulawesi snail)
I got one baby T. patriarchalis :-)
2x Tylomelania sp. Golden (Sulawesi snail)
4x Clithon diadema Bicolor (very good algae eater)
I added a few more Neritina sp Zebra

I adore crustaceans :-)

Low light garden

This aquarium of mine is approx one and a half year old (set-up Feb '07).
At first it was meant to be a Low-light Hi-Tech but after a few month I felt like less water changes less plant pruning less nutrient dosing...so I cut off the CO2, took out some of fast growing stem plants and replaced them with rosette plants which I find easier to maintain (you simply cut off a few older leaves without changing the actual aqua-scape much).

This summer was very hot and the temperature in my tank was at one stage 32'Celsius. Fish and plants didn't show any stress. I did improve the surface agitation and have upgraded my filter power head from 600 l/h to 1000 l/h (huge difference).

I also got a new fish Puntius pentazona, 19 of them. A very active fish with nice patterns. I am very happy with them. I had some bad experience with dwarf Gouramies and find them very sensitive. From now on I am only going for species which are hard like most Rasboras, Tetras, Barbs and similar.

Caridina multidentata catching living fish

I was shocked when I spotted one of my female Amano Shrimps catching a living fish. This fish (Tatia priguae) was indeed very weak, but still living.
I was very surprised to see how aggresivly this Amano caught this fish.

Amano Shrimps and Easy Carbo (same as Excel)

Photo 1; I have never seen Caridina multidentata being so red before
I was dosing Easy Carbo (same as Excel) for a long time (stopped a few month ago), and my plants did indeed grow very nice thanks to it. But my Amano shrimps (10 of them) didn't do so well at all. They simply disappeared, and were gone for approx 4-5 month. I thought they were dead.
Suddenly one day, I have discovered 2 shrimps hanging on one spot not eating. I was surprised to see them alive. Since I already observed how shrimps react to Easy Carbo in my other aquarium, I stopped dosing it and started doing often large water changes. It took a few month before I started seeing shrimps, eating around the tank, and behaving normal. And just a few weeks ago I saw 8 shrimps (4 males and 4 females) foraging around the aquarium in search for food. I was very happy to see them alive. I am still dosing Tropica Aqua Care with NPK and traces, no harm reported, but did stopped dosing Easy Carbo in aquariums containing shrimps. Instead I am dosing pressurized CO2 via ceramic diffuser.

Plants are flowering + new fish

This flower belongs to my Aponogethon crispus. Aponogethon boivinianus is also flowering but didn't have a chance to make a photo of it.
The next photo shows one of my Cory. trilineatus with serious barbel erosion. When I have introduced them, I wasn't aware that this gravel of mine is very sharp even though very small max 2mm, making it unsuitable for Corys that dig all the time. Corys should ideally have small sand substrate, rounded, with a very smooth structure, max 0.5mm in size.
One of mine 2 and a half year old Otocinclus died a few weeks ago. I got 4 new medium sized Otos that seem to be adapting well to this 180 liters planted tank.
Also (coincidence maybe) my female Ram Cichlid died last week, no other fish is showing strange behaviour though. The male Ram is doing fine.

Extreme make-over upgrade to Hi-tech tank, soon

I made a decision to upgrade the lights on this Juwel 180 liters and make it HI-tech.
I will get the Glomat 2 Electronic Ballast for two 39 watt T-5s. Meaning 2x30watt T-8s (each 10000K) and 2x39watt T-5s will create 0.76 Watt per liter, making this a Hi-light set up.

I will also remove the Juwel inner filter box and instead get an external Eheim 2217 filter.
CO2 will be injected through the external filter, connected to the filter inlet.

I will use fertiliser Tropica Plant Nutrition+ with NPK (and traces) every day 8ml, followed by a weekly 50% water change.

I am still deciding on which plants I will use for this new set-up. I will stop updating this blog and will start a new one soon.