My 48G Vicenza - updated May 16

[crazy72]

Ok so here we go for my 2nd tank journal. I bought this tank from Stuart about a year ago. Nice bow-front with an XP3. I set it up in my home office. I wanted to breed fish with interesting parenting behaviour for my kids to enjoy. I decided on kribs.

The tank when I first set it up. Low tech, pretty busy scape, especially on one side.



So I got some kribs from Aq West and Roger's. And breed they did!



The kribs stayed in there for many months. In the usual way with all my tanks, some plants did well and some didn't. Some pics over time.





Some time last summer I decided to simplify the scape. I also moved the kribs out into my 33 Long, and put a few hatchet fish in the Vicenza, together with some Bolivian rams. I can't see the rams in this pic, which is very unlike them, so my guess is they weren't there yet.



I missed the rams too much in my main CT in the living room so they were moved back in. The Vicenza got a short stint with Apisto Agassizi. I lowered the water level at some point to make the hatchet fish happy.



At that point I decided that I didn't see enough of this tank (even when I'm down in my home office I turn my back to it). I have nowhere else to put it without jeopardizing my common-law relationship, and I didn't really find anything that I wanted to do with it to justify the maintenance and everything. So I made the decision that I was going to shut it down. I used it for a couple of months to grow out some kribs that didn't fit in my 33 Long and that I wasn't allowed to keep in the kitchen sink, and that was it, I was going to shut it down.

Then, about 2 weeks ago, I visited .... someone ... someone who is a sponsor on this site, to buy some equipment for my 60G tank. And as it turned out, this someone is a wickedly dangerous guy to visit.

So yep, you guessed it, I found what it was that I wanted to do with this tank. Exciting enough to justify keeping it. Because the tank had only seen a very light bioload over the last few months I decided to start a new fishless cycle. And go bare bottom (the tank, I mean ) for the first time ever. I also removed the internal tubing because I found the XP3 was a little less noisy with external tubing (likely not enough flow through the internal tubing, as Gordon suggested just tonight). Keeping the water level lower to accelerate the cycle.

With flash:



Without:



It's been 10 days now and it looks like the cycle might be done very soon. Really excited!

So what is it that's going to go in here? And who is the wickedly dangerous person to visit? Well stay tuned...

Thanks for looking.

[2wheelsx2]

Nice, very nice. I visited this dangerous person today too and came away with too many things......can't wait to see what you do with it.

[crazy72]

Thanks Gary. Yes, I can't wait either.

This cycle is interesting actually. The ammonia isn't completely down yet, but it's way lower than it was, but I still have no nitrites whatsoever, and nitrates are through the roof. I take that it's because I seeded the filter with media from another tank, and I guess the nitrifying bacteria were up to the task whereas the other ones (which Wikipedia tells me are called nitrosifyers ) were couldn't quite handle the huge spike in ammonia (my other tank has a fairly light bioload).

Anyway. Drum drum drum...

[2wheelsx2]

Yep, seeding it is the best way to go.

[crazy72]

Update: the pH crashed and the cycle stalled. Large water change in the works for today...

I was hoping I could stock it today. Too bad.

[2wheelsx2]

Sorry to hear that Franck. Are you using any GH boosters in your water? That might help a bit, along with an alkaline buffer of some sort?

[crazy72]

Thanks Gary. No I don't add anything. I know I should. I just do it the reactive way (no pun intended), testing the pH regularly and doing water changes if needed. But this week things were too busy and I got lazy.

But it's not a big problem, really. It's just a short delay. It's not that I need to start all over again. The only snag is that it makes me miss a sale on the fish (yes, the dangerous person had a sale on until today ). In the grand scheme of things it's not a huge deal. We're not talking about a colony of blue-eye panaques here.

[2wheelsx2]

Hahaha...that's true. You might want to consider getting just some Epsom salts and plaster of Paris to raise you Mg and Ca levels after a water change. I'm sure your fish will thank you for it. Mine seem to be a lot happier since I started doing that a couple of years ago, but then that's also when I started with the massive water changes also.

[crazy72]

You might want to consider getting just some Epsom salts and plaster of Paris to raise you Mg and Ca levels after a water change.

What kind of concentration do you use these at?

[2wheelsx2]

I found this to be a pretty good calculator for dosing: Yet Another Nutrient Calculator