# Project: Divided Tank



## Catie79 (Jan 22, 2012)

For everyone's amusement, here is my first great betta project: a 10 gallon divided tank.

First I went shopping. I dropped by Petsmart to pick up some specialty items (aquarium salt, fungus meds, a couple plants) I couldn't find anywhere else that my fish, Lucky, needed. I didn't see any tanks that fit the bill without costing an arm and a leg, so I headed off to Walmart. There I found a prefect 10 gallon tank with a hood and filter for $30. Nice. I also found the gravel, some neat resin tree logs, needlepoint mesh, silicone sealant, and report binders that I would need to make my divider (office supply section with all of the report covers for anyone that's been looking). Who knew that Walmart would be my fish project shop and for so cheap?

Loaded down with items, I headed back home. The first step was to get the report binders attached to the sides of the tank. It would need at least three hours to cure. It was pretty straight forward, I measured ten inches in, marked on the outside of the tank with a dry erase marker, and glued the binders into place. I added one to the bottom as well to be more secure.










Don't mind the dishes. Or the bottles. The husband has home brewing as a hobby.

Now that the tank was set to cure (please remember that I said it needed three hours to cure before I should mess with it), I needed to clean all of the other goodies I'd bought for the tank.










Plenty of gravel and new plants and the little logs. Everything went into the sink for a very hot water bath. I'm glad the husband wasn't home to watch me put fifteen pounds of rocks through the kitchen sink. Surely it won't be any harder on the garbage disposal then the little incident with turkey bones after Thanksgiving, right?










Right.

So now I've cleaned everything and tossed some plants into Lucky's temporary tank for him to play with and I've tested my water parameters with my new test kit and generally have done everything imaginable except put in the divider. In short, I'm now bored. 1.5 hours is enough, right? It doesn't need to be totally cured for this, the mesh will just slide right in . . . 

45 minutes and quite a bit of cussing later, I've managed to pop off all of the report binders and have gotten myself covered in silicone. Of course this is when my husband comes in. That mesh certainly does NOT just slide in. I ended up assembling the divider outside of the tank and then sticking it back on with more silicone. My husband thought it was hilarious, but the end results were pretty good.










Lucky observed all of these going ons from his new bed of water wisteria.










Tonight I'm actually going to leave the tank alone and let it cure properly. Tomorrow I'll update with my adventures in decorating and filling my new divided tank. This will include securing live plants, so it should be a riot.

All of this for a $1.99 fish. :roll:


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## Panzer (Jun 26, 2012)

This makes me want to take a late night trip to walmart. Nice work.


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## Catie79 (Jan 22, 2012)

The saga continues.

After being given the appropriate amount of time to cure, my divider was securely in place. Hopefully it will be enough to keep Lucky and his future neighbor separated no matter how feisty they may get.

Next up was gravel and the neat resin logs I found at Walmart. Fifteen pounds of gravel was just about perfect with a bit left over for Lucky's current tank.










I added the water, the plants, and the last of the decorations. Popped in the filter, put on the hood, and hit the lights so I could get the full effect.










I've got microswords in the front, an annubias secured to the log on the right, water wisteria floating around on top, and a marimo moss ball. I'll be adding a second annubias for the other log since I really like how that came out and another marimo ball to make the sides even. That bunch of colorful leaves in the center are plastic plants that were originally attached to the logs. If all of my plants die, they're the back up plan.

So success! I have the tank divided and up and running. Now I'm going to go get a plastic bottle and get to work baffling that power filter. I'm also going to go to the grocery store to pick up a raw shrimp to toss into my tank to get the cycle started. Trying to explain to my husband that I was going to be running an empty tank for at least four weeks was an interesting conversation.


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## Pacqui (May 8, 2012)

It looks so great! I really love the logs, too. I have a 10gal in storage and I want to divide that someday.


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## Catie79 (Jan 22, 2012)

I'm really happy with how it came out! I'll get to spend the next four weeks trying to keep the plants alive and see if I can get them happily established before adding fish to the equation. I'm glad I went with the ten gallon to divide, since that looks like a nice bit of space for my fish. I can't wait to move him in there and let him stretch out.

Of course, that also leaves me with four weeks to consider the occupant of the other half . . . 

/browses Aquabids


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## teeneythebetta (Apr 29, 2012)

That looks awesome!! I got that same tank, the best deal ever! I also have that log


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## Goldibug (Jun 29, 2012)

You can also cycle your tank with ammonia. I've heard it works better then with food but I just use Tetra Safestart for bacteria. If you do ammonia you need 100% pure ammonia that doesn't bubble when shaken. You'll also need a medicine dropper. Add 5 drops of ammonia to the water and then test for ammonia. Continue doing this until ammonia reads 5. Keep track of how many drops you add. Add the same amount of drops every day until nitrItes show up. Then you'll only add half the amount of drops until ammonia and NitrIte read 0. At this point your nitrAtes will be very high so do as many water changes as it takes to bring them back below 40ppm. Your tank should cycle in two weeks with this method.


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## starrlamia (May 3, 2012)

you can also take a decoration, some media or gravel from your current tank (if cycled) and use that to help speed things up.

Your tank looks great! what a lucky little fishy, I may need to get some of the wisteria, because your little guy looking through it is freaking adorable!


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## Zero186 (Feb 21, 2012)

I noticed in one of the pictures there are plants in tubes. Make sure they say fully submersible or they will rot, and foul your tank.


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## Catfish Billy (Jun 27, 2012)

I would love a divided tank but I don't have enough room....


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## Catie79 (Jan 22, 2012)

Zero186 said:


> I noticed in one of the pictures there are plants in tubes. Make sure they say fully submersible or they will rot, and foul your tank.


I've learned that lesson with the 'Aqua fern' incident. These are all plants that I researched ahead of time to make sure I could stick them in the tank. My Petsmart surprised me by clearly labeling the semi-aquatic plants. They also surprised me when a lady refused to sell a fish to someone because they didn't have the minimum requirements. :shock: 

I was flabbergasted!


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## Catie79 (Jan 22, 2012)

Goldibug said:


> You can also cycle your tank with ammonia. I've heard it works better then with food but I just use Tetra Safestart for bacteria. If you do ammonia you need 100% pure ammonia that doesn't bubble when shaken. You'll also need a medicine dropper. Add 5 drops of ammonia to the water and then test for ammonia. Continue doing this until ammonia reads 5. Keep track of how many drops you add. Add the same amount of drops every day until nitrItes show up. Then you'll only add half the amount of drops until ammonia and NitrIte read 0. At this point your nitrAtes will be very high so do as many water changes as it takes to bring them back below 40ppm. Your tank should cycle in two weeks with this method.


Thanks for the numbers, I need lots of notes to make sure all of the chemicals do what they're supposed to. Unfortuantely I couldn't find any pure ammonia. It always had something else mixed in. But I was in the mood for tamarind glazed shrimp anyway, so I've got a shrimp thawing in the sink to be chucked in.


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## ao (Feb 29, 2012)

oooh a decaying shrimp is nooooottt pretty! I hope ur not squimish!


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## Catie79 (Jan 22, 2012)

I stuffed it in a bag to make the removal easier. And if it's too bad? I'm making the husband do it. He's not at all squeamish. 

That's assuming that this even works. My water has gone very cloudy and I'm hearing that my live plants may make this act oddly. And here I thought the divider was going to be the complicated part of this project!


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## ao (Feb 29, 2012)

I once left a dead ghost shrimp in a bottle with an elodea. at first it turned all fluffy then started to fall apart.... it was so ... ew. couldn't even take it out cos it was so gross:/ and that was a tiny shrimp @[email protected]


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## Catie79 (Jan 22, 2012)

Ew. Ew. EW.

I'm definitely making the husband do it. At least I was kind enough to wrap it up for him. 

Ammonia's at about .5ppm right now, so at least it's doing it's job!


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## Catie79 (Jan 22, 2012)

Well, the shrimp may have been overkill. The ammonia was .5ppm this morning, it hit 2.0ppm tonight. o.o I pulled the shrimp out because if it kept going at that rate, I would have been off the scale of my test kit by tomorrow morning! I'll see what the levels look like tomorrow and toss in a smaller hunk of shrimp once the levels drop off a bit.

There aren't any fish in there, so I can probably try to keep the ammonia nice and high, just not quite that high. And the water's gone all cloudy, not sure about that . . .


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## GhostFeather (Jun 23, 2011)

Nice job!
That is how I have all my tanks with my breeders in them,except mine are bare bottom tanks.
One thing I noticed:you have an HOB on the one side,that will draw water through the divider,but you will have no surface disturbance on the other side.
This will cause that side to build a layer of scum to form on the top of the water,you need an airstone on that side just strong enough to disturb the top of the water(keep it moving a little).
That is why I run sponge filters on both sides.


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## Catie79 (Jan 22, 2012)

GhostFeather said:


> Nice job!
> That is how I have all my tanks with my breeders in them,except mine are bare bottom tanks.
> One thing I noticed:you have an HOB on the one side,that will draw water through the divider,but you will have no surface disturbance on the other side.
> This will cause that side to build a layer of scum to form on the top of the water,you need an airstone on that side just strong enough to disturb the top of the water(keep it moving a little).
> That is why I run sponge filters on both sides.


I was worried about that until I put the baffle on the filter. Now with the water being shot right at the divider, the water is moving on both sides. Unexpected benefit to the water bottle technique!


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## Catie79 (Jan 22, 2012)

*Update!*

So it's been a couple days with running the tank and trying this cycling thing. I also added the second anubias and a background so my fish don't have to see me doing the dishes. The tank looks very natural with this background, I love it!










Now I'm waiting for the cycle. I tossed in a batch of Tetra SafeStart to see what it would do, as I'm cycling with no fish so it wouldn't do anything any harm. I replaced the big shrimp with a smaller shrimp so I won't have the ammonia so far off the chart that it impedes the cycle. Keeping it in a sock seems to really minimize the 'ewwwww' factor. Ammonia seems to be dropping off, so the cycle is starting? I'm pretty sure it is. If so, yay! :-D Still testing daily to monitor the situation.

Java moss and hornwort are on the way, so we'll see what plants want to survive in my tank. The java moss is intended for the divider to make sure Lucky and his future neighbor don't stress themselves out posturing. The anubias nana is happy, but it's cousin (another anubias variety) is not doing so good. One of the swords has a hole in it's leaf and I'm worried it's going to disintegrate on me. The microswords are holding up okay, but some are dropping off while they acclimate. I've gone with Flourish as my fertilizer, just a couple drops once a week. So far the water wisteria is holding up in the one gallon, but I'm watching it closely. If that one turns, I'll need to get it out FAST with Lucky in there.

Lucky continues to sit in his one gallon, happily playing with his water wisteria and begging for food every time I go near the kitchen sink. He's quite happy and healthy, so I'm not really in a hurry. Just looking forward to not having daily water changes to manage.


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## Goldibug (Jun 29, 2012)

It looks great! I'm to nervous to add real plants to my aquarium yet. Keep us updated on how yours grow. If they work out well for you I may be brave enough to give it a try.


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## Catie79 (Jan 22, 2012)

Thanks, Goldibug! So far the water wisteria is just beautiful even sitting in the 1g setup and Lucky has taken to sleeping in the branches and building bubble nests in the roots. Looks like he's decided the territory is nice enough to defend. 

In other news, cycling with a shrimp is NOT working. I think it's just too much for my little 10g setup. I have once again removed the shrimp due to ammonia levels continuing to climb and getting to the point that it was going to be too high. They went up just from morning to evening, going from about 3ppm this morning to about 5ppm this evening! Have to say, not recommended for anyone following along as I cycle a tank for the first time. Somehow, some way, I will have to find actual ammonia to use.

I'll check the parameters again tomorrow. I got nitrates (~5ppm) today, so the SafeStart I dumped in may have actually done something!


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## megaredize (May 21, 2012)

looks very nice, i want to make a 10g divided tank in the future. i love the pic of Lucky looking out from his wisteria


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## Aahnay (Jul 3, 2012)

You can use 'your' own ammonia. It comes out sterile, just go with a few drops as someone said, to bring it up each day. Somewhere on the web, there are several people that did it this way.

Perhaps co2 for the plants? I think they usually get that from the fish? I cant remember, its been a while since I read up on plants health. You can do that the cheap way, with baking soda and vinegar. There is a recipe for it for fish too. Google 'fish co2 recipe'.

Good luck, this is fun!

Happy 4th =)


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## Goldibug (Jun 29, 2012)

I love Tetra Safestart! It cycled my 10 gal. in two weeks! I did have some corydoras in there while it established though because my ammonia went way high in my 29 gal. from the addition of a pleco and it was causing them to much stress. You need to have some type of ammonia in the tank for the Safestart to work. My cories were enough for my tank. Just make sure your ammonia stays below 2ppm for it to work the best and if you dont like where your tank is after a week it is completely safe to add another bottle.


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## marktrc (Jun 6, 2012)

if you do another... you might try just putting 2 globs or buttons of silicone near the top of your tank. (so four globs total for 2 sides of the tank/divider) just leave a space in between them for the divider. so the divider is not glued in. its just stopped from moving from the 2 globs. the bottom is held by the gravel. the globs are hidden by the top plastic black strip.

anyway this works for me.


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## Knitterly (Jun 3, 2012)

Goldibug said:


> You can also cycle your tank with ammonia. I've heard it works better then with food but I just use Tetra Safestart for bacteria. If you do ammonia you need 100% pure ammonia that doesn't bubble when shaken. You'll also need a medicine dropper. Add 5 drops of ammonia to the water and then test for ammonia. Continue doing this until ammonia reads 5. Keep track of how many drops you add. Add the same amount of drops every day until nitrItes show up. Then you'll only add half the amount of drops until ammonia and NitrIte read 0. At this point your nitrAtes will be very high so do as many water changes as it takes to bring them back below 40ppm. Your tank should cycle in two weeks with this method.


I've been doing this for 4+ weeks now with no luck at cycling. I hope you have better luck!


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## Catie79 (Jan 22, 2012)

Right now? The cycle appears to be a bit of a mess but I'm being pretty impatient. It's been just under a week of running the tank. And with Lucky showing signs of fin rot (grrrr), I'm not in a real hurry to get him moved. The one gallon is much easier to manage for 100% water changes and it's giving the plants a chance to get settled before introducing the fish. Hopefully the tank will be settled and ready for an occupant by the time I get Lucky sorted out.

If the ammonia is still high tomorrow, I'm going to do a partial water change to bring the levels down. Clearly I don't have that many plants, since they're not making a real dent.


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## Catie79 (Jan 22, 2012)

Holy googledy moogledy, I think I was misreading my ammonia tests. I did a massive PWC (about 75%) and then tested my ammonia again to get 2ppm. I think. I think my ammonia was off the chart and I thought it was just about 5ppm. I'm showing nitrates still, so my tank is trying to process the ammonia but I apparently was approaching pure ammonia in there and my bacteria just couldn't keep up. I may have to do ANOTHER PWC tomorrow, depending on how the ammonia looks.

This stuff is wicked complicated. o.o


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## tanseattle (Jun 28, 2012)

Just take your time. I divided my tank into 3. I let it sat for 3 days, and soak in water for 3 days but when I put three fish in they all got sick. It took me forever to help fish recover.

Tan


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## Aahnay (Jul 3, 2012)

Catie79 said:


> Holy googledy moogledy, I think I was misreading my ammonia tests. I did a massive PWC (about 75%) and then tested my ammonia again to get 2ppm. I think. I think my ammonia was off the chart and I thought it was just about 5ppm. I'm showing nitrates still, so my tank is trying to process the ammonia but I apparently was approaching pure ammonia in there and my bacteria just couldn't keep up. I may have to do ANOTHER PWC tomorrow, depending on how the ammonia looks.
> 
> This stuff is wicked complicated. o.o


hmm, i thought when you get that high spike it was a good sign? and thats when you lowered the amount of daily dose? Good luck, I enjoy this thread a lot. =)


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## Catie79 (Jan 22, 2012)

Aahnay said:


> hmm, i thought when you get that high spike it was a good sign? and thats when you lowered the amount of daily dose? Good luck, I enjoy this thread a lot. =)


From what I understand, you're supposed to keep a nice, steady flow of ammonia to feed the bacteria, not turn your tank into window cleaner. :shock: But hey, the glass looked fabulous! I officially don't recommend the shrimp method, as I have had nothing but trouble with it. 

My java moss arrived today. That was ordered so that I could stick it to the divider and break up the line of sight between the two sides of the tank. Nice and easy, right? Just secure that moss on there with a bit of thread, it's even going on needlepoint mesh, nothing could be simpler! Ever tried to sew moss underwater? Word to the wise, attach java moss to the divider BEFORE installing it in the tank. I swear, the entire point of this project has been to give my husband something to laugh about. I did manage to secure the moss to the divider without stabbing myself too many times and it came out pretty good.

So after getting the water settled and everything stable, Lucky found his butt in the big tank. He seems to think he's died and gone to betta heaven.










As was commented in another thread, the crazy ammonia loads I was putting on the tank didn't make a lot of sense when I was just trying to set up for one little betta. Was it rash to move him in? Quite possibly, but I stand by my decision. I have been struggling to get the ammonia levels right and I'm doing more harm than good. I have bacteria in place, my nitrates are evidence of that. I have quite a few plants in the tank to soak up ammonia (which may also be messing with my readings) and so long as I'm willing to commit to monitoring and water changing as needed, no harm will come to my one little betta.

Well, one little betta for now.

While picking up some more water wisteria, I was bad. I was very, very bad. I found Fly.










So I now have a second male to go on the other side. He's in QT in the one gallon that Lucky used to occupy for now. Looks like he was a bit of a tail biter in his cup, but it's already growing back. He's happily exploring his temporary home. 

Now I'm monitoring the big tank to make sure it stays stable and giving Fly some TLC in the bitty tank. Hopefully by next weekend, I'll have my tank fully occupied and settled.


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## kai (Jul 1, 2012)

love this thread its simplicity of design takes all the worry out of dividing tanks


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## Goldibug (Jun 29, 2012)

I created the same divider for my established tank. I made it slightly wider then the tank so it bows. This way I didn't have to try and silicone it with water in the tank. It's working great! I doubled up the thickness of the mesh so the boys couldn't see each other as well. They've found their own special spot to stare and flare LoL! It's only on occasion throughout the day so I no longer have to do mirror exercises hehe! Here's a pic of them flaring at one another.


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## MissLyss1024 (Jun 24, 2012)

I'm so glad I found this! I started cycling my 5 gallon yesterday.. It's such a pain! I'm using diluted (with water) ammonia. It's supposed to be a drop per gallon. Ha. 30 drops later I'm finally at 4ppm. I'm looking at my little guy in his 1 gallon bowl and I want to put him in soooo bad! Should I do water changes until the level is down to 0?


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## Goldibug (Jun 29, 2012)

Doing water changes will dilute the ammonia and slow down the cycle. Don't do a water change during this process unless you see your ammonia going over 5ppm. Keep adding the drops of ammonia until you see nitrItes show up. Then cut your dosing of ammonia in half. Once your ammonia and nitrItes read 0 and your nitrAtes are above 0 below 40 then you'll have a cycled tank! Keep dosing with ammonia once everything is in check until you add your fish. Once you add your fish he'll be producing the ammonia to keep your tank cycle going.


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## Catie79 (Jan 22, 2012)

I ended up doing a water change because my ammonia went off the chart. As in over 8ppm, the test couldn't keep up, I was turning my tank into window cleaner. It took a couple changes to get it under control, but that's more of an example of when cycles go bad.

Sometimes I think the purpose of my life is to be a warning to others.

If you're under 5ppm, don't do a change, as Goldiburg said. Hopefully with the ammonia it will be easier to monitor and control. Shrimp suck.


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## MissLyss1024 (Jun 24, 2012)

I was thinking I made a mistake cycling it to begin with. I have no idea what I'm doing and want to give up. I know it's not necessary to cycle a betta tank. Hmph. I also, unexpectedly, "inherited" two new bettas who are in awfully bad shape and I would like to set up a tank similar to yours. The idea of sewing moss into the divider is brilliant. It looks so pretty too.


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## Catie79 (Jan 22, 2012)

It's been awhile since I updated, but here's the tank as of today:










Fly is happily settled in as Lucky's neighbor (Fly is on the left, Lucky is on the right). The java moss that was on the divider up and died on me so I had to remove it. There's a second piece of mesh in there to block the line of sight a big more and that seems to be doing the trick. The boys occasionally notice each other but most of the time they just patrol their territories.

Aside from removing the java moss, there were a couple of other changes. There's now hornwort floating along the top of both tanks. Most of the plants seem to be taking hold and showing signs of growth. The water wisteria on the right (from a tube) is really taking off and looking wonderful. The batch on the left came from another source and is growing in new leaves. It's a bit messy while the old ones die off, but the new leaves look lovely. I have new lighting and fertilizer in, so hopefully the plants will just keep getting stronger.

You'd have to look very close, but I'm currently running an experiment with shrimp to see if Lucky and Fly are the hunting types. My tank has three ghost shrimp on each side (you can almost see one under the marimo ball on Fly's side). So far no casualties, though the boys do like to see what the shrimp are up to. If this goes well, the eventual goal is to get some algae eating shrimp in there. The ghosties might get moved to the one gallon to make room, we'll see.

Fly's tail is growing back just beautifully and he hasn't had any bouts of tail biting since I got him. Clearly he's too busy patrolling his territory and making sure there's nothing he could eat in those plants. I think he ate part of a shrimp pellet, so he's going to be fasted for a couple days. Greedy glutton.


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## Aahnay (Jul 3, 2012)

Catie79 said:


> It's been awhile since I updated, but here's the tank as of today:
> 
> 
> 
> ...


Nice, glad to hear all is better. I wonder why the moss didnt make it, any ideas? I have some too, floating in a Tupperware tub to see if anything came in with it . I want to put mine on a floating island.

Id hate to loose it. Ive read elsewhere others have lost it too, then some say it grows like a weed....:roll:


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## Catie79 (Jan 22, 2012)

Aahnay said:


> Nice, glad to hear all is better. I wonder why the moss didnt make it, any ideas? I have some too, floating in a Tupperware tub to see if anything came in with it . I want to put mine on a floating island.
> 
> Id hate to loose it. Ive read elsewhere others have lost it too, then some say it grows like a weed....:roll:


I got mine off of ebay and it came in looking a bit brown. I thought I was seeing things, but I think I got a bad batch. It was kind of brown and crunch instead of dark green and soft. I might try again, my LFS I just found has java moss. It would be great cover for the shrimp.


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## Catie79 (Jan 22, 2012)

It's been three weeks and my plants have really taken off with the new CFLs. The plants have grown in so much I'm having to cut them back to keep them under control!










You can see an oto cat stuck to the glass, helping out with the brown algae bloom coming from the tank being up and running for almost two months. He has friends, there are a total of three on clean up duty. The just have to be swapped from side to side as needed. Not. EASY. They are quick little devils, and as my tank is becoming heavily planted, there are a lot of places to hide. i had a lot of damage control to do after today's side swap.

I still have ghost shrimp hiding away in there. With all of the plants, it's harder to count, but I saw three all at the same time today so I'm pretty sure I still have my four ghosties in there.

So what to do with all of my cuttings and my little one gallon tank? I went ahead and set up the one gallon with a sponge filter and my cuttings as a future nano tank for some red cherry shrimp, probably just three or four. If they reproduce? Lunch is served for the bettas. 










It should be cute when it grows in.


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## teeneythebetta (Apr 29, 2012)

Wow the tank looks beautiful!


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## Knitterly (Jun 3, 2012)

it looks awesome! I'm totally jealous. No tank lights here. Well, the tank sits below my kitchen cabinets which have under-cabinet lights. It's more than enough to see the pretty fishies but not enough for plants. Sigh...


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