davey's 15long peninsula

[daveysmart]

Very nice Dave, this was the setup i've been wanting to do. craving a AIO setup. It's too bad it soo hard to find 15L and 30 breeders

It fits perfectly in my house, not too big, works with a T-5 light fixture, although not a great bulb selection, gives me the 3 sided peninsula style I wanted and a small display refugium so I can have some nice macro algaes and mangroves tucked in the corner. I cant wait to get this thing running, if only I could find that light in stock so I can order my live rock!

 

[Workaholic]

But the german blue ram pair would be ok in 3gallons? I looked them up and like their color. Thanks for all the suggestions!

You could get away with it as the only things in there for quite a while. They usually come in small (about an inch) and grow quite slow to a max of 2.5-3in where as a upside down cat I've personally seen in excess of 6-7inches.

Tom

 

[MGDMIRAGE]

You could do a pair of blue rams and shrimp for scavengers. Cherry shrimp, amano shrimp. If you wanted catfish i'd go Pygmy corydoras. I'm sure Barbie would have tons of ideas for ya over at Aquarium Solutions.

 

[MGDMIRAGE]

I would definitly not do any synodontis catfish(upside down catfish) they all get much too large for a 3 gal. Celestial pearl danios are awesome alternative to the rams they only get an inch or so max and are very beautiful.

 

[seattle989]

I would definitly not do any synodontis catfish(upside down catfish) they all get much too large for a 3 gal. Celestial pearl danios are awesome alternative to the rams they only get an inch or so max and are very beautiful.

Im sorry i meant

bumblebee catfish SO cute

 

[Workaholic]

Im sorry i meant

bumblebee catfish SO cute

well depending on which bumble bee cat that could either be a great choice or an even worse one so i'm going to go with it being a great choice lol. There were a couple catfish referred to as "bumble bee cats" one only gets about 1.5in the other gets over 8in. and is very aggressive. The smaller of the two being a pretty cool mellow little catfish.

Tom

 

[gotfish]

Well, if you're going to do anything with shrimp, don't go with rams. They'll eat the baby shrimp. You have to make sure the fish are very small. Ottos are pretty shrimp friendly as well as micro rasboras which are a common name for several different varieties.

I wouldn't go with a pair of rams. If the female isn't ready to mate, the male will kill her if she can't get away. A 3g isn't enough room for her to hide.

As far as a plant selection, you want to keep things that stay pretty small and proportionate to the tank. Baby dwarf tears (Hemianthus callitrichoides), dwarf hair grass
Eleocharis acicularis, downoi (Pogostemon helferi), a small piece of drift wood with java moss. All of those stay small or grow fairly slowly.

Do you plan on using pressurized co2? If not, that 18w of light would be fine. If you do, you're gonna need a bit more to really utilize it. Home depot sells a desk lamp made by Hampton Bay that is 27w that works great and looks good.

Anyway, sorry to get off track from what this thread was actually about.

 

[daveysmart]

Thanks guys, I will probably have some more questions when I get closer to the transition to FW this summer. I finally found a place that had the 18" T-5 in stock and it shipped today so I should be running next week!

 

[returnofsid]

Dave, check out www.fishaholics.org It's a mostly local FW forum. Also, www.inwas.org this is our local FW Club forum, though the forum isn't used very often at all. You'll get lots of great info at fishaholics!! Tell em Sid sent you.

 

[gotfish]

A great site for planted tank info is www.plantedtank.net Check out the nano tank section for nano specific info. Pm me anytime if you have any questions. I've been keeping planted tanks for several years now.

 

[MGDMIRAGE]

Im sorry i meant

bumblebee catfish SO cute

I have a south american bumblebee catfish and he/she is cute, BUT they are VERY shy and nocturnal so i cannot recommend them as you will rarely ever see it. They also will eat anything that will fit in their large mouth, even at mine's 2" adult size he still has managed to eat adult ghost shrimp and i wouldn't trust them around small fish. In a 3 gal i would go a few VERY small fish with shrimp as cleaners as their bioload isn't as dramatic as say some catfish. Plus cherry shrimp and amano shrimp will also eat algae even hair algae. A pair of rams would be pushing it in a 3 gal and they probably would eat the shrimp if they spawned, which cherry shrimp will.

 

[daveysmart]

Time to finally get this thread back on track, although I appreciate everyone's input on the planted freshwater tank to be. I got my rock and water in finally. I like how the rock turned out, it emphasizes the peninsula style and left me some good room on all three sides and a couple little caves and coves on each side. Water is still cloudy here, so it is hard to see. I am running the little pico filter for now to help it clear up. I think I should have gone with the koralia 1 instead of the nano. I might have to swap it out to get a little more flow on the front of the rock.

The left front corner:

The right front corner:

The left side:

The front:

The right side:

 

[gotfish]

Looking good. Any bowing of the glass?

 

[daveysmart]

Looking good. Any bowing of the glass?

I finally remembered to measure the glass the other day. It is bowing about 1/32" total in the middle. So it bows about 1/64" on each side I assume. Doesnt seem like much to me. I wonder if the acrylic false wall siliconed in there might help it out a bit too.

Well the tank is finished cycling, or the ammonia is gone anyway. I got the diatom bloom on the sand and alot of algae starting to appear on the glass and some of the rocks. So I added 6 snails. I am out of town this weekend but when I get back I am going to start slowly transferring livestock over, the fish and shrimp and crabs first, then the softies and in another month or so the SPS and LPS will move over. That will also give me a chance to start figuring out my calc and alc dosing regimen.

I still need to decide whether or not to put a protein skimmer on here. Anyone want to make some suggestions in this dept? I will have some SPS, LPS, zoas and ricordeas, and probably 2-3 very small fish, maybe a clown. I do want to start feeding coral a little more with some coral frenzy and cyclopeeze on a weekly schedule. I was thinking of possibly just a small air driven type skimmer because I can find something that will fit in the sump section behind the false wall rather than have a HOB style skimmer which kind of messes up the clean appearance of the rimless AIO style tank. I dont have much experience with protein skimmers though and I dont know if this would even do much to make it worth trying.

 

[gotfish]

http://www.nuocean.com/skimmers/bubble-magus-bmqq.html

http://www.nanotuners.com/product_info.php?cPath=51&products_id=593

The bmqq might not fit, I don't know what the dimensions of your fuge side is. It looks like it may fit in there, but it's tough to tell from the pics. The sapphire skimmer should work as well, but I don't know if they are out yet.

 

[daveysmart]

I got some macro algae for my display refugium and some more cleanup crew from reef cleaners yesterday. Great customer service, communication, and shipping. Everything looks great. Some locals here in Spokane arranged a group buy and it went pretty well I think. Thanks again to chelsie for organizing that!

So here are some new pics. Please excuse the ugly cyano everywhere, I am still trying to get rid of it.

Right front:

Front:

Left front:

Left side:

Display refugium: 5 Red mangroves, 1 tall Codium and 1 short codium, red gracillaria, Oar grass and chaeto. Oh and 2 sexy shrimp, they keep getting back there....

 

[apollothesun]

looks good. try giving the display side more flow on the top surface area like a ripple effect and maybe around the sandbed for the cyno. good luck

 

[daveysmart]

Thanks, I bought a locline splitter for the return pump one side will ponint up to the surface and 1 will point across the tank. I just gotta find the right part so I can connect it to the maxijet outlet. I should have figured this out before I drilled the hole in the false wall!

 

[daveysmart]

Oh, I also found a small skimmer that I hope will fit in my back corner chamber on Marine Depot. Its the aquatic life skimmer that has been getting pretty good reviews and it is on sale so I thought I would give it a try.