#if not then it'll be tetras + one pleco

[chipped-chimera]

Today in fish nonsense! 🐟🐠- Tank is good to go! Cool wood piece is cleaned and time to spend way too long on a plan painting.

More below the cut.

Tank has been set up, leak tested so it's good to go (after I overhauled the layout of my office ... still dealing with the fallout of that though lol) and the piece of jarrah/mirra? wood that my Dad grabbed from the tree he cut down on a farm (noting this specifically because it's actually now illegal to commercially harvest Jarrah in my state - this was on private property so it's legal) has had the absolute crap scrubbed out of it - I mean literally, in the process I found yet another interesting hole in it so that's cool, then high-pressure blasted with water so I am finally ready to think about scaping.

Which apparently means spending longer than I should drawing a plan lol. This piece is super awkward to work with I think - while functionally interesting it has a silhouette that makes me oscillate between 'boring' and 'awkward'. After talking to some artist friends, generally it was agreed I'd need to put more stuff in there to actually make it look better, right now naked glass is super harsh. Problem is, rocks and wood? Well in the aquarium hobby that shit is expensive. We're talking 60 AUD+ for pieces of wood. I mean they are fully cleaned and treated (?) and selected for being interesting, but I have a budget and I'd like to save as much of it as I can for more than just harscape sooooo planning is just the right idea here.

Thinking seiryu stone because I looooove the white veining through it, and then for the branches to break up the shape it's probably going to be spiderwood or something (as much as I love mopani wood I don't think it usually sells branched like this - but I will watch out for it) but the good part is these pieces are all probably going to be on the smaller side since I have my huge hunk of feature wood for free.

I don't know how this piece of wood will interact with inhabitants, I've soaked it for probably a month at this point to get a large amount of the tannins out (and I know it waterlogs, which is great because I won't have to play 'how long will this take to sink') but also to help the looser material come off so all I'm left with now is the hard stuff. It's also now sitting in the sun (and I mean sun - it is going to be 40C today and the next few days so that shit is gonna bake 💀) but prior to that has been sitting in the sun either here or the farm for a total of about idk ... at least a month? Maybe more?

I've struggled to find information on whether Jarrah or Mirra wood is safe beyond one post on a forum where someone-who-knew-someone at a local fish shop had put a piece of this in his store tank and all the fish died. Beyond that? no more context. According to my freshwater ecologist friend I caught up with, she thinks it's probably going to be okay given the amount of time/work put in. I have not done a bleach soak and I don't think I really need to given the amount of time it's been soaking in regular tap water (so already contains chlorine) and sun exposure. There will still probably be tannin leakage into the water but I'm okay with having a mild blackwater tank after seeing one in my LFS, I actually like the slight tannin tint of water and how it makes everything a little 'softer'. But I do ACTUALLY want to be able to see though lmao. I've also seen Jarrah seed pods sold locally specifically for blackwater tank setups so it might be fine?

Either way the plan is going to be: Scape, plant, cycle and then introduction of some cheap shrimp as my poor guinea pigs to see if that wood actually is awful.

Right now I'll just have to painstakingly go through plant choices and placement and making sure it lines up with the planned parameters for the community. I absolutely will take suggestions btw.

More soon. Fish nonsense will contain fish ... at some point. I swear lmao.

#kerytalk #aquablr #fishblr #my art #I guess even though this is a grossly overconfident doodle #aquascaping #yes that is a sandpit for enrichment #though I'm debating corydoras #I worry tetras + corydoras might be too much schooling happening for the eventual last edition - Betta fish #if not then it'll be tetras + one pleco #... I swear I saw a video of a pleco thoroughly enjoying burrowing in sand - I'd love that #yes all of this is primarily because I want a betta #but if I only get one tank ... go hard or go home right? #ngl considering getting a small 5-10 gallon for my bedroom for shrimp breeding so that could be a feasible second plan #in case the betta is an asshole #do not tell my parents lmao #I'd love a male in the tank but know it's probably not going to work so female is more likely - or at least plakat type #it's got quite a bit of height to traverse so I don't think anything with super big fins would be great - especially with age #even if I basically have a stepped up network of holes in this wood right to where it nearly touches the surface

[arcaneboner]

I wanna get more involved in my tanks. W/o my grandma making waterchanges miserable.

(Like legit miserable to the point I couldn't do them while she was awake because she'd screech about me dripping water and damaging her new floors. I love the woman that's not the point)

I really should be able to. I have a bit of a conundrum in my tanks though. Now that my honey gourami are all old enough to sex I've realized that only 2 out of the 6 are female. The legit opposite of the recommended ratio.

Lala was the first to go through fishy puberty and is a big asshole. He'll snap suddenly chasing his tankmates in short bursts. The "fights" never lasted like more than 5 seconds and nobody got hurt so I wasn't worried.

And it looks like while I was gone somebody finally fought back. He's missing half a feeler. Soo... now I have a few options.

1. Try to wait and see if they establish a pecking order

Pro: easy, efficient, probably get store credit

Con: I don't wanna get rid of any of my babies T~T

2. Get more females

Pro: more pets!

Con: not ideal. They'll probably be too young to sex again and we could end up with the same problem. Plus, I prefer to keep my tanks rather understocked and between them and my bristlenose pleco it'd just be too many high bioload fish

3. Increase the amount of plants to give them more cover to prevent as much fighting

Pro: buying stuff is fun and I don't have to get rid of anyone

Con: no guarantee that it'll work because I don't even remember WHY it's supposed to work. Also, my tetras probably won't appreciate open swimming space being snatched

4. Set up one of my 20s to split them up a bit more

Pro: get to keep everybody and decrease the bioload in my community tank making waterchange day easier.

Con: I have to cycle the new tank and that could take a lil bit. And we just moved in and we don't have room for a new setup at the moment so this option is definitely not an immediate fix.

#bettablr #fishblr #honey gourami