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RE: My new 125g tank.

cdell — Wed, 22 Oct 2008 20:28:49 GMT

Beautiful, excellent job.

RE: My new 125g tank.

Conner — Tue, 14 Oct 2008 04:56:50 GMT

He is really cool. Problem is he'll disappear for days on end. You'll think he ended up in the sump or maybe expired, but then you'll look at the tank and he'll be sitting on the glass right up front. He is very good at hiding in the sand that I have as substrate.

Not that I don't like all my fish, but I'm split between liking the rams and the cory's best after the sole. They're both just so personable, energetic, and inquisitive. The Cory's are mostly just content with exploring every little nook and cranny in the tank for some food somebody else might have missed, but the Rams notice every time I walk into the room, and are always at the front glass watching me and "dancing" whenever I'm watching so that I'll hopefully give them some food.

RE: My new 125g tank.

FattFishy — Mon, 13 Oct 2008 19:50:07 GMT

Cool. I would say the #1 overall best fish(es) in the tank is...

THE AMERICAN SOLE

It's so unique, and odd-ballish. I would be glued to the tank glass everyday for that guy.

RE: My new 125g tank.

Conner — Mon, 13 Oct 2008 17:01:48 GMT

Heh, alright Fattfishy, here goes:

1 Dragon Goby
1 Hogchoker (American Sole)
1 Bristlenose Pleco
1 Colombian Shark
1 Rosy Red Minnow
2 Platy's
4 Angelfish (2 currently separated for breeding)
4 Bolivian Rams
6 Bleeding Heart Tetra's
9 Corydoras Paleatus (Peppered Cory)
X Ghost Shrimp (currently decreasing in number due to the shark, I believe)

EDIT: Oh yah, there are also an indeterminate number of pond snails and Malaysian Trumpet Snails in this tank. There is also one what I believe to be Ramshorn in the tank, although I'm not 100% sure what he is. I will try to get a picture of it. It started out as a teensy tiny little speck, and now is the size of an M&M or so.

I still feel like a need a top level species in this tank, as the only fish that will consistently swim near the top of the tank are the 2 platies, and they aren't very big. I would also like to maybe double the size of my tetra school. However, this is a pretty long list of fish, and I'm not sure how many more I can add. I have quite a bit of filtration on this tank, plus live plants, so I don't think I'm nearly pushing its limit yet, but I do have a lot of fish so far. Fortunately most of them are fairly small. I would also like to add a male bristlenose pleco as well. One of my lfs' recently had a male with some really impressive bristles. I nearly bought him on the spot when I saw him.

The only real concern I have is that the Colombian Shark may eventually get big enough to make a snack out of the cory's or platy's. If this is going to be the case, I will either have to get another large tank to house him in, with some other aggressive or semi-aggressive fish, or else try to re-home him. He's only about 4.5-5" so far, so the only thing he's dangerous to are the Ghost Shrimp. But they're cheap enough that I used to buy them as feeder's anyways, so I don't mind about that. Gives him something to hunt for at night.

RE: My new 125g tank.

FattFishy — Mon, 13 Oct 2008 14:58:19 GMT

I like. I am interested in the fish list, it'd be cool to see what you have.

RE: My new 125g tank.

Conner — Mon, 13 Oct 2008 13:15:30 GMT

Arg, stupid posting button sucks.

RE: My new 125g tank.

Conner — Mon, 13 Oct 2008 13:13:23 GMT

Thanks, I put a lot of time, money, and effort into this aquarium, and its turned out better than I ever expected. I'm still tinkering with it a little bit, but it's pretty much how I like it. I removed one piece of driftwood that was floating, with a smaller one that was attached to a piece of slate so it would stay on the bottom. I also have moved some plants a little bit, and added a couple more clay pots for caves.

I'm probably going to change around the plant scheme a little bit soon. When the amazon swords started dropping new baby plants, they just kind of settled every where, and some of the other plants, like wisteria and cabomba, were uprooted and resettled while I was gone for the summer. I'm going to try rearranging so that it looks a little less chaotic in there, and set the pots up to look more natural, if I can.

RE: My new 125g tank.

Mrcracker2u — Mon, 13 Oct 2008 08:39:12 GMT

EXCELENT my freind. Very nice work!!!

RE: My new 125g tank.

Conner — Sat, 11 Oct 2008 08:29:42 GMT

Hey MrCracker, long time no see

Here are a couple pictures of the stand, and also of some of the fish and decor as well. The tank has matured very nicely. I have some hornwort that I have to trim in half about ever other week or it will cover the entire surface of the tank in no time. There are 4 pieces of driftwood, 2 clay pot caves, and a pvc tunnel for my dragon goby to hide in (positioned so that he can still be seen). There is also a rock partially buried under the sand creating a small cave underneath, that either cory's or my bristlenose pleco like to hang out in. There are about 7-8 amazon swords (4-5 of them volunteers that budded off the original plants I purchased), hornwort, some cabomba, some wisteria, a small amount of java moss that doesn't seem to grow much but nevertheless hangs around, and some kind of cryptocoryne, maybe? Not sure about the last kind of plant. The fish list is pretty cool too. I'll post it if anyones interested.

I'm also going to be building a canopy to match the stand sometime in the near future. I'll probably continue to use the current lights for a while, at least until I can afford some nice T5 HO's, or something like that and also a CO2 tank and injector system.

Here's the pics:

RE: My new 125g tank.

Mrcracker2u — Fri, 10 Oct 2008 12:56:19 GMT

Very nice Connor, I never did see the completed stand put some pics of it up.

RE: My new 125g tank.

austin123 — Thu, 02 Oct 2008 18:17:49 GMT

You've got great taste in fish.

RE: My new 125g tank.

FisheLady — Sun, 28 Sep 2008 13:58:34 GMT

Looks fantastic!!! Beautiful fish and plants!

RE: My new 125g tank.

Conner — Sun, 28 Sep 2008 07:33:21 GMT

There's a LFS not far from me that sells used tanks at $1/gallon, at least up until around 75 gallons. Not a bad deal. They've got a pair of 90 gallon tanks right now listed for $130 each. I want to buy one, but don't have anywhere to put it, and my gf would probably kill me

RE: My new 125g tank.

jsmith11618 — Sat, 27 Sep 2008 23:51:27 GMT

Nice looking tank and filter system. Great looking.

I was gonna make a sump but ended up buying as I wasn't able to find a used tank anywhere..

RE: My new 125g tank.

Conner — Thu, 25 Sep 2008 07:45:27 GMT

Also, the water gets to the sump from the tank via two in-tank overflows. The tank was predrilled with these installed when I bought it. Definitely makes adding a sump to the tank much easier.

RE: My new 125g tank.

Conner — Thu, 25 Sep 2008 07:43:46 GMT

Yes, I did make the filter system from scratch. It's not that hard, if you really take some time and research what you're doing.

I took a used 55g tank, and siliconed in 3 vertical glass walls. The first chamber became the entry point for water draining from the tank. The outlet pipes feed through a 100 micron filter bag as the first step of filtration. This is the main thing to keep an eye on as far as filter maintenance goes. This is also where my dual heaters are.

The next step, is the water flows over the glass wall and onto the acrylic drip plate, which has holes drilled every 1 square inch across it. It drips through the holes and through the biomedia, which in my case is a mixture of the blue bioballs, and plastic scrubbies I got from the dollar store.

The water then flows under the next wall, into a small chamber that is just extra space for now. It could be used for either chemical filtration, or for an additional mechanical filtration step.

The water then flows over a much shorter wall, into the final chamber, where I have 2-1000gph pumps to return the water to the tank. The shorter wall is not necessary, but I like to have it. In case there is a failure somewhere in the system, it keep the pumps from completely emptying the sump. This keep the biomedia wet until I can fix it, preventing a complete die-off of beneficial bacteria.

Here is a picture of the sump. You can see the first wall on the left, the bioballs in the middle, and the second wall the water flows under on the right. I raised the bioballs off the bottom with eggcrate so that it would be easier to remove any mulm from underneath them without removing everything.

Here's a picture of the last wall and the return pumps.

RE: My new 125g tank.

austin123 — Wed, 24 Sep 2008 16:22:08 GMT

did you?

RE: My new 125g tank.

54321 — Wed, 24 Sep 2008 15:18:46 GMT

i would love to see a little bit more on the filter system, just to see what exactly you did there, also did you make it from scratch?

RE: My new 125g tank.

Conner — Tue, 23 Sep 2008 19:53:01 GMT

I just used regular play sand that you can buy for a few bucks a bag at any home improvement store.

If I were to do it again, I would have splurged and used a layer of Flourite or Laterite underneath the sand, to help the plants grow a lot better. I am also going to be upgrading the lighting soon, once I get a canopy built for it. I'm trying to get about 3-4 wpg on the tank. I'm also debating about setting up a CO2 injection system.

I love this tank. I can sit and watch the fish for hours on end

RE: My new 125g tank.

clownfishkid — Tue, 23 Sep 2008 18:12:25 GMT

I love your tank. It looks sweet. By the way what did you use for subtrate. I'm looking for a sandy subtrate for my upcomeing planted tank. Good luck!

RE: My new 125g tank.

austin123 — Tue, 23 Sep 2008 14:28:22 GMT

Thats a great tank

RE: My new 125g tank.

morfeeis — Thu, 19 Jun 2008 21:05:29 GMT

Fisher86 (5/28/2008)

outstanding!!!! wish i had the space for a 125.this is gorgeous. can hardly wait to see the fish in it. get some live bacteria at the lfs and get cracking with the stocking

I love my redtails, the funny part is i got two of them and then shortly after that i read that you shouldn't have more then one in a tank but i love them so much.

The tank looks great, i love the drift wood it gives it an amazon river look.

RE: My new 125g tank.

GlitterGuppy2008 — Thu, 19 Jun 2008 14:43:21 GMT

Wow! I like how you made it have plenty of things in it, but you made it look so neat and tidy. Great job!

RE: My new 125g tank.

Conner — Sat, 31 May 2008 21:00:28 GMT

This tank got pre-colonized with bio-media from existing tanks, so I got to add fish within about 10 days (it was cycled in that time).

The fish currently in it are:

1 Dragon Goby (about 14 inches)
1 Spotted Pictus
2 Marbled Angelfish
1 German Blue Ram
2 Bristlenose Pleco's
12-13 Bleeding Heart Tetra's

I will probably be adding a couple more german rams in the future, and will increase the size of the school of tetra's.

Unfortunately I 2 back to back cases of Ich about a month ago, and lost several german rams, a tetra or two, and an angelfish. Fortunately the rest of the fish were hardy enough to survive the ich and the treatment. I've also added a lot more plants to the tank since the last picture in the post, so here's as new a pic as I have:

RE: My new 125g tank.

octopuslover — Wed, 28 May 2008 10:02:29 GMT

I love your tank! What kind of fish are you going to put in it?

RE: My new 125g tank.

FisheLady — Wed, 28 May 2008 06:36:59 GMT

outstanding!!!! wish i had the space for a 125. this is gorgeous. can hardly wait to see the fish in it. get some live bacteria at the lfs and get cracking with the stocking

RE: My new 125g tank.

hatstalker — Wed, 28 May 2008 00:52:53 GMT

sweet tank me wants its double mine at least.

gat a red tailed black shark in there peacefull sharks that look rly nice.

I love my fish 26 english gal so thats 52 us gal.

1 panda moor

1 15 year old ryukin

a huge shoal of white cloud minnows

6 danios

RE: My new 125g tank.

Jace — Sat, 17 May 2008 16:13:46 GMT

yo man buy some bacteria for your tank ask ur LFS or buy some at petsmart... u put it in and the second you do your abile to put fish in but only a couple to cary the bacteria around the tank then you can start adding fish after days... it works.. really good thats what i did with my tank just be sure if u add bacteria make sure you have at least 2 fish in your tank to carry it around and this is HELPING bacteria not bad bacteria

RE: My new 125g tank.

Conner — Tue, 15 Apr 2008 19:57:08 GMT

Thanks. I can't wait till it's cycled and can add the fish. After all this time, to be so close, is just so hard to be patient.

I'll be sure to post up pictures as soon as I have added fish.

RE: My new 125g tank.

David Lass — Tue, 15 Apr 2008 15:14:29 GMT

Nicely done -- it's been interesting wtaching the progress. Will be really fun once it is cycled and there are fish in it.

RE: My new 125g tank.

Hailey — Mon, 14 Apr 2008 19:27:19 GMT

Very pretty! Just make sure you keep that sand well stirred so it doesn't cause dangerous anaerobic areas to form. I suggest the addition of a bunch of malaysian trumpet snails to help stir the sand (they don't eat your plants so don't worry about that).

My new 125g tank.

Conner — Mon, 14 Apr 2008 16:32:04 GMT

Finally got it running, got the lights hung, and have added a bunch of plants. Here's the list:
4 Amazon Swords
1 Ocelot Sword
2 bunches + several loose stems Red Ludwigia
2 stems unknown green Ludwigia
3 small Java Ferns
1 small bunch Java Moss on driftwood
6 stems Cabomba
2 stems Anacharis
Many clumps Wisteria
Many clumps Hornwort

What do you think?
C