ughhhh I have some work to do!
- Thread starter jaws789832
- Start date
- Tagged users None
OP
OP
jaws789832
Active Member
Thanks, Coming from you thats a huge compliment. that little tank is still going strong. It even made it through a 2 week vacation I took. Had to teach my tank sitter how to hatch brine shrimp, but only had him feed the feeder once every three days.
Ona sad note though, Sea Bisquit passed a few weeks ago. Lived for seven months and after all she had been through that was surprising. Not sure of the cause though. One thing I am noticing about this small tank is that it seems to support and maintain about 15 dwarves. After that they just dont do so well and Its usually the babies that die off first. I think either the O2 drops or the bio load is just too much, beyond 15. I am in the process of designing a DIY bigger AIO tank for them ( greater water volume with a better filtration system). Should be done sometime in January. Hopefully it works out and I can sustain a bigger population.
Ona sad note though, Sea Bisquit passed a few weeks ago. Lived for seven months and after all she had been through that was surprising. Not sure of the cause though. One thing I am noticing about this small tank is that it seems to support and maintain about 15 dwarves. After that they just dont do so well and Its usually the babies that die off first. I think either the O2 drops or the bio load is just too much, beyond 15. I am in the process of designing a DIY bigger AIO tank for them ( greater water volume with a better filtration system). Should be done sometime in January. Hopefully it works out and I can sustain a bigger population.
jasonrusso
2500 Club Member
Sorry to hear that. [emoji17] What is the average life span?
OP
OP
jaws789832
Active Member
I heard its about a year in the wild. Longer in captivity, but not sure exactly.
I was pretty bummed, but the others are still breeding and having babies. One article I read kinda put it in perspective. In the wild only about 1 in a hundred ( I think that was the number but it might have been 1000) make it to adulthood and to breeding age, so expect losses.
I was pretty bummed, but the others are still breeding and having babies. One article I read kinda put it in perspective. In the wild only about 1 in a hundred ( I think that was the number but it might have been 1000) make it to adulthood and to breeding age, so expect losses.
vlangel
Seahorse whisperer
Ahh, I am really sorry to hear about Seabiscuit. She lived way longer with you than she would have with 99% of the rest of us, me included. I know dwarf seahorse keepers are a special breed and you jumped right in and learned on the fly! You gave her a good life.
I will be anxious to see the new build for the rest of your herd.
I will be anxious to see the new build for the rest of your herd.
OP
OP
jaws789832
Active Member
OK a pretty long update here so sorry if I bore you lol. The pony tank is still going strong. I am starting on the new build for them which I will go over with pics. Any suggestions are welcome, but keep in mind my situation that I go to work for 2-4 days straight so the system has to be fully automated for feeding and such. The issues I am having with the current tank are the amount of maintenance required and the amount of hair algae that builds up on the screen tank divider. It basically acts as a real efficient algae scrubber but clogs up the filtration side so I feel not much flow passes between the 2 sides.
This is 3 days after a 75% Water change where I scrubbed the whole tank down and got it to pristine condition. You can already see the hair algae forming on the screen and in about another 3 days it will be a thick mat again and I will have to do it again. After I clean it there is good flow with that little powerhead on the right through the screen and everything is waving gently in the breeze and the bottom stays clean, but after about a week nothing is moving, and the bottom of the tank gunks up with debris so I know its time for a thorough cleaning again. Its sort of a pain, because to clean that screen it takes a while and a lot of scrubbing. So with that being said I decided to start on my new build for them. I am probably over complicating things again but I have fun doing it and thinking about things so here it goes. Excuse the mess because my caulking skills aren't that great and I haven't cleaned anything up yet (plus this is my first attempt at doing something like this.
I had an old 10 gallon sitting around and since I didn't know if any of this was going to work I decided to use that. I then went to a local glass shop and picked up some 1/8th glass scraps and bought a decent glass cutter to see what damage I could do. The hardest piece to cut was the tank divider piece as that had to have a cutout for the overflow but using a glass drill bit I had I managed to get it done.
It still needs a major cleanup, and I know there are things I wish I would have done but since its my first attempt and my budget was limited (the glass scraps were 3 dollars and I had aquarium safe silicon on hand) I am pretty proud of it .
This will be that pony section. It's a little bigger than what they are in now but not by a whole lot. Still wanted to keep it relatively small so at feeding time the food is still pretty concentrated. I would like to use sand or gravel in this one so maybe I can add more live plants and also more nassarius snails to help clean anything off the bottom. Was debating a reverse undergravel filter in some crushed coral substrate and will probably try it. The logic being this will create a upflow in the tank to help keep the gravel clean and not create too much flow for the ponies
The water from the tank overflows into this compartment. It was designed so that sponge filter media fits pretty tight in there, hopefully sealing off the overflow so no ponies can get sucked over. I might have to put some other safety measure in (a screen over the opening) for added safety but need to see it in action first. The water then underflows into the next chamber.
Here I will but my upflow algae scrubber that I have from Santa Monica. I figured this would do 2 things. It uses an air pump to create the upflow so it will help oxygenate the water. plus being right after the sponge filter it will get a lot of nutrients so it should do well. Its in the pony tank now and grows some algae but it cant seem to out compete with the tank divider screen. The water then overflows into the next compartment.
This I will just fill up with biological media. Live Rock rubble, marine Pure ect. Not sure exactly what I am going to use but It will handle the bulk of the bacteria for the tank. The water then will underflow to the skimmer compartment.
From my various reef tanks and upgrades I have 4 skimmers hanging around. A few hang on back a few in tank. Not sure which one I will use yet But when I get it all put together I will test them out and see which works the best. Due to the high nutrient load in this tank I want to over skim it, so the bigger the better IMO, plus it adds that much more O2 to the tank. The heater and oxydator mini will also go in here. The pump for the brine shrimp feeder chamber will also be in here. The water then overflows into a bubble trap then underflows into the return chamber
Bubble trap so any bubbles caused by the skimmer get filtered out. Plus I can possible hand some activated carbon in a media bag here if I need to.
Return chamber. I have about 8 MJ pumps hanging around here of various sizes (those things are handy to have so everytime they go on sale I find myself purchasing one). I will experiment with them to get the one with the correct flow for this tank. I wish I would have drilled a hole in the divider glass for the return to go through but since this was the hardest piece for me to cut I was worried that I would break it and have to start all over so I decided to just pump the water up and over.
In the center of all this mess is the Brine shrimp feeder chamber. Its similar to the system I have now except its contained in the tank itself. A pump in the skimmer chamber will kick on 4 times a day, pumping water into this chamber, causing it to overflow into the pony chamber through a small hole I drilled in the divider glass. I put it in the center so the chamber is also heated to tank temperature passively by the water that surrounds it. On the current tank there is about a 5 degree difference between the tank water and the feeder water, so everytime the tank gets fed colder water is being dropped into the tank. Not a huge deal but this should eliminate that.
So anyways. I had just finished silconing the last piece of glass into place. Now I have to let it dry a few days, then I can check for leaks and run some test runs. In the meantime I need to think about the return. Whether I want to just return the water in a normal fashion (in the water calumn) and use a bare bottom again, or design a reverse undergravel filter and use sand or crushed coral. I really like having a substrate, I think it makes the tank look so much better plus adds that much more biological filtration and gives me more options for live plant hitching posts, but will it make it harder to clean? so much to think about so any suggestions are appreciated. If you made it through all this thanks for looking.
I had an old 10 gallon sitting around and since I didn't know if any of this was going to work I decided to use that. I then went to a local glass shop and picked up some 1/8th glass scraps and bought a decent glass cutter to see what damage I could do. The hardest piece to cut was the tank divider piece as that had to have a cutout for the overflow but using a glass drill bit I had I managed to get it done.
It still needs a major cleanup, and I know there are things I wish I would have done but since its my first attempt and my budget was limited (the glass scraps were 3 dollars and I had aquarium safe silicon on hand) I am pretty proud of it .
This will be that pony section. It's a little bigger than what they are in now but not by a whole lot. Still wanted to keep it relatively small so at feeding time the food is still pretty concentrated. I would like to use sand or gravel in this one so maybe I can add more live plants and also more nassarius snails to help clean anything off the bottom. Was debating a reverse undergravel filter in some crushed coral substrate and will probably try it. The logic being this will create a upflow in the tank to help keep the gravel clean and not create too much flow for the ponies
The water from the tank overflows into this compartment. It was designed so that sponge filter media fits pretty tight in there, hopefully sealing off the overflow so no ponies can get sucked over. I might have to put some other safety measure in (a screen over the opening) for added safety but need to see it in action first. The water then underflows into the next chamber.
Here I will but my upflow algae scrubber that I have from Santa Monica. I figured this would do 2 things. It uses an air pump to create the upflow so it will help oxygenate the water. plus being right after the sponge filter it will get a lot of nutrients so it should do well. Its in the pony tank now and grows some algae but it cant seem to out compete with the tank divider screen. The water then overflows into the next compartment.
This I will just fill up with biological media. Live Rock rubble, marine Pure ect. Not sure exactly what I am going to use but It will handle the bulk of the bacteria for the tank. The water then will underflow to the skimmer compartment.
From my various reef tanks and upgrades I have 4 skimmers hanging around. A few hang on back a few in tank. Not sure which one I will use yet But when I get it all put together I will test them out and see which works the best. Due to the high nutrient load in this tank I want to over skim it, so the bigger the better IMO, plus it adds that much more O2 to the tank. The heater and oxydator mini will also go in here. The pump for the brine shrimp feeder chamber will also be in here. The water then overflows into a bubble trap then underflows into the return chamber
Bubble trap so any bubbles caused by the skimmer get filtered out. Plus I can possible hand some activated carbon in a media bag here if I need to.
Return chamber. I have about 8 MJ pumps hanging around here of various sizes (those things are handy to have so everytime they go on sale I find myself purchasing one). I will experiment with them to get the one with the correct flow for this tank. I wish I would have drilled a hole in the divider glass for the return to go through but since this was the hardest piece for me to cut I was worried that I would break it and have to start all over so I decided to just pump the water up and over.
In the center of all this mess is the Brine shrimp feeder chamber. Its similar to the system I have now except its contained in the tank itself. A pump in the skimmer chamber will kick on 4 times a day, pumping water into this chamber, causing it to overflow into the pony chamber through a small hole I drilled in the divider glass. I put it in the center so the chamber is also heated to tank temperature passively by the water that surrounds it. On the current tank there is about a 5 degree difference between the tank water and the feeder water, so everytime the tank gets fed colder water is being dropped into the tank. Not a huge deal but this should eliminate that.
So anyways. I had just finished silconing the last piece of glass into place. Now I have to let it dry a few days, then I can check for leaks and run some test runs. In the meantime I need to think about the return. Whether I want to just return the water in a normal fashion (in the water calumn) and use a bare bottom again, or design a reverse undergravel filter and use sand or crushed coral. I really like having a substrate, I think it makes the tank look so much better plus adds that much more biological filtration and gives me more options for live plant hitching posts, but will it make it harder to clean? so much to think about so any suggestions are appreciated. If you made it through all this thanks for looking.
vlangel
Seahorse whisperer
Jaws, I read through your post and it looks like a good design. I would love to see a video of a test run so I can understand exactly how it works. I agree about the skimmer, the bigger the better.
If I were using a substrate I would use fine sand. I know its reverse flow but I would still be afraid to use anything coarse that could trap anything. I hear you on substrate. I just added fine sand to my erectus seahorse tank, (the tank I specifically designed to be bare bottom, ha ha!). Like you I think it just is aesthetically more pleasing plus the added biological filter. I also added nassarius snails. I will be anxious how the new tank performs. I would love to try dwarfs myself someday.
If I were using a substrate I would use fine sand. I know its reverse flow but I would still be afraid to use anything coarse that could trap anything. I hear you on substrate. I just added fine sand to my erectus seahorse tank, (the tank I specifically designed to be bare bottom, ha ha!). Like you I think it just is aesthetically more pleasing plus the added biological filter. I also added nassarius snails. I will be anxious how the new tank performs. I would love to try dwarfs myself someday.
OP
OP
jaws789832
Active Member
I filled it with water today and everything works just as planned, with no leaks. The only hiccup was all my MJ's are too powerful so I had to order a new smaller pump. Not sure what I was thinking. My Mj's push 250 to 300 gph. In a 10 gallon tank that will probably hold 7 gallons total, that's 30 to 40 times turnover through the sump which would be way too much for the ponies and probably blow the substrate all over the place. When I get all the parts in place I will try and do a video so you can see how it works. I would actually prefer sand but With a reverse I wonder if it was cause too much channeling with the flow. I think with these systems almost the courser the better. Will have to look into this some more, or maybe experiment with it. I have both sand and Crushed sitting around here so I can try both and see what works best.
vlangel
Seahorse whisperer
I wonder if fine sand on the bottom with a coarser grain sand (but not as coarse as crushed) on top would work?
How big is your herd now?
jasonrusso
2500 Club Member
I'm a natural blue
Active Member
Link isn't working....
jasonrusso
2500 Club Member
Try this
I'm a natural blue
Active Member
Very cool @jasonrusso !!! They are so stinking cute!
Bellasmith
Community Member
I'm still considering plastic and silk plants. which one is better?
Bellasmith
Community Member
I've read an article and it said that silk plants are better for fish because plastic types could cause injuries to aquarium fish in the event that the fish happen to roam or swim right unto them.
Bellasmith
Community Member
But it's not my case. My betta was injured due to my plastic plants but when I switch to silk plants, it's fine.
Similar threads
