720 liter pleco, discus and tetra tank

[jopbgon]

I really think the tank looks better with no plants, for me it looks more natural

[Bas Pels]

I feel that plants in the frame tend to disturb the image.

They do, especially when out of focus, unfortunately.

[racoll]

I sort of agree that plants would look nice, but I will use the tank a lot to photograph fish, and I feel that plants in the frame tend to disturb the image. Maybee I change my mind later. First I have to finish aquascaping with wood and rocks.

I don't believe that plants always make an aquarium look better. In fact I think they are often aesthetically detracting.

I am just as impressed with a rock or wood only aquascape provided it is done with enough care and imagination.

Having said this I almost always include fast growing stem plants in my tanks, but for added biological filtration only.

[Haavard Stoere]

The Sultan Plecos has arrived

The ammonia smell from the fishbags was incredible. I can´t understand why they don´t add a drop of Ammolock2 to the bags.

[Bas Pels]

Nice group. You got all 10 of them?

[Haavard Stoere]

Nice group. You got all 10 of them?

Yeah! I am very happy with the group. The largest ones are only 10cm tl. Guess that means I will have to feed and house them for more than a year before I can hope to breed them. I bought this many to be reasonably sure of at least one pair.

They look very healthy. I could see by the fecees in the bags that they have a healthy appetite. I will have to make more caves and hiding places in the tank to avoid to much conflict over "real estate"

[Seedy]

Oh! I am so jealous! The tank is spectacular, and L264 is probably my favorite non Panaque sucker mouth.

Here is an older picture I took with a 35mm camera a few years back... (for those of us old enough to remember when we had to wait a week to see what our pictures looked like)

[Haavard Stoere]

They are rally nice looking fish. Seems to be peaceful too. I hope my fish will become less shy after a while.

I would love to have them pose in front of the camera

[jopbgon]

Any updates??? one question Which kind of silicone did you use to glue the driftwood?

[Haavard Stoere]

I just bought a pair(hopefully) of large L-128. They measure 18,5 and 19 cm. I have not photographed the tank yet. The silicone I use is standard aquarium stuff.

[AndreasB]

Haavard i can photograph the tank for you at sunday
Im bring my camera and take som nice pictures

Andreas

[Haavard Stoere]

The room is to messy to photograph the tank. I have to finish a few other tasks on my other new tanks first. The photo session will have to wait a week or two.

[AndreasB]

If you say so. I just "Forgot" the camera back home.

Andreas

[jopbgon]

Any update???

[Kostas]

They are very beautyfull Haavard,nice choice!I like this sp. very much and hope to keep it someday
In what tank have you putted them?Are they in with the Hemiancistrus subviridis or in another tank?

[Haavard Stoere]

They are very beautyfull Haavard,nice choice!I like this sp. very much and hope to keep it someday
In what tank have you putted them?Are they in with the Hemiancistrus subviridis or in another tank?

They will eventually be put in a 200liter breeding setup I think. I don´t consider them mature enough for breeding yet.

About this whole tank project. It was a nice learning exercise, but the whole consept did not work very well. The adhesion between the stainless steel and the silicon is starting to fail in places. I will have to think long and hard about what I will use this tank for. Probably It will be a sort of mixed species tank for fish to mature in for future breeding attempts. This means very basic layouts that facilitates easy capture of fish.

[jopbgon]

Oh man what a shame it doesn't work

[Haavard Stoere]

Oh man what a shame it doesn't work

I don`t feel bad about it because it gives me the excuse to refurnish the tank. I wasn`t all that happy with it because of certain changes in my needs. I have a couple of different plans though, and I will think about my options for a while before I do anything. The tank will be used as a bouillabaise tank for raising wc fish to adulthood(matureness). Therefore it needs to be more practical. Everything needs to be removable and simple, yet beautiful enough to satisfy my own needs. I don`t really know at the moment, but I think it is right to tell everyone that there was an adhesion problem that caused the wood to impart with the glass. I still believe in the concept, but the steel probably needs to be even more chemically clean for the silicone to adhere properly.

[Bas Pels]

Steel should be primed before using silicon glue - at least, in the 1990's in the hardware shop silicon glue was offered alongside a metal primer

[Durlänger]

Normaly steel and other metals get parkerized/ phosphated/ phosphatized befor coated with organic materials for better liability
So I would suggest you first grind it a bit
then put it with only the part which you want to silicon for 5-10min in a mix of cola and water (try to get 0,3-1 Vol% Phosphoric acid)
and at least put it into silicon glue

[jopbgon]

Ooops excuse me for my bad translation , it wasn't a shame what I mean, it was that it sucks that your wonderful tank didn't work so excuse me for the Misunderstood .....my translation mistake, sorry again

[Birger]

Oh man what a shame it doesn't work

jopbgon,as far as I could tell what you said and the way you said it was correct I understood perfectly....

Birger

[Haavard Stoere]

All plans changed, and I build a rockscape instead for my second 720 liter tank.

It was built in much the same way as my Green phantom tank, but with darker rocks. At the moment I keep 7 Hemiancistrus sp. L-128 and 7 Baryancistrus dematoides L-200 "hi-fin". I removed most of the several hundred of lemon tetras tonight, so that I can photograph the catfish over the next few weeks. In the near future I only want a small school of Colombian tetras as company for myself and the catfish. Huge shoals of fish are nice, but it makes photograpy difficult. I will not keep discus in this tank as it is totally unsuitable.

This is the whole tank earlyer today:


Left side of the tank:


Right side of the tank:


Left side filtermodule containing 3000lph powerhead an the in/outlets of the Eheim 2080:


Right side filtermodule containing 3000lph powerhead:

[sidguppy]

the light and the rocks look AWESOME

but with a set up like this, you might think about ditching ALL the tetra's for, say, 25 Cyprichromis of a single species and variety and trading those pleco's in for 4-6 Phyllonemus typus
and add a group of 8 or so Asprotilapia leptura

[slakey]

Or you could try a shoal of Puntius denisonii, they'd look really nice in that tank, and also add some nice colours.

[MatsP]

Or you could try a shoal of Puntius denisonii, they'd look really nice in that tank, and also add some nice colours.

But not very true to the biotope - as Puntius are Asian fish (not quite sure where in Asia they are native, but they certainly aren't South American].

--
Mats

[jopbgon]

Very inspiring tank!!!! , well done again

[Haavard Stoere]

Thank you all for commenting A lot of fish would be suited for the tank, but the setup is primarily for the two species of pleco, and some tetras to make it look less empty.

I have just removed the hundreds of lemon tetras. Only 23 Colombian tetras are left. I really like these. Just the right size, and very nice blue and red. Their colour is a modest contrast to the dark rocks.


This is an adult female Hemiancistrus sp. L128 She is the biggest fish in the tank measuring around 22cm tl. All the caves in the tank are ordinary large slate caves that are hidden in the shadows of the rocks. (edit... "she" turned out to be a male)

[MatsP]

I too have Lemon and Colombian tetras in my RIO 400 since a couple of weeks ago. Not as many as you have, only 15 of each (I have several other large fish in there, so not a good idea to stock too heavily with tetras).

--
Mats

[Haavard Stoere]

Tetras rocks