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Right, finally got round to setting up the L333 tank as a River Tank.

The tank.
Juwel Rio 180 (roughly 150 litres water when full)
Juwel internal filter (600 litres hour)
Fluval 304 external filter (710 litres hour)
2 * power heads (1000 litres hour per unit)
Sand and fine gravel (2 â?? 3mm) substrate
River rocks (pebbles and slate)
pH = 6.8
kH = 2 (buffered with crushed tufa rock in the external)
gH = 3 (buffered with crushed tufa rock in the external)
Temp = 29.8*C

The fish.
14 * Hypancistrus sp. (L333). 6 adults and 8 fry
30 * Ancistrus sp.3 (Bristle Nose Plecs). All 1? - 2"

Absolutely great tank design. I really like it. I have a question about the placement of the breeding caves. I was taught that the caves should be placed with their openings facing perpendicular to the current such as yours. But I have seen another post recently about a setup for L134 (Leopard Frog plecos) that had the caves placed with opening facing parallel but downstream of the current. I have both species (L333 and L134) setup in breeding setups right now but am now uncertain as to whether my cave placement is incorrect. I have both facing perpendicular but am wondering if I should change the direction of my L134? If you have any thoughts I would appreciate it. Thank you.

Great design. Looks very nice.

I've got an empty 4ft tank that I've been considering something like that for. Got to get my house-buying sorter first tho'.

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Mats

Thanks for the comments fellers.

Andy, Im going to put some more caves in the tank. Two under the power heads, openings facing to the right, and two next to the slate box, openings facing the power heads. Im also going to make some of the new caves different sizes, as the eggs from the last spawn got kicked out when Mum left the cave.

They seem to prefer the tight caves so the new one's will only be a little bigger, 6.0" * 1.75" * 1.25" (L*W*H). More pics to follow.

Any ideas for tank mates, the 3 Blue Tetras look lonely in there. What do you think to some Sturisoma festivum?

Tom

Lovely set-up and nice photos! And with kids around?

It's nice to see all the caves in use. You could go up to about 6-10 of the Tetras.You'll be suprised at how full it'll get. Also, the plants will grow. The Tetras will appreciate the space and may reward you, if you can catch the eggs before our friends on the bottom do. Any plans for more driftwood? Some interesting currents occur if you play with the placement. The fish will let you know if you get the placement correct. I find if they ignore an area, it's for a good reason. I'll put my hand in that area and there will be a swirling eddy that no fish could manage. If I move the driftwood over a bit, the eddy resolves and the driftwood is of use. There's a lot of trial and error, as I'm sure you know. Keep up the nice work!
Amanda

I'm going to remove all the drift wood and leave the tank free of plants. I was chatting to the feller from the local plec specialist, who had personally been collecting these fish, and he said that there was only sand, mud and stones in the areas he collected them from. (There may well be the odd bit of wood in the actual river, so for this reason the 1 piece may stay, especially as there are 3 baby L333's lodging in there who wont vacate )

As for tetras, I may go for penguin tetras (again, suggested by the chap from the LFS)

I've had a play around with the current and added some slate pieces to the tank today so some more pics to follow.

Tom

Im going to change the backing as well, as it is full of plants.

Yeah the background really detracts from the tank at the moment. I usually prefer the background to be a neutral or non at all.

I use brown felt to cover the back of my Discus tank, which looks really good. I may get some black for the River Tank and see how that looks.

Some more pic's, with the natural slate decorations/caves and gravel over the inlet box.







The inlets, after todays fiddling!

Wow, very nice

I wish I had a tank like that, because i absolutely love plecs but our house is rented and the biggest tank i can get is only like 2 ft.

pepper

You could still put a river system in a 2ft tank. It would be ideal for a few small hypancistrus plecs, such as L260.

Give it a try.

Tom

Also, does it say anything about the rest of the dimensions of the tank? You can get double the amount of surface/bottom area (both of which are important for most catfish) by having a two-by-two foot rather than two-by-one sized tank. [Yes, that's bending the rules, but if all they tell you is how big the max length on one side is, then that's their fault - they really should tell how big a volume the tank can be].

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Mats

Hey, thanks

Lol just gotta see if i can get one.
(Mums being a bit tight atm)
Only things that i've managed to breed in the past are some pepper corys never tried it with plecs. Well to tell you the truth i've never kept a plec before.

Clown plecs, and albino bristlenose caught my eye though.

Oh btw did you find a guide online on how to build that river tank? and if you did can you give me the link?

If you haven't got a lot of money, then it may not be EASY to get a "wider than normal tank", and a 2 x 2 footprint tank isn't going to be a "standard size", but there are companies that make different sized tanks, and it may not be MUCH more expensive to get a the bigger size tank.

As to building river tanks, if you do a forum search, you'll probably find about 3 different posts on how to do this. Bear in mind that a river-tank setup is going to cost a bit more than the average tank-setup, as you will probably want some extra pumps to move the water around, and extra pipework (although if you know what you're doing on the pipework front, you can probably get away with a tenner or two in parts and a few hours of "plumbing").

Best of luck, looking forward to photos.

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Mats

Hey,

Since my last post I set up a River Tank for my aunt.
I didn't really have difficulty sorting out the pipes and connecting them together.
Mum still won't let me get the tank yet, but if I do I'm sure it will be a Juwel Rekord 60 and try to follow the above proceedure but on a smaller scale

Anyway thanks for your help, and if I do manage to get a tank going I will definately post some pics

Post some pics of your Aunts tank!

If you do set up you own, do a step by step so others can give it a try.

Tom

lol ok but my aunts plec just died of white spot , stupid LFS musnt have quarantined But at least he had a good life for like 5 days (I would say he ate like a king/ or queen) Im going back to complain seeing as they said they quarantined them. Anyway my mums says yes to the tank but now my step dad and the landlord has to say yes in order for me to get a tank. Wish me luck Lol sorry if i havent made to much sense ive had a lil too much to drink

Very nice work! If that background came without the image of any plants and you used round river stones(like the ones in the pic) instead of the DIY caves it woul be a close representation of a biotope, notice how in some of the pics the plecos are hanging in the background.
Again, very nice work!