New Plants

Here is a list of the plants we recently bought.

Glossostigma elatinoides - Good foreground plant that will spread and form a carpet when it has the correct light conditions.

Hydrocotyle verticillata - Foreground plant that will spread.

Cryptocoryne beckettii "petchii" - Beautiful green leaves with a reddish stem, ideal for growing in middle to the back of the tank.

Tank Pictures

A few pictures of the tank

 General look and feel, including the new Penguin Tetras

Penguin Tetra swimming next to the new Cryptocoryne wendti shoot

New Plants

After having to remove some plants that were past their prime, L and I went to the shop to buy some replacement plants.

Enchinodorus red flame - This is an ideal plant to be used in the background of the tank. Has lovely reddish / brown leaves.

Anubias Heterophylla - This plant is also ideal for the background, but as it is a slow growing plant that likes shade, I will be positioning it more in the middle of the tank until such time that it becomes too big.

Nursery Plant

A good plant to rear young fish, especially those from a live bearer is Bacopa australis. We have noticed that most of the very small babies live amongst the leaves and stems of the plant and survive long enough to become a size that will make it more difficult to be eaten. Because the survival rate is so high, this will lead to the tank becoming more populate at a higher rate.

Tank Update

The new plants I planted last week are settling in ok and the fish are enjoying the change of scenery. The Cryptocoryne wendtii is already sending up new leaves from the gravel. Four of the five plants were planted on the left hand side of the tank and the fifth on the right.

The new tank layout

New plants on the left

The pictures below were taken by my best man who was visiting this weekend. He is used to taking photos of objects that only move when they tick and thought he would give live moving objects ago. You can check out his ticking objects here. Thanks for the great photos!

Two mollies

Siamese Fighter and Molly

Posing Siamese Fighter

New Plants

I decided to get some new plants to replace the Cabomba as the fish were slowly pulling them apart. As I was having trouble finding the plants I wanted at the pet shops, I decided to use a Internet site recommended in a tropical fish magazine I have been reading. So I ordered 5 plants from them last Saturday and they arrived on Wednesday. They came in bags that were very moist inside. These bags were packaged in a box. I was only able to get around to planting them on Thursday night, so I kept them in a bucket of water.

There are the plants I bought:

Cryptocoryne wendtii 'Mi Oya' - An easy plant to grow and one of the most robust Crypts. Very variable under different light and other environmental conditions.

Bacopa australis - Easy to grow in an aquarium. Under certain conditions it creeps across the bottom to form an elegantly decorative light green cushion.

Staurogyne sp. - This is a new plant to the aquatic hobby. It is a hardy plant for the foreground of the aquarium.

Baby Java Ferns

When I bought my Java fern (Microsorium pteropus) and tied it to the bogwood, it looked like the picture below.

After a couple of weeks on the bogwood, some of the leaves now have little plants growing on them, see picture below. This is how the Java fern reproduces. Once the new plants have developed roots, they will break away from the mother leaf and float around in the aquarium until they find something to which they will attach. I am hoping to put a few of the new ferns into some holes in the bogwood so that they can grow from there.

More Flora

I have bought some more plants to fill the gaps of the plants I have lost. I decided to get plants to try and hide the box that stores the filter, heater and pump in, and to get some plants that will be low growers.

Vallisneria gigantea (Giant Vallis) - The long, fleshy leaves of this Vallisneria may reach up to a metre in length and will trail across the surface. Ideal for hiding boxes or equipment. Best grown at the back of the tank. As the leaves will trail across the surface, it can block out the light to lower growning plants, so it will have to trimmed to size.

Cryptocoryne petchii - This crypt is ideal for the foreground of the aquarium where it will spread via daughter shoots borne on runners.

Real Aquatic Plants

Out of the 7 plants species that I have bought so far, 3 are real aquatic plants. These should help the fish feel more at home than the non aquatic plants ones.

Echinodorus bleheri (Broad-leaf Amazon Sword) - This is an ideal plant to be used in the background of the tank. It is a slow grower, but when it is established it will be tall and wide and can fill a large portion of the tank. When I removed the plant from the plastic plant container, I discovered that there was a baby Amazon Sword growing next to the large adult. So I have ended up with 2 plants for the price of one, which makes up a bit for the non aquatic plants. I have planted both at the back of the tank, behind the bogwood, with the baby plant close to the adult one. I will relocate the baby one to a different location once it is bigger. 

Cabomba aquatica (Green Cabomba, Giant Cabomba) - Tall growing plant, great place for fry to hide in so that they do not get eaten by any adult fish. I have planted 3 of these close together to form a nice area for fish to hide in.

Microsorium pteropus (Java fern) - This plant is different from most aquatic plants as it can grow on rocks and bogwood. I have tied mine to the V area of my bogwood using cotton thread and hope it will form a nice centre piece.

Flora Planted

Just a quick update. During the course of this week I have acquired some plants, which have now been planted. I will post more about each one later on.

Still looking a bit sparse so will be popping into the local fish shop to acquire a few more. Of course once they start growing the tank will fill up a bit more. 

The tank is still a bit cloudy, but each day it has been improving, so it appears the filtering is working.