SA Themed Riparium

[rr16]

Interesting read and nice tank. If you have hatchets in there, I assume the gap from the surface, to the top of the tank is quite high. Have you considered keeping splash tetras, Copella arnoldi? I have a 5 foot setup which is a riparium of sorts I guess and they spawn in here from time to time - it's great to watch them jumping out onto leaves!
Also, have you considered Echinodorus as a genus to try? I've found that one of my random Echinodorus that was barely growing submerged is now growing amazingly once it uprooted and got caught on oak branches about 3-4 inches below the water level. It is now taking over my tank with leaves that are pushing against the lid which is more than 12 inches above the water level (the leaves are around 7-8 inches by 3 inches wide and a new one grows around every 3 days at the moment. I've also found Hydrocotyle leucocephala to be a great space filler too (although it needs trimming around every 3-4 days as it goes crazy - but humidity in mine is very high as it has a lid).

 

[themountain]

Hydrocotyles are very nice ...they grow in the water and outside...I got one specie here out of a ditch and it does very well in the aquarium and on my Kokedamas

 

[Mol_PMB]

Hydrocotyle leucocephala makes a good spawning site for my Dicrossus, and a feeding point for my Farlowella fry

 

[rr16]

Hydrocotyle leucocephala makes a good spawning site for my Dicrossus, and a feeding point for my Farlowella fry

Yes, I've had Copella arnoldi and Copella compta both spawn on the leaves, with various pencil fish spawning on the stems/roots.

 

[skoram]

Here are some new pics of the tank and my new pair of Ivanacara adoketa. So far they seem be healthy and are eating well, especially when I feed them frozen bloodworms. They are almost as voracious as my SA puffer. I have my fingers crossed that they have bonded. It's been about 10 days and I have witnessed almost no aggression between them and I think I have seen some signs of courtship behavior. In fact, when photographing the female last night, her belly seemed to be bulging near the anus and I suspected that she might be gravid (see photos below), though in truth I have almost no idea when it comes to I. adoketa. Just before I went to bed she was spending a lot of time in a clay pot and seemed to be trying to lure the male inside with her. Of course, this could be just my imaginative wishful thinking.

full tank shot:

close-up of plants:

male and female together:

male flaring slightly:

some shots of the female. notice the bulge near her anus:

 

[skoram]

Interesting read and nice tank. If you have hatchets in there, I assume the gap from the surface, to the top of the tank is quite high. Have you considered keeping splash tetras, Copella arnoldi? I have a 5 foot setup which is a riparium of sorts I guess and they spawn in here from time to time - it's great to watch them jumping out onto leaves!
Also, have you considered Echinodorus as a genus to try? I've found that one of my random Echinodorus that was barely growing submerged is now growing amazingly once it uprooted and got caught on oak branches about 3-4 inches below the water level. It is now taking over my tank with leaves that are pushing against the lid which is more than 12 inches above the water level (the leaves are around 7-8 inches by 3 inches wide and a new one grows around every 3 days at the moment. I've also found Hydrocotyle leucocephala to be a great space filler too (although it needs trimming around every 3-4 days as it goes crazy - but humidity in mine is very high as it has a lid).

rr16 - the gap from the water level to the top of the tank is about 20 cm (about 8 inches). I know that they are capable of jumping higher than that but have heard that rarely jump higher than just a few inches in home aquaria. I am praying that this is true. Your biotope thread is one of my favorites on this board. I love the wild and natural feel of your tank - it really looks like a slice of a blackwater stream. Ironically, when I saw the information you posted about your splash tetras a few months back, I searched local shops to see if any place sold them. Unfortunately I was only able to find one place where they are sold but did not have them in stock. They are definitely on my future purchase list. By the way, do they pose any potential threat to cichlid fry?

Hydrocotyles are very nice ...they grow in the water and outside...I got one specie here out of a ditch and it does very well in the aquarium and on my Kokedamas

Hydrocotyle leucocephala is one of my absolute favorite aquatic plants. I plan to add some floating stems to this riparium once it grows out some more in my other tank.

 

[dw1305]

Hi all,

Thank you all for the kind comments. I added a pair of Ivanacara adoketa last week and they seem to be doing really well. I think I got lucky and received a bonded pair as they generally stick close to one another and I've observed no aggression thus far. I will upload new photos with the adoketa soon.

The tank looks great. I've never seen a real life Ivanacara adoketa, but I hope they spawn for you.

Darrel - I finally got around to reading the article you wrote on oxygenation. What a fascinating and insightful read. I am amazed that it was written by a botanist and not by an icthyology professor.

I think, in a strange way, that not having kept fish for a while helped. Because I hadn't been an aquarist for ~20 years, and I hadn't kept up with the literature, I came to the subject with no "baggage" or pre-conceptions of what I was "meant" to think.

I knew a little about dissolved oxygen and its importance in <"biotic indices"> for <"water pollution"> and I just regarded the rheophilic fish as if they were larger May Fly (Ephemeroptera) or Stone Fly (Plecoptera) nymphs. Then I applied what we'd found out about <"phytoremediation of landfill leachate"> to maintaining water quality in much less polluted water.

The whole rationale was develop simple, cheap, stable and resilient filtration systems that didn't have a single point of failure, or require continual micro-management by the fish keeper.

This is probably going to sound a little strange in the present company, but it received a very mixed response in certain quarters, and even ~10 years after I wrote the article, I still get a trickle of what can only be described as "hate mail".

cheers Darrel

 

[skoram]

Hi all, The tank looks great. I've never seen a real life Ivanacara adoketa, but I hope they spawn for you.

Thank you Darrel. I can tell by their colors and appetite that the fish are healthy, but unfortunately I was mistaken about them being ready to breed. 10 days post-purchase seemed too good to be true, and it was It's likely that they need a good deal more time to become a "couple" and I will probably also need to drop the pH down more from 6.8, where it is currently at.

I think, in a strange way, that not having kept fish for a while helped. Because I hadn't been an aquarist for ~20 years, and I hadn't kept up with the literature, I came to the subject with no "baggage" or pre-conceptions of what I was "meant" to think.

Pre-established assumptions and notions are often the biggest enemies of innovation.

This is probably going to sound a little strange in the present company, but it received a very mixed response in certain quarters, and even ~10 years after I wrote the article, I still get a trickle of what can only be described as "hate mail".

When people have been exposed to something for so long they often mistake it for truth, and anyone who claims otherwise is accused of propagating misinformation. If it makes you feel any better, I pasted your article into a document file and uploaded it to my Google Drive, where it is stored with other valuable information I do not want to lose

 

[skoram]

Darrel - just out of curiosity do you have any special knowledge or expertise with regards to Maranta leuconeura (erythroneura)? I've noticed that some of the new leaves have very pale coloration, identical to what is happening in the photo below:

I've concluded that this is most likely due to a change in lighting (about a month ago I switched from cheap, Chinese made PAR38 "reef" bulbs to top of the line Bridgelux Vero 18 LEDs) but some sites say that the leaves will lose color if they receive too much light, while others say this will happen if they receive too little. The Vero LEDs I am using now are much, much brighter than the bulbs I used previously but I have them running at only 33% intensity. The previous bulbs also had some blue LEDs (460~465nm) mixed in with the cool whites. The prayer plant thrived under those lights, putting up new flowers almost every day. I'd hate to think I upgraded the lights tremendously only to have the plants (well, only the prayer plant) do worse.

 

[dw1305]

Hi all,

Darrel - just out of curiosity do you have any special knowledge or expertise with regards to Maranta leuconeura (erythroneura)?

I've concluded that this is most likely due to a change in lighting (about a month ago I switched from cheap, Chinese made PAR38 "reef" bulbs to top of the line Bridgelux Vero 18 LEDs) but some sites say that the leaves will lose color if they receive too much light, while others say this will happen if they receive too little.

Bizarrely it could be either too little <"PAR">, or too much. First thing is that your Maranta leuconuera var erythroneura (syn "Tricolor") looks fine, and the leaf will darken a bit as it matures.

It is almost certainly is to do with the changes in light colour and intensity. The dark and red leaf colours are formed from <"anthocyanins"> etc. It may be the changes in PAR and light wave length have failed to initiate their formation (they often act as "natural sunscreens").

Usually if plants are receiving PAR below the <"light compensation point">, they become pale and drawn (<"etiolated">), your plant doesn't look like this at the moment. If subsequent leaves are smaller and paler, and older leaves are shed, low light would look to be the most likely cause.

<"Chlorophyll"> is quite expensive for the plant to manufacture (it contains a lot of protein), so if there is more PAR in the red and blue wavelengths then the plant will manufacture less chlorophyll and appear less green.

cheers Darrel

 

[skoram]

Thank you for the extremely helpful explanation Darrel. There were some new leaves not shown in the photos above that were very pale, pretty much identical to the photo I linked in my last post.

Without a PAR meter it is hard to make a definitive conclusion, but simple math dictates that the plant is probably receiving less light than it was before. My previous bulbs used 36 watts (8 X 6500K 3W LEDs + 4 X 465nm 3W LEDs) and were not dimmed at all. They were advertised by the seller as 2,200 lumens, although I know for plants this is an almost meaningless measurement (and the seller's information is also probably inaccurate). I then switched to 30W Bridgelux Vero 18 COB which are advertised at 4,500 lumens. At full PWM duty cycle (intensity) they were almost blinding. Even at 50%, they seemed very bright, and definitely brighter than my previous bulbs. In the end I lowered them down to about 30% intensity (80 out of 255 brightness) which accordingly used about 10W per bulb. This seemed to be "on par" (no pun intended) with my previous bulbs, so I left the LEDs at this level until 2 days ago when I doubled the brightness to 160 out of 255. I will leave the LEDs at this setting for a while and see how the plants respond.

 

[skoram]

I took this photo of a new Maranta leaf yesterday:

It was partially shaded beneath some taller leaves and thus not easily visible upon cursory inspection. There were other leaves like it earlier which I trimmed off. Granted, the Maranta seems to have regained some of its coloring since I doubled the light intensity so hopefully this is the last leaf of its kind.

Thankfully, the other plants are still doing quite well, as are the fish:

remnants of the previous night's bloodworm dinner:

 

[rr16]

Yes, I've had Copella arnoldi and Copella compta both spawn on the leaves, with various pencil fish spawning on the stems/roots.

The angelfish have also moved their fry onto Hydrocotyle leaves now!

 

[skoram]

The angelfish have also moved their fry onto Hydrocotyle leaves now!

RR - the angelfish moved their fry (wrigglers, I assume?) onto emersed Hydrocotyle leaves?

I am planning to put a large section of H. leucocephala in the back left area of my tank to partially cover up the tubes from the water pump. I'm thinking to use some kind of foam as a <trellis raft> to fix its location but I'm not sure what kind of foam would be safe and appropriate.

 

[rr16]

They moved them onto immersed leaves. I have rooted plants to pieces of bogwood that refuse to sink. How about that, or some cork bark? Have also rooted stuff to immersed root-like oak branches. All the Hydrocotyle needs is bottom of stem in the water and something to grow along or over - could be plants, glass shelf, bamboo support canes etc

 

[skoram]

3 months later, here is what the tank looks like now (got a new iPhone 6S Plus so photo quality is also much better )

male and female Ivanacara adoketa:

male only:

female only:

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