2 Gallon Hexagon

I cleaned up my hexagon tank just a bit. The bulb was changed from an incandescent to a compact fluorescent spiral. It's warm white 2700K, the plants love it, I see them pearling after a few hours into the photoperiod.

I got rid of the floating anacharis and put it in my fancy guppy breeding tank. I also trimmed the hygrophila difformis since it's starting to put out leaves in the submersed form, I originally got it with emersed foliage. The guppies get to have more space to swim in. The inhabitants are MTS snails and wildtype "feeder" guppies. I like these little guys, I hate how people overlook them and use them as feeders instead. They are really neat fish and inexpensive too. The colony in that tank seems to have its own population control, it never gets too crowded. They only have a couple of fry at a time, never over 5, and they occasionally eat their young. Also, by the time the surviving fry grow to adulthood, the older worn females fade away. The males seem to live a little longer than the females, but the same thing happens to them.

Over the one year that his tank has been set up, I have seen many color variations. Different colors and patterns pop up every few weeks. At the moment there seems to be a lot of males with a peacock eye on the upper part at the base of the tail. If you have an empty tank, give these guys a chance. I'm sure you'll fall for them just like I did a few years back. It's fun to watch a colony change over time and best of all you can also learn a little about genetics. You can sometimes even predict to precision what traits will show up next. Here's the tank:

Hygrophila difformis

Hygrophila difformia and duckweed. Also shown is my DIY CO2 diffuser.

Poecilia reticulata, male

Poecilia reticulata, male

Poecilia reticulata, male

Poecilia reticulata, males. Notice the males with the "peacock eye" on the upper left.

Thanks for reading.

10 Gallon Rescape

I had been thinking about changing a few things in my ten gallon for quite some time. Yesterday I decided to once and for all do something about it. The number one thing I had to take care of was to net out all the guppy juveniles I had in there, I realized that I didn't appreciate them as much as I used to. So they'll be going into their own tank and maybe in doing so my admiration for them won't diminish. I also trimmed all the dying leaves on the java fern which increased open space dramatically. I took out all the plants and the driftwood, sloped the gravel, and added some Vallisneria. It was very hard trying to get everything how I wanted it, the two main pieces of wood and the branches had to be tied together to make sure that they wouldn't move. Planting was probably the most difficult, considering that you can barely get both of your hands in the tank while making sure not to move anything already in place. I struggled trying to get the dwarf lily between the driftwood, the opening there is like 2" at most. After removing most of the plants, this is what was revealed:

I quite liked this, maybe if it was refined somehow it would make a great layout. Not for now though. Anyway, these are the pictures so far.

Before:

After:

Fauna: 7 Hemigrammus erythrozonus, 5 Hyphessobrycon herbertaxelrodi, 2 Otocinclus vittatus, and hundreds of Malaysian Trumpet snails

Flora: Ludwigia repens, Microsorum pteropus (2 varieties?), Vallisneria sp.?, Nymphaea sp. 'rubra', Taxiphyllum barbieri

I'm feeling a bit uneasy about the Ludwigia to the left, I might have to trim it shorter to give that area a more filled, bushy finish. And perhaps even add a few Rotala rotundifolia.
It looks much bigger in my opinion, less fish and more open space and the Vallisneria in the back gives the illusion that it is taller. I'm happy.
Shortly after finishing I noticed some courtship behavior amongst the Glowlight tetras. I've seen them do their dances before, but I'm yet to see any eggs. I'm thinking that what triggered it this time was the shade provided by the vals.

Hemigrammus erythrozonus

Hyphessobrycon herbertaxelrodi


Ludwigia repens

This is a work in progress, it might/will change as it grows. I'm open to suggestions so if you have something to say go ahead. Currently, I'm not sure whether to trim down the ludwigia to make it into a nice bushy foreground. I'm also still undecided whether I should add a bolivian ram as a centerpiece fish. I've had these fish in this tank before and they did quite well. I should give them a try. Thanks for reading and thank you Karen for the vals.