November Renovation Again

Since it's the end of November, perhaps it's time I get back into my favorite winter hobby. Because, what would Christmas be without reduced funds because I spent them all on rummy nose tetras?

I'm glad to be getting back into it, though I doubt I'll jump in with the gusto I did last year. (She says.) I'm a little frustrated with the 55, because all of the beautiful, tall plants were munched by the angelfish. Hilter is bad for aquascaping. I need to do a little research, or perhaps try some wisteria again or something. Anything. 

I did a medium prune. I decided it was time to take out that blasted riccia. Curse that stuff. It's messy and it clogged my siphon. I pulled out most of it. It was covering the tops of the lovely Ohio River driftwood I bought last year. The piece on the right is particularly lovely. So I pulled most of the riccia out, trimmed the crypts, and thinned out the scummy-looking anubias leaves. The tiger lotus had two pads removed too. There's also a melon sword (I think) that got a few snips. I left the scarfy-looking rotala, simply because the new angel, Bart, needs a place to hide from Hitler.

Along those lines, I've decided that, when Bart's quarantine is over, the marbled angel in the 29 will go into the 55. He's never grown, and I can find no explanation for why this may be. Except, possibly, that he's stunted. Yikes. So he can go in with the other 2. We'll see how it goes. That'll open up space for just a few more cardinals in the 29. I need more color.

I scraped algae, too, and scrubbed the heaters and cleaned the filter. Then I siphoned and vac'd. Damn riccia made it tough.

anubias, clean and tidy...ish

kempt crypt

tiger lotus haircut

Hitler, wary, with Bart in the background

All trimmed up.

The new betta has been named...wait for it....Nemo. Truly original. I personally like "Rusty", but Ben keeps asking for "Nemo". Sigh. 

Today I took out the riccia I'd transplanted from the 55. It's just asking for a mess. Instead I put in some java moss from the 29. I tested the water and got nothing. Good. And I put in a root tab amongst the dwarf hair grass. And a shot of Excel.

Then, since my hands were dried out and my fingertips pruny, I went down to the 29. It was a royal mess.

If anything, it's a delightful argument for the dirted tank/eco-complete. I haven't had CO2 or Excel in there for 6 months. Look at it. The crypt in the foreground is nuts, and the java ferns and java moss were so entangled that I had to go in with scissors and just start hacking.

hot mess

By the time I was done pruning both the 55 and the 29, I had an entire bucket of leaves. I always feel a little guilty throwing out perfectly good java moss, but what am I going to do with it? Seriously? If I start injecting CO2 again, which I intend to do, I'll have another green hairball on my hands in no time.

And here's how it ended up. I moved things around a bit, with the exception of the crypts, of course. Scraped more algae and did a siphon 'n vac. Didn't have the energy for a filter cleanup.

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A good day's work!