Been gone a YEAR???

I had no idea it had been that long since posting! I suppose things have remained stable and I have not done anything noteworthy with my tanks in that time, which is pretty unusual for me (very unusual!). Typically, I get bored and change up my tanks from time to time, re-scaping them, changing from one species to another due to conflicts or growth of the fish. Also, sadly, my tanks tend to experience disasters from time to time and that prompts a new incarnation. 

That's why I'm sort of NOT sorry that I haven't posted - A YEAR WITHOUT A TANK DISASTER? That's amazing! Also, not wishing to do something different for an entire year is an accomplishment for me; this is an example of patience on my part that I typically do not possess. 

Sooooo, I will post two videos, the usual, one of my 150-gallon SA angel/geophagus tank, and the other my 125-gallon SE Asian loach/gourami/denison barb tank. When comparing them to last year they're not much different, yet they are. Fish and plants are bigger, and the mood of each tank is settled, stable and content. My tanks have become like a cherished piece of art:  it looks good today and will continue to look good long into the future without any changes required. Ultimately, art is what I strive for in my aquarium setups. I'm not particularly interested in breeding my fish, I just want a pretty setup that is relaxing and fun to watch, laid out in a way that is pleasing to the eye, and that may actually look somewhat natural, though my tanks are far from natural. 

That said, one thing I have been dealing with in the 150 is algae on the Anubias. Mostly the algae is the brown diatom type, but there is also some black hard spot algae that cannot be scraped off, and is more frustrating. Also, I have some Anubias growing on the background at the bottom in the center, which is not possible for me to reach to brush off the offending brown coating. 

I know that plants need light and nutrients in balance to do well, and algae does, too. Algae species can usually thrive more easily than many higher order plants, availing themselves to the nutrients before the plants can. So, I have tried cutting back on the already low light, with two 36w CF bulbs lit instead of four, dosing with liquid ferts a couple of times a week, and continuing my 50% weekly water changes. I even cut back on those while the PO3 (phosphate) in the tap water was running quite high. This level has come down lately but through all of this the algae seems to be thriving. I lengthened the photoperiod, shortened it, slipped a "siesta" in the middle of the photoperiod, etc., and nothing changed. 

I have plenty of fish in this tank - plenty - so there ought to be enough CO2 for the plants from the fish, but I decided to try injecting CO2 and see if that alone made any difference in how the plants grew and whether the algae problem improved. 

I dusted off my 5# CO2 tank and had it filled at the local oxygen supply house, attached my regulator with attached solenoid, and dug out my old diffuser, which is a thick plastic tube that has a little Rio water pump attached at the top, and is open on the bottom, suctioning to the inside of the tank, so the bubbles get tossed around inside there for a good long while before getting into the water column, and improving efficiency of delivery of CO2. 

My pH controller (Milwaukee) needs a new probe, since it has been a couple of years since I've used it, and when I went to calibrate it, the probe seemed a bit unpredictable. I fired up the regulator and solenoid, however, and they are working great, so I will be able to control the CO2 by monitoring pH, and being sure there is not a sudden drop in pH that would harm the fish. With a KH of 5 in the tank and a pH of about 7.4 I will need to drop the pH to about 6.8 or 7 to get into a good CO2 level, I think. 

I'll keep the blog posted!