Puddle's old aquariums

Post your previous aquariums and fish here.
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Martinspuddle
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Unfortunately, due to my darling ex-wife (...God rest her sole, she OD in 2019) destroying a load of my photography, I have very little to show pre 2007. :mad:

Anyway while running 150 gallon Reef aquarium and 110 litre nano Reef tank, I started to dabble in planted aquariums. I grown plants before but with little or no success.
I also had a 36 x 12 x 15 livebearer tank for my step-kids at the time and was running an old Algarde undergravel filter, a Maxijet 600 powerhead, UNO 200 Watt heater thermostat and one T8 Glowlux tube with plastic plants. This was one of easiest aquarium I ever maintained but again unfortunately no pictures of that tank exist anymore.

So you may worked out with a pond, two quarantine tanks, nano Shrimp tank, two Reefs and two freshwater aquariums, I have to admit this was probably the reason for the divorce! :grin:

Links:
Martinsreef
Martin's old pond

29 gallon Clearseal Aquarium 2008 - 2009:

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Pick this aquarium for free, it was been chucked out by a neighbour. The Amazon Swords over grow the tank as did the Cabomba very quickly. Fish, a few Guppy fry that I was given. Substrate was pond peat with ordinary aquarium gravel capping it and I was using home made fertilizer I found online and home brew CO2 using two 2 litre Coke bottles with sugar, yeast, water mixture at this stage.

...well that's what I called it, others called it bomb making equipment! 🤣

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Replanted and removed the Guppies.

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Removed the Fluval internal filter for a Fluval 204 canister filter. I added some Pogostemon helferi in the foreground and Hygrophila polysperma / Rosanervig mid ground.

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Couple of months later... The Hygrophila polysperma grow at a phenomenal rate and I was cutting back weekly.

Sorry but none of the previous images enlarge - Must find the original Nikon RAW picture files.

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Start of 2010, divorce, sold reefs, other aquariums and moved into a small rented bachelor pad.

Despite a large sign out the front the house saying 'Single stud, females apply within' ...I had no takers, can't think why? :dodgy2:

Below the same Clearseal aquarium I took with me to my new pad.

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Akadama bonsai soil substrate, home brew CO2 with an inline feed on the Fluval 204 and plants a mix of Cryptocorynes added.

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As you can see from the Vallisneria, I wasn't having great success with this plant. I now know there just wasn't enough nutrients in the substrate.
You can it was still on a budget, no hood, T8 lights and I was testing the CO2 by using a daily liquid test. Unfortunately I don't seem to have any further growth pictures of this aquarium.
WARNING - DO NOT BREED, FEED OR PET THE PUDDLE! :dodgy2:
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Martinspuddle
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The Juwel RIO 180.

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After the Clearseal aquarium, I upgraded to a shiny new Juwel Rio 180.

Substrate was Tropica Aquarium Soil, more Cryptcorynes Wentii green, brown, Petchii and some Lilaeopsis brasiliensis.

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Also I rehomed some Blue Platies, a piece of secondhand bogwood complete with hitchikers ...Left side on the glass. :dodgy2:

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Two months later with daily dosing of Easy Life PROFITO and Easy Life EasyCarbo. I had added some Echinodorus harbii but they didn't fire very well.

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Around this time I added some more Cherry Shrimp and also a group Emperor Tetras to help control the Platy population. These great and did well at controlling the livebearer fry until I noticed my Neocaridina Shrimp population was going down hill fast, so they where rehomed into a friends aquarium.

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A year later, I've added some Rotala rotundifolia and replaced the Echinodorus harbii for Echinodorus Bleheri. The Platies where rehomed by this point and Cherry Barbs, Harlequins and Pristella Tetras added.
Around this time I added a CO2 with regulator solenoid fed into the back of the Juwel Bio filter.

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You ever get chance to find this fish, Pretty Tetra (Hemigrammus pulcher) is a beautiful fish when fully grown, golden sides, black with red eye make for an impressive shoal.
WARNING - DO NOT BREED, FEED OR PET THE PUDDLE! :dodgy2:
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fr499y
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Some lovely tanks there 😁
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fluxtor
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Stunning! And a nice journey :)

Love you're planting, this is where I want to be at some point!
Novice
67ltr Nano Tank
Koi Keeper
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plankton
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Nice tanks Martin. :D
If at first you don't succeed....
...get someone else to do it! :D

Enjoy your fish, shrimps and snails!
Ian
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Martinspuddle
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Juwel Rio 240

After a couple of years of Rio 180 my friend Mike told he was down sizing his high tech tank for a Juwel 60 aquarium. I purchased a Juwel 240 cabinet and Mike gave his Juwel 240 to me and I brought the Arcadia T5 quad Pendant from him.

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I used the same Tropia substrate as in my Rio 180 and ordered some manzanita wood from The Green Machine in Wrexham. The setup was filtered with TetraTec 1200 filter (🤬 horrible filter, I hated it!) I used estimated index fertilizer daily dosing and added some Lamb Chop Rasboras. CO2 was done using Easy Life EasyCarbo dosed every day as my gas bottle had run out. Later on I used 'Bar' CO2 gas I manage to acquire from a local drinks suppler. Plant growth was phenomenal and soon I had to strip it all down and sell on some plants, others that didn't ended up on the compost.

New fish added including six mixed button Angelfish. :dodgy2: I must of been a sucker, knowing full well from breeding them in the 1990's how much of a pain in the 🤬 arse they could be.

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Next image was after a rescape in an attempt to stop squabbling Angels, not that it worked very well. By the end of 2013 I was left with a breeding pair, having moved on the other Angels. This pair I had left were a breeding nuisance. On left side would be Angels with eggs or fry and the right everyone else!

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Middle of 2014 I sold the breeding pair of Angelfish and replaced them with four Opaline gouramis plus a group of Golden Barbs. To be totally honest Pterophyllum scalare are not good community aquarium fish, great when their small, bloody nuisance as adults. Every time the Angels would breed, a few months later the tank would be overstocked because the surviving fry, causing algae issues. Also I got fed up with keep having to rehoming these fish. Don't think I'll ever keep them again ...they are worse than livebearers!

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Give an Idea of plant growth, this is one Java fern in the middle of the aquarium.

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I was forever removing Java fern babies form the ends of the leaves.

2015, I sold the everything and regretted doing so.
WARNING - DO NOT BREED, FEED OR PET THE PUDDLE! :dodgy2:
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Staffylover
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Some nice tanks :happy:
Wish I had kept more pictures of old set ups it's nice to look back sometimes, I do keep a log of fishies in a notepad, when I buy them and have recently started adding dates if I start or rescape a tank, then the back of it I use if I am researching for a new set up or possible new fish, probably shouldn't admit to that, sounds a bit nerdy :laugh:
500l - Africa river - https://www.aquariumforums.co.uk/viewtopic.php?t=6873
2x200l - https://www.aquariumforums.co.uk/viewtopic.php?t=7790
Others - https://www.aquariumforums.co.uk/viewto ... =15&t=7411
(230L 6ft - Shallow stream, plus many small tanks for wild type livebearers)
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Martinspuddle
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Staffylover wrote: Fri Jan 05, 2024 19:20 pm Some nice tanks :happy:
Wish I had kept more pictures of old set ups it's nice to look back sometimes, I do keep a log of fishies in a notepad, when I buy them and have recently started adding dates if I start or rescape a tank, then the back of it I use if I am researching for a new set up or possible new fish, probably shouldn't admit to that, sounds a bit nerdy :laugh:
I do on the PC with a spreadsheet.

Occasionally I look back but then think I'd wished I kept some setups. :[
WARNING - DO NOT BREED, FEED OR PET THE PUDDLE! :dodgy2:
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