U.S. Native Stream Tank with DIY 3D Background & DIY Roots

[jjohnwm]

Still one of my favourite tanks on here.

 

[xenacanth9]

Same here

 

[Chasmodes]

Thank you so much John and xenacanth9!

 

[Chasmodes]

It's been a couple months since my last update. After I went and returned from a vacation, my tank was overrun with cyanobacteria and other algae. My stonerollers were fat and happy though, but, the tank was ugly, so I broke it down for the most part and gave it a major cleaning. The canister filter was clogged and barely putting out any current, so I had to do something. Man, that blackbeard algae is tough to scrub off. It has little holdfasts that are tough. I tried several brushes until I found one that worked to remove it from the rocks, even after I gave the rocks a hydrogen peroxide bath for a couple days. I also soaked my plants in a hydrogen peroxide solution and that seemed to kill off all of the cyano and algae, and was able to rinse almost all of it off. Anyway, I explain more in detail in the video. Also, check out my fancy fish room updates.

 

[latapy10]

Here's a video of the new fish in my stream tank, now that they're acclimated. They're all so bold, not afraid of me when I clean the tank. They even try to eat the hairs on my arm when I clean algae off of the glass. In this video, I feed them blackworms using a turkey baster. I fed the minnows and dace flakes first, so they wouldn't pig out on the worms. Some of the fish are starting to color up more as well. I had 24 minutes of video clips at first, so I had to trim off 14 minutes of it to keep it from being too long. It was tough cutting out some of the scenes for me. Heck, I stayed up way too late last night watching these fish as it was. I'm so addicted to this tank. I hope you enjoy this video as much as I did making it.

I have a build thread in the DIY section if you'd like to see how this tank was done.

The species in the tank are as follows:
Darters:
Rainbow Darter (Etheostoma caeruleum)
Fantail Darter (Etheostoma flabellare)
Greenside Darter (Etheostoma blennioides)

Minnows, Shiners and Dace:
Eastern Blacknosed Dace (Rhinichthys atratulus)
Spottail Shiner (Notropis hudsonius))
Silverjaw Minnow (Notropis buccatus)
Longnose Dace (Rhinichthys cataractae)

I would add some species of sculpin.But very wonderful tank...Coldwater biotope tanks are my favourite tanks.

 

[Chasmodes]

I would add some species of sculpin.But very wonderful tank...

Thanks Latapy. I catch them regularly and agree that they are really cool, along with madtoms. But, both of those types of fish would eat my darters. If I have to choose, I'm a darter fan first. I'd say the rainbow darters were to be my showcase fish initially, but now, I love all of the darters...and the rest of the fish too LOL.

 

[latapy10]

Thanks Latapy. I catch them regularly and agree that they are really cool, along with madtoms. But, both of those types of fish would eat my darters. If I have to choose, I'm a darter fan first. I'd say the rainbow darters were to be my showcase fish initially, but now, I love all of the darters...and the rest of the fish too LOL.

So european sculpins are quite peacefull fishes.Maybe in North America are more carnivore sculpins...

 

[The Masked Shadow]

Darters are such cool fish!

 

[Chasmodes]

So european sculpins are quite peacefull fishes.Maybe in North America are more carnivore sculpins...

Yeah, North American sculpins will eat anything that will fit into their mouths, often fish the same size as them.

I have another video update showing more of my fish room and the beginnings of the reality of my new and improved much larger oyster reef tank project. I made a couple minor scaping changes in the tank, for the better, one that I mention in the video. Can you see the other changes? Maybe the "Eye Spy" approach will generate some conversation. I'll reveal the answer in my next video update. I always loved when I was a kid, going to the Doctor's Office and reading the kids magazine, "Highlights", especially the picture find page. I guess this can be a fish tank version of that. I hope you like the video.

 

[latapy10]

I went fish collecting a couple weeks ago, and the fish that I collected went into QT for 2 weeks. I treated them with salt for the full period, and during the last 3 days, one dose of Prazipro. All of the minnows, shiners and dace collected survived QT OK and were added to the display tank yesterday.

I also collected 4 tessellated darters. One jumped out of the tank, one disappeared and I couldn't find it, and one died early on. The last one died the day before he was slated to go into the display tank, and was eating and apparently happy up until then. So, I'm bummed about that. I added 4 satinfin shiners, 3 blacknosed dace, and a bunch of bluntnose minnows to the tank. I also fished a local small stream for smallmouth bass on Sunday, and brought home some plants and snails. I collected wild Valisneria and water stargrass, and added those to my tank. I "cleaned" the plants with a mild hydrogen peroxide/water bath for 20 minutes. The snails just went into the tank,so I hope that I didn't introduce any villainous hitchhikers with them.

I found 2 species of snail, one very common one that looks like a pond snail. It seemed like if you looked at one section of chunk rock, you'd see over a hundred of those snails. The last time that I added snails like those, the darters in my tank hunted down and ate every single snail. This time, they seem to be ignoring the snails altogether. I also added a bunch of ramshorn snails. Maybe the darters will leave those alone because they are a bigger snail.

I got the snails to help with algae control and maybe as an additional food source for the darters. My stoneroller has done a nice job of keeping the tank pretty tidy, and he's getting big. I know he eats a lot of algae because I see him grazing often, and he poops out algae all the time. And, the plants that I had in there took off and I think that has had a huge influence.

I have a green sunfish in the tank as well, but his days are numbered in my tank. He's growing quickly, and seems to be starting to take interest in the minnows, and not in a kind way. It's almost a feeding response. In the past, since I got him, he merely chased fish away from his staked territory. Now, he has that evil eye toward the smaller minnows, dace and shiners. I will donate him to the local aquarium or give him away.

Anyway, below is my video tank update. Enjoy.

Fish collecting is for me most interesting thing in coldwater native aquaristic hobby....