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A bit of a late night planting frenzy!! The new tanks needed some colour so decided to get out some tissue culture plants and do some work! For the four 30cm cubes I used the following: 2 x Cups of Monte Carlo 1 x Cup of Crypt lutea 1 x Cup of Crypt lucens 1 x Cup of Bacopa monnieri 2 x Cups of Bacopa carolininia 1 x Cup of Alternanthera reineckii mini 2 x Cups of Rotala colorata 2 x Cups of Green Pennywort Full list of available plants and details can be found here: http://newbreedaquatics.com.au/planted-tanks/plants These tanks will be used for guppy strains (maybe shrimp later on!) and I want them heavily planted. Below are just some step by step images of how to use your tissue culture plants, for those of you who haven't used them before. Step 1. Select the plants you wish to use. Determine layout based on plant growth habits and how you want it to look. Step 2. Break the hermetic seal by opening the lid of your plants. Some may take a bit more work than others. Step 3. Remove all excess gel from plant roots. I used a bucket of tank water and swished them about vigorously. Some plants will come away from the gel easily, some need some more effort. Step 4. Separate your plants into planting group sizes. I prefer to plant smaller amounts per lot, spreading them over a larger area. At this stage, I also trim the roots of any plants that have really long roots. It makes them easier to plant in. Step 5. Using fine tooth tweezers (bent) hold plants by roots and push into soil until covered. Step 6. You may need to push some soil back onto roots for a neater finish. Step 7. Repeat steps 2-6 until all planting is done. Below are the four cubes. All tanks have same filtration, heaters and Shirakura Red Bee Sand substrate. The shirakura is a shrimp substrate, not a plant substrate, I wanted to test how these plants will fair in a shrimp friendly environment. Only the lights are different, so will be interesting to see how they develop. Hope this has been helpful!! ??

Ok guys this is a fun one and its tough I cant even find it yet. This is open to everyone except Myself and the other Admins. Every member gets one guess and every subscribing member gets 2 guesses. You must circle the shrimplet and post the pic up as a comment here. First one with the shrimplet picked and posted is the winner. This comp is sponsored by @Kitz from Awquakitz. you can find the website here https://aquakitz.com/ Make sure you visit and support the businesses that support us. The Prize is the below Ebita Pack. Ok below is the picture with a shrimplet in it. Good luck.

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You'd be banned on any other forum for saying stuff like that ? But here on SKF, it seems totally acceptable to talk about your bosses crack and mineral balls.

That little kid is great in the Jeep ad -what father wouldn't want their little son to say that!!! Jeep must have got it from us! we were sprouting that years back!!!! Oz yes get the bubbles out where possible. I'm cycling a tank at the moment and transferred some moss into it. There must have been some little shrimp on the moss or driftwood as there are at least 2 shrimp in there and the ammonia is 2!!! They seem fine and as the tank is big I don't really want to try and catch them-I would have to take all the plants out -so hopefully they survive the cycle process!!! That's tank number 14 now -I didn't like the uneven number!

Hi SKFers Just a headsup. yes these aquael unbreakable heaters DO look great and its wonderful they're not made of glass but of plastic instead. i decided to be a guineapig without muxh info out there on the net about their reliability or otherwise.. and so I've got them for most of my tanks. So they've all been running for an average duration of 3-5months i suppose. and now unfortunately I've had two fail recently with the same symptom :-( The power seems to constantly come off and on - (the led indicator keeps flashing) and the heater fails to actually heat the tank at all.. They haven't had to work very hard as my house stays very warm. I am disappointed!! i am sorry @newbreed -edit- oops i meant @neo2fx !! i did not spot the second failed aquael heater until tonight (this one was in the cull tank, issue could well have been going on for some time..) Anyway think I'll be avoiding this one from now on and stick with good ole fluval and eheim. I'm glad its spring now i can probably turn off the heaters soonish anyway and replace them in half a years time (i mostly keep cherries) I'd love to know if anyone else has much experience with these??? love n peace will

So I had the opportunity Friday to setup some new 30cm cubes, which will be used for guppies (maybe shrimp later on!) I then decided it would be great to run a side by side comparison of the lights we sell online. All tanks have same heaters, filters and substrate (shirakura red bee sand). Left to Right: Aqualighter Nano Aqualighter Pico Up Aqua Y series 18cm ATLEDTiS E6 Left to Right: Flexi Mini Aqualighter Nano Up Aqua Y series 18cm ATLEDTiS E6 Left to Right: Flexi Mini Up Aqua ProZ 30cm Up Aqua Y series 18cm Up Aqua Y seties 25cm Left to Right: Flexi Mini Up Aqua ProZ 30cm Aqualighter Nano ATLEDTiS E6 Very surprised by the blue content in the Y series lights, though these still work well wih mosses and low light plants. Really Pleased with the ATLEDTiS E6 as it probably hd the most natural colour. I knew the Flexi minis were bright, and this is the original version, but when directly compared it outshines all. The ProZ has a nice even white colour to it as expected. Not a very scientific study, but amazing to see the side by side comparison. Hope it helps with any future plans for smaller tank setups. Will definitely give me a better base for recommendations in the future. Also have planted some tissue culture plants in each tank, again same plants across all tanks, so will be fun to watch the growth rates of each. As all other factors are the same, light will be the ultimate factor to growth. View full article

Good luck guys awesome prize kudos to @Disciple for organising. I can see the planaria lol :-p

Woohoo those night shifts stalking the forum and posting paid off lol :D Prize will actually come in handy with the tank being setup as i got no balls :P

Congratulations Oz!

Hello Baccus, loved your pics and report, Many years ago myself and a couple of other ANGFA members at the time did a field collecting trip to Rocky. Along the way home we stopped at a creek called Machine Ck. this is south of Gladstone and we collected a rainbowfish there which must have been the first changeover from M. Duboulayi to M. Splendida Splendida is was a pastel blue body colour with really long finage for a rainbow trimed with red and only relatively small probably max lth of 90mm. Also on the opposite side of the road bridge where it was the uppermost point of tidal flow we found a green gobie, i was always going to go back but never have. We had no interest in shrimp those days ,never know what we may have found, this all occured back in the early 1980's, it might worth looking at on your trip to Agnes Waters.

I like the look of the ATLEDIS one the most to. Really good write up to see the difference. I am intrigued to see the results of your tissue culture test.

Lol, that is awesome: 'I will just walk over to my Online Store fridge and browse which plants I think I fancy to express my creative side ' -really cool to have stuff on hand??. Like having a kitchen in a Woolies! ?

Welcome Mitch, if you thought breeding L No's was addictive, shrimp are a whole new level of joy and pain! Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Welcome to the forum mate, the beginning of a long enjoyable journey im sure! I like the snow white shrimp u have

I seem to have one solo K14 CBS baby from a purchase a few months ago.... Didn't even know what I had LOL Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

You could just do what you do for marimo balls, in a way. You could free-float it with a ton of current so it's constantly moving around with all parts of it getting equal light. I've found that keeping a current going also helps lowering the rate of stagnation/rot that you get with some mosses.

There are still a few people breeding them. I have a good colony going. I think there is potential with these guys but I've yet to explore it. @waffle might have some interesting results soon ? Not much love for snowballs. Only real shrimp lovers appreciate them ?

I have them glued in. Go to Aquarist Chamber and order it from Alvin Chan. You give him the measurements and he gets his guy to do it and you can pick it up in a couple of days. I guess it depends how long you are there for so if you need it quick just request it.

I think our next outing will most likely be down towards Agnes Waters/ 1770 / Miriam vale. We seem to have an abundance of national parks in our general area but some are only accessible by boat, some only have the odd 4WD track and many have no walking tracks, while others don't even 4WD tracks in or around them.

My plan is to replicate @newbreeds rack system eventually. We gotta move house again in January then next August we will be in a position to purchase our own home so another moving lol

reminds me of that JEEP ad. "You're gonna need a bigger boat".

Little tanks can still be a lot of fun but also very testing on the mind. This is my old 36L tank I had on my desk, 3 years since it got decommissioned.... I still miss it! Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

The thing which would make me concerned is the SS filter intake covers everyone has. Surely due to the price they would be of a leaching quality. I wonder if thise can be 3d printed to the point of having such small holes in them for water flow

I am really fed up with the fact that there is nowhere nearby that I can zip up the road to and buy shrimp products. Everything has to come via online shopping....Just curious as to how many members have a shop near to them that actually stocks shrimp products???? Might have to start a shop up in my garage for locals to buy from bahahaha ?

Hey guys! I thought I would chime in about my products to clarify a few things. First off my products are not made with resins, but with solid corn based PLA plastic. The suction cups do turn a bit white in the water bit they are made with PVC (or phthalate free material) and they will return back to a clear color when removed from the water. Everything is sourced here in the USA! Chaz ElevateShrimp

Use US Fissidens.... Generally gets more length without the underneath dying off.... Or get Marimo ;)

So as noted in the "flimsy shelves review", I was having trouble with the set-up sitting on a flimsy set of shelves. Last weekend I swapped over to the "Rack It" shelves from Bunnings - the thickest steel version which comes in black (which I used) or galvanized. I am super happy with this set-up and still kicking myself that I didn't use it to begin with. Its 1200 long BETWEEN the uprights, and 400 mm wide. All the shelves are fully adjustable to any height and you can have as many or as few shelves as you like without paying extra because all the pieces for the stand come separately. I went with four shelves. The set-up: Sorry for the blurry pics, I forgot to switch the camera from macro mode While setting up I stood in the center of one of the horizontal beams and it barely flexed. I lay down on the shelves and there was no movement. Only one minor issue/change: To get the bottom horizontal beam to sit on the bottom, you have to trim the bracket on the two ends of the two horizontal beams (and paint the bare metal to stop corrosion). This gives you an extra 50mm between the bottom shelf and the shelf above. I used an angle grinder to make the cuts and I had some paint left over from painting the mdf shelves (which you should also do otherwise they will swell if they get wet, and they will get wet being around tanks! ) which took about 20 mins total including dragging the angle grinder out of the cupboard and fitting a new blade. Cutting time was only 2mins for all four cuts. I think an extra 50mm is worth 20 mins of extra set-up time. Usual bracket Trimmed bracket

I've always viewed pond snails in two lights useful in some ways but incredibly annoying due to their population explosions. Close up they are actually quite beautiful as well.

As promised, here is the stand today. I've whited out one tank as its a special project. The sizes of the tanks from top to bottom (and left to right) are: 4ft wide *1 high * 1.5 deep - holds L333 colony and rummynose tetras. Currently building an LED light for this tank. AquaOne 32 Ecostyle - currently a temporary home for my Caridina cf. confusa. Whited out tank: 2ft wide, 1.5 wide, 1.5 deep - classified Aqua One 1ft cube - new setup for my Bloody Mary variant of Caridina davidi No-name glass tank - cull tank holding cherry variants, some Aus. natives, natives, mosses and a few other bits and pieces. Will be retired once I purchase some new tanks. Plastic tanks - temporary housing for moss and/or shrimp as required Bottom tank - 3ft wide * 1ft high * 1.5 ft deep. New set-up for my confusa. The plan is to purchase four new tanks (1.5 ft wide * 1 high * 1 deep) and put them 'end on' on the shelves - two on the second shelf down, one next to the cube, one next to the 3 ft. I have another 2 ft, (same size as 'classified' tank) which is currently (...................................redacted........................................................) but will be returning to the right hand side of the third shelf down (where the plastic tanks are). This should give me plenty of tanks to set up a dedicated tank for the Malanda, a choc cherry tank and a dedicated tank for KK, as well as a spare for culls and mosses ect.

Looks like a demsel fly nymph, destory it and make sure there is no more.