White Cloud Mountain Minnow - one tough fish!

My intention was to construct a second moss wall to span the whole of the planted tank. As I was reviewing the situation I noticed there were only two fish in the 10g:view, Huh?

Two Neon Tetras and . . . no White Cloud Mountain minnows? What happened to five fish, overnight? Vanished, *poof* - gone. I also noticed an unusual amount of protein on the water column surface. Hmmmm . . .

Should have checked the filter as soon as I noticed missing fish.  

Ohhhhhhh, there they are, trapped under the filter basket.

I swapped the Aqua Clear 30 from the Shrimparium to the planted with the intention of making the 10g planted into the shrimparium due to the moss walls. Somehow all five WCMm's got sucked into the filter through the hole in the intake drilled for the DIY CO2. Nice.

All five are missing dorsal fins, most are missing all or part of their soft dorsal, one is missing pectorals. One has half a tail, very streamlined.

I dropped all five into the aquarium fully prepared for the possibility the Neon Tetras would make lunch and dinner out of the injured fish.  It appears the Tetras missed their shoaling pals; they seem not to have noticed the fish are injured. All five White Cloud Mountain minnows are swimming around as if nothing unusual has happened.

So on with the plans . . .

Fish Village Update

The recent algae outbreak forced a decision to move the whole fish rack again.  The rack is now no longer in front of the windows.  The flooding of direct sunlight and the shop light T8 tubes, even with a reduced photo period to seven hours per day, was just too much light.  The photo period has been raised again to nine hours per day.  There is still some residual algae on the lower part of the aquarium glass near the substrate.  This can be easily managed by the addition of some Olive and Tiger nerite snails.

The move caused a significant White Cloud Mountain minnow fry die-off.  This was totally our fault.  There was not enough water left in the tanks as we moved them.  Sad about the loss of fry and will be more careful in the future.  So the remaining population are all at least 1/4" to 3/4" long and there are four in the 10g:redux Shrimparium, four in the 10g:view planted tank, plus the three original parents in the 10g:view.  Not bad for our first fry, especially since they were totally unplanned for.  We also lost one of the three neon tetras.  Not sure why, it died two days after the move.

The nice surprise just after the new year was two berried American glass shrimp as we posted earlier.  They have been moved to a five gallon aquarium with one male.  They survived the move, seem not to have dropped any eggs, having been in the five gallon aquarium for a week now.  They are due to hatch shrimplets anywhere in the next week or two as best as we can figure.  This is very exciting as these are the babies we actually wanted.

A new camera is wending its way to us but it may be as much as two weeks before it arrives therefore; no pictures at this time.

The Planted Tank Inspiration

giypsy ~ December 16, 2009

During the process of re-learning good fish-keeping habits, I ran across a tank that brought back memories of the first serious tank I kept as an adolescent. Jason Baliban's Second Place winner in the 2008 AGA [Aquatic-Gardeners.org] contest: "Meander". Jason's tank had all the elements that inspired me; large enough to accommodate a full scene, rimless and endless view, simple balanced design. I was enchanted and inspired.

The 10g tank-with-a-view is a direct result of that inspiration.
The tank is placed in front of a narrow window, allowing me the same endless view through the tank. The 10g:view tank's planting scheme has not come together yet. The end result will be different than "Meander". However; I just had to know if I could achieve something similar on a scale one tenth of the size Jason used.

Time and patience will tell.

Flora

• Radican Marble Queen, mother plant & daughter plant
  
• Cryptocoryne Lutea
• Banana Plant
• Anubis Petit nana

Fauna

• Betta Splendens, female
• 3 Neon Tetra, fry in a nursery tank
• 3 White Cloud Mountain minnows
• 12 Malaysian Trumpet snails