# my 20 gallon long (piano top) crs tank



## jazzlvr123 (Apr 29, 2007)

hello, i have been planning to build a new tank for my crystal red shrimp for quite awhile now, and finally i have been able to devote a weekend to building this tank and trying to create a layout that is both pleasing to the eye and subsequently create a tank for the CRS to enjoy (many hiding places etc). The main reason I wanted to start this new tank is because it is real hot where I live and I needed to install a 50w iceprobe chiller to my tank, to do this you must drill a 1.25 inch hole in your aquarium. So I figured if I am drilling a tank might as well just get a nice new tank and create a new scape right!?! I wanted to make this tank as ADA looking as possible so I purchased ADA style flo pipes and glass co2 diffuser. I also took the entire frame off the top of the tank to make it look more presentable. Once the aquarium was drilled, had its frame removed and was washed thoroughly it was finally time to add substrate. I wanted to create a lush carpet of HC in this tank so I went to San Francisco for a day to visit aqua forest aquarium and I picked up a 9 L bag of Amazonia 2 and a large bag of power sand special.







i poured the substrate into my tank before I added water so that the water wasn't cloudy and I could visualize how I wanted to scape this tank. On my way home from San fran I decided to go by my LFS (capitol aquarium) and buy some nice pieces of driftwood for my tanks hardscape. I bought 10 pieces but only ended up using 5, here's the hardscape I decided on.








A big part of creating my hardscape was trying to hide this bulky chiller that was drilled into the top left section of the aquarium.








even with the driftwood added in I felt my scape was somewhat lacking, so I went outback a grabbed the best looking rocks I could find and added them to the foreground of my hardscape, I think the rocks made the hardscape feel "complete"








once the substrate and the hardscpe was done now came the fun part, adding plants. 








the first thing i decided to do was add plants to the wood, so i decided to attach weeping moss to most of the wood. Wherever there were cracks or crevices in the wood I added an anubias nana plantlet which i propagated from a mother plant in a different aquarium. But I did not want to just add a whole bumch of weeping moss to all the wood and call it quits; I wanted to make it interesting. So for a contrast in color I lined bright green riccia all along the top of the driftwood piece where it is closest to the light. Also, I decided to add nothing but Pellia (Monoselium tenerum) and two anubias plantlets to the wood on the bottom right closest to the foreground. I think the texture of pellia will provide a nice contrast with the weeping moss and riccia once it all grows out. after i had planted all the driftwood, I broke up a bunch of Hemianthus callitrichoides I had and planted each piece a couple centimeters apart. I then added blyxa japonica and needle leaf java fern around the base of the wood to try and create a natural bush effect. After all this was done, I added a couple downoi plants in the middle of the forground behind the Hemianthus callitrichoides. I love downoi and think they are a very interesting plant and provide a good contrast behind the HC once it is grown in. here's what the tank looks like after two days of existence.








I'm still toying with it and am adding/ removing and moving plants here and there to try and match what I feel best suits the tank. Any constructive criticism on how you might think the scape could be improved would be greatly appreciated; thanks for looking ill keep this thread updated as the tank grows in. All i have to do now is add a backround and add the shrimp. I am letting the tank circulate for a couple days and get a little established before i add the shrimp 

















oh yeah and just a side note i put the tank on top of my piano so i have something to look at while i practice my jazz hehe








sorry for the low aquality pics everything was taken with the camera attached to my cell phone: )


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## zQ. (Dec 15, 2006)

Ahh,the pic's color looks really familiar,is it a W810i ? BTW,nice tank man.


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## jazzlvr123 (Apr 29, 2007)

haha yup w810i wow i cant believe you could acutally determine the phone from just the pic quality, very impressive


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## zQ. (Dec 15, 2006)

haha,cuz i've used it to take pics of my tanks for a year before i buy a digital cam :heh:


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## trenac (Jul 16, 2004)

Love the shape of the wood. Very nice scape... _Don't you have the open the top of the piano to tune it?_


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## jazzlvr123 (Apr 29, 2007)

trenac said:


> Love the shape of the wood. Very nice scape... _Don't you have the open the top of the piano to tune it?_


LOL well it was tuned maybe a month ago so i don't plan on tuning it again, probably ever, i have really nice pianos at school (sac state) that are tuned weekly that i practice on : ) BTW I'm a jazz performance major so i have access to the really nice piano's whenever i want to practice hehe.


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## Kelley (Aug 27, 2006)

I think your tank is beautiful, but I know that my mother and sister would kill me if I put an aquarium on top of their aquariums. You are inviting disaster.


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## jazzlvr123 (Apr 29, 2007)

haha inviting disaster huh? what do you mean? the aquarium is NOT on top of another aquarium its on top of a very sturdy piano. Im not worried about water damage if thats what you mean i have an ada tank liner below the aquarium and its an old crappy piano so a couple water bumps in the long run wont bother me


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## Overallgal (Dec 24, 2006)

Wow, really beautiful scape but I think you should practice more on your technique...with my aquariums. LOL I wish I could do a tenth of what you have done with this tank. I have three tanks with plants that look like I just tossed everything in there, yours is what mine want to look like when they grow up to be real planted tanks. Great job.


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## Kelley (Aug 27, 2006)

As long as it is not a piano that you care about water damaging. 

My mom wouldn't even let me touch her piano when I was a kid lol.


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## bartoli (May 8, 2006)

jazzlvr123 said:


> A big part of creating my hardscape was trying to hide this bulky chiller that was drilled into the top left section of the aquarium.


How do you like the IceProbe? Are you controlling it via a temperature sensor?


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## jazzlvr123 (Apr 29, 2007)

yup it has a controller hooked up, the T65. its made to control from 65 to 85 degrees I have it set at 74 for the sake of my CRS and the temperature has not fluctuated since it has been on so i would have to say I like it : ). It does its job very efficiently


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## bartoli (May 8, 2006)

Jazzlvr123, thank you for the reply. I was considering using Ice Probe in a 30-gallon tank. But I doubt that it could pull the temperature down for more than 3 degrees.


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## jazzlvr123 (Apr 29, 2007)

update: everything has been growing in great i counted probably over 30+ newly born shrimplets in my tank that are no bigger than a grain on sand, im planning on adding more HC to the foreground today becuase thats the only aspect that i feel is lacking at the moment I aslo added some mini pelia (riccardia) that i tied to a couple stainless steel meshes and then added them to the woodwork. I also added two cryptocoryne cordata rosanervig plants, one tall one to the left of the tank and a smaller one to the right, I figured the tank needed some kind of big leaved plant to cantrast will all the small stuff like, fissidens, Hc, moss (taiwan, flame and weeping), Riccia and others please let me know how this tank might be improved becuase the whole reason i post these pics if your your guys constructive critisism : )


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## jdmstop (Aug 20, 2007)

Hi, nice looking tank by the way. I am starting up a 10 gallon planted tank, can you give me some pointer as which light fixture, bulb color and wattage as well as should i just go with the hagen co2 natural plant system? Thanks a lot


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## kiwik (Apr 3, 2007)

wow, i should grow riccia and soem moss on my driftwood besides just nana petites. i think that's just what im going to do over the weekend once i get some good moss.

i actually have a bunch of extra java moss....does java moss make a good effect on driftwood? when you use the netting to tie down the riccia, does the netting have to go over the whole piece of driftwood? how do you do it so you dont have to net the whole piece of driftwood but also not have the netting come loose?

o another question, which substrate do you put on top? or do you mix em?


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## jazzlvr123 (Apr 29, 2007)

actually I only use fishing line to attach everything, for attaching moss to wood like this, netting is unecessary and IMO is more of a hassle than its worth, i suggest using cotton thread to attach moss becuase the thread will desolve after awhile and by that time your moss will have already grown itself into the wood. The only reason i used fishing line is becuase riccia does not attach itself like moss does and requires frequent trimming if you want the riccia to stay attached, or else the bottom leaves dont get enough light and die and all the green growth will detach itself and float to the top. I use ADA's power sand special for the bottom layer of the substrate and then amazonia 2 for the top


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## jazzlvr123 (Apr 29, 2007)

heres a mini update: I have not posted this in a long time but anyways, I have MANY more shrimp from when I had initially started this, I think I started with something like 30 shrimp and now I probably have over a couple hundred. I do not have a good camera but heres a pic of some shrimp i took from my cell phone.


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## Chuppy (Aug 5, 2007)

Look at all those buzzing bees!!!!

Really beautiful shrimp .. no? and your tank is truly splendid as well.. 

Drew


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## jazzlvr123 (Apr 29, 2007)

update: everything has been growing out wonderfully I have so many shrimp in the tank now that i have to start thinning the heard probably over 200 shrimp in the tank now of all grades hehe


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## jazzlvr123 (Apr 29, 2007)

more updates: many more shrimp and more beautiful growth


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## Tex Gal (Nov 1, 2007)

They're everywhere!! They're everywhere!!


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## cs_gardener (Apr 28, 2006)

Your tank is looking great. Wow, you have a lot of shrimp.


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## h4n (Dec 23, 2005)

Wow... Look at all them shrimp!


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## jazzlvr123 (Apr 29, 2007)

absolutely horrible news. the bottom glass panel of my aquarium broke last night when i was sleeping. I woke up to 20 gallons of water and hundreds of dead shrimp on the floor, not to mention all the rare plants that dried out


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## Halibass (Jan 28, 2007)

Wow, sorry to hear that.....


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## jazzlvr123 (Apr 29, 2007)

okay I saved about 100 or so and got them to a new tank (thank god) so all is not lost. ill post a pic of their new home tonight


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## ir0n_ma1den (Apr 27, 2007)

omg, thats horrible.

how the hell does a bottom glass pane break?

damn, I wanted to see an FTS... o well, atleast you save some...


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## cs_gardener (Apr 28, 2006)

That is a worst nightmare come true having a tank completely drain like that. I'm glad you were able to save some shrimp. Were all the plants lost?


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## skinns (Apr 8, 2004)

Holy smokes, thats horrible. I had a 29gallon drain out on me 20 some years ago. I know the feeling.


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## jazzlvr123 (Apr 29, 2007)

okay heres the side of the tank, (the bottom is worse) 









Heres the surviving shrimps in their new home:


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## reefcrawler (Dec 31, 2007)

Feel the pain, but happy that you still have many shrimps to recover.


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## jazzlvr123 (Apr 29, 2007)

okay i added some hard scape with mini pellia, round pellia and fissidens attached as well as added various Toninas for a nice background plabt


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## mellowvision (Jun 18, 2007)

so is this new tank chilled as well? did the chiller break the glass?


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## jazzlvr123 (Apr 29, 2007)

the new tank isn't chilled, and yes i think the chiller did have something to do with it


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## Tex Gal (Nov 1, 2007)

So sorry! What a horrible thing to wake up to! Wonderful and amazing that you were able to save 100 of the little guys- they must be tough little buggers! This tanks looks like you've had it up for a while looking at your ground cover. How did your piano fare? What plants did you loose that you need to replace?


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## jazzlvr123 (Apr 29, 2007)

closeup of shrimp:


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## baboo_jenge (Apr 6, 2007)

how can plants be lost? 
Only the water was drained out for couple of hours. It's not as if there was direct sun over it for hours. 
I'd think they only lost turgor pressure.

The lighting was also off since it was night right? 

Did tank break due to unevenness of supporting ground?
I recently set up a new tank on one of the furnitures and i am dead scared the tank willl break.


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