# My 55gal Goldfish Tank Journal



## abnormalsanon (Jun 6, 2006)

I decided to give it another go with plants in my goldfish tank. This thread details the process. If you're interested in that neat, landscaped look, this thread probably won't interest you! But if you love goldfish and would like to hear what works and what doesn't in a planted goldie tank, read on. Keep in mind that I'm not going for a beautifully scaped tank here--I just want to have healthy, happy goldfish and I wouldn't mind having a nice looking green tank either.

I started out with an established tank, so rather than tearing it all down, I kept the 50% flourite 50% gravel substrate. I left the fish in while I planted.

*Equipment:*










-Eheim 2213 (blocked by my dog, who is forever in the way)
-Coralife 130W compact flourescent strip @ 10 hours per day
-Azoo CO2 regulator @ 1-2 bubbles per second
-Aqua Medic bubble counter
-Oresun glass CO2 diffuser
-Rio 600 pump

*Flora:*
-Anubias barteri v. nana
-Bolbitis heudelotii
-Cryptocoryne wendtii "red"
-Cryptocoryne wendtii "copper"
-Echinodorus paniculatus (amazon sword)
-Echinodorus x. Ozelot (red spot ozelot sword)
-Egeria densa
-Microsorum pteropus
-Microsorum pteropus "narrow leaf"
-Microsorum pteropus "Windelov"
-Sagittaria chilensis
-Sagittaria subulata "narrow leaf dwarf"
-Sagittaria subulata "narrow leaf tall"

*Fauna:*
-1 comet
-2 fantails
-2 dojo loaches (one gold, one brown)

*24 hours after planting:*









This is what you see when you walk through my apartment door:









I tried to make the side view relatively interesting so you can view it from the front or side:









Here you can see the diffuser with the pump right above it--this works great! The micro bubbles produced by the diffuser get blown all around the tank. Otherwise I don't think the diffuser would cut it (read more below).









As you can see, I didn't give a whole lot of thought to where the plants were going. I just went for a general downward slope from right to left. I may play more with the layout, but the narrow shape of the 55gal doesn't give you much to work with. Basically, I tried to stick to things the goldfish won't eat! So far, so good--24 hours later, there's one comet-sized bite out of a young ozelot sword leaf 

*Also, a few notes about the equipment: *

The *Azoo regulator* seems good so far. It came set at almost 60psi, so I had to turn the front screw to get it down to 30. The only other issue I had was connecting the airline tubing--I had to screw the nut completely off, connect the tubing, then jam the nut onto the other end of the tubing and thread it through to get the thing on. Otherwise the tubing wouldn't fit through the hole in the nut. Mildly annoying but it's working fine.

The *Aqua Medic bubble counter* is a disaster. I got it as part of a regulator package from Drs. Foster & Smith, and it leaked from the airline inlet the second I plugged in the solenoid. I could not assemble the supposedly "robust holding plate." Apparently it was too "robust," because I swear the two pieces don't fit together. I plan to replace the counter as soon as I can afford to.

The *Oresun glass CO2 diffuser* is pretty crappy, too. The bubbles just drift straight out of the ceramic disc, rather than traveling up to the rim of the glass. It works fine for my purposes though, because I have it placed just below the Rio pump, so the bubbles get blown all over the tank.

That's all for now. I will update this thread fairly frequently to give those goldfish keepers out there some idea of how it's going.


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## Tentacles (Jun 25, 2006)

You say "another go". Did the goldies eat too many plants last time or did they bump and uproot them by fossiking around in the gravel?


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## yoink (Aug 31, 2005)

The tank looks nice. I'm interested to see how all the plants fair with the goldfish.


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## abnormalsanon (Jun 6, 2006)

Tentacles said:


> You say "another go". Did the goldies eat too many plants last time or did they bump and uproot them by fossiking around in the gravel?


Last time I tried plants in the goldfish tank, I had no idea what I was doing and just put in a few java ferns and anubias. The goldfish ate all the new growth on the plants, so they never grew much. Plus the lighting was the strip that came with the tank and there was no CO2/ferts. So yeah, that didn't turn out so well!

The comet has uprooted a few things, though it could also be the loaches doing it. I've had trouble keeping the elodea and dwarf sag in the gravel, but otherwise no problems. There's just been that one bite out of the ozelot sword and maybe a few nibbles on the tips of the lace java fern. As long as I feed them lots of greens, I think they'll mostly leave the plants alone.


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## trenac (Jul 16, 2004)

I see your cute dog had to get in the picture!

Nice start... Keep us updated on how it holds up to the Goldfish. I want to try this oneday myself.


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## abnormalsanon (Jun 6, 2006)

Thanks, Trena! Yeah, Bart is always in the way. He's so cute though, it's hard to get mad.

So far everything is going well...I'm waiting for the day they decide it's their personal salad bar


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## DataGuru (Mar 11, 2005)

LOL Yea. my commons were hard on plants. They're outside now. My fancies do great with plants. 

Glad you're feeding them fresh veggies. That should help. try rubberbanding a hunk of zucchini to a rock. That should keep them busy as well.


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## skinns (Apr 8, 2004)

I had goldfish in my planted 10gallon and it was a mess. Although I love the antomny of the goldfish (swoopy tails, bright colors, wiggly swimming patterns, etc) I can't stand how dirty they are as fish goes! The make cleaning a filter unbearable.


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## abnormalsanon (Jun 6, 2006)

Well yeah, a 10gal is too small for most goldfish, unless it's one very small fish! I would say 20gal for one goldfish is the minimum. I've found that the more room they have and the more plants I add, the less they bother their surroundings. They are indeed filthy, but I think the plants will help a lot with water quality. Scavengers (loaches and snails) also help.


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## TWood (Dec 9, 2004)

I won't ever keep anything but goldfish anymore. Here's my 90 gallon, just waiting for a good tankmate.


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## skinns (Apr 8, 2004)

Thats a beautiful Goldfish. I love the contrast. So how big is that goldfish, a 90gallon tank huh?


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## TWood (Dec 9, 2004)

Thanks,

Tip of nose to end of tail is 7". He started out as the 'medium' size from Petsmart. I bought him because of the intense red coloration, something I don't see often at retail prices. He'll eat out of your hand without taking a bite out of it and tolerate the kids holding him, gently.

The color balance is way off in that photo, I need to figure out how to white-balance the camera.


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## DataGuru (Mar 11, 2005)

Very nice ryunkin! and your tank is lookin great!


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## Tankman (Feb 19, 2006)

Wow, it's unusual to have goldfish in a planted tank. Good work and nice composition too


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## Salt (Apr 5, 2005)

Tankman said:


> Wow, it's unusual to have goldfish in a planted tank. Good work and nice composition too


It shouldn't be. It's a myth that it can't be done, and it gets propagated so badly so many people don't even try.

Commons can indeed be quite hard on plants, the key is using goldfish with compact or "egg shaped" bodies. These will do great with most plants. I would say the only plants that probably won't work with them would be the _very_ fine stemmed plants like glosso, HC, hairgrass, HM, and the like.

If you want a foreground "lawn" look with goldfish, you could use crypts... parva and lucens work great.


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## abnormalsanon (Jun 6, 2006)

*Update!*

The tank is doing fine, though going through the usual bumps in the road during its first month.

First, the things that are going well:

1. The goldfish seem genuinely happy and entertained. That was the main goal here, so I feel that it's worked out nicely. The nitrates are down to 20ppm, which is good for both plants and fish. I'm only dosing phosphate, potassium, micros, and Ca/Mg (dolomite, though I want to get something better since it doesn't really dissolve)--the fish provide plenty of nitrates on their own.

2. The CO2 mist (using the diffuser and pump) is working great.

3. Most of the plants remain untouched. A few of them have obviously suffered from goldie sampling, but nothing worse than a chunk out of one leaf. Anacharis is ugly and annoying to replant all the time, but the goldfish don't eat it. It's grown so much that several stems are on their way to being emersed. I need to cut it back this weekend. The crypts are also doing very well and are looking much better than they did when I received them.

And the things that aren't going quite as well:

1. Brown diatoms have taken hold for the time being, so I've cut the light back. The problem is that I've been too lazy to hook the lights/CO2 up to a timer, so I usually just turn the lights on at 8am as I leave for work, then turn them off again when I get home around 6 or 7. This has been too much light, even for a heavily planted tank with some fairly fast growers.

2. I read that dwarf sag was a good choice for goldies, so I ordered about 20 of them as foreground plants. Unfortunately, dwarf sag will not survive the onslaught of 3 hungry goldfish and 2 nosey dojo loaches! They were uprooted time and again, and the goldfish picked at the leaves as they floated on the surface. Some of these were tossed altogether, others were moved to my 30gal to recover.

3. The swords (Amazon and Ozelot) don't look so great. They're growing plenty and putting out new leaves, but they seem to have some sort of deficiency. I added root tabs and I'm dosing ferts/micros, but they're still getting brown/yellow spots. Haven't figured that one out just yet. Any ideas?

This weekend I plan to do a large water change, as well as trim and clean up some of the plants that have been tasted or moved around. Over all though, it's looking fine and all of the tank occupants seem happy!


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## Telperion (Jun 12, 2006)

Wow I almost did a double take when I clicked on the shot of your 55 goldy tank - it is sooo close to the way I set my 55 goldy tank up, including the choice of gravel, placement of hardscape and types of plants. lol My tank has a doppelganger  Nice tank!!

The 90 gallon looks great as well - was it harder or easier to keep planted than the 55 with the goldies tendency to help "garden?"


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## abnormalsanon (Jun 6, 2006)

Well, the Aqua Medic bubble counter already broke. I hated that thing!! it leaked from the moment I hooked it up to the regulator, and I couldn't get the top off to refill it without using pliars. That led to the plastic lid getting messed up and now it leaks like crazy. I'm going to order a new one online, but the tank is going to be mostly in the dark for a while.


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## T-Bone (Nov 23, 2005)

Thats quite a beautiful goldfish setup. I'd be thrilled if I was a goldie. I've never been able to get away from brown diatoms in a new tank, no matter what i did. It's a PITA but it will eventually go away.


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## abnormalsanon (Jun 6, 2006)

*Picture update...*

Now that I found the camera, here are a few pictures--you can see that everything has sprouted some new leaves, though some of the older growth doesn't look so great. I assume this is mostly the plants adjusting to the tank, but we'll see. I decided to dose Excel while I'm waiting for my new bubble counter to arrive, rather than doing a blackout.









You can sort of see the long stem sprouting from the Amazon sword. This has grown probably 6-8 inches in the last week and is now trying to push its way through the glass top. I'm hoping for some daughter plants eventually!


















One of the dojo loaches. I love these little guys! You can also see some of the algae forming on the anubias leaves. I replaced the dwarf sag that had been in this corner with a few new crypts, courtesy of a member of the local aquatic gardener's club. Thanks 









One of the fantails, and the other dojo loach. Sorry it's blurry.









Side view, what you see when you enter my apartment.


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## abnormalsanon (Jun 6, 2006)

Another update...

Algae: The brown diatom algae seems to be here to stay. It's been several weeks and has only gotten worse. I've got about 2.5 wpg over the tank (which is now lidless so the light is direct) and I run the CO2 at about 3bps. I did fall behind on ferts for a week, but it's been several weeks since then and I was hoping it would have recovered by now. I was expecting green dust algae by now! :tongue1: 

Plants: I added two new pieces of driftwood which look much better than the old stuff. I removed the anarcharis because I just couldn't take it; I think it's a really ugly and boring plant. The swords are sprouting new growth everyday, but the leaves are slightly transparent. I'm trying to figure out what deficiency this indicates but I'm not sure yet. It has affected the amazon but not the ozelots. The chilensis also has some brittle/transparent leaves. Any ideas?

Fish: I'm planning to add an inline heater (heat it to only about 70-72 year round) and 4 or so SAEs. I figure, what the heck--the tank isn't even close to being overstocked, and it might be fun to add something different to the tank. I plan to use the SAEs for cleanup in my 30gal now and then too.


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## DataGuru (Mar 11, 2005)

I'd get some ramshorn snails. They love brown algae. They would need to be larger than your goldie's mouths tho. The goldies will eat any small snails, so you don't have to worry about them getting overpopulated.

The only downside to ramshorn snails and goldies, is that I've had goldies get them stuck in their mouth. Wasn't a big deal to take some tweasers and get them out.


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## abnormalsanon (Jun 6, 2006)

Thanks, DataGuru. I actually have a few ramshorns in there--I pick the biggest ones from my tropical tank, wish them good luck, and drop 'em in! They're reproducing like mad in my tropical tank, so once the babies mature enough I'll add more to the goldie tank and hopefully get the population up. 

Do you think SAEs would be a bad choice? I'm curious as I've never had them before. I know it's weird to add them to a goldfish tank, but I plan on keeping the water at 70-72 year round and all other water parameters are like my tropical tank, so I figured it wouldn't be a big deal.


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