# My 10 gallon planted RCS tank



## Chris. (Dec 22, 2008)

I don't have my RCS yet, but they will soon be here from epicfish. I can't wait!

Here are a few pics of the 10gallon I just took. For now I only have my bully, Molly in there with several plants.

This is a "goldfish crackers" plant that I pulled from my yard, along with the cave that I made for the shrimp to hide in; at least until the plants fill in.









To the left of the cracker plant is another from my yard. In the back-center is another small plant from my yard that has leaves shaped like hearts. We'll see how these plants do submersed. Money wort plantlet on the edge of the front. E. Tennellus pink just above it and another piece of e. tenn. just above that algae wafer. (Apparently the molly doesn't like the wafers so much.) Java Fern is tied to the artificial rock.









And the Amazon sword with the bully taking a glamor shot.










Hopefully my shrimp will be here soon to give some more life to this tank! Gonna hook up a diy co2 reactor soon to encourage plant growth. Lighting is done by two 15W spiral CF bulbs rated at 6500K for 10 hours a day. Trying to keep the water temp around 80 degrees. Substrate is Flourite Black. I'm in the process of moving my 20 gallon tank from my girlfriend's house (the reason I set up the 10 g). Used about 6 gallons of water from the 20 gallon along with a filter I had running on a 5 gallon to get it cycled quicker. Everything is stable. I also used the substrate from the 5 gallon, so that had plenty of bacteria in it for the new tank. I will eventually set the 5 back up as an isolation/hospital tank. Let me know what ya think! I'll be updating this thread as my tank changes! Hopefully within a couple days there will be 6 amano shrimp and 20 RCS in there!


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## Bert H (Mar 2, 2004)

Are you planning on keeping that sailfin in there with the cherries? IMO, there's nowhere near enough plant cover in there for him not to make snacks out of all of them in short time. 

Keep in mind you've put in there fairly slow growing plants, and/or possibly terrestrial plants. In a newly set up tank, this could cause problems. My 2 cents.


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## Chris. (Dec 22, 2008)

the molly may go back into my 20 gallon but a couple of my guppies will have to go in the 10g if he does. You think he will snack on the shrimp? I've never seen him be aggressive towards anything but that one guppy. What plants would you recommend for the tank? I can get some java moss relatively easy, and there is a tiny bit of singapore moss in there...hoping it grows a lot soon.


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## Bert H (Mar 2, 2004)

> What plants would you recommend for the tank?


 I would put some fast growing stems in there during the maturation process. Check out the plantfinder here on the site for lots of good info.


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## Chris. (Dec 22, 2008)

Well, thanks to your advice I took some more echinodorus tenellus and some moneywort from my 20g and put it in here. Also removed the terrestrial plants. I also just purchased some e. vesuvius and Najas sp 'Roraima'. Really hoping the najas grows quickly. I just fed them in these new pics. I'll take more pics when the grass grows.


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## Chris. (Dec 22, 2008)

Is it okay to use some aquarium salt in a tank with shrimp and snails in it? My nitrites were a little high yesterday so I did a 25% water change and put 1 Tbsp salt in there...should I do a 50% now to get most of that salt out?


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## Chris. (Dec 22, 2008)

How do you tell exoskeletons from dead shrimp??? Just found like 5 clearish shrimp. a couple of them were torn in half so I'm assuming those were just from molting of a couple. Is there a definite way to tell if one is dead or if it is just old "skin"? All of them were in the little shrimp cave I made for them to hide in.


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## Valthenya (Feb 11, 2009)

If it doesnt look like a live shrimp then its a molt believe me i've found a dead shrimp and i've found molts and the molts scare the poo out of me sometimes.


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## Chris. (Dec 22, 2008)

Thank you. Yea i'm used to finding dead ghost shrimp. these are the first rcs I've ever had. When they die, do the bodies turn pinkish like ghost shrimp?

I'm getting some good growth from my money wort and the e. tenellus. Some of the leaves are even turning red on them.


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## starrystarstarr (Dec 18, 2008)

yes when they die they will turn the same color as dead ghost. but most of the time they get eaten up pretty fast.


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## Quetzalcoatl (Feb 13, 2009)

Chris. said:


> Is it okay to use some aquarium salt in a tank with shrimp and snails in it? My nitrites were a little high yesterday so I did a 25% water change and put 1 Tbsp salt in there...should I do a 50% now to get most of that salt out?


I don't know about shrimp but salt will kill plants.


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## Chris. (Dec 22, 2008)

I stopped adding salt and even cut the back of the filter to remove the carbon from the filter media since I did a little reasearch and stumbled onto a bit of info that carbon removes the nutrients your plants need to thrive. They have been doing a little bit better since then as well.


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## tonbrencat (Jan 21, 2009)

I like you multi-colored rock-looks good on the black substrate


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## Chris. (Dec 22, 2008)

thank you, I just wish I had a good way to clean the algae off of it. Using a coarse pad just leaves blue stuff all over it. I see guppies peck at it a lot though. Mainly the juvenile ones. This tank is still a WIP. I just got my 20 gallon moved in from my girlfriends house and rescaped it. Waiting for the parameters to stabilize again so I can put my fish back in it. They are ALL in this 10 gallon right now. Talk about crowded!


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## tonbrencat (Jan 21, 2009)

I have a small rock that looks a bit like that one you have and the only way I could get it clean from algae was to bury it in the substrate for a week or two-a lot of times I would just bury it half way and flip it over ever two weeks so I could enjoy the color.....


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## Chris. (Dec 22, 2008)

thats an idea, I may try. The tank looks a little different now. Not ready for full pics of it though. Here are a couple pics of the shrimp. Their color has really come in!


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## Chris. (Dec 22, 2008)

the algae is almost completely off of the multi colored rock now. I guess shrimp, an IMS, a two otos did some work on it! Plus a little excel dosing. lol


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## Chris. (Dec 22, 2008)

here's a little update on the shrimp tank. Water finally cleared up and I put a toms rapid filter on there in conjunction with the other hob to keep the ground clean. Also got my pressurized CO2 up and running for both tanks!!! I'm stoked about that!

here is a crappy macro of my berried rcs









apparently my neons don't like bloodworms anymore but the rcs are taking to them!


















And my co2 setup. Using an industrial single stage regulator, that I modified to work with paintball. The blue manifold is an old vaccum manifold I had from when I turbocharged my honda. It came in handy when I need to go down a size in hose from the regulator to the gang valves.


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## Chris. (Dec 22, 2008)

so, I was looking in my shrimp tank today and I notice this LITTLE guy. He must be a neon tetra fry. He's in a tank with my shrimp, juvenile guppies, and neons. He's the only one I can find for now.


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## Bert H (Mar 2, 2004)

Chris. said:


> so, I was looking in my shrimp tank today and I notice this LITTLE guy. He must be a neon tetra fry. He's in a tank with my shrimp, juvenile guppies, and neons. He's the only one I can find for now.


My money is on it being a guppy, not a tetra.


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## Chris. (Dec 22, 2008)

I would say that too, but there has never been an adult guppy in this tank...Time will tell though. I've never seen a neon fry. I was hoping these guys would breed eventually. I only have one female in the bunch...lol

So my fabco needle valves came in yesterday. One of them screwed all the way down and now it wont adjust at all. the knob just turns, but doesn't open or close the valve. Are there any remedies for this before I contact aqua botanic?


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## Chris. (Dec 22, 2008)

the Nv seems to have fixed itself...maybe cause I got it wet to check for leaks from the nipples?? the other one worked fine though after I did that. Oh well. 

Now I have my paintball co2 tank split between my 20g and my 10g shrimp tank. No more leaks either after battling with it for about 3 tanks worth!


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## Chris. (Dec 22, 2008)

small update: The e. tenellus is really starting to fill in since I got pressurized co2 on it. Here are a few of my reddest shrimp. Recently I had a berried(very red) and another very red shrimp die for no apparent reason. One of these three shrimp is berried now though. w00t!










And some of the new inhabitants.


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## Chris. (Dec 22, 2008)

Okay, all of the guppies have been removed so I can take them to my LFS. I have no need for 15 female guppies that ll look alike, lol! They are constanly putting out fry! even after being isolated from the males. It's driving me crazy, lol.

Somehow 3 of my neons all died at the same time so I'm down to four of those guys. All other inhabitants seem fine and my water tested out fine as well. I discovered them during a water change yesterday, otherwise I would have never found them(hidden under leaves and stuff). Here are some new pics.

The tenellus is filling pretty quickly!


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## Chris. (Dec 22, 2008)

oh and the black dot in front of the filter intake, is a baby Thiara Winteri on the glass.  It's only about 1mm wide.


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## Chris. (Dec 22, 2008)

Found a second baby snail yesterday also! I'm excited to see them breeding! the more the merrier(the less algae scrubbing I have to do), lol! Here is a pic of one of 3 amano shrimp in this tank.


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## Chris. (Dec 22, 2008)

Heres a littel update. I came home after lights out, to plant some newly acquired ludwigia and a couple others into my 20g, and I put some of the Ariculata in the 10g as well. I used a clamp on light for lighting to do this so I wouldnt shock the fish or plants too much. Well, after looking around for a minute, I noticed a bunch of new TW snail babies! Also found my first 'litter' of RCS babies!! I'm very happy about that! I've been waiting for these guys to have babies for a few months now. Here is a pic of a berried rcs and one of the babies near by.

















And something quite strange. I found a red worm poking around under the substrate! This is the best picture I could get of it. It looks just like a frozen blood worm, but it's alive! I think there is another on also, unless this thing is about an inch long...


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## Chris. (Dec 22, 2008)

A little update. Added a couple new stem plants, including the blyxa in the corner. RCS colony has doubled and I have a couple more berried ones. I have two berried Amano shrimp. I'm going to attempt to raise their larva in a 1 gallon tank of full salt water. If all goes well, I might have 100+ amano shrimp for sale in a couple months! The Thaira Winteri snails have multiplied like crazy! I moved a few into my 20H just to see if they will multiply in there like they did in here.


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## ZooTycoonMaster (Apr 23, 2008)

Woah I like the E. Tennelus 'Pink'!


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## Chris. (Dec 22, 2008)

yea, I really like it too. I love that it turns red in med-high light. It grows like crazy too! It just takes a little while to establish itself before it starts spreading.


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## Chris. (Dec 22, 2008)

well, crap. Yesterday I had a little issue. I think I must have overdosed some ferts in the tank. I'm not sure which though. It was Macro and Fe day. I think I put too much Fe in it. A lot of the shrimp were acting very lethargic. They would even let me hold them in my hand inside the tank. I changed 25% of the water, and they seemed to bounce back within an hour. 

I just looked through the tank and found a dead RCS(berried), and one of my berried amanos is dead as well! Sooo disappointing. I really hope the other amano makes it so I can try to raise her larvae...


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## Chris. (Dec 22, 2008)

Small update. I took out the 4 big pygmy cory cats and put them in my 20g to live with my 3 peppered corys and guppies. I left the 4 tiny corys in here, hoping they don't disturb the few RCS that I have left so they will breed and restock the tank. The plants have REALLY filled in! I need to get rid of the amazon sword in the left. It blocks 98% of the light on that side. The java fern is getting VERY bushy as well. If you look closely you can see one of the pygmys in the center being a camera whore.


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## mudboots (Jun 24, 2009)

That sword looks great=D>; it was funny watching it slowly take over through the pic sequences. I started out 3 of them in a 20 gallon once and in very short order had to move them into the 125 npt, where they now look like nothing compared to the relative size of the tank. 

I thought I recalled that you received some E.ang.vesuvias. If so you can stick it in the place of the big sword and it will utilize the space nicely without becoming a menace.


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## Chris. (Dec 22, 2008)

LOL that sword kinda crept up on me to get that big! I just looked through the pages again and I forgot all about it being as small as it was! The parent shoot has a baby sword on it right now. Leaves of it are about 1" long so far. It's hard to believe they get so big from such tiny plants!

I guess this last update was a big one considering I haven't posted any pics in ages and the plants are MUCH more dense and I've added some new ones to it. 

What i really want to do is sell the sword and the artificial rock with the Java fern on it, to make more room for an HC carpet over there and to let a lot more light into the tank. I have a small carpet of HC in a 2.5g tank that just doesn't seem to be doing very well for some reason, so I really want to put it in here before it dies...


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