# 5 Gallon Hex - Plants and Cories and Shrimp, Oh My! [IMAGES]



## Chandavi (Jun 12, 2012)

Good evening everyone! I have finally gotten my little 5G hex set up, cycled, planted, and stocked. I have been promising several different people pictures of the finished build, so I figured I might as well make a thread about it and direct them here. It took about a month for the fishless cycle to complete, and in this case the cycle seemed to go from 0% completion to 100% completion overnight. Just goes to show that our measuring methods are simply a "view port" into our tank's water chemistry and not always a perfect representation of the facts. Regardless, everything leveled out earlier this week and the bacterial colonies were processing 1 ppm of NH4 into 0 ppm within 24 hours. Almost serendipitously, my LFS finally got the fish I had ordered with no warning whatsoever. What a pleasant surprise!

The aquarium itself is a Marineland 5 gallon acrylic hex, using the stock in-built bio-wheel filter (with modifications). I added a pre-filter sponge and replaced the stock carbon/bluemesh cartridge entirely. Instead, the "basin" of the filter is now filled with porous Aquamax Biomax bio-media, with a cut-to-fit fluval coarse filter sponge on top and a ripped-off chunk of blue mesh from the original filter cartridge at the output end. It sounds and looks very contrived, but it seems to be working well. The heater is an Eheim Jager 25W, which seldom needs to run during the summer here in Georgia. Despite mixed thoughts on the subject, I also decided to add an airstone to increase gas exchange and surface agitation. I am extremely glad I did, and will discuss this further later. All of the water is treated with Prime before being added via siphon, and I am keeping tabs on the parameters with my trusted API Freshwater Master kit.

The tank is planted with spiral/corckscrew vallisneria, _alternanthea reineckii_,_ ludwigia repens_, and frogbit. All of them started out rough after the shipment (special thanks again jccaclimber2 and frogwings), but most of them have perked up quite well. The ludwigia recently took a bad turn and the bottom several inches lost their leaves and began to rot. I pulled it out of the substrate and removed the dead portion and I am hoping that allowing it to float for a while should help it recover. Otherwise, the plants seem to be growing in nicely. On jccaclimber2's suggestion, I planted a single root tab full of osmocote at the center of the tank. After learning about its chemical composition, I became somewhat worried that it was releasing excess ammonia into the water. At this point, I have decided that either my fears were unjustified or I simply have grown a colony of hardcore honey badger bacteria that eat it all anyway. Either way, the root tab has stayed and is hopefully providing good nutrition.

Partway though my cycle I began having a bloom of green hair algae, which I was concerned would choke out the light from my fledgling plants. After reading around online, I decided on a two-pert solution. First, I would lightly dose with Flourish (not excel). Second, I would get some cherry shrimp in there asap. I had planned to temporarily use DIY co2 if those both failed, but it seems that I will not have to resort to that. I added the Flourish, and literally overnight the vast majority of the algae disappeared and I saw an explosive growth in my plants. One of my vals (pictured later) put out about 50% more growth in a 24-hour period. I am sold on Flourish, and at this point I would recommend it to anyone. I am guessing that water had an excess of macronutrients and was almost emptied of micronutrients, which led to algae growth and a slowdown in actual plant growth. Now I just need to carefully balance my dosing without going overboard and harming my cherry shrimp.

As far as fauna goes, I finally got my shoal of cories in about 24 hours ago, along with a pair of cherry shrimp. I originally requested _corydoras pygmaeus_ with _hastatus_ as a fall-back. My LFS got in touch with me on Wednesday and said that they would be getting _hastatus_ in, so I said I would pick up 8. Seeing them on Friday, however, I am fairly certain that they are actually _c. pygmaeus_! I hope someone else can take a look and give me a second opinion here, but they certainly have the _c. pygmaeus_ stripe running head to tail. 

Both the cories and the shrimp were drip-acclimated and then scooped into the aquarium; they then got 12 hours of lights-out rest. All 8 of them are now swimming all over the tank in a relaxed but inquisitive nature. They are specially fond of the air stone it seems, and they can often be seen repeatedly swimming up into the bubbles, getting blown upward, and then swimming out of the bubble column near the surface. I was originally concerned that they did not seem interested in eating, as I introduced a single shrimp pellet 12 hours after placing them in the tank. They showed no interest at first, but both of my shrimp seemed to have cannibalistic tendencies and jumped on it straight away. The shrimp, actually, have gone from pale pinkish gray (transport) to bright pinkish red over the past 24 hours. I guess this is a sign that they have settled in comfortably? They have been voracious eaters so far and seem to be chowing down on the remaining (possibly dead) hair algae.

Now, the pictures! Everyone loves this part! Unfortunately I only have my phone here to take pictures, so they are pretty blurry. I will try to get some better pictures taken soon! The entire album is uploaded here! Please take a look and make comments or suggestions!


















In the immediate future, I am looking to expand my cherry shrimp population. I originally wanted to get 6-8 specimens, but my LFS only had 2 remaining when I got there. I hope to get 6 more soon! At that point, hopefully I will be able to have a sustaining (and growing) colony! In the long term I _may_ elect to get single small high-water fish to add in later. Dario dario (scarlet badis) is one I am looking at, as it should inhabit the mid-high regions while remaining small. Also, it seems to like the same water conditions as the cories. The major drawback of adding this guy would be that he would surely eat any shrimplets. Regardless, I would not be adding anything (aside from more shrimp) any time within the next several months.

Comments, suggestions, and general feedback are appreciated and welcomed! *c/p*


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## KG4mxv (Oct 25, 2011)

Nice set up. I am so jealous. How about a picture of the entire setup. 
I have a 46g bow front that doesn't look half as good as yours at the moment.
I have a tone of angel hair alga I manually got rid of most of it but I have a 
good bit on my gravel. The little hitchhiker snails I have in the tank don't touch the stuff. 
So do the shrimp eat it. I use to have ghost shrimp but they didn't touch it either. 

again nice set up.


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