# Reginald's Do!Aqua Mini-M



## Reginald2 (Mar 10, 2009)

I dug this little fella out of the closet not too long ago and decided I'd give it a go. I really didn't have a great place to put it or, a stand to put it on, so this project has been on hold for quite some time. The glass itself looks nice, but is awfully soft and quite scratched, it's also got a few hard water stains, which is sort of remarkable considering how soft my water is. 

This is the first tank I've ever set up with ADA Aquasoil. I put some crushed lava rock in the back to help give it a bit more of a slope, but I notice that it's already flattened out considerably over the three weeks it has been planted. A lot of that was my fault though, I bought a new stand, so I had to move everything after it was planted, and I may have gotten a little excited when the rocks first came in, so I ended up flooding it a bit prematurely as I was making a giant muddy mess w/ wet rocks and dry soil. I'm also using a hob Aqua Clear Mini, which due to the placements of the rock on the left and the lightness of the soil will dig right on through to the lava rocks given half the chance. I'll have to be kind of careful with the water levels. I'm hoping once the plants take root that they'll help out a bit & maybe I'll even be able to correct the slope a little, but I'm not sure how possible that really is.

Equipment:
Do!Aqua Mini-M
Azoo Flex Mini
archaea co2 regulator & a little glass diffuser from my old picotope (running this at a very generous rate).
Aqua Clear Mini
Amazonia powder substrate



This is the day after I planted. I used three pots of Micranthemum tweediei 'Monte Carlo', one of Lilaeopsis brasiliensis, & one of Hydrocotyle tripartita. Going for sort of a mixed lawn look.

I trimmed the snot out of the Monte Carlo & Hydrocotyle Tripartita and tried to space it out as much as I could and sprinkled in a bit of Lilaeopsis brasiliensis here and there with most by the filter inlet. I'm pretty impressed with the Aquasoil's ability to grab onto little plantlets. I put it under water before I planted and haven't really had much trouble with plants floating up. The planting itself was pretty painless as well.


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## Reginald2 (Mar 10, 2009)

My 40 has been set up for so long, I've forgotten what a new tank was like. This Aquasoil lets off a LOT of ammonia. I'm pretty sure it blew out my api test kit one or two days. I've been doing 50+ish% water changes daily after the lights go off. Sometime during this week I started to notice that nitrite slimy feeling and was able to confirm it with a test kit. It had a bunch of nitrites and ammonia. I'm too unfamiliar with aquasoil to know if that is being leeched out as well (or nitrates for that matter) but I noticed some of each in the tests and would like to think the cycle has started.

I also forgot what a pita water changes on little tanks like this can be, especially with the aquasoil being so light. I've sort of got a system now involving an old filter inlet attached to my python and just dribbling in the water, but I've considered buying a ladder (to get a little height) and using a bucket and some airline. That's how I used to change my pico, but I had a shelf right above it.

This is after two weeks (one week ago). Some growth, some conversion, and some melting. The Micranthemum tweediei seems to have taken some hold, it had a bunch of emmersed growth, but I feel like I can sort of see a difference. The Hydrocotyle tripartita seems to be in pretty good shape here. The Lilaeopsis brasiliensis was basically all emmersed growth. I've used it before and can't quite remember if it dies back or not, but it's such an easy plant I think it'll be ok.


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## Reginald2 (Mar 10, 2009)

Well, it's been pretty much three weeks. It's definitely filling in a bit. These pictures are a little reassuring. If there was a war between the Micranthemum tweediei & Hydrocotyle tripartita. I believe the Hydrocotyle would be winning. I can definitely see some growth in the Micrathemum tweediei though. I've had to pick off a few of the Hyrocotyle tripartita's leaves that looked like they weren't going to make it and were developing some algae. They look healthy enough that I think it won't be a problem. I've even seen a couple of runners from the Lilaeopsis brasiliensis pop out here and there. 

I'm hoping the Micrathemum tweediei starts laying down some more roots soon. I'm happy to see it creeping along the bottom. it looks like everything in there has melted/converted probably 90% of what it is going to do, though I'll have to keep an eye on the lilaeopsis brasilensis as I believe it should be the slowest plant in here. Overall I think I'll have to yank out a few various leaves and bits here and there, but the order for the day seems to be to wait.

I've thought about stocking very little, I may not even put anything in there tbh. I'd love a betta, but I think this tank would have a little more flow than they seem to like and I'm not sure how they'd feel about this sort of open space with nothing to hide under. I may well do some shrimp, but I'd need to figure out a way to keep the filter from sucking them up somehow. I don't really like the thought of little shrimps getting impellered. I think they'd like crawling around all over the place with no fish though. In my larger tank, I feel like baby guppies and baby shrimp reach maturity by their wits and mettle Either way, this tank has a while before I think it would be stable enough for livestock.

The ammonia has dropped to zero on the test kit, so it's definitely cooking some bacteria. I feel pretty certain the aquasoil is still leeching ammonia. The nitrites are way high. I'm not even sure. I've never really been able to tell the difference between 2 and 5 on those little test kits, so I'm just taking it as: a bunch of nitrites. It may be a little less slimy feeling... though I have had my hand in there a bit more too. I feel like nitrates are the last to leave in a cycle, and the last to show up in a boo-boo. I'm guessing the bacteria that eats ammonia must be a little more boom and bust and the bacteria that eats nitrites must be a little heartier. I'm also seeing some nitrates, but I don't think I could pin them down to being a byproduct of bacteria buffet.

Between the growth and the cycle, I have to say that I'm a bit more impressed with the aquasoil than I wanted to be. I believe my bag (which was a little old, this project has been on hold a while) was a little dried out and may have given me a little grief. Barring anything else though, it'll be hard for me to not think about using it again, despite the cost and shipping. I've been putting a little boop of Easy Green in there (it looked like it had some phosphate & potassium that I understand aquasoil to be a bit lacking in, but other than that, it's just sort of going right along. 

I've been experimenting a little with water levels and co2 (because if things are going well, you should fiddle until there's a problem). I did pick up a little bubble counter though, so hopefully I'll be a bit more precise in my fiddles. I do think my drop checker is a bit slow to respond due to its size and may eventually try to come up with a better system than the ebay glass diffuser that I'm using now. 

We'll see. They've recently bumped my city back to stage one quarantine, so it's nice to have a little project.


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## Reginald2 (Mar 10, 2009)

Chugging right along...

I really like the light color temperature on this little light. The hydrocotyle tripartita is still going a bit nuts. I have had to take off a leaf here or there due to some algae (pretty sure, it was brown) I expect that those are leaves that didn't quite make it to their immersed state, really just on the hydrocotyle tripartita & lilaeopsis brasiliensis. The micranthimum tweediei has been a bit melty in some places, but seems to be shooting off little leaves wherever it can, still not real good roots though. My technique for moving the dirt has improved a little though. I now just comb it a bit to try to unearth the plants that get covered through my various filling-the-tank boo boos. Sorry for the long names, just trying to memorize them.

THe hydrocotyle tripartita is pretty aggressive tbh. I may have to cut that back a bit but I figure, for now, the more plant mass the merrier, but it sure likes growing.

The nitrites have dropped a good bit, kind of everything has. So I'm sort of thinking that the aquasoil is leeching a bit less than it has in the past. I'm hoping the nitrite eating bacteria have a chance to take hold though. They've always taken a bit longer in my tanks for some reason. I'm sort of leaning towards shrimps now. I think there's just a bit too much flow for a betta. I feel like i'd want it to sit for a while after it cycles (like a month or two just to iron out any of that other new tank stuff). I'm a little concerned about the biological stuff in that case though, and wonder if I should... like drop a fellet or two of food in there in the mean time. I've got some little powdered shrimp food (bacter ae) maybe that would help out to keep the bugs going, until the bigger bugs arrive. Though, in the likely event that i can't source some shrimp locally, it'll probably be a few months before temperatures gets warm enough to ship again.

This is at week four.


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## NotThePainter (Dec 17, 2020)

That's really coming along nicely!


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## Reginald2 (Mar 10, 2009)

The tripartita is an absolute weed. I think I'll give it a haircut this next little while. I'm kind of thinking I'll just trim it and see how it goes (maybe start off with just half the tank or so). I do like the mixed lawn look, but I realize I have a mixed lawn of three radically different growing rates lol. I guess you live and you learn. I think a little haircut may help give the micranthimum tweediei a chance to continue coming in. I noticed a little more brown algae in here. I guess it is diatoms, but it's not quite as dusty as I remembered it being, more hair like. I'm thinking that is just new tank stuff. I've just been picking at it for now.I had recently backed up on my water changes, maybe that was a bit premature.


Didn't do quite as good with my camera angles this week. I'm a terrible photographer, but I figured I could at least be consistent lol. Also, are these too big?


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## Reginald2 (Mar 10, 2009)

The joy of cycling an aquarium: I think we've completed the nitrogen cycle. Now we've got that new fish tank smell, oh and the water is got a wild film. It is sort of interesting to watch a tank break in, well one without fish at any rate, so much has to come together to create a little habitable glass box. To see a little ecosystem come together in the living room and to realize how fragile, but how _natural_ it is. It's like taking some little piece of something older than history itself, something genuinely ancient, and stuffing it in something as modern as glass and watching it come together and figure out how to exist. It's a bit magical... or something.

Still plucking out some algae leaves, and i gave the tripartita a little trim and wiped off the algae from the front and side glass. I'm not sure why i left it on the back, but I surely did. For some reason the green algae seems better than the brown algae and I guess any algae means that it's a little further along. I'll take what I can get. I need to get in ther and give it another little spruce up already.

If you look closely you might be able to see some mildew (I guess, the pink stuff)


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## Reginald2 (Mar 10, 2009)

No real update this week. The smell has died back a bit, it's still a bit oily, but I think that's starting to clear now too. Brown Algae is sort of on right now. I spotted some cyanobacteria in there too. Ammonia/nitrite is super stable, but I'm not too sure how much ammonia is being leeched off any more, there's still some nitrate, so I think a bit is still coming off. Everything is growing like gangbusters so I gave everything a big ole' haircut to give the micranthimum tweediei some light under the hydrocotlye tripartita carpet.




























Bump: No real update this week. The smell has died back a bit, it's still a bit oily, but I think that's starting to clear now too. Brown Algae is sort of on right now. I spotted some cyanobacteria in there too. Ammonia/nitrite is super stable, but I'm not too sure how much ammonia is being leeched off any more, there's still some nitrate, so I think a bit is still coming off. Everything is growing like gangbusters so I gave everything a big ole' haircut to give the micranthimum tweediei some light under the hydrocotlye tripartita carpet.


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## Junglist (Apr 1, 2020)

Looking good! Gonna do livestock?


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## Reginald2 (Mar 10, 2009)

Junglist said:


> Looking good! Gonna do livestock?



Thanks, I picked up a couple of Tangerine Tiger shrimp and threw a couple of pond snails from my other aquarium in here.

For real though, this tank has been looking like Dagobah. I've got brown stringy algae for sale!

I've had a couple of hearty haircuts to keep it at bay, and it seems to be dying back a bit now. I think it's just growing pains

Real Talk™ I'm not 100% sure that I'm feeling this tank. I absolutely wanted to set this back up in the day... I may have just carried through with that due to momentum. I had reasons, I'm not sure they're still the same/going to come to fruition.

I don't know how I feel about that. 

I've decided to decide in June. In the meantime I've been thinking a lot about a waterbox 30, something kind of low light with a betta. I'm not one for hasty decisions, and it maybe just some new tank blues: hence June.


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## Reginald2 (Mar 10, 2009)

Well, the brown string algae has died back a bit. Now I have some brown diatoms and green algaes of various types. The two snails I introduced have reproduced, a lot, and all together everything seems to be doing well. There must be a fair chunk of organics in there to facilitate their population growth. Also, these little pest snails look good under this lighting and seem kind of massive compared to my other tank. I guess the tank is kind of breaking in past the basic bacteria ammonia/nitrate stage. There are some strange little worms, and I'm hoping a whole slew of various micro flaura/fauna that I'm unable to see. It's nice to see it come together a bit more. It's easy to forget just how complicated these little glass boxes are. Life is sort of crazy and fragile and interdependent. I guess even more so on such a small scale. 

I've been leaving it a bit dirty to entourage nature's shrimp food. I think it's working as I see them out and about shrimping around a bit more often now. I'm not sure which side of the line I'm riding there lol: healthy environment or ticking time bomb. Time will tell. I'm also quite happy to report more shrimp survivors than I previously thought. I even found one hanging out in the filter. He's the smallest, but they've all grown a pretty good amount.

Plant-wise, it's a pretty high energy tank, lots of growth. I was able to get rid of the hair algae by removing the top layer of plants a few times. Trimming it is sort of a pita, and scooping out the trimmings: more so. 

The surface scum, is not quite as bad as it was, but it's still there in spades. Honestly, this tank might like top offs more than water changes. The tank is sort of still maturing and balancing. I think the snails were a good idea.

I'm still thinking about that waterbox 30. It's an odd sized stand and that is a perfect sized tank. I'm not sure ada/uns still make that size. I kind of wonder if I should pick one up to have it on deck. The stand is certainly nice enough to keep around.

Please ignore the algae, washed out color, and poor photography.


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## Nanomike (Feb 10, 2021)

Here's a tank I setup 4 weeks ago now using CO2 and monte carlo. 
3 pots of monte carlo 
1 pot of bacopa 
1 pot of Salvinia 

1st Day 
And week after week





































Sent from my SM-G998W using Tapatalk


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## Nanomike (Feb 10, 2021)

Reginald2 said:


> Well, the brown string algae has died back a bit. Now I have some brown diatoms and green algaes of various types. The two snails I introduced have reproduced, a lot, and all together everything seems to be doing well. There must be a fair chunk of organics in there to facilitate their population growth. Also, these little pest snails look good under this lighting and seem kind of massive compared to my other tank. I guess the tank is kind of breaking in past the basic bacteria ammonia/nitrate stage. There are some strange little worms, and I'm hoping a whole slew of various micro flaura/fauna that I'm unable to see. It's nice to see it come together a bit more. It's easy to forget just how complicated these little glass boxes are. Life is sort of crazy and fragile and interdependent. I guess even more so on such a small scale.
> 
> I've been leaving it a bit dirty to entourage nature's shrimp food. I think it's working as I see them out and about shrimping around a bit more often now. I'm not sure which side of the line I'm riding there lol: healthy environment or ticking time bomb. Time will tell. I'm also quite happy to report more shrimp survivors than I previously thought. I even found one hanging out in the filter. He's the smallest, but they've all grown a pretty good amount.
> 
> ...


With monte carlo make sure to trim the carpet often don't let it get really thick as the bottom layer will die. Or air will get trapped in the carpet and rip it up off the bottom. Also sounds like Planaria worms. 
You can get rib of these little pests with a trap. VIV Planaria Trap

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## Reginald2 (Mar 10, 2009)

Nanomike said:


> With monte carlo make sure to trim the carpet often don't let it get really thick as the bottom layer will die. Or air will get trapped in the carpet and rip it up off the bottom. Also sounds like Planaria worms.
> You can get rib of these little pests with a trap. VIV Planaria Trap
> 
> Sent from my SM-G998W using Tapatalk


That's a nice looking tank. 

Yeah, the growth in this little fella is a bit more than I was aiming for honestly. My bigger tank I can forget about for a week or so and not worry to much about it, plus the MC in there is one of the slower growers due to the light it gets. This one needs top offs a couple of times a week and trimming every week or two and is sort of high maintenance fr. I'm a bit light with the feedings, but not sure I've found the balance yet. I'm used to feeding voracious killer guppies and not shrimp, so I only feed a couple of times a week, but I'm sure it's too much.


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## Reginald2 (Mar 10, 2009)

I'm happy to have the little shrimp in here. I've noticed they're still a bit timid though, in my big tank they walk around like they own the place. In this little guy, they seem a bit skittish tbh. I guess it could be because it gets so overgrown so quickly, or maybe the light is a bit bright for them. I think I've only accurately counted them once or twice. I do have one with little babies/eggs in her flappers. I'm hoping they do well here. The snails and planaria sure seem to be thriving. I'm still trying to overfeed a hair to get some good micro-fauna/flora in there for shrimps to eat.

The snails are the real savior of the tank. They got in there and did work on the surface scum. There is no more noticeable smell or film. Basically, all the diatoms are gone. I'm not sure if that's just the cycle or the snails, but they have been in there doing work, so they get credit. It's a happy little tank, happily chugging on.

I've developed a real love/hate relationship with the aquasoil. It does plants real gud, but if I look at it wrong it gets sucked up the siphon when cleaning lol. I feel it's flattened quite a bit. I'm used to eco-complete that I can gravel vac like it was clown puke gravel.

I think I'm still eyeing my Juneish date for a decision on whether to keep or convert. Currently leaning toward keep.


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## Reginald2 (Mar 10, 2009)

There's not too much to report. I guess we've reached the point where I'd say this tank is pretty stable. I had to swap out my CO2 diffuser. 

I noticed one of the little shrimps carrying eggs/whatever, that makes me sort of happy. I feel pretty proud of this little tank. I always wanted a little high energy high growth tank. I have to admit I'm still thinking about a bigger betta tank on this stand though. It's an odd little sized that I don't think uns or ada make anymore. I've also realized that I don't love rimless tanks as much as I love the idea of rimpless tanks, but it might be a different situation if it were bigger. idk. I'm still thinking about a low light low energy betta/shrimp type of thing, Who knows?

The stand on this tank has got to be six inches taller than the stand on my big tank and it makes me a bit jealous. 

Right after a pretty severe haircut. I cut it as close to the substrate as I could:


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## Reginald2 (Mar 10, 2009)

Overgrown. In my defense: one of the shrimps dropped shrimplets and I was sort of waiting for them to get a bit bigger before I mowed. They're not quite rice sized yet, but I think I'm going to have to do something with this mess anyway. Everything is nice and thick, plus little shrimplets running around. I know I've seen at least a couple. In that last picture you can see one of the little shrimps mission impossibleing. I think the Lilaeopsis brasiliensis got choked out by the tripartita & monte carlo.

I'm kind of waiting for the ganas, but I've been staring at it long enough that I think I'll get to it. I do dread picking out all that Monte Carlo though. I didn't want to disturb the little shrimp too much though.


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## Plinkploop (Jan 24, 2021)

Wow the h tripartita really took over!!


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## Reginald2 (Mar 10, 2009)

post trim:


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## Reginald2 (Mar 10, 2009)

Plinkploop said:


> Wow the h tripartita really took over!!


It's an absolute weed lol


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## Plinkploop (Jan 24, 2021)

Hoping my 'japan' variant fights off the diatoms soon. Would love to have them looking like yours!!


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## Reginald2 (Mar 10, 2009)

Well, I had a little tiny power outage and somehow the hob never restarted (I've never had that happen) all the shrimps died in like 12 hours or so.

I'm not really too sure what happened there tbh. It was pretty disheartening. I already had little shrimps and then...

I was able to move three over to my big tank, but one died and the other two may or may not have. I did catch a glimpse of one a few days after, but no sightings since then. It's a big tank with lots of good shrimp spots, so I hope they hang in there.

So. I guess now it has some snails in it and has become an odd experiment in excel. I've always wondered if you can overdose the whole tank to kill bba and it has sort of worked, but required a dose I don't think I'd feel comfortable with if there were any shrimp/fish. I treated w/ 15ml every other day and 20ml on the last day for a week. Napkin math puts that around 6-8x recommended levels. I kind of plan on monitoring this tank, but honestly not much past that at this point. I am going to keep it up for a couple of more months at least and play around with the parameters, but I don't know that I will restock this tank.

Honestly, I sort of made this post to convince myself to trim. It's been about two weeks since the incident and I'm still a bit bummed about it.


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