# Fletch's Fishbowl Shenanigans



## tenzero1 (Nov 29, 2011)

Good start. Just remember that with less water volume you are likely to have more issues due to the confinement. Personally I would fill it to the brim. You will know when algae appears in that small of a tank.


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## Fletch (Mar 18, 2004)

*Fletch's Fishbowl Day 9*

On Day 7, after I noticed brown algae on all the leaves, I did another 100% water change (used aquarium water) and added some ramshorn snails. By Day 9, the 4 tiny ramshorns had cleaned all of the algae off most of the plants. If you look at the photo of the Anubias leaf on the right, it still is half covered with brown algae. By the time I got around to doing this post, the snails had totally polished off the algae. I love these guys. Now if I could just get them to clean my kitchen. Might have to fill the kitchen with water though. Also, they didn't die of ammonia poisoning, so I thought that was a good sign. Still nervous that I am going to get some sort of ammonia spike, or massive algae bloom, mainly because this is actually my first "dirted" tank. Herbert Axelrod's ghost is telling me that using dirt in an aquarium is insane, but all the fantastic pictures on the internet are telling me the opposite.


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## Fletch (Mar 18, 2004)

tenzero1 said:


> Good start. Just remember that with less water volume you are likely to have more issues due to the confinement. Personally I would fill it to the brim. You will know when algae appears in that small of a tank.


That was my plan. Push the issue, find out sooner (ie. while I was still on holidays) so I could react immediately. It's full to the brim now. Love the magnification look.


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## Fletch (Mar 18, 2004)

*Another shot of Day 9*

A better shot of the slightly dirty Anubias that my buddy the snail totally polished by the end of the day. Hmmmm, apparently I need to do some reading in the photography forum.


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## Fletch (Mar 18, 2004)

Went back to the dreaded WalMart and bought the last 2g clear bowl in the city. If there was an Aquariums Anonymous, I would have to call my sponsor


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## Knotyoureality (Aug 3, 2012)

Nah, "addiction" is when you go out to dinner and find yourself eyeing the oversized wineglasses wondering if they'd be too top-heavy to make a good pico tank. Or haunting the thrift stores on your day off collecting interesting vases, bowls and glasses. 

My high (low?) point was 40 nano/pico tanks, 36 of 'em 1g and under. Took me a year to work my way down to just the seven tanks that I have now.


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## tenzero1 (Nov 29, 2011)

Fletch said:


> Went back to the dreaded WalMart and bought the last 2g clear bowl in the city. If there was an Aquariums Anonymous, I would have to call my sponsor


Carefull! I started off with too many tanks initially and my wife got sick of the sight of them. After toning it down she now appreciates a nice tank haha. I do miss my bowl though, all i ever had to do was top off the water and it handled the rest. I will subscribe to your thread and check on the progress!


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## Fletch (Mar 18, 2004)

tenzero1 said:


> Carefull! I started off with too many tanks initially and my wife got sick of the sight of them.


I have no such impediment to my obsession. I am not sure if that is a good thing or a bad thing. :|


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## Fletch (Mar 18, 2004)

Knotyoureality said:


> Nah, "addiction" is when .... haunting the thrift stores on your day off collecting interesting vases, bowls and glasses.
> 
> You just described my morning.


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## Fletch (Mar 18, 2004)

Day11: Crypts are melting?!? Everything else is growing beautifully. Fresh leaves, good color, no algae on surface. Some plants even bubble off oxygen later in the day when the artificial light comes on. Crypts have decided to punish me for moving them from my main tank. They are melting. I may have to make an example of them.


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## AGUILAR3 (Jun 22, 2013)

All my crypts melted then came back strong. I now get the occasional light deprived melted leaf.


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## Fletch (Mar 18, 2004)

I think I have figured out why my Crypts were melting. It's been a very cold winter, and my house is cold. Below the range where tropicals thrive. However, they are still growing new leaves, and appear to be adapting to the conditions. This got me wondering if I could find a small heater to bring the temperature up. I found a Fluval bowl heater http://www.petsmart.com/product/ind...76&lmdn=Aquarium+Size&f=PAD/psNotAvailInCA/No
So, I started a new bowl, that is now heated. It should be an interesting comparison.
See how I rationalized another bowl


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## Fletch (Mar 18, 2004)

*Yes we have no bananas*

I am hoping that the banana plant likes this bowl, and sends leaves to the top of the tank. I love the way the bowl warps and magnifies. The Fluval 7.5W pad heater buried under the substrate seems to be keeping the temperature at 22-25 degrees C, while the rest of my house is at 20 degrees.
I used new, small grain, quartz gravel for this bowl. Unfortunately it was not from a cycled tank, so I may have some algae and bacteria blooms for a while. The water was from an established tank, so that may help.


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## Fletch (Mar 18, 2004)

Here is a Day 23 pic of my first bowl. After an initial burst during the first two weeks, growth seems to be slowing down. Most likely due to the fact that my house is quite cool. There are 5 ghost shrimp in this bowl now, living up to their names.


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## Aplomado (Feb 20, 2013)

Don't bury the anubias rizome in the gravel, attach it to an object. It will die if the rhizome is buried.


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## Fletch (Mar 18, 2004)

The rhizome of the Anubias in my bowl is about 1/2 cm above the gravel, actually standing on its own roots, like they are legs. The roots grow down into the substrate. If you tie Anubias to something where the roots can't grow into the substrate, they grow so slowly they may as well be plastic. If the roots can grow into the substrate, I get three or four new leaves per month. When the rhizome gets to be about 3 or 4 cm long, I reach into the tank and cut the rhizome in half. The half with leaves keeps on growing just fine, and the piece with no leaves sprouts new ones within a few weeks. When it gets large enough, I move it to a new location. It usually takes a clump of gravel with it, which keeps it from floating. Definitely my favorite plant.


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## Fletch (Mar 18, 2004)

If I make any more larger bowls, I will definitely put one of these low wattage heaters in it. http://www.petsmart.com/product/inde...AvailInCA/No
My first bowl, without heat, is hovering at 18-20 degrees, and the plants are NOT happy. Only the Ludwigia is growing, the rest have slowed to a crawl. The second bowl with the heater under the gravel, stays between 22 and 24 degrees C and is showing new growth for all the plants. I sure hope this -20 degree C weather goes away soon. My house is not the best environment for my nano tanks and spherical bowls without heat.


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## Fletch (Mar 18, 2004)

Day 30, and the ghost shrimp in Bowl1 are a lively bunch. They lounge around all day under the plants, and at about 10pm they all come out for a game of "frantically swim around the outer rim of the tank for 20 minutes". This is why I love the bowl. As the tiny ghost shrimp approaches the other side of the bowl, he is magnified large enough to see all the details of the shrimps weird little alien body. Freakin weird little things, with strange behaviors. Better keep an eye on them. So, apparently Bowl1 is pretty much cycled, and fit for animal life. Plant growth still kinda slowed down due it being freezin freakin cold (-30 C with the windchill) outside, which makes my house a cold, drafty existence for a bowl with no heater.


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## Fletch (Mar 18, 2004)

*Bowl 2 update: Heat helps.*

Apparently, tropical aquatic plants like to be warm. Whooda thunkit? These two shots are from day 17 of my second bowl, the one with the cheapo under gravel heater in it. The water is now crystal clear, and the plants seem to be thriving. Time to start looking for some Red Cherry Shrimp. Bowl 1 seems to be stuck at the same level it was at a few weeks ago, but the ghost shrimp in it seem to be happy enough. Not much point in posting a pic of Bowl 1. It looks the same as the last photo, except for a few more leaves on the Cardamine lyrata and Ludwigia. I need to think of a way to construct a heated shelf, so I don't need to have electrical cords hanging out the back of the bowls.


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## AGUILAR3 (Jun 22, 2013)




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## AquaAurora (Jul 10, 2013)

AGUILAR3 said:


> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KRdwPlqn0Zg


Cool idea and ok pricing until you get around to the detail of temp control... Then you end up with a cord and a bill larger than buying an adjustable aquarium heaters.


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## Fletch (Mar 18, 2004)

*Message from beyond*

When I was attending University, someone gave me a Betta fish left over from a Biology lab. I took it home and my mom gave me a 2 gallon pickle jar to house him in. She told all her friends about this, and recruited free aquariums, filters, light canopies, and stands from her extensive network of friends. Pretty soon, the spare bedroom upstairs was full of fish and plants. Recently, I started assembling planted aquatic bowls. I wondered how my mom would have liked them. Today, while rummaging through boxes of trinkets I inherited from her, I came across one of those trinkets. Purchased decades ago by my mom to hang on a fish bowl I assembled long after she passed on. Thanks mom.


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## Fletch (Mar 18, 2004)

I have a ghost shrimp in Bowl 1 that is carrying eggs! Woo! Hoo! I can quit my job and open a shrimp farm! Let's see, at 50 cents a shrimp, I can make..... oh crap.... oh well, they should be interesting at least.


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## boxboy (Jun 1, 2013)

Nice looking bowl.. Do you have a list of plants you have in there and what temp are you keeping it at??


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## Fletch (Mar 18, 2004)

The bowl with the snooping cat contains the following plants:
Golden Lloydiella
Didiplis diandra
Banana plant
Telanthera Cardinalis
and a sprig of bladderwort that eats the copepods in the bowl.

The Fluval under substrate fixed temperature heater keeps the temperature between 20 and 24 degrees, depending on how cold the room is. It gets a few hours of winter sunlight during the day, supplemented with 6 hrs from a 23W, 6500K compact fluorescent lamp, for a total of 8 - 10 hours of light. The Didiplis diandra and Telanthera are doing very well. The Lloydiella and banana plant seem healthy, but are not really growing that much. There are a multitude of snails, copepods, and some sort of water bug the size of a poppy seed. I am planning to stock it with a few Red Cherry Shrimp when I can find some. The first, unheated bowl is the one with the ghost shrimp in it.


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## wbwks (Dec 29, 2013)

Hi Fletch,

I inherited a 2 gal tank with a red claw crab, it has a swimming area as well as dry land. I also had trouble with finding a heater, especially since this tank has very low water content. 

I "dug up" a regular old (old is the key word) heating pad and put a couple of magazines on top then the tank on top of that. Viola!! The tank keeps a steady temp of 75 deg with the heating pad on "low", I plan to remove the heating pad when the weather (and my house) warms up. Without the magazine buffer, the tank was a bit over 80 deg which was too warm for the crab.


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## Fletch (Mar 18, 2004)

*The addiction grows*

Here are some more of my planted nanoish containers. The first is actually my first planted nano container. It is almost 100 days old in this pic. It is Cardamine Lyrata with a Nephthytis podophyllum growing up the centre. When the leaves grow out above the top of the container, I will fill the vase to the top. The lamp it is standing under is actually kid of interesting. It is made of Cyprus nodes (or knee), the growths on the roots of a Cyprus that grow up out of the water so the roots can get access to air. My parents made this lamp in a tourist trap in Florida, in the 1950's, while on their honeymoon. Apparently harvesting these is now frowned upon because it can damage the trees. The second vase is a 2.5g I found at a Thrift shop for $3. It is only 2 weeks old, and has a Cryptocoryn wenditii (redish) and some floating duckweed that hitchhiked in on the Crypt. Both vases have a few tiny snails to clean up the algae, and eat the dying leaves.


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## Fletch (Mar 18, 2004)

*Not really aquatic, but still fun*

These are two views of my Mosstini. Terrestrial Moss, in a weird glass container I found at a thrift shop for $2. It is about 2 weeks old. There are actually a couple of different types of moss in this glass, and a piece of petrified wood.


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## OVT (Nov 29, 2011)

I am enjoying reading your thread - keep it up, please.

v3


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## Fletch (Mar 18, 2004)

*Dec 2014 update: The obsession grows*

Here is a pic of my Bowl 1 after 11 months. This was the unheated bowl. It grew slowly, and has only been trimmed and tidied up once. It is very stable and I have had no algae problems at all. The photo was taken just before a water change that was the first in months! It has a bit of a tea look to it because of the tannins from the MGOPS. It has quite the population of flatworms, snails, and various tiny crustaceans. It has housed Shrimp, Endlers and White Cloud minnows at various times. The heated bowl 2 shown earlier in this post had to be torn down after 4 months because the plant growth was so fast it completely filled the tank. I used the plants to start another few bowls and fill out a 35 g tank.

Bump: Below, check out the odd shaped tank I found at my LFS and just had to buy it. I have never seen one like it anywhere, not even on the internet. I am thinking I might try to set it up as a riparium, with tall emersed plants, fully aquatic plants, and some dwarf frogs. This will be a new years project.


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## Fletch (Mar 18, 2004)

*Expanding bowl collections*

Here is some more of my obsession


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## Fletch (Mar 18, 2004)

*My 3g bowl with marble sculpture*

Made this a few days ago. I found a weird marble loop sculpture and thought it would look much better under water, with plants and shrimp.








Bump:


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## Fletch (Mar 18, 2004)

*Portable, easy water change Betta tank*

Made this portable Betta tank for some friends at work. The office setting makes water changes cumbersome, so I thought I would try to make it a bit easier. There is a basket of filter media behind the tap that keeps rocks and soil from leaving with the water. There is also a handle on top, so it is much easier to carry from desk to desk. I am hoping this will be a better Betta home for the fish they are keeping in a tank that is hard to service, leading to water changes being done not nearly enough.


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## Fletch (Mar 18, 2004)

*2 year old thrift shop goldfish bowl aquascape.*

I put this together 2 years ago. This one needs maintenance, which is not bad, considering I have done NOTHING to it for 2 years. Added no water, scraped no algae, nothing. Just admired it. My houseplant collection is dwindling because they are needy bitches that require constant care and watering. The only creatures in this classic goldfish bowl are a few tiny snails, and some aquatic crustaceans that I put in to help keep suspended algae under control. Their population is very low, but I occasionally see some flicking around in the water, doing their job.


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## limeslide (Jan 27, 2010)

This thread is amazing. Each one is so individual and equally beautiful. Have you ever done one of these set ups using sunlight?


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