# New 25g starfire tank



## cityhunter (Feb 15, 2010)

Bought a Fluval Edge back in 2009 as my first planted tank. I think I maxed it out in terms of what I can do with it.. (see thread here) So, last December, I decided to pick up a bigger tank to try out other different ideas. The tank I chose was a 25g starfire from Aqua Inspiration. Also picked up their ADA Amazonia II soil and NAG accessories. Took everything home and left it in my basement for more than a month before I started playing with it 

Jan 17 - Finally started work on the tank. Got some driftwood and also put the ADA soil in, with a layer of Fluval substrate underneath. I thought I woudl also give emersed planting a try. Went and bought some dwarf hairgrass and HC, and this is what it looked like after the planting.










Feb 20 - More than a month later, there was growth but slower than expected. I was also getting a lot of cyano and black slime algae covering the hairgrass and HC.... I think I might have put too much water in the soil to begin with. During this time, I decided to move the driftwood around and tried out some stone work...










Feb 27 - The black slime was getting worse and worse, so I figured I might as well fill the tank and see what happens... This pic was taken right after the tank was filled. As you can see, the water was green and pretty dirty. Helped a little after I changed 50% of the water..










Mar 19 - Attack of the fuzzy brown algae. It started almost the next day after the tank was filled in... At first, it was very little and I just removed it by hand manually, then as days went by, it became more and more... I put in stem plants to try fight it (i.e. thinking they would "steal" the nutrients from the algae), but things only got worse. I know this is part of the cycling phase, but it didn't help that the algae was blocking a lot of light which caused my HC and hairgrass to die off. I tried changing 20% water every other day, and spent at least an hour daily removing this stuff, but it just kept coming back with more and more...This pic was taken after I tried to remove it by hand as much as possible, and as you can see, it still didn't look too good.. I was about to give up and thinking I should just rip out all the HC since that's where I was getting most of the algae.










Apr 2 - As I was about to give up, I thought I would try one more tactic. I went to the lfs and bought 2 SAE's and 2 otto's, took them home, put them in the tank, then overdosed 2x Excel. Finally, I put a garbage bag around the tank and left it blacked out for 3 days. That was back in March 23rd. Well, all I can say is it worked. This method managed to get rid of almost 80% of the fuzzy stuff. The remaining I removed by hand. Pic below shows what my tank looks like now. I have already filled it with some Harlequin Rasbora's and Celestial Pearl Danio's. All that fuzzy stuff has pretty much disappeared and the plants are pearling and growing crazy. Only issue now is that when I had the brown fuzzy algae, it prevented the HC to root firmly, and now a lot of it just gets uprooted by my SAEs and cherry shrimps 










I am pretty happy with it now, and just a couple of weeks ago I was about to tear down the whole tank... I guess patience really pays off in this hobby.


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## cityhunter (Feb 15, 2010)

Some more pics of my livestock...

A Celestial Pearl Danio checking out a cherry shrimp










Harlequin rasboras just having fun










Cherry shrimp uprooting my HC.. Grrr...


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## dr3167 (Feb 18, 2011)

Well done. I bet your happy that you waited it out. The tank is beautiful.

Is that a needle leaf fern on the right ( looking at it ) side?


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## Cypher (Apr 15, 2006)

You know, I've read that starfire glass wouldn't make much if any difference at all for tanks under 100 gallons. Meaning its not any more clear than a regular glass in smaller/ thinner glass tanks.

I don't know if it's your camera, lighting or how clean you kept the front pane, but I can barely tell there's glass at all! Especially in the first two and last three pictures. Your pics definitely make a case for starfire being superior regardless of tank size. Nicely done.


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## laurahmm (Apr 1, 2010)

Beautiful tank! What type of moss are you growing on your driftwood?


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## Kerohime (Jan 10, 2011)

Seriously really gorgeous!


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## 5318008 (Dec 11, 2010)

Amazing growth!


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## cityhunter (Feb 15, 2010)

PelicanFarts - Yes, it is needle leaf fern on the side of the tree trunk. I was actually looking to put in that spot something with more narrow leaves and smaller size, but couldn't figure out what yet...

Cypher - To be honest, I was skeptical at first with all the hype on starfire glass, but after comparing it with my other tanks that have just regular glass, I can say that there is definitely a difference. When I look through the starfire glass now, everything behind it seems "high definition" if you know what I mean. The first four pics I took with a Panasonic LX-5 (great little camera), and the rest, including the livestock pics, were taken using a Canon 5dMk2.

Laurahmm - On the big tree trunk, I have peacock moss. On the branch that is sticking out, it is flame moss. The thick branch in the back, I have riccia tied to it.

Thanks to everyone else for their compliments. I am not sure if I will ever do this again (at least the emersed growing) after going through so much trouble to get to this point....


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## Beijing08 (Jul 19, 2010)

cityhunter said:


> the rest, including the livestock pics, were taken using a Canon 5dMk2.


the 5D Mark II takes this hobby to another level
regardless of the type of glass...LOL 
it's many a person's dream camera (myself included)

anyhoo, loving planted tanks at the moment, just like you.
Wait for my thread to pop up, starting my 3rd ever planted tank in 2 weeks.
I have almost the exact setup as your's
However, given the amazing current status of your tank...it'll be a quite challenge to come up with something better than this.


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## cityhunter (Feb 15, 2010)

Beijing08 said:


> the 5D Mark II takes this hobby to another level
> regardless of the type of glass...LOL
> it's many a person's dream camera (myself included)


The only issue I have with this camera is the slow focus, and often it is quite challenging to capture the fast moving fish in razor sharp focus... I guess the image quality makes up for it though.



> anyhoo, loving planted tanks at the moment, just like you.
> Wait for my thread to pop up, starting my 3rd ever planted tank in 2 weeks.
> I have almost the exact setup as your's
> However, given the amazing current status of your tank...it'll be a quite challenge to come up with something better than this.


Can't wait to see what yours will look like. Will it be a starfire tank also?


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## Beijing08 (Jul 19, 2010)

cityhunter said:


> Can't wait to see what yours will look like. Will it be a starfire tank also?


yea, starfire =)


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## cityhunter (Feb 15, 2010)

Here is an updated pic taken today. The peacock moss and flame moss grew so long and thick, it looks like a big dense tree canopy. I "trimmed" it further to make it take the shape of a turtle


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## kamal (Apr 21, 2009)

Awesome tank


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## Beijing08 (Jul 19, 2010)

hahaha aww very cute dude.
true aquatic "gardener" in the house


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## solarz (Aug 31, 2010)

wow, that's some nice moss!


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## cityhunter (Feb 15, 2010)

Just picked up a new Sony camera yesterday and trying out the auto HDR mode. Thought the end results look rather "surreal". Btw, I have removed a lot of the moss since my last pic, as the moss started attracting lots of GHA.


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## xriddler (Feb 16, 2012)

That is


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