# 30cm cube Resurrected



## coldmantis (Apr 5, 2010)

So this was the tank long ago and has been shut down and put in storage for a while now.

old setup

Decided to Resurrect this tank today.

*Equipment*

30cm cuba from ai
18w PL 30cm from ai
up aqua hob canister filter
Netlea Brown
Some black Rocks
maybe 50w tetra heater from Walmart

*Livestock*
to be announced

*Plants*

*Background*

Something really Red (unknown purple plant for now, until I find a nice red plant)

*Midground*

Staurogyne Repens
Blyxa Japonica
Downoi

*Foreground*

Four Leaf Clover (Marsilea Quadrifolia)

*Misc*

Pheonix, Flame and Mini Pellia Stones

*March 3rd 2013*

Start of tank, went to ai today to get the 30cm PL light. It was on sale for $27, you can really tell buy looking and touching it that it's $27 lol but it looks way nicer then the clip on ai lights for $15.

I decided on this scape










Stand is perfect for this Hang on back Canister Filter










Now I don't really want to wait 2-3 months for this tank to cycle so I decided to do a force cycle, It will be completely cycled in about a week or under.

Time to clean the 45 gallon tall.










Rinsed all the media from my Ehiem 2217 filter










Yummy Fish Poop water










Filling the tank with Dirty Water










Hopefully it clears up in a day or two


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## greg (Apr 29, 2012)

Nice looking setup. I'll be looking for more pictures soon. One day I hope to have enough experience and knowledge to grow aquatic plants as well as you do 

Greg


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## brapbrapboom (Sep 2, 2009)

Yummy water!!  Another setup to stalk and see its progress 

Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Tapatalk 2


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## tom g (Jul 8, 2009)

*hey*

welcome back coldmantis look forward to seeing your work again .


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## coldmantis (Apr 5, 2010)

The water cleared up faster then I though it would, good old canister filter for you. Cleared up in like 3-4 hours.










Had some spare parts lying around so I decided to build another Paintball Co2 Regulator, all the wrenching made my hand hurt now  I'm really debating whether I should go Pressurized for this setup or not. I already have 2 co2 setups running on 2 tanks and I have two spare tanks. If I decide to use this one that means I will only have 1 spare co2 tank for 3 fish tanks. Don't really feel like filling the co2 tank everytime it runs out. I rather have 2 spare tanks so I can go anytime I want. decisions decisions.....


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## NuclearTech (Mar 23, 2008)

I hope you do decide to use the Marsilea spp. It's my favourite foreground plant. Way back when I had some it grew great for me in a no CO2 tank. You're right, I haven't seen it lately either.

Looking forward to this.


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## coldmantis (Apr 5, 2010)

*March 5th 2013*

So much poop has settled on the substrate. I siphoned out as much as I could, the rest I stirred up the substrate and let the filter suck in the rest. I must of drained and flooded 3-4 times, I even cleaned the filter twice. It looked like a ehiem canister filter that hasn't been cleaned in a year it was nasty!!.

unfortunately I made a big mistake I was afraid I wouldn't have enough four leaf clover to cover the tank so I ripped out my entire carpet on my 0.9g cube tank. This is what the 0.9g tank looked like video and this is what it looked like after 










These are the clumps of clover I took out, it doesn't look like much because it's all clumped together, but after I separated the plant into 2 lobed nodes I realized I had enough to completely cover the foot print of a standard 10 gallon. I had so much that I could plant the 30cm cube, replant the 0.9g cube and make like 9 pots to sell.










Here is the fully planted tank, I wanted Mini Pellia stones on the right front corner but I realized that I never made any lol, so in it's place is temp christmas moss stones.










Closer shot of the clover planted










Right back corner of downoi and flame moss stones










The stem plant is just temporary until I figure out which red plant I want, anyone have an idea of what this plant is? it's purple and the leaves are narrow.


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## lovevc (Nov 24, 2010)

nice set up. didnt know poop water from dirt filter can help cycling


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## coldmantis (Apr 5, 2010)

*March 6th 2013*

This will probably be the last update for a while, everything is planted and the waiting game is on.

Replaced the Christmas moss stones with Mini Pellia, I didn't realize how little Pellia I had to work with, even though I layed it on the stone perfectly after I wrapped it, it looks bad after 

before










after


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## coldmantis (Apr 5, 2010)

*March 11th 2013*

Changed it up, equipment wise. I couldn't resist the temptation of adding pressurized co2. I was using one of those in tank atomizer diffusers but those are just not efficient enough for my taste even for a small tank like this. I had a spare Jaqno Co2 Reator lying around so I decided I wanted to use that, however you can only use that with a canister filter or you have to rig it up to a powerhead, since this tank is so small a powerhead will stand out too much.

I busted out my Eheim 2213, which was in storage. Here's some background story for this filter it was purchase a while back for $10 bucks yes $10 bucks. It was on kijiji and advertised as broken because the canister cracked. Now why did I buy a canister filter for $10 bucks. Because it came with everything minus a suction cup or two. I just wanted the double tap valves since they are like $35 bucks for a set at big al's and I'm paying $10 bucks for 2 sets . When I took home the canister filter I looked at it and it's indeed very cracked from the bottom to the middle of the canister. I just left it as is, I got bored one day and decided to see what happens if I use super glue that is used to make cars, took like 20 minutes and I leak tested it and to my surprise it worked like a charm. So that's my story of the $10 Eheim 2213 filter, now back to the tank.

I don't really want green pipes standing out in this tank, so I was going to fleabay some lily pipes but I don't really want to wait a month for it to get here. So I decided to make my own from a spare parts I had laying around from my last diy project with plastic here Now you have to understand it was late at night and I wanted to go to sleep but if I don't do this now it will bother me when I try to sleep. I made both in the inflow and outflow pipes in about 10 minutes and man it looks like crap but it works lol

New Equipment










Jaqno Co2 Reactor in action










Diy Lily Pipes










Yes you can tell I rushed it, it didn't bend smoothly at all!










Before Co2










After Co2










Man this mystery plant is starting to melt and getting some weird mold on it


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## manmadecorals (Jan 17, 2012)

If i'm not mistaken that Marsilea should be Minuta and not Quadrifolia.

This should be Quadrifolia









Regardless very nice purple plant 

Reading this was pretty entertaining


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## coldmantis (Apr 5, 2010)

manhtu said:


> If i'm not mistaken that Marsilea should be Minuta and not Quadrifolia.
> 
> This should be Quadrifolia
> 
> ...


That's what it looks like when I first bought it in it's emerse form after it changes to submerse form it looks like the pics, just like glosso but a little bigger and it's darker green. Also the little plant tab that was on it said Marsilea Quadrifolia.


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## coldmantis (Apr 5, 2010)

*April 7th 2013*

So it's been a little over a month, here are some big updates.

Yet another equipment change. Took out the old drop checker and put in an external one I made










Retired the Paintball co2 because I managed to find a 20lb tank for cheap. Bought an Aquatek Regulator(not as good I as expected and read) and modified it for two outputs.



















Phoenix moss is growing well










Mini Pellia is growing crazy fast.










Flame moss is coming along










That mystery purple plant all melted away except for 1 stem 










Four Leaf Clover is carpeting quite nice and as you noticed I added some cherry shrimp, thanks to Matt2dude and another on this forum.










Also Added a few Spixi Snails. I added them to 4 different tanks and they all started to lay their eggs the next day. I probably have over 200 eggs at least now in different tanks.










One bad thing about spixi snails is the tendency to dig which is not ideal for carpeting plants. You can just make out the spixi that is hiding in the substrate to the left of the uprooted clover.










I had about 2 shrimp deaths so far, it could be either the tank is not completely cycled or the shrimp can't take my ei dry dosing and %50 water changes per week. I'm going to start letting the power dilute a little in a cup of tank water then pour it in, instead of just dosing it dry. I believe the shrimps are eating the chemicals. However I did notice over 5+ are berried and I see some newborns in the tank.










and finally a FTS


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## lovevc (Nov 24, 2010)

nice tank! that diy drop checker is so cool


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## coldmantis (Apr 5, 2010)

*July 25 2013*

Once more another equipment change has occurred. Changed the filter from eheim 2213 to Ai Hang on back mini canister filter.

Because of the filter change the Jaqno co2 reactor can no longer be used 










Redid the diy drop checker so it looks "better"










Change the needle valves to Fabco NV-55-18. Also those cheapo Dici Bubble counters decided to leak and break.... went to big als and bought 2 fluval ones, not as nice but works better.










I think I'm going to stick with these red plants










The Clover has completely grown in










FTS, thinking about shutting it down since everything is fully grown and there's nothing else to do.


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## 10G (Sep 15, 2013)

Plants are lookin fresh, nice and green. #CO2_pumpin...


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