introduction of yme

yme

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Hello everybody!

After a thread on APC about NO3/PO4 and the very usefull answers of Tom, I feel that I must introduce myself on this site.

Well, I am yme (my real name), 23 years old and finished my study biomedical sciences last summer. Now I´m a PhD student working with zebrafish at the dutch cancer institute. Currently, I´m investigation a gene that is involved in the Peutz-Jaeger syndrome (rare syndrome associated with several rare cancers) as well as polycomb proteins (associated with gene silencing).

I have been trying to keep fish and plants for about 10 years now, but it is still a hard job and I am learning every day. Now, I two tanks. The first is a biotope for pseudogastromyzon cheni (which I haven´t bought yet) and the second is my 1 meter planted tank.

Because my camera broke down two days ago I can only show you a picture of my planted tank (that I took 3 days ago).

bak.JPG


Tom, thanks again for the answers. I hope that I can a lot more from you (and everybody else)!!!!

greets,

yme
 

VaughnH

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Re: introduction of yme

That is a beautiful aquarium, Yme! What is the reddish sword - Ozelot???
And, welcome to this forum.

When you started describing your PhD work I was thinking it was something to do with aquatic plants - and I thought I was going to have to go back to college for post-graduate work.
 

CrownMan

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Re: introduction of yme

Beautiful tank yme. You're going to have to tell us about your tank specs, types of plants anf fish and maintenance schedule. Please!! I love looking at these types of aquascapes admiring plants that I will probably never get a chance to own.

Thanks,

Mike
 

Tom Barr

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Re: introduction of yme

yme said:
Hello everybody!


yme

You might wish to read each of the prior month's reports.
They a mix of review journal science and aquarium hobby. While I cannot do entirely one or the other, there are plenty of hobby level articles on aquariums already, I decided to try and mix a little of each together. At least having some references for support. This has never been done except with respect to Diana Walstad's book, but I disagree with some of the conclusions and some support is weak and does not always follow. Still, it's an excellent book, better than any plant book out there today.

Your tank looks pretty good, but you know that sword plant up front is going to get bigger, so...........

You might consider a nice red Crypt of some sort there instead.

Also, I'm not sure you are aware of the various contest in your country, but you can learn a great deal from them and from the process in general of competing.

I like the method of judging for the contest much more than anything done internally or in the USA and many other places.

I also have a powerpoint with Dutch tanks dating from the 1940's-1950's.
a really good historical presentation on planted tanks from a rarely seen peroid.

I will be working with Greg Watson to bring this presentation here for download.

The cancer research will likely be worthwhile, while silencing genes work, haha, so does evolution. The question is, for how long might such a gene work if you do get it to go?

I can tell you working with weeds, the herbicide life span is about 30-40 years till they a rendered ineffective.

All it takes is one mutation.

Regards,
Tom Barr
 

yme

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Re: introduction of yme

Thanks for the warm welcome!

I indeed forgot to give you info about my setup and species. So here it is!

Tank: 100x40x40
Pomp: eheim professional 2224 (containing just white foam)
CO2: pressurized and since this weekend I use the mist method
Substrate: amtra plant depot (2 years old)
Light: 1x Philips 840: 13.00-23.00
1x Philips 830: 13.00-23.00
1x Philips 830: 13.30-23.30
1x Philips 840: 19.00-22.00
liquid fertilzer: 3x/week 10 ml profito (=2x recommended dose), 3x/week 5 ml ferrocell (=3/5 of recommended dose) (but will switch to seachem products)
pH: 6.5
KH: 4
GH: 5.5
Ca: ~20 mg/l
Mg: ~ 7 mg/l
PO4: 0.2 mg/l is added daily
K: ~20 mg/l
NO3: 2.5 mg/l is added daily
Conductivity: 460 µS
Water change: 60 litres per week, 30 litres of RO water and 30 litres of tap water (pH 8, KH 5, GH 8, 660 µS, NO3 10, PO4 0)

Animals:
-barbus pentazona. I do not know how much, I bought 6, 10 were given to me and there is some offspring swimming around
-otocinclus spec. (affinis?) I bought 10 but I think some died the past two year
-cherry shrimps.

Plants (from left to right):
-heteranthera zosterifolia
-proserpinaca palustris spec “cuba”
-blyxa japonica
-tonina fluviatilis
-potamogeton gayi
-echinodorus spec. (do not know the species, it was sold as osiris, but I´m quite sure that it isn´t)
-hygrophila difformis
-potamogeton wrightii (at least, that is what is currently thought)
-elatine tiandra

@Tom:
I am reading, but I´m pretty busy and you really need to READ it. I scanned most of the articles, but then again I will READ it in the future.

I never got the change to read Diana Walstad´s book or even better buy it. And that´s pretty annoying.

I am aware that the sword is getting too big. However, I am in love with this plant. Every time my tank looks like crap, this plant still flourish and looks healthy. I cannot bear it to have it not in my tank! Thus there was only one option: a bigger tank (130x50x50). Maybe still a bit small, but there is also a money issue. (I will buy a house this summer if everything turns out allright).

I am aware of the various contests. I even went to the annual nbat day (from the link) where the winners were announced. However, I think that some of the people that judge your tank are a bit old-fashioned. The good thing though is that there are new inspectors (if that´s the right word) in training with a view on aquaria that I like more. So perhaps in the future….

About the gene silencing: I am not talking about artificial gene silencing. Just the natural thing that occurs for instance during development. I will especially look at ring-1b and bmi.

Greets,

yme
 

Tom Barr

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Re: introduction of yme

I'd not worry too much about a group with old fashion ideas, you can change those ideas fairly easily if you approach them with lots of plants, and clearly do well with the methods.

They also will not live forever:)

The proof is in the result.

I'd suggest getting the Tropica Master Grow locally for for trace elements. It should be cheaper there than SeaChem.

I would add a little more PO4, otherwise things look good.
Read the articles as you have time. There is no rush.
Diana's book is available from Amazon.com fairly reasonable price.

Regards,
Tom Barr
 

yme

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Re: introduction of yme

thanks for the amazon link! I never look at that site.

I didn´t add more PO4 because I have still that annoying BGA. I haven´t taken very serious actions, but I thought that more PO4 would be a bit too much at this moment. But maybe that´s just me thinking old fashioned...

For removal of the BGA I wouldn´t like to darken the tank for a couple of days (read that tonina really hates it) or add chemicals that destroy your healthy bacteria. Just removal of the algae by hand and the water changes.
I also did a H2O2 treatment (5 ml, 3%) for a week, but that didn´t work at all. So for the moment I hope that it will go away just by manual removal and the waterchanges...

greets,

yme

ps: it is the kind of GBA that´s is located mostly in the tops of the plants, where there is a lot of light
 

Tom Barr

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Re: introduction of yme

You are not going to beat BGA with the routine you have planned.

Either blackout or use erythromyacin, one of the two.
BGA is a good sign of low NO3's. You might have good NO3 now, but once induced, many algae cling to the tank's environment. So you need to kill what is there and correct the conditions that caused it to begin with.

So either method to eradicate.... and then good KNO3 dosing thereafter.

Adding PO4 to very high levels will not induce algae of any type, some species die off at high levels of PO4.

BGA will keep bothering you unless you kill it. Tonia can survive a 3-5 day trip in a box to the USA, it can survive a 3 day blackout and the antibiotics I suggested will do no harm to the tank also.

Regards,
Tom Barr
 

yme

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Re: introduction of yme

thanks tom,

I will take more serious actions.
erytromycin is sold in the Netherlands as Erythrocine, but can only be bought if you have a doctors recipe. Fortunately, my neighbour is a dermatologist and may be willing to give me a recipe.
For the commercial anti-BGA stuff, it is not on label what the working ingredient is (like the plant-fertilizers). So I'm not willing to try those before I know what it contains.

Thanks again!

greets,

yme

ps: I hope this topic doesn't turn out to be a algae-control topic. Therefore I will just work on it and not mention algae again in this topic :D
 

Tom Barr

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Re: introduction of yme

Most algae control stuff is peroxide based, often percarbonates.
Red slime (for marine use) algae control is often made from such products.
Blackout will work and is ideal where antibiotics are not sold except by prescription.

3 days and you are done.
Some folks have been able to several water changes and cleanings each day along with KNO3 dosing to get rid of it also.

This works well if you have a mild case.
I'd do a water change(50-80%) each day for 2-4 days and dose nutrients back each time.

This will help the plants grow very well.

Regards,
Tom Barr
 

yme

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Re: introduction of yme

I think that I am rid of the BGA algae at last. lots of waterchanges, additional blackoutsand H2O2 did the trick. Sadly, the elatine tiandra, potamogeton gayi and potamogeton wrightii didn´t like the treatment and dissolved. I hope that 1 or two stems that are still more or less alive ae capable to survive, giving rise to a new group of plants.

greets,

yme
 

fresh_newby

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Re: introduction of yme

yme said:
I think that I am rid of the BGA algae at last. lots of waterchanges, additional blackoutsand H2O2 did the trick. Sadly, the elatine tiandra, potamogeton gayi and potamogeton wrightii didn´t like the treatment and dissolved. I hope that 1 or two stems that are still more or less alive ae capable to survive, giving rise to a new group of plants.

greets,

yme
If you ned any p. gayi I can send you some. I need to prune.
 

Wet

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Re: introduction of yme

It is enjoyable and informative to read about your tank, fertilization of hard plants, and such on the forum, yme. Full tank shot in this thread is very nice.
 

yme

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Re: introduction of yme

oeps, missed it!

Thanks for the offer, but I have again a little bunch of gayi in the tank :) .

As you might have read in the other posts, I still have problems with the difficult species and the hardware. I don´t know why, but things are always failing when you are not at home... So again BGA, some algae (didn´t mention it, because I know it will go away...) and of course the tonina problems :) .

But you can read in my "other" post!

greets,

yme
 

Tom Barr

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Re: introduction of yme

If you are not at home much, such plants can be tough.
I think the ADA soil saves me when I leave for a week at a time.
I still have issues when I get back, but not so bad. Namely some hair algae, Caldophora. That's easily pruned out. Big water change and back to normal.

I'll still tell you, things sound like a slight CO2 issue.
Using it, realizing we generally need to add more over time is critical.
Always must consider it time and time again when dealing with nutrients and other issues.

We all slack off on it and assume it's something else.
Best to use your eyes once you have seen good CO2 levels and it's effects.
Too much testing and not enough plant watching often results is poor growth.

People with a "Green thumb" watch the plants more and respond by taking care of the plant's needs such as repotting- this is much like a water change followed by a dosing/watering.

I will always nag people about using CO2 right/better/getting better results with CO2 ad adnauseum......... :gw

Regards,
Tom Barr



Regards,
Tom Barr