Such a beautiful setup Bala De Plata.
They get fed these about twice a day using just freeze dried Australian black worms with either the color enhance or Spinach.
Such a beautiful setup Bala De Plata.
Great job Rory . Your Planted Tank set up and Ricardo's Eruptions , they both looking great.
I'm curious though , how do you maintain and siphon the Jungle of plants and decor behind the stones Rory ?
Do you siphon that plant substrate part of the tank ?
I have never siphoned the tank. Once or twice a year I may move plants but that's it. I will rake the sand as well but just to get aqua soil out of it.
Occasionally I will use my hand to wave water around and kick up mulm to allow the filter to pick it up, but not often. This setup is all about zero maintenance by me. Water changes and filters are automated 95-99%.
I use the Rollermat filter as the main filtration for this tank. It requir changing a roll of filter floss material about 6 times a year or so.
However it is rather maxed out at this tank size and with Discus. There is a filter sock for the 2nd flow of the "Herbie" drain, but this receives very little flow.
The water is also changed 50% 3x a week via Apex programming as setup with filtered tap water stores in my garage.
Last edited by Bala de Plata; 02-04-2017 at 02:40 PM.
Great tank! I see congo tetras with the discus. How is feeding managed? Congos are so fast to their food whereas discus are kind of slow. How does it work out? How do the discus get their fair share?
Non-discus fish species could cause infections to discus. Did you do any special quarantine procedures on your non-discus fish before adding them in with discus?
Thanks.
Feeding is done via worm cone feeders and Congos have always remained secondary to Discus when feeding. I only purposely feed the the discus and all other fish sustain on the scraps from the discus. Only the ABNP and panda cories will try to feed from the cones if the discus are feeding. But all fish bow to the "Big Guys" as my daughter says.
The discus were the last introduction to the tank. Sourced all non discus from very reputable LFS's and they were in tank 4-6 weeks monitored prior to discus. That was it
Your tank looks so great in my next life I'd like come back as one of your fish, any one.
I may have missed this in the thread but I was wondering what kind of discus these are. I am new to discus and starting to gather info for a large planted discus tank, and find this thread very inspiring. thanks, steve
Awesome tank and build. I need to save up for a Rollermat and Apex. Automation is key, really impressed with how you set things up. May need to do something similar if/when I eventually get discus. Thanks for the great ideas!
can you please tell me more about the stainless steel value you are using to drain the tank? I am having trouble finding one that will open with near zero preSure on it. If you could give me the part number, brand and where you purchased the values I would really appreciate it.
Beautiful tank and great setup, too expensive for me, but maybe I can copy part of it.
Thanks
Ron
Last edited by alron2; 03-18-2017 at 01:49 AM.
Hi Rory, reviving your old thread - this was a fantastic read, a very inspirational build and one of the few descriptions of the Theiling Rollermat in action.
After several years running, I was wondering if you were able to dial-in the rollermat further by now? looking back, would you go again with it, or would you rather choose a mechanical sponge filtration which can easilly be cleaned up at no cost?
I am currently building a 300gal discuss tank which I intend to scape in a really nice heavily planted "nature aquarium" style. I am really intrigued by the Rollermat idea to simplify the maintenance, but when I look at Theiling's site and their instruction manual, they suggest one roll should last 4-6 months, meaning 2-3 rolls per year. You seem to be running more than twice that speed.
Really curious if you could give us some tips now with your accumulated experience with this device?
Much appreciated!