90g malawi tank journal

[kwirky]

Today I started a 90g malawi cichlid tank. It'll house haps and peacocks and the various synodontis and such that can be kept with them as well. Kevin at the store talked me into it because our well water has a dKH of 24 which means that the pH of the tank will be ROCK solid and NEVER shift.

Dennis was surprised lol. "I'm not sure you want to keep cichlids sean, I thought you were a reef guy!"

It's running off a new AC110 HOB and an AC70. I like the HOB filters because they're very easy to clean. I aim to keep the tank pristine with large water changes every week along with cleaning the filter weekly.

I'll have pictures once the sand's in the tank. I'm leak testing it right now. Had to level it off with LOTS of pennies because it was a whole half inch unlevel on the one side. I have 3 stacks of pennies on each corner. One corner's 4 pennies high, one is 12 high and the other 10 high. Not having a table saw made it difficult to ensure the DIY stand was nice and square.

update: found some med-large rocks around the acreage. I still need to figure out some way to fill the tank all the way to the top. I might just put some tall fake plants in. I washed 25 kg of play sand today too and I'll be washing another 25kg if I'm up for it tomorrow. looking good so far. I'll take a picture tomorrow maybe.

[i have crabs]

ive always been a saltwater guy too but i bought a breeding trio fossiochromis rostratus im shure thats spelled wrong but whatever, i set the tank up with old reef sand, a few big rocks and chunk of drift wood, i wanted to get another group of something but i enjoy how simple and non stressfull the tank is so ive just left it as is.
ive also had to set up a 50g freshwater tank due to the 87 baby's they spit out.

[kwirky]

I had to empty the tank last night. I had a book that recommended putting pennies under the tank to level it out so I put a half inch worth of pennies under it and filled er up. Nice and level. Then I thought to myself, "looks kinda risky having all those rocks on there with nothing supporting the middle of the tank." I googled it and found lots of advice recommending NOT to shim the tank but to shim the stand. So I had to empty it all into a bunch of rubbermaid trash bins (because the water took forever to heat up to 70F so far) then removed the coins, put the styrofoam back and shimmed the stand. Lots of un-needed work if I had done it right the first time. Ah well live n learn.

So here's a picture of the setup:



and here's a shot of the room with the tanks in it:

[michika]

Nice start. I barely have an idea of what a cichlid is, much less a malawi, but this is all very cool to watch.

[Delphinus]

Interesting idea about the pennies...