Here’s this week’s picture of my 75G. As you can see, it’s about 90% there. The glosso is right about perfect. Too much longer, and I’ll have to pull it up, and start over. The aromatica is about where I want it too; albeit, maybe 2 days past it’s perfect look in this picture. The broadleaf stellata could afford to be a little bit bushier, but it’s well on it’s way. Really, I’m just waiting on the utricularia. It’s keeps getting uprooted anytime the whiptail catfish is spooked and uplifts the Soilmaster Select. Please feel free to comment and critique.

 

This was posted on the forums, but I wanted to re-emphasize its importance. It appears that the native habitat of the Galaxy Rasbora is being threatened due to overfishing by exporters of the aquarium fish. I’m not really sure what we, as hobbiests, can do to help except to avoid buying Galaxy Rasboras that aren’t captive bred. Unfortunately, most LFS’ don’t know or display such information.

I’m a little bit conflicted because as I mentioned a few weeks ago, I recently purchased a bunch of these beautiful fish after coming across a deal I couldn’t refuse. I’ve been feeding them black-worms, so now I think I’m going to do my best to breed these guys. Unfortunately, there’s not a whole lot of information about their spawning parameters due to their newness to the hobby. Please comment if you know how to breed these fish.

Update: I manage to come across a link to another site that details how they’ve successfully bred the Galaxy Rasboras. Here’s the link: http://www.aquamoss.net/Articles/Microrasbora-sp-Galaxy.htm

At the December GWAPA meeting, I was fortunate enough to obtain Pogostemon yatabeanus in the mini-auction that we have at every club meeting. P. yatabeanus is an Austrailian plant, from the same reknowned genus as Pogostemon stellatus, formerly Eusteralis stellatus. This particular species reminds me more of the broadleaf variety of P. stellatus, in that it’s a little bit larger of a plant, except that it stays a beautiful bright green instead of bronzing under bright light. It doesn’t seem to be particularly demanding if kept in your typical high-tech setup.

I currently have the plant in my 75G, planted in Soilmaster Select ‘Red’, with pressurized CO2, high-light, and regular dosing. In this environment, P. yatabeanus might be the fastest growing plant in the tank. Young stems stay rather slender with narrower leaves. Older stems can grow quite thick, with leaves that become longer and fatter, similar to how P. stellatus ‘broadleaf’ grows. When you trim P. yatabeanus and leave the lower portion in the substrate, 2-3 new stems start to grow out of the incision.

Due to this plant’s size, I don’t know if I’d recommend it for a smaller tank, but in a larger tank I think it’s the perfect ‘green’ companion to plants such as limnophilia aromatica, pogostemon stellatus ‘broadleaf’, etc… If you can get your hands on this plant, please give it a try.

A year or two ago, GWAPA placed a group order for a number of apistogramma. In that order, I got about 6 apistogramma borellii fish. I successfully bred these guys in a 20G high and had at couple generations going. Then, unfortunately, while I was in California at the AGA, my CO2 tank

Apistogramma borellii female with babies (lower right)

dumped the remainder of the canister into this aquarium, and killed off all of my adult fish. All of the smaller fish in the tank survived, including 5-6 borellii babies, which at the time were not sexable. I decided to dedicate a 20G long tank to try and get a new population going. After a couple months of blackworm feeding to get the fish in good breeding shape, I finally noticed the drab juevenilles coloring up — bright yellows and blues! I noticed that a pair formed, which kept 2-3 other males to the outer parts of the tank. Then, this weekend I finally see the female hovering around with a handful of babies. To get an idea of perspective, this female fish is probably only 1.5 inches long. The babies are mere millimeters. Those large looking foreground plants are marselia quadrafolia! It seems that the female has taken to guarding the fry. I haven’t seen the male near them yet.

I few months ago, I bought a plant from SCALES that was labeled “Rotala indica ‘Red’.” I believe this plant is probably the same thing as Rotala sp. ‘Colorata,’ but at least one GWAPA member believes this is the “real” rotala indica. Either way, this is a gorgeous stem plant that doesn’t need a ton of light to get some very vibrant red tones.

I’ve also noticed that this rotala will start to grow horizontally much more readily than many other rotala’s I’ve tried. As it does this, it sends up multiple vertical stems which can eventually be trimmed and replanted as their on stalk. The plant definitely takes off when CO2 is added, but it seems to grow, albeit much slower, without the added carbon injection. Right now I’m growing this using all SeaChem products in my 20L.