This is a collection for photos of the tank, arranged in chronological order.
There's also a
pictorial sequence describing
setting up the tank.
This is what the tank looked like just after being set up. All that
remained at this stage was to add a black background and wait for the
plants to grow. What's gone on up to this stage is shown in the
setup sequence.
Nearly seven months after setting it up, these are the first photos I've got round to taking of the tank. It's starting to look really rather nice (or so I think, anyway).
This is just a general view on the front. I'm happy
with pretty much everything except the gap at the left end. We
had a plague of caterpillars for a while, which seemed to produce
aquatic grubs which demolished my giant vallis. The lovely lush
growth at the left end of the tank has still not recovered (even
though it's months since we saw the last grub).
The dark at the right end is actually full of plants - but this shot was by tank lights only, with a digital camera which wasn't entirely happy with the range of brightness in the tank. You can see that area better below:
The vallis at the
back right corner, for some reason, has recovered. This area is shady
because as well as the vallis trailing across the surface, there's
some floating something-or-other. I don't know what it is, but it
grows like the clappers - I pull out half a bucket-full each week.
Just another frontish view.
My favourite plant in the tank at the moment. It's some sort of stalky java sword, I think. While it doesn't have many leaves, and isn't exactly lush, I like the red mottles it has.
This photo is also good because it has at least one each of most of the fish in the tank. In shot there's a zebra danio (right at the top), four of the six yellow platties, a couple of flame-tailed rasboros (about halfway up), various cardinal tetras and near the bottom right two siamese foxes. The fish not in view (besides others of each of these) are one angel (the remnant of a breeding pair) and a few ottos.
To comment on anything (please do) email ian.web@astounding.org.uk