sleeping fish

Walking past my betta tank late last night, saw a bit of blue among plants in a corner-

I looked around the corner and there was Samblu, right in the subwassertang. Motionless.

As if he tucked himself in, to go to sleep. Moment of alarm because I never saw him before with the chin and belly so white, but then he woke up and moved off.

It's interesting to see how things changed a bit in my tank when it goes two weeks between a wc and fert dose. (I had to keep my hands out for a while because healing from the surgery on my finger.) I was feeding 1/3 the normal amount. Yesterday able to do maintenance again- even though there is a ton of mulm buildup (just bought a mini siphon gravel vac, so going to get a lot of that out) I'm pleased to see the nitrates tested at only 5ppm and Samblu looks quite content- he even made a bubble nest for the first time! Maybe I should keep doing the ever-other-day feeding.

Some of the plants suffered. Spirodela polyrhiza lots of browning leaves, and it was piling up in one corner because I hadn't culled. Only one leaf off the bigger crypt died, a few of parva and two java leaves. Half the windelov was seriously degraded and dying. I pulled all the brown leaves out. There were lots of babies, though- put them in the window tank. What's left looks really healthy; I wonder if those dying leaves were on their way out anyway (plant adjusting to changes I made a while back). Rotalas look better than ever, but bacopa was melting like crazy. I removed all those remnants- a little of it that is salvageable might go into my 38.

All the other plants look unaffected, I even took a few buce trimmings to try out in my window tank. To my surprise found one tiny sprig of marisela hirsuta is still alive, and even though my anubias look a little peaky, there was a new leaf sprouting. So overall it did fine going lean for 2 weeks. Bacopa had never grown well in here, anyway.

Funny, when I was done I put the feeding ring back in a different corner. Samblu remembers the location, not the object. When I opened the lid later on to give him a moth, he hurried to the old spot and started looking up expectantly.