in the tanks

My amano shrimps are busy in the 20H, constantly picking at stuff. They've cleaned all the older unsightly leaves off the lower part of rotala stems

Here's a closer pic of one:

I've noticed since the angel moved out, the glass is a lot cleaner- malaysian trumpet snails are out all day, and there are tons more baby ones floating around underside of the surface film. My nerite snail is way more active in here than it used to be, also. I know the angelfish had been eating the baby trumpet snails off the surface. I bet it was also nipping at the adults and the nerite.

I was a bit surprised during maintenance day -yesterday- to find this tank had 40ppm nitrates. I haven't been feeding it much at all- or so I thought- giving the shrimps a bit of food once every two or three days. A flake or two of fish food crumbled up, or the microscopic bits left at the bottom of the thawing container, after I feed all the fishes frozen food. The last time though, I simply dumped all the water from the thawing container straight into the tank, instead if siphoning out the tiny food bits. Maybe that added too much organics to the tank. I won't do it this week, see if nitrates stay lower.

My window tank is chilly at 62°- so when I had my hand in the tank to rub off some algae and clean up a few dead leaves, I couldn't keep it in there too long! No algae at all on the glass this week, but more on the large crypt. Its scion is bright, untouched green but the mother plant is starting to look worn out. Last week I cleaned a ton of browned, wilted salvinia minima leaves from the surface; this week those floaters look great- seem to be spreading, and very few dying this time.

In the tenner, I repeated my change of last week- doing the maintenance right before the light comes on, and dosed half the recommended amount of ferts (because nitrates were at 40, and I prefer them to stay near 20ppm). I broke a root tab into quarters and placed them in the back row of rotalas, to give a boost.

My angelfishes look better! Skye doesn't have any more damage to his long trailing fins, and he threatens the tetras which keep clear away, so I think they quit nipping him. M. Beautiful seems to be healing- tail fin doesn't look quite as ragged on the edge. I was sitting on the floor watching the fishes feed this morning and noticed that two of my black skirt tetras- not the largest ones, by the way- have fat, squared-off bellies. Probably gravid females! Well, if they spawn, there will be some egg goodies for the kuhlis and angels. I seriously doubt fry would survive in the tank (although I had a surprise before- when I raised one baby cherry barb).