7 month progress report

[sophung]

https://youtube.com/shorts/bALSYRMVPog
https://youtube.com/shorts/ZadPSoy7-n0

Here's my 10 gallon setup in my office, no natural light. I do have a couple baby shrimp that aren't in the vids above.

Milestones and learnings:

-Hardscape, water, cheap air pump/stone, etc. were March ~10th
--bought from this site: 4 cups of sand, 2x calcium stones, 10 gallon pre-measured salt, 1x handful of lava rocks.
-Macro Algae and moss ball from this site were March ~15th

-20x Snails March ~20th
--waited for the walls to all crust up and turn green. I did not add any food pellets while waiting.
-60x Shrimp May 12th

--The logs tanned my water to piss so I researched and found a "Purigen" pouch (it's the floating brown packet thing in the vid), I'm not sure, but I think this is only available from one brand. It really helped clear up the water color and says it won't remove bacteria/nutrients. I haven't cleaned or replaced the pouch since putting it in. It cleared everything up within the first week and I've left it since.

- Maybe I should remove it now?

--First food pellet was August 1st, then once every 4th week.

--Air pump became obnoxiously loud in September so replaced with new air pump and sponge filter, but I quickly realized I needed to put a stone inside the filter. I should have started with a more expensive pump: less/smaller bubbles means less salt creep, having the pump be adjustable plus a flow valve is nice, the sponge is still too new to have much benefit.

- I know the pump isn't even necessary, but I do think if I were a shrimp I'd like my water to not stagnate.

--My lid has two large gaps on either side of the light which had a lot of issues with salt creep from my original pump. I was also worried the snails would be walking out, but honestly haven't had a single issue with them (yet). I plugged these with some styrofoam cut from some of the packing stuff. I have about a 1mm gap on both sides of the glass lid, I also keep a couple inches between the water level and the rim. I do have to clean salt from around the tank every few weeks. I'll need to learn how to measure the salt sooner or later.. Nitrogen, ammonia, etc, all remain steady.

--I also cleaned the front panel of glass for the first time early October. I won't clean any other sides, and only plan to do as needed.



Shoutout to Clint's Reptiles and Aquarimax Pets youtube videos for getting me into these guys.

Anyway, I'm open to feedback, thanks for reading this far!