Tom’s Bucket Of Mud – Paro. sp. ‘sentang’

[Aleksandr Egorov]

Thank you Tom.
I made a description of your aquarium on Biggest Ukrainian Forum. Many people’s delighted with your work.
Particularly impressive is the work of the operator. 🙂
Waiting new photos of Paros.

[Tom Black]

Aha. I still feel bad about not succeeding with Paros on the first attempt – I think I was trying to achieve too many things at once really. The new setups are more focused.

If people are interested in the tank apart from the Paro angle then perhaps they might like to read the journal over on the UKAPS forum, where there is much more detail and will not clutter up PP with non-Paro content 🙂

http://www.ukaps.org/forum/threads/p31.14521/page-34

[Peter Finke]

The tanks of Big Tom are beautiful, but they are not really adequate for Parosphromenus. It is impossible to grow such a wealth of plants with subdued light, in water of a pH below 6, maybe 5 or 4, even 3, and with a carbon hardness of zero. You even could keep adult specimen of some fish species (linkei, filamentosus) in such ornamental tanks, but nearly no others, and the breeding will be difficult or impossible.

I very much like Tom’s tanks, too, but they are not typical blackwater fish tanks. It is just what Tom himself says: You cannot achieve all your goals within one ideal tank. But you can run a beautifully planted dungle on the one hand, and breed nice Paros on the other.

But I admit: after having seen only blackwater tanks, you like to see a beautiful plant jungle again. Therefore, welcome back, Tom!

[bartian]

Your bucket o’ mud surely is the most beautiful tank I know.

It looks like a perfect paro tank, except the water isn’t ideal. It is well possible to make a tank look like this, but with acidic water. Most Cryptocoryne will grow happily in any type of water, just like [i[Microsorum[/i], and there are a lot more.

[Tom Black]

Yes, I believe that the main issue for Paros with this tank was simply the substrate (the pond soil used contained lime, which I did not realise at the time). A friend of mine has a similar tank with an acidic substrate and has successfully bred good numbers of Paros sp ‘Sentang’ and chocolate gouramis in it without any intervention –

http://www.ukaps.org/forum/threads/a-little-box-of-chocolates-licorice-n-allsorts-baby-chocco-fry.25069/page-23

So it is possible, although I agree with Peter that a more controlled approach is generally preferable and obviously the more demanding species would need more particular care.

[Bill Little]

Welcome back … we indeed missed you in your absence. Paros or no Paros your tanks are amazingly beautiful. Did you reposition the tank? It doesn’t appear to be in front of the window any longer. I must now go and read you post on the other forum.

[Aleksandr Egorov]

A friend of mine has a similar tank with an acidic substrate and has successfully bred good numbers of Paros sp ‘Sentang’ and chocolate gouramis in it without any intervention

Hi Tom,
What water parameters in this tank? What specific substrate does he use?

[Tom Black]

[quote=”Little” post=2873]Welcome back … we indeed missed you in your absence. Paros or no Paros your tanks are amazingly beautiful. Did you reposition the tank? It doesn’t appear to be in front of the window any longer. I must now go and read you post on the other forum.[/quote]

Very nice welcome back on this board 🙂

Yes, the tank was moved form the window to against a wall – it was annoying not having window access in the summer, and this way it can be seen from 3 sides.

[Tom Black]

[quote=”Aleksandr” post=2874]

A friend of mine has a similar tank with an acidic substrate and has successfully bred good numbers of Paros sp ‘Sentang’ and chocolate gouramis in it without any intervention

Hi Tom,
What water parameters in this tank? What specific substrate does he use?[/quote]

From my friend –

“Kh was 0 and sonetimes 1, gh4 and ph tended to vary between 5.8 and 6. Temp was 26.
Substrate was the aqua pond soil with eheim peat pellets sprinkled on capped with tmc nutrasoil.”

The “aqua pond soil” is this one – http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Original-genuine-AQUA-SOIL-formulated-for-your-pond-plants-20-Litres-/151225919051?_trksid=p2054897.l4275

Basically just a topsoil without added nutrients I think, it has negligible effect on water parameters.

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