I keep forgetting to ask at meetings when the miricale sludge comes up... could this be used for emersed growth? I've been slowly pulling information from Ghazanfar (thank you especially for putting up with all my questions, I want to get it right!) and since I got the "kit" from Aaron I'm...

Sorry if this ends up being a double post, my internet blipped and I lost the post I wrote :( I can add my personal experience to glasscages.com, very disapointing. The tanks I got from them were amphibian/reptile tanks - not fish - but if that was how they build their tanks then I fear for the fish...

Hmmm... very cool to learn about the local shrimps, but the salinity issue would make them inappropriate for the two applications I was looking into (coastal plain dwarf waterdog tank and SE Asian blackwater). The more I look into the blackwater, the more I realize that traditional cleaning crews ar...

Looks like I'll be in town for the meeting. Does anyone have a little extra mineral soil, 3M quartz stuff, and/or amazonia? I'm finally getting around to actually planting my 2.5 gallon but stole the amazonia for my crypts, plus I really want to try the mineral soil... just enough for a tiny 2.5 is ...

Yes, I use oak leaf and wild almond leaf "tea" to lower the pH in most of my water. I'd probably recomend boiling the leaves until they sink, and use the tea concentrate produced to change your pH rather than just floating leaves in the tank. This gives you the ability to have more control...

So they are more like marimo hairdressers than anything

Funny, sounds like you're doing a similar tank to mine, but with bigger fish! I'm also looking into doing a SE asia, but specifically working with the super low pH mini species. While not super knowledgable, my two cents goes along with Ghazanfar... see if someone on here is Sean/Aaron miricale mud ...

I'd second the bit about the moss ball vs. true marimo balls, I've seen stuff listed as such that are clearly the moss ball rip offs. The moss will just do what moss does, and grow straight out, not keeping shape at all unless you want to keep trimming it like a garden bush. The true marimo ball loo...

It's one of the reasons I love crypts and feel like with joining this hobby I'm now enjoying them from another angle... While I don't think it was wendtii I have grown at least one crypt on a light stand with some of my other tropical plants in the same conditions. Did pretty well once acclimated an...

Bob - do you know anything else about the native Shrimp? Ideally I'd like a shrimp that I could reproduce and I'm not really sure if the local glass shrimp need that salty stage or not. Too bad I didn't read this BEFORE I spent the whole weekend on the Eastern Shore ;) But then again I'm not sure ho...