# Some pics of my 125g mbuna setup :)



## Rhinox (Sep 10, 2009)

Finally got some pics to post of my 125g mbuna setup. I posted a full tank shot in the rate the tank thread, but that thread appears to be broken at the moment. Anyways, here's the pics, hope they don't break this thread:

Full Tank Shot:









A couple group shops:



























My 2 favorite fish in the tank:

Troy, the dominant male yellow lab looking particularly dark. He shows a mustache from time to time:









Dominant not-so-Giant Demasoni. Still small, the whole group I have is out and about as much as the rest of the fish. Not yet seeing them living up to their shy reputation I've heard around here, but that may change as they get older. and not particularly aggressive at all either.









Best shot I could manage including an Albino Cobalt. This one I believe is a male, and had a little spat with another apparent male cobalt about the same size after moving all the fish to the big tank, but for now, both males seem content on opposing ends of the tank. These 2 males in this photo reside in the same territory, which looks good for the long term prospects of keeping both metriaclima species in the same tank.









DIY sump. Buckets stuffed with polyfill and pot scrubbers. was a pain setting up, but working well now. will test maintenance in a couple weeks. Some water is dripping through the ducktape holding the right drain spaflex tubing to the pvc elbow. I should probably fix that at some point. The whole system tested my resolve. My resolve eventually prevailed 









DIY Lighting. 3 x 3-bulb bath strip lighting fixtures, bought as a contractor's bundle at lowes for $30. I've chosen to use 1 6500k daylight compact flourescent and 2x blue CFL party bulbs found at home depot for each tube. I started with all 9 daylight bulbs, but it was just too bright. The blue bulbs create a very pleasing (IMO) color and effect. I do get light shimmering on the rocks, substrate, and background. Its still plenty bright - all the photos I've posted of the tank and fish were taken without flash.









I'm still working on getting a decent pic of the rusties. Some of them are showing some nice purple colors on their sides now, but they're all so active I can't get a non-blurred pic. They're looking very nice though. Any other pics, I'm up for requests.

OH, here's some bonus pics of my 10g fry tank:
Full tank shot (notice the small albino cobalt who wasn't quite fitting in in the 125g). By the way, thats my home made DIY sponge filter with an AC110 sponge:









Macrocloseups of the fry. Troy (pictured above) is the daddy:
















They're all showing some great black striping on their dorsal fin. I look forward to adding the females into the 125 and removing at least 1 male lab in the 125 with some underdeveloped stripes.


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## Duke79 (Jul 16, 2010)

Great photos of a great aquarium! Thank you for posting them!


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## fox (Jun 11, 2009)

:thumb:

Lighting seems to bring out the colors nicely. =D>

Watch it with those labs they multiply like rabbits.


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## Imaconvict (Feb 1, 2010)

Very nice set up and fish Rhinox, glad to see you got your system in control. These shots make me a little antsy to get fish into my tank.


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## Rhinox (Sep 10, 2009)

Thanks for the comments everyone! I really do enjoy the lighting. My wife thinks it makes the aceis look like they're glowing. Speaking of multiplying, I meant to put up a poll to ask which species do you think will be the first to do some spawning in the new tank? The labs (obv) and aceis both had females holding when it was just them in the 55. There was a female rusty holding in the 33XL, when they were really tiny. Neither the giant dems nor albino cobalts had a holding female yet, but they seem most dominant in the new tank, and they're the 2 species I really want/need some fry from. Any guesses?

Convict, won't be too much longer til you get some fish in your tank. Gonna look real nice, and pretty similar to mine. I think so far I like your rockscape better than mine, but I'll keep fiddling with mine and maybe add in a few more rocks until I'm satisfied with it.


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## DJRansome (Oct 29, 2005)

I like the rocks themselves. Looking good. :thumb:


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## bernreuther (Jan 29, 2007)

Wow, that looks great. I like that you have a lab named Troy. 

How's the algae with those bulbs? I may have to copy you.


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## Rhinox (Sep 10, 2009)

Hey I actually managed to get back into my thread  Since my last post, I've been getting the "no suitable nodes" error every time I tried to view this thread.

@DJR: I like my rocks too, but I think I can get a few more in there, and pile them more efficiently - get more better placed caves and crevaces than what I have now. Also, the fish seem to prefer the left 1/3 of the tank most of the time, and I think I can remedy that by rearranging rocks to reset some territories. It makes maintenance a little tougher, but I've had problems with separated piles like whats set up now, that went away when I did more of a rockwall type stacking, or single pile. If all goes well, I'll pick up some syno multis at a fish swap this weekend, keep 'em in my 33XL for a few weeks, and then plan on rearranging/adding rocks in the 125 when I'm ready to add the syno's to it in about a month. Until then, the rocks should be fine how they are.

@bernreuther: I've got some brown algea growing on the rocks already. Although, there's been some days/weekends where I've had the lights on 12-15hrs. I'm actually trying to get algae to grow for the fish to graze on, I just want the green algae. Being a new setup, I suppose I have to put up with the diatom bloom stage though. I was surprised to see the brown algae growing already though. Its only been 3 weeks, and I seem to remember it taking a couple months at least before I began to see even the brown algae/diatoms growing when I first set up my 55g. Maybe the lighting has something to do with it.

I managed to grab a decent pic of 1 of my rusties showing some good purple coloring on the side.

I've also grabbed a few photos of my albinos. I've been doing some reading around and I'm trying to get a positive ID on what species exactly the albinos are. I can't remember exactly what I bought them as, but I thought they were albino cobalts. Maybe they were albino zebras and I assumed cobalt. idk. I haven't found any pics online that really match what my fish look like. The white cobalt pictures I do find online are all mostly of the pearl white variant with black eyes (non-albino). My fish are definitely albino (red eyes). The only albino cobalt pics I've found online (bluegrass aquatics) look nothing like my fish, which is why I'm now doubting the ID of my fish. That, and I remember reading in another thread that someone said albino cobalts were actually kind of rare in the hobby, and that albino zebras are more common.

Pc #7 above has a pretty good pic of (one of) the dominant albinos in the tank, I'd appreciate if anyone could take a look at it for a positive ID. I'll try to post up some more/better pics of the albinos and the nice pic of the rusty I managed to get when I get home later, if I can still get into the thread anyways. Just wanna know what I have exactly. If they're albino estherae, for example, I don't think they'd be good to keep with the labs long term if I want to keep/sell/give away fry for either of the species (and I probably will want to keep some fry from time to time).

Thanks for the help and the comments!


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## jonathansruelas (Aug 28, 2010)

wow nice tank.. love the rocks


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## bmweiler09 (Nov 17, 2009)

Great looking tank! I agree, with a tank that size you could definitely go with some more rocks. Love the choice of fish too, very similar to mine.

Also, I would limit the lighting with those cfls to 6-8 hours a day. I used to have 4 cfls lighting my tank and I had a lot of trouble with algae blooms.


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## Rhinox (Sep 10, 2009)

Typically, the lights are only on from about 7Pm to 10-midnight. Usually its on the weekends when the lights are on longer, especially the last couple weekends we had houseguests so I left the tank lights on a lot longer to show off the tank. I don't mind the algea as long as it stays on the rocks and turns green.

Here's the promised pic of one of my nice looking rusties:









And a couple better shots of the albinos. No guesses on a proper ID yet?


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## kabuto (Mar 9, 2007)

awesome tank! 
Keep us continually posted with full tank shots over the months! that would be really interesting.


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## justinf67 (Jul 19, 2009)

looks like an albino zebra to me...


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## jonathansruelas (Aug 28, 2010)

they do look like ablino zebra's too me as well. cobalt


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## phorty (Oct 30, 2009)

Looks really nice. I'm setting up a 125 right now and I hope it looks as nice as yours. Could you give some details on the lighting hood you're using for those CFL's?


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## emusnes (Aug 9, 2010)

I think they are, Pseudotropheus socolofi "Albino"


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## Rhinox (Sep 10, 2009)

Long video: Video

New Full Tank Shot:









Better or worse than before? I took some more pics, but I'm not happy with the picture quality, so I'm gonna try again. Even this pic doesn't really do it justice.


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## Glaneon (Sep 27, 2010)

emusnes said:


> I think they are, Pseudotropheus socolofi "Albino"


+1 :thumb:

I have 5, look just like those. Longer body than zebras.


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## gliebig (Oct 1, 2010)

Interesting lighting setup. I'm trying to nail down the lighting on my tank. 60x36x24. I was going to do 2x250 halides so I could get the shimmer. Do these cfl's give off a lot of shimmer? 
Does having a blue then white then blue give it a color spotlight look or do they blend pretty good in the tank?
I'd like to see some more pics of your light setup if you could.
Tank looks great btw.

Thanks,G


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## Rhinox (Sep 10, 2009)

Glaneon said:


> emusnes said:
> 
> 
> > I think they are, Pseudotropheus socolofi "Albino"
> ...


Thanks for the opinion 

Maybe they are, maybe they aren't. I think as they get bigger, they've got a mouth shape that doesn't look socolofi to me. They've got bigger lips and a bigger akward looking shape to the mouth. Hard to explain and tough to get a good pic of. They definitely otherwise look very similar to other albin socolofi I've seen.

I think it might be moot though. Thinking about swapping them out for another species, like maybe Labeotropheus trewavasae (Mpanga) or maybe one of the natural blotched varients, or something a little more unique and interesting. These little white guys in my tank are actually pretty boring these days . I do like the color contrast though.



gliebig said:


> Interesting lighting setup. I'm trying to nail down the lighting on my tank. 60x36x24. I was going to do 2x250 halides so I could get the shimmer. Do these cfl's give off a lot of shimmer?
> Does having a blue then white then blue give it a color spotlight look or do they blend pretty good in the tank?
> I'd like to see some more pics of your light setup if you could.
> Tank looks great btw.
> ...


I'll try to get some more pics to show off the light. They actually shimmer a lot on the rocks. Don't know if the video shows it or not, and I can't watch it at work to check. The shimmer in my tank is at a high frequency because my sump provides a lot of flow and surface agitation.

When all 9 bulbs are on, they all blend together pretty well. IMO, the blue lights are necessary. I first tried 9 of the 5000K bulbs and it looks very drab in the tank. I then tried 1 blue bulb in the center of each fixture and it helped a bit, but the blue was more of a spotlight effect and still didn't look quite right. Moving to 2 blue bulbs per fixture was perfect, except for the blue bulbs being more expensive than the white ones . 1 white bulb per fixture provides more than enough light for me to view the fish in the evenings and at night when I usually have the lights on, but its not necessarily bright.

A neat effect I've found was unscrewing the white bulbs in the outer fixtures in leaving only the white bulb in the center of the tank and all the blue bulbs on. It provides a nice spotlight effect in the center of the tank than blends nicely to a darker outside. I've got a couple pics that show this.

I can also run just the 6 blue bulbs and none of the white ones, and it looks a bit light moonlighting. A little brighter than needed maybe, but a really interesting effect.

There are some other color bulbs I wouldn't mind experimenting with sometime for some novelty effects. I've seen yellow, green, orange, etc. Maybe try red and green for christmas .


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## gliebig (Oct 1, 2010)

Sounds just like what I am looking for. I'd love to see some more "behind the scenes" pics of how the lights are setup/wired. I'm not very good with that stuff. 
Thanks for the reply.
G


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## Rhinox (Sep 10, 2009)

gliebig said:


> Sounds just like what I am looking for. I'd love to see some more "behind the scenes" pics of how the lights are setup/wired. I'm not very good with that stuff.
> Thanks for the reply.
> G


I'm at work now so I can't get any pics, but I can describe the process for now. Its actually really easy.

Each 3 bulb strip has 3 wires sticking out the back, positive, negative, and ground, which will be black, white, and plain copper or green for the ground. I can't remember which color is + or - but it doesn't really matter.

I also bought a 15' black heavy duty grounded extension cord, and cut off the female plug, leaving the male plug (the part that plugs into the wall) and the long cord. They make cables without a female plug for this purpose, but for some reason, the cord with the female plug was a couple bucks cheaper and the only difference was the presence of the plug. Anyways, inside the extension cord are the same 3 wires: black, white, and ground.

All you have to do is connect all of the like colors, and plug it in.

I had to cut a small 2' section from the extension cord to extend the outer strip lights' wires to the center, and then I attached all 3 strips to the main extension cord in the middle of my hood. To connect the wires, all you do is strip them to the copper, twist the ends together really good making a Y, and screw on a wire nut where the wires come together. A wire nut is a little plastic cover that is threaded on the inside - the threads grab the wires and hold them securely together, while covering up the exposed wire. Then for safety, you can wrap electrical tape around the whole thing.

So, at the left of my fixture, there is the bath strip with 3 wires, each going with their respective mate in the 2' extension. thats 3 connections, 3 wire nuts. Same on the right. Then in the center, there are the cords from the center strip, and both extensions from each side, and then the main power cord - 4 black wires, 4 white wires, and 4 ground wires. All the wires of one type get twisted together into 1 wire nut, for 3 more connections in the center. Thats the toughest part physically, connecting all 4 black, all 4 white, and all 4 grounds together.

Thats all there is to it. If you've never heard anything like this before, it might sound complicated, but its a piece of cake.

Depending on what you want to do, you can get more complicated. You can wire the lights into a wall switch, for example. You can wire in a dimmer switch (but that won't work for CFL's) or a timer, for example. You could even wire up your whole stand with built in plugs for your filters, pumps, heaters, etc. and control it all with power switches, rather than unplugging all the individual wires, for example turning off the heater during a water change, or the filters to rinse out some media.

Next time I do this, I'll probably buy individual light sockets and wire them to different switches, so I can control the blue and white lights independently, for example, rather than unscrewing bulbs. If I'm ever bored, I can probably take apart the light fixtures to do that  but its functional how it is now.

These are all plans of mine for when I own a house (rather than rent) and put in a nice, 8' in-wall tank


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## gliebig (Oct 1, 2010)

Thank you for the write up. :thumb: I may be able to pull it off (after reading it several times. haha) 
How many bulbs do you think I would need to use over my tank? it's 60x36x24.


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## Rhinox (Sep 10, 2009)

gliebig said:


> Thank you for the write up. :thumb: I may be able to pull it off (after reading it several times. haha)
> How many bulbs do you think I would need to use over my tank? it's 60x36x24.


hmmm... tough question. My tanks got 2 blue and 1 white bulb per 2' of tank, but yours is wider and deeper than mine. I think I'd try 2 rows of 5 bulbs each, and I wouldn't think you'd need more than 4 white bulbs if you like the blue-white combo - so maybe B-W-B-W-B in each row. If I couldn't find appropriate fixtures, I'd just do it the same way my tank is set up now.


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## dtune21 (Dec 16, 2003)

Great looking tank! I actually like the way you had it in the first pic, it just looked more natural and less crowded to me. Either way good job!


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