lets see some full tank shots.

The idea of me setting up this thread is for ideas. I want to see some of the difrent african setups that some of our members have. I have posted mine in a couple difrent threads. I would love to see some of yours larry, betty, terence etc. Let me see what you got. I have seen anthraxxs' tanks, but he should post his up too. Come on folks please.

I know you have prolly seen mine and it's soon to change to a Tropheus tank but here ya go. Overall the tank wont change that much with the Trophs. Since these pics were taken I have a nice carpet of algae growing on the rocks will post a updated pic tomorrow.

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Nice!

you asked and you shall receive!!

Brichardi tank 25
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Ocellatus tank 20
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Multie/julie tank 55
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my favorite multie shot
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old mbuna 55
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Mesonatua Insignis/Apistogramma tank 55
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WAY old 55 mbuna setup
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my first shellie/julie setup 30
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Planted 20 tall apistogramma tank
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Can you say LACE ROCK?!?!?!

Wow, Anthraxx you really do have tanks.... was beginning to wonder with no pictures.

Really nice!

Couldn't even post a teaser shot of the 125g?

Nice tanks. Wheres all the fish?

madness wrote:Nice tanks. Wheres all the fish?

They are invisible.

ahahaha i keep dwarfs. we cant all have five monsters per cubic yard of water. ur more then welcome to come over and see them.. haha

We know you keep dwarfs, just having some fun!

What were you keeping and what were you downsizing to make room for the 125g?

i had a ten gallon shrimp tank, and ive dumped the brichardi on VW, and still gotta dump the occie setup.. but i may end up keeping it. theyre finally fixing my floor so i dont need all my tanks on one wall anymore.. lol

also im surprised nobody mentioned that i HAD CA cichlids... lol

Anthraxx wrote: theyre finally fixing my floor so i dont need all my tanks on one wall anymore.. lol

More tanks!

yeah pretty much. idk if ill want many more past the 55 and 125. gfs got her own tanks that i really have no part of. i did get her 5 kribs for a dollar last night tho.. haha so i had a hand in that decision . ideally maybe a 40B or a 55 growout for babies. as i think i may have some of madness runoff in my local water supply.. lolz

Anthraxx wrote:also im surprised nobody mentioned that i HAD CA cichlids... lol

That's because you dident have central american cichlids. You had south american cichlids. Apistos and festivum are from south america, although I was a little surprised you posted the pics of full tank s. American cichlid tanks in the african cichlid section of the forum.

By the way, very nice tank jim. I really like your natural look and over all feel of the tank. Thanks for sharing. Anyone else... I see betty and larry and terence are all online. Don't be shy.....

god you guys need to perhaps get a comedy tour going. what with all these witty retorts. fishbox comedy tour? naw thats a crummy name. lets see if any of you "funny guys" can come up with a better name.

That wasent meant to be a rude comment at all, please don't take offense. It also wasent intended to provoke laughter. It was a simple comment of fact and correction that's all. I DON'T keep s. American cichlids. I have in the past and there just not that cool to me. I love centrals though, and when people confuse the two, it kinda drives me nuts. Again I meant nothing harsh, I promise.... now here take your pacifier back, and stop crying..... that was a joke. You know for the comedy tour. Lol! See the difrence, you will know when I'm being a smart donkey..

lol see what i said was a joke.. but you ruined the punch line with that plz dont take offense talk.. do i really seem like the kinda guy who would take offense that easily? lolz. ahh text.. how it lacks tone.. le sigh

I don't have recent pictures of any of mine. I'll have to take a few tonight. Here are a few older shots.

29 gallon J. marlieri
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38 gallon P. saulosi (old setup)
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55 gallon mbuna
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60 gallon mbuna
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I will try to get some pics of the other tanks later.

awesome tanks betty. i really like em. btw if you wanna get in on this lace rock buy i got going saturday the 26th feel free. cense is going down from mountlake so maybe u can catch a lift up there with him. i just see you clearly like it as much as me... and you cant beat the price at 1$ a lb..

Wow, Betty those are beautiful tanks and the fish just "pop" with the dark backdrops. Very nice!

Thanks Anthraxx. I've been thinking about it... . A couple more large pieces might look nice in my 60 gallon.

I'm not sure where Mountlake is -- isn't it up north? I'm down south of Tacoma.

Thanks, DMD.

Anthraxx wrote:god you guys need to perhaps get a comedy tour going. what with all these witty retorts. fishbox comedy tour? naw thats a crummy name. lets see if any of you "funny guys" can come up with a better name.

There are a few guys that beat us to it: Blue Collar Comedy Tour

yeah but they stopped being funny quite a long time ago DMD. you guys however still crack me up on the regular..

@ betty: o well then feel free to jump on board with me down south here. i wasnt sure where mckenna was TBH. its up to you but its well worth the trip. even if ur stuck with a bunch of male fish geeks..

Here's my 72g Mbuna tank

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Thats a lot of cichlid stones!

Nice set up and fish.

Wow really nice tanks betty... I really like your style.

Yours is also rad stierwalt, I really like cichlid stones.

This is what I was talkin about, really nice tanks everyone. Keep them coming.

Thanks guys... It's not the most realistic looking setup but the fish love it!

My cave spawning cichlids love those cichlid stones. Many babies have been raised in them.

Here are a few more of my tanks.

75 gallon mixed Malawi
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75 gallon tropheus (cherry spot)
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20 gallon A. calvus
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20 gallon N. leleupi
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10 gallon N. brevis. My new shells came in, so I'll be redoing this tank.
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These two tanks are temporarily holding P. multicolor victoriae; one male per tank. They were growing out together, but are so aggressive I was afraid they were going to kill each other. The first tank has two L134 plecos in it.
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I think that's all of the African tanks.

Betty's excellent tanks and photography skills are the reason I don't post photos of my tanks.

Hey Betty quit making everybody look bad lol

I would like to kow what you are using for lighting on the mixed and tropheus tanks? Great shots.

nice clean tanks

Fishman, supposed to be african cichlids... but nice tanks.

@ betty, wow I'm blown away you have some of the best looking african tanks I have ever seen. I bet you would do very well in the tank of the month contests on mfk.

@ larry come on man, I want to see.. this thread was started as a sly way for me to get to see your tanks. You see anthraxx was telling me you use your rock very well. Don't make me beg.. I totally will.

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Jim, the lighting on those two tanks are just the cheap Coralife T5s. Like these --> [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]. Mine work fine, but I've heard a lot of complaints about them, so won't recommend them.

I just took about 20 shots of my Tang tank but none of them are coming out. Same settings I use for my fish closeups, but they obviously don't work well for FTS. Betty, what settings are you using on yours? I had it at about F2.8, ISO 80, flash off. When I shoot individual fish I shoot flash on, but for a FTS it just creates a huge flash spot on the glass

shoot from an angle.. so the flash doesnt show up on the glass. the reflection is something to avoid. other then that not many tips i could toss you. besides turn off all other lighting but the tank itself. most of them will interfere with your full tank shots. clearly u can see what happens when u dont do this (my pics) lol GL larry i look forward to seeing your tanks whether they look good or not

Larry, I have absolutely no knowledge of cameras! I just set it to automatic and let the camera choose the settings.

For my tank shots, I turn off the flash and try to hold the camera still. (Don't have a tripod.) I also try not to have lights from the room reflecting on the tank glass. Turn off the lights or cover windows during daylight.

The fish won't be in focus, but without the camera flash, you won't have that terrible reflection that washes everything out. And like Anthraxx said, if you want to use the flash, try it at an angle.

I just reread your post, Larry and see that you tried it with no flash. I'll look at the info on my pictures and see what the settings were and let you know. . .

Exposure Time: 0.167 s (1/6)

Aperture: f/3.8

ISO Equiv.: 800

Ah, well I see that you're using a medium ISO and I was using very low speed, so I'll try to give that a shot tonight. I have a problem in that the rooms in my house have HUGE windows (complete walls of windows) so I can't shoot at all during the day, and even during the night I get some reflection from lights out on the water.

I just finished going thru all the photos of the Af. cich. tanks here and they are beautiful, you guys! I'm wondering if I wil get the same effect with a tan type substrate; not white or black. We'll just see. I will try to remember to post pix on this thread when the fish go in my 75g.

Thanks for all your pix!

fishloverRon wrote:I just finished going thru all the photos of the Af. cich. tanks here and they are beautiful, you guys! I'm wondering if I wil get the same effect with a tan type substrate; not white or black. We'll just see. I will try to remember to post pix on this thread when the fish go in my 75g.

Thanks for all your pix!

Ron, with the exception of the black tanks, all of my sand is tan pool filter sand. The pictures just make it look whiter than it really is.

Here are a couple of pictures that show color more. The way it actually looks in the tank also depends on the lighting, but it never looks glowing white in real life.

This tank has the tan sand and I had tried to see how the various types of rocks I had looked with it.
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And a closeup that shows color and nice grain size.
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Do make sure you post your pictures. I like looking at other tanks and getting new ideas as well.

Larry, we'd still like to see your tanks.

Here is an updated with the Algae growing. My sand is pfs with a mix of some other stuff as well some fine, some coarse.

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If you look at the lower right in this picture you can kind of see the mix.

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Thanks so much for the new shots and views. I don't have that fine of sand but I believe mine will do okay. If not, I'll remove a bunch and replace with finer grit.

well wasn't sure where to post this but im happy to say my 125 is all up and running now! (FINALLY) looks fantastic.. only issue is that there's too many hiding places for these little buggers to hide in. i barely see the monsters its all the fry and babies all over the place. on a happy side note. when tearing down my ten gallon holding tank i missed a rusty baby from Jim. thought it was dead and i went to touch it and it wiggled so back into the ten it went, where it immediately went upside down. i figured well bummer and left it alone.. and this morning hes back swimming around!! its a Christmas miracle!!!!

Pics!!!!

And change your sig from 125 in the works to..........

Where's the pics Anthrax

..this is my 40 gallon tall
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well heres a base pic. nothing fancy and none of the stock yet. need lights to make it worth while

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Its looking good Anthraxx!

Wow what a great design... I really like the two peaks... where did you come up with such great rock placement???? J/k, it looks great, nothing better then a few intoxicated fish nerds to put together an aquascape.