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Melaleuca Driftwood?


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Love it Paul! The windscreen wipers were the funniest.

Yes Les. Absinth was oroiginally supposed to have wormwood in it, at concentrations which are supposed to cause hallucinations. The "artists" at the time were apparently endulging in the drink regularly!

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@ Busman Paul

LOVE IT ROFL I gota make me a copy of that.

Paul

I have a recipe for it but havent tried making it yet.

i have a still myself and made most of the alcohle for my daughters 18th party yestarday started at 10 on sat morning and the last left at 12 sat night sixty five teenagers I have been cleaning up all day long but is was great

Cheers

Les

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Just some pieces that I have in the tank droped a chisel in there last week so emptied it this week so I could sharpen and use it again

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The chisel has turned black in a week LOL

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all the wood has gone past the stinky stage no more dead things and all bark is off ready to boil and new wood to go in

Cheers

Les

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While I've spent the last 72 hours recovering - the wood has't yet made it into the bath.

I am a driftwood failure.

I did however move 300+ liters of fish and shelving so as to re-arrange my room (epic)

Bus- that cracked me up.... i feel like i did all of those things just on the sudafed, thank GOD i'm over that flu/delirium/plague

I felt just like... david after the dentist.

ANYHOO - Les - is that teatree? and if so how long have you had it in tank - and did you think it plunged pH ?

I think I'm actually afraid of the angry ladies I live with - I'm just going to plonk my wood in the 44 gallon drum and leave it out there - gets plenty of water changes with melbourne's moody showers.

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Hey Ness

Some of that is Mellaluca and some Eucalipt the Mellaluca that grows in wet areas (paper bark) can make the water smell a bit but it all comes good in the end it is such a divers species from quite arid to swamps freash and brakish. Hear in WA Tea tree is Leptospernum using a common name for wood can somtimes couse confusion so I try to keep to botanical.I would recomend putting it well away down the back so the Fema Savage dont get upset with the smell just incase LOL

Cheers

Les

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In an effort to beat Ness into putting twigs in a tub, I decided that as my car was full of said twigs and I couldn't be bothered doing any work that I'm actually paid for today, I decided to start unloading my car into the office balcony and cut up sticks to the length required for my future forest scape, 53cm which is the height of my tank (I may need to trim some off later once I empty the contents of the tank and can measure from the inside, but I decided it was easier to trim later than get them to grow an extra centimetre or so).

The flip side of beating Ness to the tubs is that my twigs are all quite boring because I want them to be. So my photo essay is not going to be as interesting. But here goes....

The first thing I did was cut a flat end...

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And then because I will need to place them vertically I was trying to find the easiest way of making them steady and I think I've decided on cutting a cross pattern in the bottom and making a foot out of plastic much like these pictures (the paper that I have used in this prototype probably won't be quite enough to hold it in place).

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This is also one of my favourite of the bits of melaleuca, it has a cool kind of knotted texture.

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Then I got sidetracked and forgot to take photos until I had lots of sticks already cut and in the tub with the water. Fascinating no? Lots of different diameters, but all the same length.

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Pretty markings on some of them...

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Some of these I don't think will be appropriate, although Dad assures me that everything on those piles has been cut for at least 8 years, some of it feels newer than that and I suspect may be too leachy to play with. There's a few bits of gum amongst it, but we'll see how they go too. I have more to cut and put in, but this is a start.

And I broke the office watering can trying to fill the tub... Ooops...

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LOL Nes that coment reminds me of a recent Big Bang episode

Hey Adan that is such a great idea cutting before soaking I will have to remember that you will get some remarkable paterning from meleluca.

All of my drift wood has finished soaking and I have scraped of all lose fibers and debrie so tommorow it will go into the oven for two hours and then it will be ready to go into the tanks. The oven part was somthing sujested by a guy in USA as there nare certain things like planaria and other water born griblies that are not wanted in a tank that can live through the soaking but not the oven stage so I am going to take his advice this time around and see how it pans out

Cheers

Les

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I'm curious about how you'll control the PH swing that the wood might create - I just checked my water in the 44 and it's bright yellow - so it the ph reading

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But I guess that's normal as it's only rain water (right?) I've never had much to do with rain water chemistry....

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But the good news is (as mentioned on my angel thread) that the small 60 lt tank I had with some of the not even soaked twigs- are not affecting the ph... because I use Aquapix KH Hardness powder... so it's just locked in.

Dus that mean there's some psychotic chemical warfare between the water and the buffer and the sticks?

Or is it perfect harmony with rainbows and unicorns?

Who knows - all's I know is my smaller tank is stable table.

Unlike the temperament of my angel fish.

So would that mean I could plonk a heap of this wood into a bigger tank and it wouldnt crash?

Maybe I should put some teaspoons of my magic aquapix product in the 44 and see how stable it stays..

overkill--- probably.

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PS the flash made the reading look a bit blue - it's neutral... TRUS ME

YOUR-ARGUMENT-IS-INVALID-meme-collection

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Hears a report back on the drift wood I have been using the wood I put in to the oven when put in to the tank had to be waited down again untill it soaked up the water but I got no Planaria in that tank. The drift wood I didnt put in the oven I put in a diferent scaped tank and it is now full of plinaria so from hear on in I will be putting in the oven before using for scaping. Thank you America LOL

cheers

les

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I think the oven trick is similar to the boiling in terms of killing nasties isn't it? I guess the difference is that unless you have industrial sized pots & pans you can fit larger pieces of wood in the oven. The advantage with boiling is you don't dry out the wood in the process.

On a side note, I have small amounts of planaria in most of my tanks. It used to bother me, but it doesn't seem to worry the fish so I stopped paying attention unless it gets to a point where they're bothering me or them.

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Hey Adam

I see somthing wrigle and it makes me itch so they have to go I use the guppies to get rid of them and they do a realy good job of it three or four days and no more planaria. I think your right about the boil or bake and its realy hard with big pieces on the american site they said its a must for boil or bake if the wood comes from creeks or rivers as this is where most greeblys that you dont want in your tank are found, that makes sense.

Hows the forrest going do you need any ricia for it as I realy have to offload some somwhere every tank has it now and I have it in the green house as well its a frigin weed when it floats.

Cheers

Les

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Reports back from my little 60 litre angel hospital tank, the kids are fine - well .... there are 2 left now, Lacey is MIA... but I think the bullying might have gotten to him/her and 'e might have jumped ship, I'll find out when I move house.

I DIGRESS - the tank is still stable.

So I got bored and made my 3 foot (and very tall) tank into an angel scape for my two bastard children that hate eachother, dragging out of the VERY stained water in my 44, I took 10 sticks of tea tree into the yard and hosed it all down (imagine a picture of me hosing down sticks, I didn't take a photo)

2 of the said sticks had really spongy cores, stank like rotting bad things, and basically said NO THANKS, WE'VE GOT THE ROT.

The rest of 'em were still hard, wouldn't split when twisted (like a chinese burn) and have since found themselves in an in-elegant arrangement in my new angry tank.

Ph is 7, and I expect it to stay as such, slight bacterial bloom as it was a 100% change and very little attention to cycling or detail (sorry angry angels, it's a slap dash production)

Or maybe I just put in too much cycle?

Eheim is on it, heater is crankin, angels are angry and sticks are in - the carbonate hardness buffer should keep these bad boys in-line - I'll be testing in a few weeks to see if there's a ph crash.

(ohhhh you can still see the black dividers from my failed DIY experiment, I should point out on that thread that it was a fail... or.. NAH - let 'em work it out themselves!) heehhehehehehheheheh

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NiceNess

Glad to see some of those sticks in a tank and it looks so balanced. What Moss did you use? and if you get any bloms on the wood whilst in the tank use a tooth brush and leave the filter to suck it up

Cheers

les

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