10 gal Split Betta Tank (With project moss divider)

[Ciryature]

Sooo, I've decided that a journal sounds super fun! Like, totally, and awesome. Respectively. But I have also decided keeping a toll on how much is spent on just a 10 gallon is a reasonable way to keep myself from going "Omg new tank nowwww"

So... We shall keep a tally here. And also keep tabs on a project divider I have in mind. A moss wall of sorts. (Shout out to Idoerr and Bignellum for the idea. :) )

Today I went out to look for stuff I'm gonna need. Already I had

10 gallon glass aquarium - about $12 from petsmart
50 watt heater - ~ $30
air pump and sponge filter from a failed happenstance - ~ $60

Don't know the exact prices on those cause I bought them a couple weeks ago and have since tossed the receipt.

Today from my LFS I got
1 20lbs bag of Ecocomplete (black) - $33 with tax (Apparently the price went up 5 bucks from the last time I had looked at it. Like, a week ago. :/)

From Petsmart I bought
2 Marina Slim S15 Power Filters - $14 each (Yay clearance!)
1 Bridge Background Cling - $3.50 (Yay sale!)

And from Joannes 2 mesh plastic Canvas (18" x 12") - $1.29 each

And 1 grande nonfat, sugar-free cookie crumble mocha frappacino for $3. Yay! I love half priced stuff!

So now all I need is:
Moss
Plants
Bettas
Decoration (rocks/wood/plastic statues, etc)

I saw some moss today at my LFS, it was even christmas moss, but it was like this tiny little ball of it for 10 bucks. :/ I would've needed like at least 3 to cover even half of the divider. And while shopping local is something I prefer to do, sorry... 30-60 bucks for some moss? No... way. So does anyone know a good place to order moss from? Preferably that doesn't cost an arm and a leg in shipping as well.

[rmiller]

Great rundown so far. I will be following as I am considering a split 10 for bettas as well.

[Ciryature]

Oh forgot I need a hood too and a light. Any suggestions on that?

And yay, rmiller! Bettas are so cute. :3

[ldoerr]

I bought 2 of those same filters off of amazon not that long ago for my 10g QT. I wish that I had just bought an Aquaclear 20. I hate filters that have the cartredges. These filters are not as bad as some since there are 2 per filter. If I were you, I would clean 1 cartredge each week. With the carbon ones I would take the carbon out and put some biomax in there instead.

There is 1 other thing that you will need for the dividers. You will need the spines of 2 report binders per divider. This will probably cost you under $4.

[bignellm]

Looks promising. On the light front, I would look to do a glass top (Versa Top is a nice one) and then go for either a regular ole' T8 single fixture sat on top of glass or a HO of some kind and hang it suspended above the tank.

[Ciryature]

Ok sooo couldn't wait for ebay to confirm my address. I think I'll cancel it anyway (ebay scares me O.O) so I just went back to my lfs and bought some christmas moss. They also had gotten in some new driftwood (woot!) So I grabbed two really nice looking smaller pieces. :) And two little clumps of moss (Seriously, they were tiny... I feel super ripped off. Oh well.) and I just am gonna use the java moss I had in my big tank for this moss wall filler. It was just kinda... meh in my 20 gallon. Not really looking good not really matching the decor... Yer outta there!




So the pieces of wood were 5.99/ea. I bought two.
The plants I bought were kinda expensive too...:
2 Amazons: 4.99/ea
1 Elodea (or... anacharis can't remember it's fluffy): 4.99
1 corkscrew Val: 3.99
and 2 christmas moss: 9.99/ea

I also went to Petsmart and picked up a light (Just the t8 like Bignellum suggested) 31.99 for the light, and on friday they're gonna have a 20" versa glass hood in for me that's about 14 bucks.

So first things first:

[Ciryature]

Then I started the divider. I searched through google and found thisperson who had done it exactly this way as well:



Except they had a big more moss, so mine's probably gonna take a while to really fill itself out and look nice. :(

[Ciryature]

And because I am always impatient (it's a serious problem...) I started really filling up the tank. :) I found that I can't actually get the divider to be even. :/ Not without possibly cutting too far and then it'd be worthless cause the fish would swim through and kill each other anyway. And that... would be sad.




Sooo.... It smells like boiling wood in my house. :x gross.

Next I put in the plants and filled up the water. It's super cloudy right now, but the two filters are at work (and they are mega quiet! Which is nice since this is my dresser.) But after I finish at the gym I'll put the wood in and take more pictures. :D And then friday I can fill it with fish! (I'll be putting seeded floss from my other tank into the filters.)

[bignellm]

Looks good and the divider will look super cool, when it fills out. Especially with those curves. That curve is natural, since it's a tension divider, so no worries. Can't wait to see

[rmiller]

Loving it so far. It will take quite some time for the wall to grow, but it will be worth it in the end.