Glass Box Diaries

This is my golden white cloud mountain minnow tank, and today it’s 533 days old. It’s a room-temperature setup, currently sitting at around 18°C, or 64°F. Since we’re in the middle of winter, that drop in temperature has led to a few noticeable changes.

My Tank Setup And 1 Year Update Video For This Tank - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LptIJ...

My golden white clouds, yellow neocaridina shrimp, amano shrimp, and pink ramshorn snails are all doing perfectly fine at this temperature, but some of the plants are beginning to show signs of dormancy. The Hygrophila 53B is the clearest example, with holes developing in its leaves. Many people would immediately assume this is caused by a potassium deficiency, but this wasn’t an issue during the warmer months.

Instead, colder temperatures can cause many aquatic plants to enter a dormant state, similar to hibernation, where their internal processes slow down or temporarily pause. Keeping your tank above 22°C, or 72°F, is often enough to prevent this in most setups. However, this tank has already been through one winter, so I know growth will naturally pick back up again in spring.

Interestingly, the cooler temperatures do have some advantages. My white clouds actually seem to prefer this cooler water compared to the summer months. The dominant male has been actively maintaining his territory at the front of the tank, chasing everything else—including females—towards the back. Meanwhile, the non-dominant males and females have been breeding in those areas, although I haven’t spotted any fry just yet.

#aquarium #fishtank #fishkeeping #plantedtank #plantedaquarium

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3 days ago | [YT] | 451

Glass Box Diaries

One year ago, I rescaped my 30-liter (8-gallon) AquaEl Shrimp Set into a lush, beginner-friendly jungle-style betta aquarium, and these photos show how it looks today.

My Video Update On The Tank - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5CxwA...

The tank is built around easy, forgiving plants like Anubias ‘Coin Leaf,’ Cryptocoryne, Limnophila sessiliflora, and a carpet of Eleocharis, with Seryu stone, spider wood, and Amazon frogbit creating a natural, overgrown feel.

Over the past year, this setup has gone through bacterial blooms, algae phases, filterless experiments, and plenty of plant trims, but it has steadily matured into a stable, living ecosystem filled with biofilm, baby shrimp, and ramshorn snails.

My betta, Marmalade, has explored every corner of this scape, interacted with floating plants, and even learned to steal food from her shrimp tank mates.

While her health has declined due to a tumor, this tank has given her a calm, heavily planted environment where she can rest easily near the surface.

Jungle-style aquariums have very few “rules,” which makes them perfect for beginners who want something natural, low-tech, and full of life.

#aquarium #fishtank #fishkeeping #betta #bettafish #bettatank #bettafishtank #plantedtank #plantedaquarium

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1 week ago | [YT] | 522

Glass Box Diaries

🚨 Huge shoutout to everyone who watched my videos last month! 🚨

Because of you, the channel pulled in over 2.5 MILLION views in January 🎉

For full transparency, my original goal was 1.5 million views, which we hit, but a short went viral and brought in an extra 1 million views, pushing the total even higher.

2 weeks ago | [YT] | 275

Glass Box Diaries

Planted Nano Community Tank Setup: A Perfect Project For Small Spaces!

This is my 45-litre (12 US gallon) nano community tank, home to ember tetras, pygmy corydoras, blue neocaridina shrimp, amano shrimp, and a nerite snail.
The hardscape is built from river cobbles and spider wood, glued together with aquarium-safe adhesive to create a stable foundation.

Long-Form Video Setup - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ab4QK...
Short-Form Video Setup - www.youtube.com/shorts/a0JKj8...

I attached Anubias coffeefolia and Bucephalandra ‘Brownie Ghost’ directly to the spider wood, using them as natural decoration while keeping their rhizomes safely above the substrate. Most of the tank is filled with Fluval Stratum aquasoil to a depth of around 5 cm (2 inches), which makes planting much easier thanks to how lightweight aquasoil is. In the front left corner, I added a section of black sand to create a dedicated sand bed for the pygmy corydoras.

When planting, my initial goal was a filterless, plant-driven cycle, so the tank started out far more heavily planted than it is now. This helped the plants manage the bioload once livestock was introduced and kept everything stable early on. As expected with aquasoil setups, the first month included a bacterial bloom caused by nutrient release and residual gel on in-vitro plant roots.

I also added aquaponically grown houseplants along the back rim of the tank. These bring colour and texture above the waterline while contributing to natural filtration. By the end of the first month, water parameters had stabilised enough to stock eight standard pygmy corydoras, two albino pygmy corydoras, and ten ember tetras.

At the start of month two, algae growth increased more than usual, so I added six amano shrimp, ten blue neocaridina shrimp, and a nerite snail. Around the same time, I did a partial rescape—switching to a triangle layout, removing a large amount of stem plants, and adding a small nano filter.

Month three became a bit of an algae battle, as the light turned out to be far more powerful than expected. I gradually reduced the intensity from 100% down to 35%, which is still the setting I use today.

Now, five months in, I’m really happy with how the tank has matured. Algae is under control, the livestock are healthy and active, and I’ve even seen signs of ember tetras breeding among the roots of the houseplants above the waterline.

#aquarium #fishtank #fishkeeping #plantedtank #plantedaquarium #nanotank #communitytank

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2 weeks ago | [YT] | 418

Glass Box Diaries

Just published a new article that goes over the downsides of community tanks: glassboxdiaries.com/downsides-of-community-aquariu…

To be clear, community tanks are a great way to keep an aquarium—they let you enjoy multiple species living together in the same tank. I keep several community tanks myself and I’m planning to add more to my fish room.

That said, there are some common problems many beginners overlook when setting one up, so I wanted to highlight them and explain how to avoid them.

The long-form video version of this will be coming out later this week 🙂

#aquarium #fishtank #plantedtank #plantedaquarium #fishkeeping #tropicalfish

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3 weeks ago | [YT] | 438

Glass Box Diaries

This is Coral, my new betta fish.

After publishing a short yesterday about potentially de-building this tank, I went to a local aquatic shop to pick up a new pearl gourami and some neon tetras for my 40-gallon community tank.

While I was there, I noticed they had some female koi bettas for sale, and I decided to try one from a local shop instead of ordering online and putting a fish through the shipping process.

The Endler's Livebearers that were in there have been moved to their new tank to free this one up for the betta.

So far, she’s settled into the tank really well.

She’s ignored the shrimp, had a quick look at the nerite snail, and has eaten her first meal without issue.

Next week, I’m planning to order a pot of Monte Carlo for the foreground, Lobelia cardinalis ‘Mini’ for the back left, and potentially swap the Limnophila sessiliflora for Hygrophila difformis.

I’ll also be ordering another batch of white Neocaridina shrimp to try to get some males in there and start a breeding colony.

#betta #bettafish #aquarium #fishtank #fishkeeping #tropicalfish

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3 weeks ago | [YT] | 465

Glass Box Diaries

Here’s a quick update on my filterless Endler’s livebearer tank, now 223 days old.

How I Setup This Aquarium - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vz6tu...

It uses a soil substrate capped with gravel, a Chihiros AII light running at 30% intensity, a Fluval T-series heater, and fast-growing plants for natural filtration.

This tank was originally set up for a betta, but sadly the fish had health issues from unboxing and didn’t make it.

Since then, I’ve been keeping Endler’s livebearers in here, and they’ve been doing far better.

I’ve recently started moving some of them into their new rectangular tank, which has a larger horizontal footprint and gives them more room to swim.

My colony of white Neocaridina shrimp is doing well, but they still haven’t had any babies. I often see saddled shrimp with eggs in their ovaries, so I think they may all be female.

There’s a research paper suggesting that Neocaridina bred in cooler water can have an 8:2 female-to-male ratio, which could explain why this is a common issue in the hobby. I may order another batch soon to try and introduce some males.

All the plants in here are thriving. The main plant responsible for natural water purification is Limnophila sessiliflora.

Two clumps of Monte Carlo have also taken hold and are slowly starting to spread, so I’m curious to see how they develop.

I’m a bit torn about keeping this tank long-term, as cube and portrait tanks can be quite restrictive unless you’re planning to keep a betta or a shrimp colony.

The new tank for the Endlers is fully cycled and ready for the full colony to move over, so I may eventually break this one down and give it to a friend who breeds a lot of shrimp.

#aquarium #fishtank #fishkeeping #plantedtank #plantedaquarium #walstad

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3 weeks ago | [YT] | 265

Glass Box Diaries

I’ll be a guest on a livestream over on Edgar’s Fish Channel on 17 January 2026, starting at 10am UK time.

While the main focus will be aquarium-related topics, we’ll also be chatting about growing social media brands and answering questions from viewers live.

You can click the link to his YouTube channel to check the local start time in your area:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XAuiY...

1 month ago | [YT] | 103

Glass Box Diaries

After seeing steady growth on Google Trends over the past couple of years, this month has officially seen more people searching for information on Neocaridina shrimp than ever before.

Personally, I think it’s great to see the shrimp-keeping side of the hobby taking off as quickly as it is.

In 2025 alone, I gave away hundreds of shrimp—some of them to people I never would’ve expected to get into the hobby, let alone keep shrimp specifically.

#neocaridina #shrimpkeeping #shrimptank #cherryshrimp

1 month ago | [YT] | 90

Glass Box Diaries

This is my filterless guppy and cherry shrimp tank, which is 625 days old as of today. It’s set up using the Walstad Method, with a thin layer of topsoil capped by fine gravel as the substrate.

The plants handle the vast majority of the filtration, and even after recently removing all of the duckweed from the surface, the water parameters have remained safe and stable, with no signs of toxin spikes.

My yellow cobra guppy and two blue lyretail Endler guppies are all doing well, although I haven’t seen my dark blue guppy for about a week. That said, I’m not convinced he’s definitely passed away—he’s disappeared into the plant cover before, only to resurface days later at feeding time after quietly helping himself to shrimp food.

The tank is heated to 22°C, or 72°F, which is slightly cooler than the ambient temperatures it experiences during the summer months. Even so, the shrimp have adapted well. While there are still a few females carrying eggs, breeding activity has definitely slowed over the past month or so.

Overall, the plants are doing well, but I want to briefly touch on the Rotala, as it’s been showing a potential issue for several months. I recently received a comment asking whether the smaller leaves might be due to a lack of CO₂, but I believe it’s more likely related to the age of the stem plant itself. If you look closely, you’ll notice that the leaves become progressively smaller on new stems that grow after trimming.

This wasn’t an issue during the tank’s first year, but it’s become increasingly noticeable over the last couple of months.

Aquascapers often reference Takashi Amano, who suggested trimming stem plants around seven times before removing them and replanting the healthiest tops. I’m not sure if that guideline exists for this exact reason, but the new stems in this tank are significantly smaller than they used to be—and the Rotala rotundifolia here has been trimmed far more than seven times, as the tank is now approaching two years old.

#aquarium #fishtank #fishkeeping #plantedtank #plantedaquarium #walstad

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1 month ago | [YT] | 602