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Household tips



James Purchase wrote:

"......Canadian Tire (an aquarist's best source for off beat solutions to 
common problems)...."

James,

Like many others I'm sure, I would love to hear some examples of your "off 
beat solutions".  Canadian Tire is a great place, in fact I was in there 
today buying a small bag of potting soil to try my first soil substrate 
tank.  It's a lovely 9 gallon cube tank.  I was actually just fiddling 
around with my bits of cork bark to see if I could make a "mountain" to go 
in the centre of the tank.  I think I'll take myself back to Canadian Tire 
and buy some of those dark brown fibre pots.

I have also used the dark brown (untreated) cork tiles as rear walls.  I 
have them in two of my tanks.  I used a combination of ladies hairnets and 
cut down hairpins to secure moss, so as to create a moss wall.  I have 
recently started a java moss wall in one tank and a "Kwek Leong" moss wall 
in another tank.  Needless to say, the latter is much nicer!

Last week saw my first attempt at making coconut shell caves.  After I had 
taken the fruit out, I decided to boil the shells, to rid them of any 
lingering nasties.  The water was dark purpley-brown afterwards.  Cutting 
the holes was a bit of a challenge. But I found some sort of heavy duty 
ceramic tile cutter in my husband's tool box.  I didn't have the benefit of 
a dremmel, so I filed the rough edges down with a metal file.   I then 
covered them with java moss and popped a hairnet overtop.  Haven't seen my 
clown loaches since!

Apart from the marvellous technical advice that is always available on this 
list, I think the "off beat" solutions using everyday items is invaluable, 
I love to hear peoples anecdotal tips about what to do with hairnets, old 
corn plasters and the like.

JC in Calgary