Back for Good!

Not only am I back from skiing with no vacation to take for the forseeable future, but my camera came back from the shop, so pictures will once again abound. Here's one to orient ourselves with the status of the tank:

As you can see, there's lots of luscious, green growth, but what's not so obvious is that some of it (too much) is algae. I was amazed again that when I came back from only 4 days away, the black neons had lost so much color yet again. I fed them Sunday night, and by Monday morning, they looked fine. It's amazing how sensitive that coloration is to their diet. I went ahead and refilled the CO2 canister today because the bubbling had dropped off considerably. Between that and some more consistent, daily Flourish additions, we will be right back on track.

With the weather finally getting cold, I got a little heater for the bucket to keep the water from getting too frigid. I hadn't worried about it much before now since I have not tried to keep fish in there, but the plants were starting to suffer from the cold.