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I ordered this book and it finally arrived. It really is an awesome read, partially because the author is a very personable writer which I don’t see as much of in other guides I have. Some of the things you read about (alcohol blow-torching “gum shellac” to create basically a drilled tank) are amazing. Plastic might be convenient but how can you not want your very own mason jar and wood fish carrying case? Imagine strolling to the Petco counter with one of these bad boys.

I've seen questions about the Co-op's nano air pump pop up often so here is a quick teardown of the usb nano air pump. With half of the out rubber removed we can see two main components, the motor(right) and the pump(left). On the bottom of the motor we can see a large 50-Ohm resistor between the terminals. I believe this resistor is there to protect the power supply. When the power is cut off the motor still spins for a moment and can throw some power back at the power supply, this resistor would help eat up that power. On the pump end we find three small screws. Once we remove the screws and top we find three small diaphragms that pump up and down when the motor runs. Now with the diaphragm rubber removed we can see the motor head piece that moves the diaphragms and on the underside of the top we can see the three small rubber backflow valves. I guess those screws weren't so small after all. And there we have it, the guts of the fabled pump popularized by our beloved Co-op.

@Pete, I purposely cut my power cord and soldered in a rotary thumb-wheel switch for an easy, on/off feature.

One of my aquariums has been running a bit hot in temperature and wanted to try an experiment anyway. Was curious how much the temperature would actually drop, by using a low voltage fan. Salvaged a computer power supply fan and wired it up for portable (12 volt battery) or fixed (wall transformer) operation. Will use removable Velcro to adhere the fan to the tank's top rim. Now, to try it out and see how well it performs. 12 volt / 300mA box fan with installed alligator leads In-line safety fuse installed

I've really been enjoying my pumpkin arch this year.

The pair brought the fry out of the cave for the first time last night

Continuation! I received my weld-on 40 acrylic cement some time ago! Ordered 2 pints of it to reinforce the seams on the bottom. The tank has some crazing on the bottom seams, and the person had this tank for a long time without using it, outside their home, so I felt reinforcing was necessary. Someone checked it and told me most likely I would be ok, but I didn't want to take chances, so here it is: So, let's check the package of weld-on 40 first Pretty straightforward. The kit comes in two parts, component A and B. We have to mix them in a 100:5 ratio. The kit comes pre-measured to be this ratio. But the catch is that you have only 20 minutes to work with it from the moment you mix! We have to be very careful not to waste this material, as it is costly! (a pint kit was $40). The first kit however, I mixed all because I had to reinforce the front seam, and it was very long and had a good amount of imperfections/bubbles, so I was told I would need a very substantial amount there. The second one though, I had to use just the amount needed to reinforce the side seams. Doing the entire pint would be a waste since the side seams are so much shorter. I had to find a way to figure out how much material I needed to make roughly a 1" thick pour (remember, amterial has a working time of 20mins only! Gotta be precise). What I did was, I took a graduated cup and poured 100ml of regular water, and then poured it on the seam, just to give me an idea of how much 100ml of weld-on would look like. It ended being too little, so I added 50 more mililiters. 150ml of water was just great for the side seam! I went ahead and dried the tank, and then re-measured 150ml of water in the cup, then transfered the water to a plastic bottle that I cut for the purpose of mixing, so I don't ruin the graduated cup. After that I made a small mark on the bottle (red dot) so I can know when I have exactly 150ml of weld-on. Threw the water and poured weld-on component A to the red dot (150ml). Now I had to find a way to measure an amount of the second component (B) that would make the mixture 100:5. Luckily, the metric system made this easy! haha. Since I was using 150ml of component A I just needed 7.5ml of B to make the ratio. So, 150ml and 7.5ml. Now I needed a guide to measure such a small amount of liquid. Well guess what? a teaspoon converted to mililiters is nearly 5! Super easy haha, So I just needed to pour 1 and a half teaspoons of component B and I was all set. Used some kitchen measuring spoons for this. Orange one is 1 Teaspoon and purple is half. So, one and one! All ready to start mixing! This is how I mixed it, they say to do it extremely slow in order to avoid air bubbles, but it seems it is nearly impossible to not have some. I was so worried but I was told I would be fine! (Please excuse the dogs, they're chihuahuas and will bark at pretty much a leaf blowing in the wind...) We are using what is know as the "Tip and Pour" method, and it's just that lol! You tip the whole tank so it forms a V, with the seam you are trying to reinforce (drip the cement) at the bottom, like so: Pouring the mixture on the seam. (Excuuuuuuse the dooooogs and the musiiiiiiiiiiic lol). This is the front seam when I finished pouring. Notice how I made a mess? First time doing this, Should have been more careful haha. But that will be covered with substrate so ah well! Side Seam: Now the ugly part. This is how it looked after 1 day of curing. My heart sank, I thought to myself "oh god that doesn't look good, I screwed it up, so many bubbles". I quickly asked around and was told this was very, very common while doing this, and that I would be fine. The mixture penetrates any spaces that happened to form in the seam, and well, bubbles come out, and since the material hardens so quickly, the bubbles might get trapped. But as long as I have a firm and decent surface contact between the two panels, I should be alright! The mixture reacts and becomes extremely hot some minutes after you mix it, so that might cause a bit of crazing on the surrounding panels too, but it is harmless and nearly invisible, and frankly it is better to have a little bit of crazing than have a seam burst from stress: 3 days later of curing, everything is all hardened up, solid as rock and completely welded together! It's kinda hard to see but I welded the back panel from the inside of the sump compartment (You'll ahve to excuse the parrot this time, I know I know, I have a zoo already! xD): Time to rinse substrate and fill it up! After 24 hours if waiting for the water to go down from over 100`F (I live in desertic climate) to my room temperature of 79`F, it was time to put some plants! I just hope the severum, blood parrot and oscar leave them alone... one can dream lol! Added a massive amount of cycled bio rings and seachem matrix in a net bag at the back of the sump, as well as two aquarium coop, fully cycled 20gal sponge filters, as well as an ampoule of BioDigest Prodibio bacteria culture and voila! The guys are happy in their new tank! At long last, poor oscar was tired of that 10g tank! And was outgrowing it fast! He didn't even sulk after the tank change, started swimming all around right away! Temperature on the heater is 80 or so,a bit warm, but they're fine, properly temp. acclimated them, and the temperature will be 78-79 by tomorrow morning. The three fellas are getting along so well! I can't believe it haha! They're even shoaling all around the tank together! It still need some river stones, a proper cover, more plants and perhaps some driftwood, but the hard work is finally over! Been working on this tank since April or so, and now they finally have their forever home, I'm happy and they're happy! Looking forward to watch these guys grow into big monsters! I shall update even more when I have more scaping! Thank you so much for reading!

Hi all: As I continue to work on my Six-Piece Nano-Ponds project, I wanted to try an alternative to the tried-and-true sponge filter: this 4" box filter from Jehmco: https://jehmco.com/html/box_filters.html (non-affiliate link) In the constant debate between sponge and box filters, the sponge filter usually wins for me, except for one big problem: that thing is a mess to clean, even using the baggie technique. So I thought I would see if I could get some nice layered sponge work going on in such a way as to make it easiest to clean and most efficient in polishing the water while I'm at it! The Jehmco box filter consists of three pieces. Water flow goes from top to bottom, and then bubbles back up through a tube in the center. So, rather than think of mechanical media and bio media as two distinct phases in filtration, I'm thinking of it more along the lines of a "gradation". Coarse particles get filtered out and removed first, and the fewest bacteria grow there, because that's cleaned and/or changed more often. At the end, I would have the most bacteria and the finest particles. And all the layers in-between would be a progression from one to the other. If I layer things right, the plan is to never change most of the media! So I went hunting on Amazon, and found this lovely pack of AquaNeat foam pads in various densities, designed for SunSun filters and others: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07VBQHKR1 (non-affiliate link) This selection provided me three pads of each kind, all for $13. It may seem like overkill, but I'm actually building SIX such filters, so it'll all get used! The pads are about 8-1/2" across, so I figured I could get 2-3 box filter pads from each one. I plan never to replace them. The replaceable part comes from this blue and white floss, $7 from PetSmart (sometimes discounted), and I think I should be able to get somewhere around 20 pads from this one piece! The final type of pad I wanted to employ here was also a piece of filter foam from Aquarium Co-Op, because it's so very coarse and a good first layer: https://www.aquariumcoop.com/collections/filter-media/products/sponge-pad-coarse After taking some measurements, I decided I needed four-inch circles, so I first cut a piece of cardboard to size, and I used that as a guide for cutting my pads. I punched each pad twice with a chopstick to make room for the filter tubes, and assembled my "Dagwood Sandwich" of a box filter! I ended up using TWO floss pads for the top, to help catch more detritus before it enters the pad assembly. Looks like the Aquarium Co-Op pad will catch a lot as well. One last bit of hot-rodding to do: The Jehmco Web site suggests that putting a real uplift tube on the filter will significantly increase the draw of water through it. So I purchased a 3-foot piece of 1/2" stiff tubing (also from Jehmco), cut it into six-inch lengths, and it fit quite snugly on my filter box: And that's it. I'm hoping that maintenance will pretty much consist of replacing the two floss pads, lightly rinsing the first couple layers of pads most often, rinsing the rest of the pads progressively less often. One souped-up, turbo-charged, hot-rodded box filter ready to go! I'll try to post a follow-up in coming months about how well this worked out. Thanks for reading! Bill

Hi all. i am newly returned to the hobby after a 40 year hiatus. I had quite a few tanks as a kid with the usual suspects; Guppys, Neons, Angels, Loaches, etc. I am also newly retired and have started up a ton of new hobbies, like Extreme Hammocking, and Beard Growth Watching, but I was looking for something else to do...then I remembered the joy I got from keeping fish when I was in my early teens. I actually don't even have a tank yet, other than a little 10 gallon the kids used for rodents, years ago. I set it up to make sure I understood how to do the cycle and get the parameters down... Then I started watching Cory's YouTube videos and videos of a few other youtubers... Now I have a 20 gallon tank coming tomorrow and a 40 gallon that will be here Tuesday. I'm lucky that I live in rural upstate NY(right on Lake Ontario, I can see it as I type this) and do not have a fish store within 50 miles of me, other than the petcos and petsmarts and even those are a good hour's drive away, otherwise I'd probably have a big tank by now. I did spend my first $100 at the shop here already and got my package pretty quick, especially for what's going on with the USPS right now! I am going to slow down a bit though and get these two tanks set up and make sure I still enjoy it as much as I used too. The 20 gallon is going to be planted and have guppies, shrimp, and snails. Not sure yet what I will do with the 40 gallon, but I am going to set it up as soon as it gets here and do my research. I LOVE that we are really going for entire ecosystems these days. It's not just a cage for fish, but a home, so I am going to be doing a lot of plants and trying my best to put stuff together that like the same things. SOOOOO much info out there! Obviously there was no internet when I was a kid, so I rode my bike to the library a couple of times a week to check out another book and hopefully expand my knowledge a small amount. Looking back, we really didn't know even a quarter of the things that are "KNOWN" now. It was a lot of guesswork, so a huge thank you to all of you sharing info! I'll post pics as I go along and if things work out as I think they will, I'll show each new tank as they get progressively larger and probably my divorce papers somewhere along the line too.

Other than, say, your quarantine or hospital tank, which one of your tanks do you enjoy the least right now? Why is that? What do you plan to do about it, if anything, to make yourself like it again? One of my 20G talls is housing a breeding pair of plecos, a 10-month-old lone survivor offspring, and a colony of tiger endlers and cherry shrimp. When I first set it up, I was looking to get a breed-for-little-to-no-profit project going with the plecos. The plecos produced fry within a couple months, I just sort of let things be and kept the fry in the same tank to rasp on wood and algae, and between the larger plecos, the livebearers, and the shrimp, I'm suspecting they just weren't getting enough to eat. I pretty quickly lost all but the one still-alive offspring. For the next 10 months, I never again saw any fry, just ejected eggs every spawn. I sort of ignored the project and let things play out naturally. Changed the scape a little as some plants did poorly in the low light, and as of late it's a tiger endler breeding colony. Photo as of a month ago: I just recently noticed the plecos spawning again, and I had more time to devote to being more proactive. Dragged out that Marina/Fluval breeder box and stuck the cave (with dad) in there. Today I saw the wigglers in the cave! Now i'm prepared to give them unrestricted access to food. This has breathed a little life into this aquarium. But always wondering which tank is next.

I've serviced my Fluval Fx4 canister probably close to 100 times. Just this last week when doing my bi-monthly service on it, I forgot to close the tubes, I promptly dumped fish water all over myself. 😅

It’s funny you usually just say “where did you come from?” When you see a smaller one. Nice that they were in this little tank and I can watch them a bit.

Yeah, my nerites do that all the time too! Especially the black racers. Eggs everywhere, including all over each other. Wish something would eat them...

Pretend they are betta pellets. Just a little once or twice a day. They are nice and nutritionally dense.

I'll be interested to see how it goes. Keep an eye on evaporation.

I recently bought a 40 breeder from Petco ($1 a gallon sale) along with the corresponding lid. When I set the tank up the lid doesn’t fit, it’s 1/2” too wide (front to back). I called the store I got everything from and they measured the rest of the 40 breeder lids and they were all the same size as the one I had. I called and emailed Aqueon about this and they tried to throw Petco under the bus saying that Petco was reboxing Tetra tanks as Aqueon. Then I read them the code on the bottom of the tank and then they admitted it was theirs. So it looks like with the added volume quality control has taken a back seat. I had to take the lid to a glass shop to have a 1/2” taken off one of the panels. Aqueon is sending me something for my trouble. So if you’re in the market for a similar setup I’d make sure everything fits before you leave the store. No need for surprise when you get home.

My second tank finished cycling today! I moved the guppies I had in the 10 gallon into the 20, early this morning. Looks like they are doing well! So excited to get the 45 high cycled too, but even though it's already been a week and a half or so, I probably won't put any fish in that one for at least another 6 weeks. I'm not even really doing much to speed up the cycle other than putting the API quick start in it. I want to get the right combo of plants and driftwood set up in that one and I'm really taking my time deciding on what fish I want. leaning toward some of the smaller rainbows as the main fish. I'm currently setting up the cinder block and 2x4 stand for a 55 gallon too. I hope to have that tank home by next weekend. So I started the hobby back up less than a month ago, and I have a 10 gallon hospital/QT tank, 2 20 gallon tanks and a 45 gallon. I have another 45 gallon too, but the center brace is broken on that one, so I need to put a new top on it. I might not even do that and just give it away as a reptile tank.

The only wish I had about this pump was that the cord could be easily replaced. I've had a pump get ruined once or twice from water splash, and it's been a nightmare disentangling the cord to replace it. I shudder to think the headache I will have to endure when one of the pumps on my 6-up nano ponds goes out... If it were a modular cord attachment this truly would be the best small air pump on the planet.

How retro! I can't remember the last time I saw one of those.

Daphnia is a tiny live or frozen crustacean. A "water flea" they are sometimes called. You can grow them yourself or sometimes buy them frozen in little blocks. I have a very piggy betta that I got from the store looking about like that. I just didn't feed for a few days and kept a very close eye on him... Not that there was much more I could do at the time. Now that I know him better I suspect he was being overfed at the store. It resolved slowly over the course of about a week. I fed him VERY lightly to start, and now feed a few small meals a day. No matter how many pellets I put in the tank, he eats them ALL and still acts like he's starving.

@TheDukeAnumber1, Yeah, isolating components, then measuring their "unpowered" resistance value is the most accurate, safest approach, in this situation.. I was tinkering around this morning and slipped off the green rubber boot on one of my pumps. The resistor color code on mine was: Green, Brown, Black & Gold Green=5, Brown=1, Black=0, and the Gold "tolerance" value represents 5 % tolerance value rating of the resistor component resistance itself. So, 51 ohms @ +\- 5% tolerance. The part # on my motor was 11670N - 180514 The resistance reading just across the motor alone was 33.4 Ohms So, the two resistances "in parrallel" with each other measured 20.18 Ohms, which was close to your original measurement with everything connected together. Note: These are D.C.resistance values, not to be confused with A.C. Ohmic impedance values, I.E. Audio speakers or other A.C. driven devices. Since it's a basic D.C. motor, it simplifies things. There are multiple reasons for the resistor including to protect the motor a bit if the power is often applied & removed. It also changes the total circuit current (Amperage) consumption.

I think my least favorite tank was my multifasciatus setup. I love the fish, but due to poor planning, I hated working on the tank. It's the bottom of a stacked set up, and had a built in wet dry in the back. Which is extremely difficult to get in and do maintenance. The inside is just as bad, the wet dry takes up much of the footprint and I added faux cliffs for cover. Reaching in or netting out fish was incredibly difficult. What I'm doing to remedy it, total take down. Rescaped a 40 breeder and rehoused all the multies in that one. Purchased a bunch of new glass tanks, including a couple 55's. So the plan now is to use the substrate and filter media to start a new 55 in place of the old one.

Tank on the stand now

Today I added another feature to improve on this filter: an elbow outlet with a duckbill nozzle: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B01N11DVZS (non-affiliate link) These particular nozzles fit the 1/2" tubing on the box filter perfectly, force-fit without glue: This tube and nozzle attachment pushes quite a bit of water, even with just the bubbles of the USB nano pump: Under the water, there's a nice long linear stream, as evidenced by the bubbles showing up several inches away: I think this nozzle helps increase the water pressure, giving it more power!

What is the rule of thumb when it comes to paint? I know Dean mentioned what he uses before in a video, but I can't find it now. I'm just looking to paint a filter intake. I know Krylon Fusion used to be recommended often, but I also understand that formula changed some time ago. I have Rust-oleum 2X on hand, which says it works on plastic. Is this ok, or do I need to shell out for something plastic specific like Tamiya? -Thanks

I've used several kinds of spray paints over the years with no problem; I think most of them are inert for freshwater IF they've been given several days to cure. One of my favorites is Plastidip for its texture. I've used that many, many times for years with no trouble.

I’ve used both Krylon & Rustoleum on my aquariums with no issues.

I used krylon fusion in December for my 3d background. 8 months no issues so far.

Those temps are definitely fine mine have been breeding in a tank that has been consistently just below 80* due to summer temps. Its great that you have a lot of plants, if you have larger rock surfaces for them to hang out on and theyll love you for it. The more flow the better but mine love playing in the bubbles coming from the sponge filter also. I also found that my leopard danios were a bit much for the hillies acitivity wise and seemed to stress them out but that was in a smaller tank, as long as they have places to escape to they should be fine.

I got my two in yesterday from aquahuna currently have them in the QT tank 10 gallon and all that tank has is a sponge filter and a ziss bubble bio they doing good but doing the med trio that @Coryrecommends. Maybe try a qt tank and make sure they heathy and make sure they have a good belly not sunken in is my opinion I’ve seen @Cory and Lucas from lrb aquatics keep them in low flow and higher temps

@Chandra I saw a cherry shrimp near the side of the aquarium by my desk just now. I moved a desk light over near the shrimp and then used an iPhone to take a video. Here is a screenshot from the video. Thanks to the lighting the clarity isn't too bad.

When my house was damaged by a fire, the damage to my aquarium was covered my homeowners insurance. The insurance company didn't blink and promptly wrote a check for $29,000 to restore the aquarium.

I don't have insurance on my aquariums, but I did ask my agent about damage caused by a broken aquarium and they told me that my insurance would cover damages to my home if an aquarium should leak. I only have one tank in the living area upstairs of my house, the rest are in my fishroom in my basement, which is unfinished.

To keep ya'll updated, I'm okay, me and my family are safe, the hurricane brushed passed my home so at worst, it's probably a power outage. Sucks for my nitrogen cycle but there's no fish luckily. Praying for that little bladder snail and my plants but we're okay.

Hey @JessR and thanks for responding to my post and your patience with my low quality photos. I can't quite confirm that my betta's fins look comparable to either of yours, but if I had to guess, I'd say it looks more like the first photo you posted. To answer your questions: - It's difficult to tell if the fins are inflamed; the colours seem uniform, but he is a dark blue so perhaps I am mistaken and just can't see any inflamation. Some of the stringier bits have white tissue on the tips. An associate at my local store said the white is possibly regrowth? It does not look like the regrowth on your betta in the first photo. - I believe I first noticed how raggedy his fins look approximately one month after COVID shut down everything. For the most part they have looked long, thin, and frayed since then, however, I do occasionally notice his fins are shorter. - I would estimate the damage is about 1/2 - 3/4 the way up his tail and does not appear to be closer to his body. It looks as if someone took scissors and cut his tail into shreds or ribbons. That's the best way I can describe the issue. As you said in your post, the damage does not follow a pattern. - Not once has he seem lethargic or uninterested in food. He will always greet me when I come to see him. He have a ravenous appetite, and at one point I had to treat him for constipation. He also eats algae wafers that I put in the tank for the corydoras. I believe he picked up the behaviour from them. He is now fed every other day lol - He does like to hide in the plants, but I don't believe I have ever seen him intentionally rubbing against anything in the tank. My driftwood is fairly gnarly-looking, however, so maybe that is damaging him. I've wondered this before. - In addition, I one found an approximately 5-10mm long piece of fin on the bottom of my tank. It was as bright blue as he is. I assumed it was ripped off by something, or he bit off a chunk? I do not have aggressive tank mates, either. Given your questions and my responses, I'm starting to think he's eating himself or there's some other kind of infection going on. Again, thanks for your reply, and wishing you and your fishy friends best of health 🙂

DIY “hook”. And add hose quick connects.

I often forget to plug back in my heater after a water change, but thankfully it takes a long time for the tank water to change temperatures. 😅

Started installing aquariums this weekend, looking forward to getting the filters installed and hooked up.

Thanks for responding. As you can see, I couldn't wait to give him his playground. Thanks Aquarium Co-op! He investigated every nook and cranny of those plants, lol. I don't have any hardscape wood or rocks in there, so not sure if things will be moved around or not. All my other tanks are planted, it was so hard to stare at an empty tank with one fish.

I know salt will be okay with some shrimp, because they are pretty hardy and nerite snails eggs actually hatch in brackish water so salt will be okay. And as far as I know maracyn has had no effect on any of my inverts.

I couldn’t figure out to hook mine into any of our decorative faucets and didn’t have something to remove an aerator. But our shower had an unused hand-held shower head portion.... tried that but it was not matching up. Took both parts to the hardware store down the street and the dude there thought for 5 minutes and found me a converter. Gotta love a decent local hardware store.

I should warn you, this forum is full of kind people, who are full of good ideas.

Hello! I’m from the San Francisco Bay Area and I am brand new to the hobby! (Not including my childhood fishbowl fish). I have already learned a ton (and now feel badly for those fishbowl fish I had lol) and I still have many more questions. I don’t have any pictures to share as I’m still stocking up on my supplies but I’ll be excited to share my progress with you all! thanks!

Doh! I didn't think of glass. I do have some tubing or a least some narrow glass burettes and can put the tubing around the narrow end (I think).

Glass tubing. It would have been glass. I don't have any, but we used glass serological pipettes just a decade ago that would have been perfect if you snapped off the tapered tip. They have been phased out for plastic disposables. Students are too rich to wash glassware now.

Right now I am frustrated with the new nano tank I placed at work. I got it on clearance for $3, and I used only stuff I had on hand to decorate. I placed some cherry shriml in there and a juvenile mystery snail (I have oddles of them right now,) but I just hate the way it looks and I can never see the shrimp! I need to reduce the amount of hardscape (its only 2gal, for cryin' out loud.) I did have hornwort but it was not doing well with almost no light, which I expected. (Just wanted to see if it would help the cherries acclimate.) I'll mess with it a little more until I'm happy with it.