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Swim in peace, big fish ❤️

Finally rescaped both tanks. Started with the 20 long and it took me almost the whole day. I went through each and every single stem of the jungle that I had. Had all these rocks to use but I feel like some of them are inert so I used ph down to test them This lot was not inert so they will not be used. I wonder what I stocking can work with these rocks? I’m thinking some dwarf livebearers so I can grow them in the 5g. I didn’t know a 20 gallon long can hold this much plants 😂 First layout but wasn’t satisfied. I felt like I didn’t give them enough floor space Moved some rocks on the left and kinda piled them on the right. Still not satisfied but I like it better This plant straightened itself out in just two days. If you look at first version of the rescape you can see it all bent in the front center part of the tank A week later I started on the 40 breeder because I didn’t have time last week. I decided to keep the emmersed hygrophila because my roommate said that he really liked it. Started emptying the tank. I kept about 15g of the original water First time seeing it empty again since the setup Hygrophila jungle Purple flower from the hygrophila Plants attached to dragon stone I didn’t intend for the lighting to look like this but the hygrophila blocks so much light. There’s actually more detail at the back 😂 Some shots of the fish I also added another light for the emmersed growth hygrophila. I’m hoping that it will start reaching for that light instead of my main light so that the tank isn’t blocked out of light as much. I had this idea because when the hygrophila first started growing emmersed, it was growing straight out of the water. As time passed it bent to kind of like an S shape so it can get under the hood of the main light. I also learned than the plant would try to send little stems out from the main light when it gets too tall. Im assuming to look for other light sources. Never offered another light source before so hopefully my experiment works. Here’s a video of the 40B. It’s hard to appreciate the tank right now because of how little lighting gets through. I’m sure the fish love it tho I’m also preparing to scape the 60 breeder that was given to me. I still need a stand, more hard scape, a new light and more money. I got some rocks from aquarocks Colorado cause they had a sale recently. Thanks to @nabokovfan87 for the heads up. I got 45lbs of Icelandic lava stone and 45lbs of maple leaf rock because they both compliment the rocks that I already have (dragon and yamaya stone) The plan is to move everyone in the 40B to the 60B and then move the 20L to the 40B. The 20L will be dedicated shrimp tank.

Fish in brackish environments possess remarkable features in their gills that allows them to change their gill function sometimes as quickly as 30 minutes! So you shouldn’t shock them either way but if you have plants it’s best to add salt gradually. They don’t adapt as quickly as fish. As for marine salt 1.005 is not alot of salt by volume but also salt doesn’t expire so however much you want to buy at the time is the correct answer. There are some new scientific articles that suggest that quite a few species of brackish puffers can actually be found in full marine and that their gill structure seems to be able to change to look more like their reef inhabiting cousins. Although I believe the attempts to do this in captivity have been relatively unsuccessful. Unsure as to why that is. Fascinating stuff regardless.

that sucks big time. big fish is just like a dog or cat, they have personality. hard to lose them.

Actually the plants do care. They LOVE the ammonia, it’s their preferred source of nitrogen. Farmers inject anhydrous ammonia directly in it the soil for fertilizer. It quickly is absorbed by the soil’s moisture so it doesn’t release into the air. Then breaks down into nitrites and nitrates. You’re still good, it’s just going to take a bit. No harm to the plants from the ammonia. Or to the bacteria colony. But next time you’re back to 0 ammonia and 0 nitrites, trust the process. You’re cycled enough for a small amount of fish

This is MY OPINION: In my opinion the instructions are too much. *I* Use the dosage 1 drop per gallon. I go to measure the amount of ammonia then I check 24 hours. I once tried 4 drops per gallon but I could not ever get a tank to cycle with that dosage. Think about it, Is your fish really going to mess the tank soooo much over night to equate to 4 drops per gallon? NOPE. More realistic is 1 drop per gallon. Unless you plan on WAY overstocking your tank, I believe the instructions are wrong. If you do manage to get the tank to cycle with 4 drops per gallon, and you stock your tank with fish that don't give out equiv of 4 drops of ammonia per gal, you will have a BB crash because they will not be getting enough food. When I do 1 drop per gallon and if I can dose that each day and 24 hours later, I get 0's on all tests except nitrate, I'm good to go. I then SLOWLY add fish to my tank. (As in, add 3-4 fish, let it sit for a week, then add 3-4 more, etc..) just to make sure bioload isn't exceeded. *** Thats my experience and opinion *** PS : I've fishless cycled a tank with plants in it, plants love the Ammonia & Nitrite. Plants are good to go.

as per forum rules, aquahuna, or dans fish.

New fish additions courtesy of @SugarBassJoe and they are doing great. I am so relieved that Grace is still being calm and loving the tank with some more life in it.

Diving into things now and I think there is some techniques we can do to help. For future reading, I have an algae thread (years of struggles) and compiling all of that experience into a few posts. That being said, what is your lighting situation on each tank? What lights, intensity settings? For each tank, what is your GH and KH testing results?

Just so you don't freak out, your plants will likely look like they are dieing. Most plants are grown out of water and their leaves need to convert for underwater. So they will melt back. Just leave them alone. As long as the roots are healthy, they will dig in, and after a few weeks you'll see new growth

I'm so sorry for your loss. He was a very loved fish friend. Sometimes it seems like we have more time and then suddenly they're gone - it's hard even when you know it's coming soon. My thoughts are with Cory and the ACO family who are missing Murphy today.

The discussion about the heater occurs fairly early on here and Cory kind of lays it out. Basically, the 50W heater was having something like 4% defect rate and the 100W was about 7%. Cory goes deeper into it.

Very sorry to everyone at Aquarium Co-op for all of what you're currently going through with Murphy. I think everyone here knows that it's always been a goal to give that guy the best life and the best care around and I think the team was very successful with that. For those that have never heard it or watched it, I'll post the video with Cory talking about Hank here below. Losing a friend is never, ever easy, and that pain is just Love that you're feeling. Cherish the good times and all the wonderful moments.

I run the instant ocean salt in my brackish tank, have also tried the seachem brackish salt and really saw no difference in the fish or enviroment other than the big bag of instant ocean is cheaper and the granuals must finer. With brackish a little salt will go a long way and a bag will last quite some time I've tried java fern in mine, its alive but doesnt do much(doesnt do much in my fresh tanks either though) have recently tried val as well, but the puffer seemed to knock it lose or break it up chasing food, whats left looks pretty good, i'll probably try it again here as it grows like a weed in my 40 gallon fresh. As for the belly color, they change (my ceylon puffer his whole body will change at times) Mine is normally white belly if he's happy and content, if he's stressed or your not giving him attention it'll turn dark, mines truly a wet pet, i can go down and start having him chase my finger across the glass and he almost smiles and his belly will go back to white. I had to drain the tank way down to move it a few months back to lay flooring and he nearly turned completely black from the stress, started filling the tank back up and he loves darting around in the water coming in and came right back to normal color, first thing in the morning when the lights come on he's almost completely yellow and white until he gets moving around then his black comes out, really cool fish to keep! My ceylon loves ramshorn snails, clams, mussels, silver sides, blood worms shrimp and tilapia! Don't be afraid or overthink a brackish setup! I stressed myself out like crazy at first,(especially being it was kind of an emergency relocate from my father in law there was a matter of days to get the tank setup) but it reallly isnt anymore complicated than fresh water, just have a good salinity meter and add the salt slowly.

Thanks a lot. I have been doing lots of reading and creating posts around but couldnt find any answer really. It was painful and I didnt want to risk putting my fish into risk for nothing by introducing a pure freshwater species to brackish. They are adorable. They must be starved at lfs, you should see them attacking white worms as big as themselves I put for the f8! Today I am ordering marine salt or reef salt as you recommended. How much salt should I order, I wonder. I currently keep them at 50x40x25/50 liters but I may soon take down my 50x50x50cm/125 liter tank which aquasoil and plants already gone bad and I basically have only one f betta and L199 there so I can easily move them to another tank. I read something like 6gr of salt per liter for 1.005 approximately. I bought me a hydrometer anyway but I dont wanna go buy a huge box of 10kgs of salt if it will be a waste. f8 puffers seem to enjoy lower end brackish too. I read a lot of topics and guides in the puffer forum, and I guess 1.005 is the best choice, someone even kept his for 18 years with 1.005! I may start with 1.003 or so and increase gradually, I cant be sure if they have been kept in brackish or full freshwater until now. I directly bought the fish after they arrive to the lfs to lessen any potential further damage, as they are kept in crowded tanks and may hurt each other. Basically none had perfect tails, all had bites and stuff. Everyone seem to have great experience with bumblebee-f8 puffer combination. Mollies seem to lean on a good experience too overall, but some people started having issues after ages from what I understand. I have never tried molly before, and I kinda want some more tankmates for my f8 to not get bored. I loved this guide and many other f8 related experiences in the puffer forum. https://www.thepufferforum.com/forum/library/puffers-in-focus/fig8/

I took pictures of the rotala and it seems it is doing good, no more replanting needed, seems like it is even growing! On the other hand, stargrass is dying. I mean...a weed basically and I cant keep it alive...nice. I guess I will take it out and replant the rotala once it starts doing better and needs maintenance. But for real

cc @Fish Folk (in case you didn't get the notification) As a sidenote, it might be a benefit to look back at some of Simply Betta's breeding videos.

I don't think there's any risk putting your plants in that. Assuming there are no fish? The plants will likely have a little bacteria on them which will help jumpstart. I don't have any great suggestions, I know a lot of people do fishless cycles, but I find it a little silly as simply changing water is pretty easy. I'd expect once the plants get in there your levels will start going down. I think I'd quit pounding ammonia into the tank, though.

Take me to your leader! 👽

When such a simple thing like a bell pepper brings such a joy! Same for the rabbit snails, but didnt have time to take a picture before they ate it

Hello Hillstream !!!

Hello shrimpies! Do froggys eat shrimp??

This Anubias is approaching 2 years or so and has been growing pretty consistently on one end for a while now. Recently I noticed some new, tiny leaves growing on the old growth under some pretty mature leaves. Is this normal? Is it getting ready to branch off in different directions? 🤷

This is my crayfish Bubba! I've had him for almost 2 years now. When I first got him he was about an inch long. He is now almost 6 inches long tail to claw tip. Bubba is one of my favorite pets and I sometimes spend hours just watching him! These are pictures of when I first got him: This is him now:

If you’re under 50,add. For plants, they’re not really an upper limit. Within reason

I might even go as far as a 150 gal.

@Fish for Nothin now you’re talking!

I was planning to get them in a stock tank. At least 100 gallons. They live with my turtle in a 55 gal. I have old floors and its an old tank so I dont fill it up past the halfway point.

I also have a bare bones sump. My cheap pump from amazon started pumping inconsistently so I upgraded to a Nyos Viper 2.0 I believe they are new to the market. Expensive for what it is, but my water level in my sump hasn’t moved at all yet. And it is so quiet. Nothing beats a sump. And they aren’t as complicated as the reefers make them out to be. Mine is refugium style and I have used it to grow out WCMM fry 3x now. It was going to be a shrimp grow out as a food source for my gobies but only one actively hunts them 😅

Nitrates are not an issue. It’s still plant food. Not their favorite form , but it works. And water changes will lower it immediately. Even for fish, nitrates are really not an issue short term. Keeping nitrates under 50 is for their long term health. It’s not uncommon for nitrates in a large, unplanted cichlid tank to reach 300ppm. Nitrates are more like being in a room full of smoke. 50ppm is manageable, 300ppm becomes hard to breathe. So watch the nitrates, keep them under 50 for plants. Don’t stress about nitrates. That being said, there are fish that can’t handle even less than 20 ppm. Thinking rams, discus, hillstream loaches.

I had mine in a 55g long for a couple years. She reached about 9” pretty quick. It takes them awhile to hit their 1st growth spurts in my experience. Eventually you will need a 125+ but you can gradually work your way up to that as the fish grow They are messy but a canister filter is more than capable of keeping up. Just don’t keep any plants with them you like, because they are the cows of the underwater world. I lost a $100 anubias that was over 10 years old to her in a matter of months 🥹 along with duckweed they really like grazing on water lettuce and lily pads.

There isn’t much publications on how to accurately differentiate. There may be dorsal ray counts or some other but for right now we can use typical patterns. Your gobies have 3 lateral bars rather than 4. Which means you most likely have B. doriae or B. sabanus the most commonly traded bumblebee goby. Both of which are freshwater fish that can be found in low-end brackish waters in the mangrove swamps of the upper reaches of the tidal flats and river. I believe that the whole genus is capable of low end salt tolerance but some are only found in freshwater. Either way I remember reading that their salt tolerance is low at a maximum of 1.005. Good luck! Update us with pics of the puffers! Personally I have decided to wait to make an intertidal tank. I want to only have 1 display tank at a time to really appreciate and enjoy 1 biotope at a time.

Nitrates are fine for the plants. But you want low ammonia and nitrite before you put fish in. So I would suggest a big water change before you put fish in OR let the plants work at bringing the levels down and then add the fish. And I would still probably do a water change before the fish go in either way.

Agree with @xXInkedPhoenixX that it would be nice to know if ammonia is present. I'm not the sort to harp on whether a tank is cycled or not, but you do need clean water. You can keep fish just fine in an uncycled tank (like a qt setup) so long as you change water often enough to keep ammonia and nitrite, if any) very very low. For the situation you describe, I'd say the most likely causes of the fish dying are 1) diseases acquired before you bought them; 2) stress of moving/different parameters (this could relate to store to you, but could also be wholesaler to store, with you seeing the consequences, depending on how long the store had them before you bought; or 3) ammonia in your qt setup. It's also possible (I'd venture to say likely) that a combo of these, or one making another one worse, might be going on. The first you can't do anything about except treat prophylactically (though you don't know what to treat FOR, and that's always an issue). And, many times, treatments are administered too late. I bought fish. They "got" sick. I treated them. They still died. That's not a case of the treatment not working, it's just the disease is too advanced. Or you're treating for the wrong issue. The second you can tackle by asking questions. Ask the store, what are your levels (so you can compare to your tanks)? How long have you had these fish in? Have you had any losses (in transit, or in the store)? The 3rd is just water changes and Prime. I know, some folks say it doesn't bind nitrite or ammonia. Maybe true, maybe not. But it's almost impossible to find a reputable source that says it's harmful, so I use it. Also, can you describe your filtration/circulation? Not looking to compare or evaluate what brand or any of that, but kuhlis don't tolerate still or low-O2 water all that well, so you should have either or both of a filter that moves water around well enough, and/or an airstone. Not looking for a whirlpool, just circulation.

https://www.seriouslyfish.com/species/pangio-semicincta/ Temp listed on their site is 21-26C. That would be 70-79 degrees F. Optimally I would shoot for the middle of that range, 74-75 degrees. As temp goes up, that means that oxygenation goes down, which can cause some gill issues and added stress. What that means is that if you can, adjust the temp down, but also be aware of adding an air stone as a benefit for the loaches in particular.

I've always wanted to try the buce brownie. I think I can get a tissue culture of it.

I have over 600 images of Murphy spanning the last 3 or so years, if there is any interest in a compilation of the life of of this wonderful beast.

The right side has either an anubius nano or an anubius barteri (they were the same size when i bought them so i dont know which is which) and a bucephalandra brownie.

You need to have an end point. The next time you see 0s, add some fish. Plants will love the ammonia. On a side note, for a "sterile" tank, it can take 40 days to cycle. That can be decreased by adding filter media from other tanks as well as using bottled bacteria. However, that 40 days is going to be 40 days unless you've done some of those other things...

Looking forward to the new retail store video 🙂 Its been a long time coming

The plants won’t care about the ammonia at one point in the tank I just cycled I had more than 4ppm and the plants didn’t seem to care as for the tank not cycling it just needed time it took a month and a half for me the beauty of a fish less cycle is you don’t have to do anything just wait for it to go but it does require a certain amount of patience that said 4ppm is a bit high for the bacteria imo

Gotta love cheap rimless tanks! Thanks Brandon!

@Lennie im curious on the brackialsh and goby SME answers. For the identification this publication lists more about gobies than I knew prior to finding it today. It does cover many brachygobius species taxonomy starting l at page 51 https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C5&q=A+revision+of+the+gobiid+fish+genus+Mugilogobius+(Teleostei%3A+Gobioidei)%2C+and+its+systematic+placement&btnG= This field study only found xanthomelas in pure freshwater (Easiest way to search nih study is save as pdf and find by scientific name) https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9169113/ Salinity is a cool variable. Some studies note variances in salinity can change the digestive processes and functions in some species. That will be a fun project to hear about.

Hi @Lys, welcome to the forum. Very sorry about your Kuhlis, that's very sad. Being as how you got them 3 days ago, it wouldn't be unusual for them to have already been sick or exposed to something. I see you don't have an ammonia reading and primary reason for red gills is ammonia burn. Do you not have a way to test for this? They could have gotten that from either where you got them from (were they shipped or did you buy them at the store?) or in your QT conditions (potentially from food left in the tank, you can use a turkey baster when your siphon isn't working to clean a lot of this up). Sometimes fish will get a secondary bacterial infection from ammonia burn which can be treated with antibiotic, some are so damaged they never recover. Clean water, water conditioner (if it has aloe some say this helps) are the best remedies unless you also need to treat with antibiotics. BUT primary thing to do is get rid of any ammonia sources and test for it if you can. I personally do not use aquarium salts for ammonia burn unless I'm using it as the only option for bacterial infection.

I can't see a dang thing!!!

@Guppysnail It does stay mild here year round on the extreme Northern California coast. . It also helps that I have an old Co-Op heater set at its lowest setting in the wine barrel pond!

@Matt BI’m so envious of you warm climate folks during the winter. It makes me miss outdoors so much. Love the gator. I’m sure the frogs are not so amused 🤣

I'm trying to figure out where to put a Squidward house in the pond....... I'm thinking it might look interesting halfway submerged in the cattail container. I suppose I should ask our friends kids, they're the experts! they liked the gator head on top of the frog house!

Every aquarium now has a Squidward house in it! . Next place that needs one is the wine barrel pond!

New Squidward house! It only took a few minutes in the tank and the shrimp were all over it investigating! Hmmm, new cave! When do we move in?