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It’s a nerite snail. There are quite a few variants available for sale now. This one is called a helmet nerite

Then maybe it's time to clean it up...

I’ve seen algae do this from time to time or as said before could be pollen, but it looks like the tank is normally sealed off with a lid so id say a type of brown algae most likely

It's been a while! I've had this tank for a very long time now - 5 or 6 years? And it has gone through quite a few iterations. This is the 4th house I've had it in, but I hope it will finally be able to stay where it is for a long time now. After the move, it was extremely bare - the nice, thick pieces of wood I purchased years ago had rotten and been chewed on by plecos to the point where they were basically nasty twigs. I threw those out. I was also low on fish. The first move I made with this tank was flawless, I lost no fish. The second (a much longer move) took a heavy toll, especially on my tetras. I knew a third move was coming, so for the last year and a half, I hadn't really gotten any new fish. I also didn't really lose any, until the week before the move, when one of my two remaining angelfish suddenly sickened and died over a day or two. You can see most of the big fish I had left in the photo above. A severum, an angelfish, five corydoras, two Bolivian rams, a geophagus, and a pleco*. **I forget the exact type - he should be getting 8-10 inches based on what the LFS that sold him to me said, and on my research, but I forget the name and you know how pleco common names are...* Well, I knew a tank that bare simply wouldn't do. The fish would not be happy there for long, and there is nothing to break up sight or aggression. It was time for a rescape. My new house had an old pond in the backyard that had been filled years ago. It was filled with decomposed gravel and capped with round river stones. I happily raided this new source or hardscape material for my tank. I also got a couple of plants, some pieces of real wood, and some fake roots to complete that river feel. After a week or two I also added some new fish. Seven red eye tetras (so far, that was all the LFS had) and two more geophagus. The wood has also released some tannins, and I added even more plants. The water level is getting low - it may be time for a water change today. There are a couple of floating planets I gotta fix, and the severum dug a big pit over on the left side (which is totally fine, I left the sand as a playground for him and for the geos). All the fish seem much happier with the rescaped tank. The rams especially have colored up, and one swims out in the open much of the time, perhaps advertising for potential females? The other ram colored up very similarly, so I wonder if I have two males. I'm planning to add some more plants - I'm thinking some Val in easy planters along the back wall. I also want to add just a bit more stock - more of the red eye tetras, obviously, maybe a couple more angels. Or maybe something else...

Hi everyone! For the last couple years I've been living in a rental and so haven't really done too much with my tank. That also involved a big move, where I actually lost a number of fish; afterwards I decided not to replace too many of them until I was settled permanently. Well, we finally got our own place again, and so I decided that it's time to rescape the tank and get some new fish. And I may have even convinced my wife that we need a second tank!

Your situation is unique. I know the hardness affects them a lot. The 8.0 ph may be a touch high. But in the soft water it may or may not affect them. Try it. Keep them warm and large weekly water changes even with low nitrates. Keep the substrate clean. And avoid fertilizer until you know if you kids can handle your water. Then if you really feel you need to use fertilizer try tiny amounts. Good luck let us know how you make out.

Yup thats a caddisfly larvae. They are ubiquitous in NA and construct their cocoons out of different available materials using saliva and maybe even a spinerette style thing (think spiders)? They are harmless detritivores that start emerging this time of year as a larvae. Takes anywhere from a few months to a year to pupate and turn into a caddisfly.

Try resting tap water for 24 hours in a glass. It’s most likely coming from your tap.

That is interesting! To me it looks like something that has dropped from outside. Like dust or pollen

Thank you! It's a mix of red root floaters, amazon frogbit, and duckweed that I did not intentionally add but I'm not mad about either lol. The frogbit is definitely winning out overall. I'd say it's 80% frogbit, 15% red roots, and 5% duckweed. I thin it out a little bit every couple of days to make sure light still gets down below but I love the green hue it gives everything and the root structures. Gale does weird acrobatics hanging off them, which is also fun. So I never thin them back particularly aggressively 🤪

Great to know and also, excellent logo. Not sure the auction is my speed at the moment but I'll definitely poke around the GSAS website 🙂

if none of the other fish show any odd signs, id write it off as a weak fish.

I do get where the employee is coming from but I doubt that 12 Pygmy Cories would crash the cycle. Those fish are so tiny the mystery snail and other snails probably poop more than 12 of them.

I mention the specific tank as it's a popular recommendation for first-time aquascapers, which is why I got it...I looked at a bunch of scapes in this tank model before making mine so, I wanted to make this journal easy to find for similarly-situated newbies I started my tank with plants (...and hitchhiker bladder snails) only in November 2023, added my first intentional livestock mid-January 2024, re-did the scape with the same materials (plus some more plants) at the beginning of this month, and added my centerpiece fish, a pair of peacock gudgeons, on March 30. Here's how the tank looks now: and how it looked when I first set it up: The inhabitants are: 1x Mystery Snail (Gale of Waterdeep), 2x Otocinclus (Dot and Dash, named for the respective shapes of the markings on their tails), and 2x Peacock Gudgeons (as of yet unnamed). Temp is 74 F, pH about 7.2, GH a work in progress (6 at the moment, adding Seachem Equilibrium to bring that up 1 degree at a time every 3 days bc I'm worried about Gale's shell, but I don't want to shock anybody by changing it too quickly), Nitrate about 10 ppm -- actually trying to increase that for the plant health, Nitrate/Ammonia both 0. I'm running CO2 using a DIY system (the kind where you mix citric acid and baking soda in a reactor) with a solenoid. Usually, the drop checker goes green by the end of the CO2 period but is blue most of the day -- all the plants are easy/beginner plants that don't strictly require CO2 so this fine by me, as I'd rather have less CO2 and not risk fish health issues. Goal with the CO2 is to speed up things growing in for a jungle-y look...and Gale was eating the plants I'd added from in vitro pots so I figured they could use a boost.

Nerites are explorers. Yours might be looking for food or just wandering. Mine have been in, on, and under the HOB, but otherwise haven't ventured above the rim. They can and will spend days above the waterline. I know very little about snails, so I have wondered : Do aquatic snails loose some of their ability to stick to a surface when they leave the damp, humid, aquarium environment?

I "think" lacking enough natural growth of biofilm/algae to graze on constantly in the tank triggers it. So they can reach other places to find food but the tank has its limits unlike nature

You are welcome! The keeping healthy water is a huge part of algae control that many don't realize. IMO horticultural practices and plant mass is next. As for your GSA hopefully the plants ordered will help!! Also, here is pretty good link for controlling most algaes (which I should of sent sooner). https://nilocg.com/blogs/news/algae-common-causes-and-solutions-for-different-types Thanks for the update, hopefully you will see continued improvement!

Algae is kinda like a plant that you don’t plant. I have a stream style tank so my main ‘plant’ is algae. It took a while for mature mats to grow like 3-6 months. I didn’t touch the medium that was growing. I watched it go from green spots to brown to hair like to structured like it is now. My fish strike it and eat it which is a cool behavior I’ve never seen before. I couldn’t tell you what different algaes I have. One downside though is if you have some sunlight come in from a window the algae will have periods of high photo intensity where it’s green and beautiful and lush, and low phot intensity where it’s brown. Some people may not like that, but I suppose if your light is strong enough it may never do that Here are different photo intensities: low: Medium: high:

@Tony s I don't use any purigen. Just coarse sponge and fine filter material, with a coarse pre-filter on intake. But that does make me think that possibly my filter is clogged and maybe just bypassing the filter media now.

We got two mystery snails about 6 weeks ago and a few weeks ago noticed them mating. Just last week, we noticed our first egg clutch. We’re new aquarists so didn’t feel equipped to try to care for snail babies, so we removed and disposed of that egg clutch. A few days later, we found another egg clutch. When I went to remove it, I found a third hidden clutch that looked like a few snails had already hatched!! I removed and disposed of what was left of that clutch. That was yesterday, today I found 5 of the teeniest baby snails crawling around the aquarium. While I did NOT want to try to hatch and care for a whole clutch of eggs, now that I see these fives little babies, I’m curious if there’s any chance they might survive just roaming around the aquarium? (I made a couple attempts to scoop them into a DIY breeder box, but they are just so small I haven’t figured out a safe way to scoop them up). We have a 20 gallon tank and right now we don’t have any other fish or anything in the tank-just mom, dad, and five baby snails. I’m prepared for them all to die, but thought it was worth asking you all what you would do in my shoes. Appreciate any advice y’all have!

SNAIL LIVES MATTER! Good luck keeping those buggers alive. Mine just laid eggs on Sunday. I'm hoping for a high survival rate. 🤞

Silicon will adhere to many different material but it may be a weak bond. For foam backgrounds, silicone will not adhere to the slick surface of cured "Great stuff" foam. But if you cut off the top layer, it will bond to it. Silicone will form a decent bond to cut edges of PVC material but not to the factory finish surfaces. For my sump filter which use PVC sheet stock, I leave a gap between the PVC and glass then fill it in with silicone. This creates a gasket around the PVC which is a strong bond.

The Repashy morning wood I gave him last night was like the size of a half of a die (dice). It was gone by morning.

They are considered “armored” and are not part of the scaleless fish category. That is a myth. They tolerate salt quite well. Maybe feed more so he has the calorie resources to heal. Just like we tell humans you have to eat to keep up your strength when they are sick. I hope he feels better soon.

Is the white spot on a fin ray if it is it could be a callus that's formed on a broken fin ray doesn't look like it has a fuzzy appearance what i would do is add some Indian almond leaves and a small amount of aquarium salt 1 table spoon for 5 gallons

I've had a of a think on this and no idea's at all on cultures but the best way to grow one in to my mind would be to only fill the tank a couple of cms deep light it well so there are no dark spots and add fertilizer. If you try and grow it in a full tank you will get algae forming every where and nearest the light source first so you will be forever scraping it off where you don't want it. Also no matter what you do you will probably get more than one sort of algae so you will need to manage that manually. You will get some dieback if you later add plants and décor as these will compete or add shade

Thanks for sharing them, I appreciate you. 🙂

Question, do you use anything like purigen in your canister? I had a bag start leaking on me. Did not notice the top as mine has a hood. But the sides collected fine granular particles. Still cleaning them up

Probably correct. Add to that, if was insect eggs, the fish would be gorging themselves. Eggs are delicious and nutritious

Yes they will survive. I have actually had better luck raising mystery snabies in a seasoned tank than in a breeder box. They tend to have more access to food this way. There typically is biofilm, algae and micro organisms all over a tank. If you are at all concerned, you can add flake food, fry food or bacter ae to help but they shouldn't need much at all. Btw, the ones in the pics are magenta. I see one of the parents are magenta as well so not surprising I guess.

First thing. Guppies love hard water. And higher ph. Almost All live bearers do. So ph is not the issue. Especially do not use ph down. There are better ways. But you don’t need them. if anything, you need more hardness in your water. You’re kh is good. But your gh is not. For guppies. ideal water for guppies. Ph8. Gh 180-240. Kh 120-240 or close to that anyway. crushed coral or wonder shell can help you raise your gh. Gh of 75 is way too low. now this might not be your only issue though. You may have a low grade bacteria infection in the tank. Maracyn, or any erythromycin should help to clean that up. Used carefully by package directions it is snail safe

I always appreciate when the fishkeeping hobby gives me an excuse to buy some new toy

@Colu trying to figure out if treatment worked with white growth, or something else is needed.

Cut the tubes. (The green tubes) See pic. (Nano filter in my 5g shrimp tank) Another option is take the Nano Filter apart, Toss one basket, cut the black sponge in half, now you have a 1/2 sized nano.

Thanks everyone for the comments. i have some updates and some of my own testing. I first got the Tetra 150. It is WAY quieter than the tetra whisper 60. It had enough flow for my 2 large sponge filters in my 55g and one medium sponge filter in my 20g tall. So that easily replaced one of my whisper 60s. Second, I got they Hygger 10W and it is also really quiet (maybe even more) than the Tetra 150 and with more flow (was about $10 more expensive and about double the size). The one hygger 10W easily replaces both of the old whisper 60s and it is way quieter and easily runs all my tanks listed above with some extra flow to spare. I will keep the tetra 150 as a backup (or give to one of the kids for their tanks). I feel this is really a perfect step up for my tanks, perhaps if i expand more i may try one of the small piston pumps as the next step. The whisper 60s are still very inexpensive so I am holding on to them for backup or if ever get around to some expansion tanks somewhere out of the way where I won't mind the noise so much. Thanks again for the recommendations! My tanks are so much quieter!

works good!

I enjoy cleaning my tanks too (I've only got 3.. so maybe that's why 😂). BUT, Having only 3 ... the 75g, a 29g and my husbands 10g Glo tank, allows me to take my time and really focus on the details and it still not take very long to do. I find it's therapeutic.

It's various reasons the one I've experienced is that the fish was not healthy although it looked healthy. I suggest not to add anything else to the aquarium. I would wait for about minimum a month and hopefully things remain good. I would quarantine any other fish prior to adding in the future.

Well, that technically changes with kids. Sometimes you desperately do

Did you do a large water change before you added all your fish? Whenever I do a fish-less cycle, I do a 80% water change before I add my fish. Sometimes there can be things in the water you can't test for. Sometimes fish just die when you add them to a new environment. Stress can kill a fish quicker than anything.

Honestly, it looks more like a Plakat male. Not 100% sure but if I had to guess, I’d say male **Not a betta expert, lol

if your readings stay good, and you bump the amount of food up just a tiny bit to emulate what you will feed with the extra fish.... give it a few days to a week for the bacteria levels to grow, then add more fish.

Yes! This is very helpful, thank you!!! I have been testing daily and so far everything seems well. Since I have six now, and I want at least ten, you say I should wait at least three weeks or so to add four more? Just checking to make sure I understand correctly!

Cories are not going to clean up algae but they do clean up food that falls to the bottom not eaten by other fish. They also scurry along the bottom a lot and in the process re suspend mulm and detritus in the water column giving your filter, 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th …. Chances to suck it up. The bigger cories do this far better than Pygmy cories, but Cories are definitely valuable for cleaning up…. Just not Algae…

Employee seems a bit misinformed and out of line, really. I tend to be fairly understocked in my tanks unless they're growout tanks with lots of fry in them getting lots of water changes, but 12 pygmy corys shouldn't be an issue I wouldn't think, though I have not kept them. It's not all bad staggering the loading, but water changes solve any concerns of ammonia or nitrite spikes.

I think the employee was out of line. However I would probably have opted for6-8 myself on first stocking and pick up more in a week or two… generally I try to add fish in groups of 6-8 when starting a 29 gallon tank and wait a week or two before adding. I also tend to test for ammonia and nitrite after adding fish every few days for a week or so… in essence your tank may be fully cycled inso far as it can metaboloze all the bioload it is exposed to. Double or triple the bioload and it needs time to adapt…. And it might not keep up and could be issues. Now water changes will deal with those issues just fine…

Not mine but true