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Chick-In-Of-TheSea

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Everything posted by Chick-In-Of-TheSea

  1. Chick-In-Of-TheSea
    You didn’t go to the hospital right away?! Grandma didn’t know your arm was broken?! 😂 There’s this thing called “protective gear”… My husband, a gamer, broke his arm and had to learn to control the mouse with his other hand (and not get his guy killed.) Hey @TheSwissAquarist, how’s the shrimp jar doing?
  2. Chick-In-Of-TheSea
    More information about "How to make a Walstad Jar"

    Version 1.0.0

    5 downloads

    Small Planted Tanks for Pet Shrimp By Diane Walstad
  3. Chick-In-Of-TheSea
    @nabokovfan87 this is the one “tank” that requires the least effort! I don’t do anything for weeks at a time. You see how it keeps making flowers, etc. The initial setup is what makes it thrive: Try it!
  4. Chick-In-Of-TheSea
    I was trying to take a photo of the plants and afterward I looked at it and saw that Snoopy was being cute for the camera.
  5. Chick-In-Of-TheSea
    Try using the magnifier app. Hydra look like the claw from the arcade game where you can win a stuffed toy. The behavior you describe sounds very much like hydra. Also hydra gets a bad rap but I’ve had it and never had any issue with it, not even with little shrimps in the tank. Mine turned green because it ate algae and the green powdery food I was adding to the tank.
  6. Chick-In-Of-TheSea
    I would have never started with dwarf hairgrass. Not only was it messy and didn’t want to stay in the substrate, it also yellowed and died out and I had to pull it all. Later I found out Walstad avoids carpet plants. I assume she had the same experience. I wouldn’t have put the driftwood in, in the beginning. Walstad has a reason for not using wood. I forget what it is. Less room for oxygenating plants? Carbon matter? Personally I found that it just took up too much space, and the jar has a small footprint. And I wouldn’t have put a rosette sword. That was the one I uprooted. It was compact enough but was surrounded by everything else in there and couldn’t be seen or enjoyed. Also it made one or two baby swords that it had on runners above the plant. Lastly, I wouldn’t have added shrimp. They were doing well in there but when the plants start getting thick, you can’t really see/enjoy all of them to check on them. Also they had shrimplets in there and grew the population, and I felt it was the right thing to catch them all to put them in a tank. But that was tedious because I had to work a net around the plants, and there were always shrimps I would miss. It took days… Overall I am happy with everything else! My friend made a jar in the same week, and her plants are now dead. I don’t believe she did water changes; only top offs. She used a vase, and I wonder if the height of that prevented the plants on the bottom from getting enough light. But she also had salvinia floaters at the top. I try to keep an eye on the water clarity, and if I can’t see through it, I do a water change. When I had the bladder snails and shrimps in there I tested the water every day. I did that for weeks. I got away from it because I never got a reading except like a 5 nitrate. I think I did test after the uprooting too, and things still looked fine, but something about the soil in the water column killed the bladder snails. I still have one though! It hitched a ride into a tank on the rosette sword, and I just let it be. It has never reproduced and is fun to watch.
  7. Chick-In-Of-TheSea
    There are juvenile shrimps in Geppetto’s tank. Despite that I tried to select all male shrimps for his habitat. Guess we have at least one lady in there! Shrimps are out in the open, and he’s not even bothering them. Sometimes he looks at them, but they also stare back and are lightning fast if they feel he can’t be trusted. Then he just does a 180 and carries on with whatever else he wants to do. Especially sitting on his leaf hammock and keeping a catappa leaf afloat with as many bubbles as possible. There is a catappa leaf carpet on the bottom as well that the shrimps go under and eat. Also a couple of hides and cholla. I did a water change for him this week but I didn’t siphon or move the hose around, so his bubble nest was not disturbed. Then I added his rooibos tea bag for 24 hr. I quite like the ease of those for adding tannins. He’s doing pretty ok with his fin health. I just keep up with the tannins and leaves. The Malaysian trumpet snails are sprinkled here and there, but they are not overpopulating, and they are not annoying or invasive. P.S. @Guppysnail Geppetto loves grindal worms! Oh, and speaking of catappa leaves, the pleco likes eating that! He has chewed a bunch of holes in the one in his tank. He likes the Soilent green Repashy a lot too. I gave him white worms but he doesn’t understand them and they are still squirming around in there from this morning. My grindal worm culture was crashing. It had ammonia smell and mites. But I split it and both containers are once again doing well. I split the white worm culture today too as that was starting to get a bit of a smell too. Everything seems good now. I use masking tape to label each culture with the date it was started. Also when I cut holes in the lids I reinforce with masking tape first and that way the plastic doesn’t crack when I make the cuts.
  8. Chick-In-Of-TheSea
    There is some kind of suspended algae in the Walstad jar that I’ve been pretending not to notice. As well as some of the plants having crispy or slimy leaves. Finally I have a day off so let’s take care of it. So that’s what we got goin on. Despite this, lots of flower buds. I mean like, every single day. I tried to turkey baster the stuff out but it wouldn’t work. So I swirled a toothbrush around. I see it is a type of hair algae. It was easy to remove. Given I haven’t had bladder snails since my uprooting/soil disrupt mistake, I did a 100% water change to get some of the mulm out (plant melty stuff). I always use tank water as the replacement water (Walstad does too). After water change and plant trim: Much better. Then I noticed that I have limpets in there. Cool! Still got a bit of an ecosystem going. Three are pictured here on the wall. Maintenance time: 10 min. As you can see, roots are growing at midlevel as well as at the bottom of the plants, below the substrate. A bit unruly in there but the vines and flowers that emerged are nice to enjoy. I am still running a hint of air in there to prevent surface film. The ACO nano pump works well for that.
  9. Chick-In-Of-TheSea
    Man, this guy that sells the filter baffles. Customer service 110%. I reported my Marina S10 baffle didn’t fit. Not only did he ship out my replacement same day… he shipped 3! Just in case! W😍W! Etsy: GalaxyGlowStudio
  10. Chick-In-Of-TheSea
    I’ve seen videos of fish huddling because they were cold. The heater wasn’t putting off much heat and they were all huddled around it.
  11. Chick-In-Of-TheSea
    Tried my best to get photos but they are quick! 77 degrees 0 ammonia & nitrite 5 nitrate They have been through a few courses of levamisole/praziquantal. I have been treating a different fish in their tank with parasitic symptoms, but the embers have not displayed any symptoms. They eat well, as you can see, and are highly active.
  12. Chick-In-Of-TheSea
    Enjoyed Mrs. Claus’s magical kitchen and Winter Wonderland on Ice at Sea World this evening.
  13. Chick-In-Of-TheSea
    Yep! Existing leaves helps the plant photosynthesize, store up & use the energy to produce new growth.
  14. Chick-In-Of-TheSea
  15. Chick-In-Of-TheSea
    A post, and a decision, I never want to make. It was necessary to euthanize Spike this morning. He was at about 5% life when I checked on him; he was suffering. Thanks to all for sticking with me through this.
  16. Chick-In-Of-TheSea
    Ok, see? Details help. 😂 & that sounds horribly painful. I’m sorry you went through that. If it helps, Jose Cuervo kicked my foot out from under me one time and broke it. Either that or, I tried to pull off a “star jump” (crazy dance move) and didn’t stick the landing (rolled my ankle). Jose was there though. I definitely remember that jerkface having a part in it. Idk, the details are fuzzy for some reason. That is the only time I broke something, and I did it in my living room, with a house full of like 23 people. I got to wear a fashionable space boot for the next month or so. Hawt! Also it gave me a good excuse to ride those little electric scooters at the grocery store. I especially like the beeps it makes when it backs up. 😂
  17. Chick-In-Of-TheSea
    What a mess… ☹️
  18. Chick-In-Of-TheSea
    My principle is, if one fish in a tank is sick, they all could be sick, even if not showing symptoms. All these fish are new. I remove uneaten food within 30 min unless it is live worms or Repashy. 30 min because Spike is slow to act. I set a timer. Yes, Spike would have less competition for sure. I target feed Spike. I will drop the food in front of his face with tongs so he has first pick. I’m not opposed to a bucket qt for the tetras but I’m out of heaters and established media that I can move without affecting its current tank cycle. Pleco kid started qt in 2nd tank on 12/2 so maybe 1/2 he can go to the community and Spike can live in his tank. The pleco seems very healthy! (I would continue the @Odd Duck deworming treatment on both tanks in that situation.) Also the ammonia in Spike’s tank has been holding at zero! the video @Colu
  19. Chick-In-Of-TheSea
    Spike was in the back corner behind the sponge filter this morning. Rejected the 7 white worms I dropped on his head. So I dropped like 40 grindal worms on his head and he did eat one of those. The tetras were LOVING life at this point. LOL! Spike didn’t swim but an inch, and I could see the wobble was present.
  20. Chick-In-Of-TheSea
    I remember in college we went sledding in our laundry baskets. 🙂 How about a nice stick insect habitat? @nabokovfan87.. like, you played hockey. And yet you broke your arm on a SIDEWALK CRACK?! 😂#iceskatesbutcantwalk @TheSwissAquarist I’m so sorry you broke your arm. You need a pond pump with 1/2” tubing to do nice easy water changes (for the big tanks). And you can use smaller tubing (no pump) for the small tanks. Send that water out the window. Lol! Just cover the intake with a net so you don’t launch your critters through the tube! As @Guppysnail calls it, “the water slide ride”.
  21. Chick-In-Of-TheSea
    Little bit of A. C. Newman. I originally discovered them when I bought a grab bag of CDs from an independent record store years ago.
  22. Chick-In-Of-TheSea
    2:43 also & not sure. I’ve never had a fish with a swim bladder ailment.
  23. Chick-In-Of-TheSea
    This is a 13 min video of Spike at feeding time. It probably won’t hold your attention, but anyway. This is what’s going on. It is kind of encouraging that he is hanging near the food, and I believe I saw one or two nips at it. But you can tell the little guy is not feeling well. There is just a sponge filter and an airstone in there, and a heater. The stuff behind him is seeded filter floss, which brought balance back to the water parameters. It looked to me like the air was a little too much, maybe pushing him around? But I tried reducing it and his breathing became labored. So now I added an additional hide for if he wants some shelter.
  24. Chick-In-Of-TheSea
    Added a small hide for Spike since he keeps tucking behind the sponge filter. Right now he is on some filter floss. He keeps wanting to scratch his belly and has been swimming with his belly dragging on the sand. The salt has been added.
  25. Chick-In-Of-TheSea
    Aw ❤️ Cute little dude having a nap in his hide.
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