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Chick-In-Of-TheSea

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Posts posted by Chick-In-Of-TheSea

    Guppysnail Aquarium Journal

    in Photos, Videos & Journals

    Posted

    On 7/22/2022 at 10:09 PM, Guppysnail said:

    About 6 inches. Are you thinking of getting one?

    No, I was just wondering. I saw this 1.5 footer at the pet store the other day. Not a BN, just the standard pleco that I was used to seeing growing up. What a beast! And girth was soup can.

    • Like 2

    Chick-in-of-TheSea journal

    in Photos, Videos & Journals

    Posted · Edited by Chick-In-Of-TheSea

    Filtration woes (for the 29 gallon tank)

    I’m discouraged. This year I changed to sand. It was looking good but I can’t seem to keep it clean. I think I figured out why. Filtration. UGH! My least favorite thing to deal with. 
     

    To put it into perspective, I will vac the detritus, and the next day, this again.

    A month or so ago, I had a filter problem. My filter died and I switched to an AquaClear. I cut my media to fit the AquaClear. It was fine until power failures occurred, and the AC would dump all its water and run dry when the power came back on (often when I was at work and couldn’t prime the filter). Meanwhile @nabokovfan87 helped me fix the Penguin.

    Took the AC back. Now here’s where I think the problems started. I put the chopped up media into the Penguin. So, chunks of sponges and floss instead of properly fitting media. I did this for fear of losing my beneficial bacteria.
     

    I didn’t put 2 and 2 together; I knew the mega snail was a waste factory and figured it is what it is. But now I’m not sure. That much waste overnight? Everywhere? I think not. What I think is happening is that detritus is flowing through the sponge chunks and not really getting filtered.
     

    So today I did a big water change in order to vac a lot. Maybe like 40% water change. It made a huge mess. I cut the filter off during this because of water level, and a lot of the detritus fell back down on the sand. 
     

    I cut fine floss (the green and white stuff) to PROPER size (6” x 7”). I don’t have enough coarse sponge to cut to size but I did my best and filled the gaps with the coarse sponge chunks. 

    46E3B214-4365-4196-8508-D9FA79F4E2C6.jpeg.5447985225a218f9c52ae418b8c49c00.jpeg

    0ADCD507-F85B-48CD-BF6B-01561AC0A515.jpeg.b199400ec7feea7f60f144be65c19a23.jpeg

    B6F0BDA2-C0B1-4516-B3AE-684B4C544793.jpeg.8ac9043bd7658f023e7fe08e7b225388.jpeg

    If any filter NERMs are still with me up to this point, I could use some help. I want to optimize the filter to prevent all this gunk from going out into the tank. I know I need to pick up another coarse sponge so I could cut to size. I want to preserve my nitrogen cycle as much as possible. Today I took out half of the seeded chunks in order to fit the new stuff. 

    I also added a 29g sponge filter to help. (Thanks CARE package!)

    C0B33CA9-F99F-4FAA-97F0-A90E694FD7BF.png.ba9dccfa08402c8bb045b5a572da580f.png

    The filter shown in pics is the Penguin biowheel 200. No wheel is in it though. The wheel had a tear, and I had to retire it. Hence the outflow sponge.

    Also should note that I removed the pre filter sponge but it’s still in the tank to preserve the bacteria. I just need to get a lot of these floating particles cleared up after the recent vac. There was quite a bit.

    Python Hook tip

    in Photos, Videos & Journals

    Posted

    On 7/20/2020 at 5:51 AM, shkote said:

    I had an extra Aquaclear tube laying around and tried this during water changes yesterday. It worked perfectly in my 75 gallon. I stuffed filter floss in it for smaller tanks and that worked great as well. Thanks for the tip! 

    As a side note, I just LOVE the positivity on this forum. I have been on a few other forums that just have nasty negative vibes. I hope this one keeps bringing in helpful and happy members to the community and keeps spreading the love of the hobby. 

    This is the only social media I participate in.  I don't like it anywhere else.  🙂

    On 7/19/2020 at 1:21 PM, Daniel said:

    I rigged up something similar. My big angelfish tank is the source of water for all of my other tanks when doing water changes. Fortunately the top of that big tank is at about 7 ft and all my other tanks are between 30" and 60"s.

    I used a piece of 1 inch flexible tubing and the outflow outlet from an undergravel filter with sponge cut to fit in the intake. I also put an on/off cutoff switch on both ends and this has simplified doing water changes quite a bit.

    How do you get it going, or do you just allow gravity to start it?

    Cheap Hardscape???

    in General Discussion

    Posted

    When I was younger I used to put seashells in the tank. Not even sure what that does to the parameters, but when you're a kid you just want the tank to look pretty. Probably adds calcium and whatnot; same effect as crushed coral?  Wasn't that many. Just 2 or 3.  I didn't even boil them, but I did rinse them under the tap.  Fortunately had no ill effects.

    Bolivian Ram Journal

    in Photos, Videos & Journals

    Posted

    It only took 2 days of training with the flashlight, and now the Bolivian Ram instantly goes to her cave at mealtime. First I feed the tetras at the opposite corner of the tank to distract them. Then I wedge the tip of the turkey baster between the wood and the cave, so the tetras do not see the food coming out of the end of it.  (They do know to look for that.)  They have no idea any other food was placed in there, and she eats peacefully.  Today she had the variety platter of Xtreme Krill flakes and Cichlid Gold.

    • Love 1

    Water refill dispersion tool - Anyone have one?

    in Experiments

    Posted

    On 7/21/2022 at 10:09 PM, nabokovfan87 said:

    OK. I have an idea. Doesn't require new "major" tooling by any company and should be easy to make.

    1.  Specimen container.

    2.  image.png.f22673b85ec40883d16aed930d90e4b5.png

    Trim the faces off, leave the hook on the rim. 

    3.  Drill in the slots and then you're good to go. 

    You make a jig / tool for the box to sit on, CNC just machines them one by one, very easily.  If you sell enough, you launch a tool to mold the boxes with the holes and cuts already in place.

    Depending how the tool is currently manufactured, you can make a plug to fit in the internal space of the box as-is which would fill the regions you don't want plastic to be and allow you to add pins / slots for the water to flow into the tank.  You would see a seam line if you went this route, which wouldn't make it viable when you try to run the specimen containers as-is.

    You’ve just got to be careful with the rigid plastic, as it cracks easily when drilled.

    If you have the breeder box with the mesh on the bottom, I wonder how that would work as a water change helper?

    Water refill dispersion tool - Anyone have one?

    in Experiments

    Posted · Edited by Chick-In-Of-TheSea

    On 7/21/2022 at 10:04 PM, nabokovfan87 said:

    Thank you for the demo, much appreciated!  Don't ya just hate that the glass is so light that when you open the lid it slides all over the place.  Something that's been bugging me on my tank, lol.

    I took out a snail on that demo. LOL. See him fall? Sorry bud!

    • Haha 1

    Black neons with columnaris (resolved)

    in Diseases

    Posted

    On 7/21/2022 at 10:01 PM, nabokovfan87 said:

    30% of the water initially ---> 30% of that new volume is changes (5-10% is old water, unknown).

    Hehe. Yeah I know…. I just didn’t want to change too much at once since they’ve been soaking in meds for a week.

    • Like 1
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