FLFishChik

Feel free to send me an extra Ivory or two if ya need to rehome them 😂 j/k

Well, that depends on if you want snails. If you do, then leave the be and if fertile, you’ll have baby snails. If not, then you can remove the clutch and dispose. it’s my understanding that you can raise your water level so there is no available ‘dry’ area under the lid for them to lay eggs

If it’s a small tank, a Turkey baster might come in handy for removing poo from the surface of the sand without having to do a whole water change. I did this for my 5g tank. Just used the baster to suck up a poo here and there until it was time for the next water change and gravel vac

Well, transferred some bio rings from the 29g into the new filter and also added a good dose of Stability. Initial bacterial bloom is fading but we’ve now entered “Wood Fungus” phase. Exciting stuff. Noticed a little bit of Crypt melt happening, but hopefully won’t be too bad having given each planted Crypt it’s very own ACO root tab and dosed the tank with Easy Green liquid and Iron. The Corkscrew Val came in looking really rough, hoping it will make it. Got an ammonia spike going so now it’s just a waiting game of “when will nitrites rise”.

Looks great, fish won’t know what to do with all that extra space! Nice job!

Well, the Congo Tetra would be the Main Focal fish… but I’m open to suggestions! What’s your opinion?

Thank you! I was leaning towards that but just wasn't sure if they would be the best to add first!

Well.. 24 hours in and we’re in our “Bacterial Bloom” phase. Woot (trying to find joy in all phases of the process 😁) giving the temperature in the tank time to stabilize before moving filter media over from the 29g.

I found Aquarium Co Op during a YouTube search. I forget exactly what I was looking for, but I had just gotten back into fish keeping with my little 5g Betta tank after 20+ years of having given up the hobby and knew things had changed since I last kept fish.

So I’m currently cycling my 75g tank and trying to figure out which fish from my stock list to add first. My list is: Congo Tetra x12 Lemon Tetra x20 Albino Corydoras x12 6 Otocinclus (added in the future when tank is established and mature) Longfin Blue Eye Lemon Pleco x3 which would you initially add to the tank once it’s cycled AND is there anything else you might consider adding to this stock list?

For the last 2 years, I’ve had several tanks - a 3g Ramshorn farm, 5g Bladder snail farm ( both to grow food for Pea Puffers that sadly did not survive), a 5g Betta tank, a 10g glofish tank in my husbands Man Cave (if it gets him interested in my hobby, I’m down for it) and the biggest being my 29g. I’ve enjoyed all of them, so naturally, I wanted to go bigger. I decided last year that maybe it was time to move up to a “Big Girl” tank and decided I would wait until Petco had their major tank sale and I’d buy a 55g tank. Well, the sale happened and imagine my husband’s surprise when instead of the 55g, I brought home a 75g tank. Just so happened that Petsmart was having a sale on stands, so grabbed one of those too. He just rolled his eyes. “How am I not surprised?” Was his only comment. Anyway, I was saving up for equipment and hardscape… but life happens. Husband spent time in the hospital… then was on life support… then recovering… then back in hospital and so forth and so on. The tank sat empty on its stand in the living room for 8 months, housing some artwork my mother had painted. Suddenly, a new aquarium was not a priority nor nearly as important as making sure the very person who has been supportive of my hobby’s health and life quality was. After awhile, life became settled (or as much as can be expected) again.. new routines are established and though life is a permanently different for us, Husband has encouraged me to once again work on the 75g. so, here I am. Equipment purchased, substrate, hardscape and plants in, tank filled and now begins the cycling journey. In the meantime, I can get my final stocking list set and look forward to evenings relaxing on the sofa and watching the fish swim.

My 75g is Petco’s Imagitarium brand black sand. I saw in a YouTube video that @Irene used it in her tank because it was a coarser sand. I also have a black background on that tank as well… simply because I love how the colors of fish, plants and hardscape seem to just pop. The plan is to eventually house Congo Tetra, Lemon Tetra and Albino Cory in this tank - all very light colors so they will hopefully stand out against the background and sand

It’s up and running!!!!! Got the 75g going today and starting cycling!

I used my brand new hygger auto water changer for the very first time. I have had it for a couple of weeks and admittedly, I’ve been intimidated by it (IDK why… 🙄). BUT… literally changed the water in my 29g under 5 minutes. NO MORE BUCKETS!!!!!!! I’m so dang over the moon about that! would take at least 30-45 minutes using a bucket (2 gallons at a time). I bought it for the new 75g and needed to test it out. Game changer. My back is thanking me already!

Tetras… all of them 😁

Dwarf Lily will usually propagate itself when it’s happy (it’s a heavy, heavy root feeder), by making little planlets. Once you see some good root growth on the little plantlets, you can snip the “runner” from the mother plant and carefully plant it in the substrate. you can prune a lily by snipping the stem of the leaf/pad you want to remove as close to the base as possible.

Usually that happens when the test strip wasn’t laying completely flat during the waiting period. The chemicals from one pads will bleed onto another. Try retesting and make sure it’s laying on a flat, dry surface and see if that makes a difference

Yeah, you’d have to buy quite a bit if you want it to look like a carpet sooner than later

What about Crypt Parva? Would that work?

Maybe not. If the layer of substrate is thick enough and the root tab is buried as far down as possible. I’ve got the same substrate (but it’s 3.5 inches deep) and I use a LOT of root tabs without issue. However, I push mine all the way down to the glass almost AND I have a lot of root feeders. I believe @Cory uses the same type of substrate with root tabs without issue

I just use a small Rubbermaid sandwich container and cut it into little squares. I make enough to last about a week

Welcome to the forum! I also suffer from social anxiety, but more in public than in the keyboard (the internet has brought out my anonymous social butterfly). As for stocking, as @JE47 has mentioned, aqadvisor is a great resource. I use it often.

Just setting up my 75g tank. Got the equipment in, the sand and hardscape. Just waiting on plants to arrive and my light (which got lost in transit and had to reorder.. fun stuff). But, here it is so far

Got my very first Pleco today! Longfin Blue Eye Lemon Bristlenose! So tiny and so cute. He’ll eventually move to the new 75g, but he’s gonna live in the 29g Community tank until he grows up!

I haven’t grown this myself, but here’s what I found from Buce plants website