venzi

What's ADF?

Cool. I didn't know about pymeters. @xXInkedPhoenixX How are you placing the aqueon flat heater (on the glass using suction cup or flat on top of the substrate etc)? Yeah, I'm hoping to find some variatus platies at my LFS. My local petco only carry regular platies (or they call them assorted I think so maybe they might be variatus). Thanks!

Hi. I was doing some research into aquarium heaters and I'm starting to feel a bit overwhelmed with all the bad reviews. Glass breaking or fish frying or electrical shock or heater breaking within days or weeks etc. My situation is that my room temps (during the evening/mornings) will likely dip into low 60s throughout the winter, but will prob average more closely to mid 60s during the evenings/mornings. So I want a heater that can raise my temps to be above high 60s. I plan to get platies so they might not even need a heater, but just wanted a little buffer in case the winter ends up being colder than planned. I have a 20g tank and I read that roughly 1.5 watts per gallon will raise the water about 10 degrees. So I'm looking at a 15w or 25w heater. The aqueon flat heaters seems like they'll be the best bet b/c there doesn't appear to be glass that can break and it's flat so that I can have it sitting on top of the gravel or below some decoration so that I can easily hide it as well. Any feedback to my thought process would be appreciated.

Thanks for your feedback @Anjum. wow that's like next level 🙂

Hi. I created some medicated gel food using knox gelatin. It ended up being a bit thicker texture, but I didn't want to waste the batch so I've been experimenting with ways of serving it so that my fish will most easily consume it. My general observation was that it was too hard for my 2inch comet fish to bite off chunks at least initially. After sitting in the tank for a few minutes, then it softens up and also expands in size (seems like it absorbs water to expand). Does anyone know if this expansion of the gel is problematic for the fish? Once it softens, then the fish can more easily bite chunks off, but it seems still not ideal b/c the cubes I cut for them (roughly 1/8" or 5mm cubes) move around quite easily. So I can't tell if they're really biting a good chunk off or they're like slowly making progress (like tons of tiny bites). I even experiemented w/ spearing a cube on a fork, but that seemed like too much work for a daily thing. So I eventually started experimenting w/ slicing the gel up into thin strips, which works, but the strips were too long and most of the time the fish would swallow it, but it wouldn't be able to cut the strip and they'd have to spit it back out. But after cutting the strips to a smaller (2-3mm) length, then I think I found the sweet spot. Anyways, most youtube videos I've seen of people feeding gel food involved just tossing a roughly 1inch cube of gel food into the tank and the fish go crazy for it. This hasn't been my experience yet. Maybe partly b/c of the medicine in the food or b/c of the thick consistentency. I'm guessing for even smaller fish (less than 1 inch) the only option would be to make the gel more soft (like jello) so that they can bite off chunks (b/c cutting up small enough strips would be impossible for them)? Fortunately, for my comet goldfish, they feed off the bottom and the gel sinks. However, I was thinking for other fish that don't typically feed off the bottom, what are my options for using medicated gel food? I found these feeder tray systems on amazon that look promising, but not sure how top/mid tank feeding fish will do w/ them. Anyone have experience w/ a setup like this? Or do mid/top feeders not like to eat off a tray (in other words, does the food need to be floating or sinking)? Any other general advice on gel food or your experiences with gel foods (expecially medicated gel food) would be appreciated.

@PineSong is it necessary to use an airstone for the ziss breeder boxes? I would think if a tank has adequate aeration/flow, then another airstone (while it wont hurt) would not be necessary. Like how much oxygen would some fry take up? and even if there somehow was a disparity b/t the oxygen in the breeder box vs the tank, wouldn't the oxygen levels reach equilibrium eventually?

Hi. I was curious if there are articles or posts of people tracking their water parameters throughout their cycling process. I found this one post where the author had created a chart like this, which I found interesting. Curious to know other people's experiences with how much ammonia being put into the systems and how many days it takes to cycle and the peaks for ammonia/nitrites in the tank. Can be fish-in or fishless cycling.

Oh interesting. So the uplift tube goes into the sponge filter's center core and so bubbles still rise to the water surface, but the sponge basically traps the bubble spray? That's something I never considered. Anoxic filters is a whole new world for me. Yet another thing to learn about the hobby 🙂 Good luck.

I'm completely new to the hobby so take this with a grain of salt. I'm not sure how you'd "idiot proof" the in flow to match the out flow. Do you really need to do a weekly water change? That sounds like a lot of work 🙂

@CJs Aquatics I tried airstones with my UGF, but ended up going with a powerhead located at the bottom of the tank (hidden in the gravel). I didn't like how the bubbles caused water spray and how noisy air pumps were. I think the concern with adding sponges to the uplift tube would be the reduction in flow. You want as much flow through the gravel as possible, but if your filter is already cycled then I guess it doesn't matter that much.

@AnimalNerd98 thanks for the insight. I like the idea of the externally hung units didn't know they existed. I might be able to divert some of the powerhead output instead of using airstones.

What do you mean by this? Are you using airstones or powerhead?

Hi. I'm considering buying some kind of breeder box/jail for when certain fish either get too aggressive or later on when breeding occurrs. Anyone have suggestions on particular designs that work better than others? I'm thinking something like this will work but i guess it depends on how good the suction cups are. It would be nice if it had a hook so that it could hang off the tank's rim.

oh yea I've seen that video before (didn't realize he was Dean). It's pretty cool the little tips he throws in there on orientation of the pipes to achieve different goals. I think before trying out any mods to the output spray pattern, I need a better understanding of how to estimate how much turbulent flow is occurring at the surface with my existing setup. I keep staring at the water surface trying to figure it out 🙂 I read a stat that said like you need "15 sq inches of turbulent flow per pound of fish " i forget the exact numbers. I was considering getting an O2 test kit b/c that's prob the most precise I can get. Anyone have experience with O2 test kits? Are they pretty reliable? Any recommendations?

@SimmonsSnailsNScales @nabokovfan87 hi, i reuploaded my photos b/c I noticed they were still having issues. I noticed the forum was unavailable a few days ago so not sure if something is going on in the forum's servers. Hopefully it sticks this time.

Hi. I have this fluffy sem-transparent whitish dust primarily growing on the front and rear panes. Barely any on the side panes. Is this the start of algae? I can see it swaying around from the flow in my tank.

I have two scenarios in question. Keeping equipment clean when quarantining fish (to avoid cross contamination b/t the healthy tank and quarantine tank) Preventing diseases from transfering to humans For these two scenarios, do fish bacteria/parasites/disease survive when the equipment is completely air dried? What about if the equipment is not completely dried but slightly moist still? Equipment can be things like bowls, nets, pipettes or even towels.

So if left over food remains in the tank. Do fish still end up eating the food after it goes bad (spoils/rotten) or do they know the taste of rotten food and spit it back out?

Is it ok if fish in general swallow a piece of food without chewing? In particular I'm wondering about gel food. I had tried to prepare some medicated gel food and the fish weren't really eating it. The texture ended up being a bit firmer (it doesn't disintegrate in water even after an hour). So I was thinking it might be too firm for the fish to bite off chunks. So I cut the gel into thin strips, but I just noticed that the fish would end up swallowing a 5-10mm strip of food (like a piece of noodle) Do fish need to masticate like humans for the proper digestion and absorption of nutrients from food?

Ok cool. My main concern is over impeded flow over time, but the detritus is evenly distributed so I guess it'll be fine unless I somehow get like a thick layer of it.

Ok whew. Thanks for responding. What kind of change could I expect as time progresses? Will this turn into a flat layer of detritus or will it stay as these tiny clumps? Will it eventually disappear as my tank matures?

Hi. I noticed this mineral deposit or detritus (not sure what it is) on the bottom of the glass. You can't tell from the picture but it is sitting on the glass and not something growing on the UGF plate. Anyone know what it might be? The biggest change I had made to the tank was adding 10 tablespoons of sea salt (that was dissolved in a bowl of water) to my 20H tank. I don't know if the deposit was there before or after the sea salt addition. But this tank is new so I don't think any mulm/detritus would form by that much already. Water temp is 76F and PH 8.2. I had read that adding salt can cause calcium and other minerals to be removed from the water (depending on GH), but I thought that was supposed to happen at the water surface and not at the bottom of the tank. I have a few guesses maybe salt crystals that aren't getting absorbed by the water (but I kinda doubt this b/c I'm pretty sure I can add more salt and it would dissolve) maybe adding the salt somehow flushed all the fine debris (sand) that was in the gravel to the bottom maybe calcium/mineral deposits

I've tested the fresh tap water w/ low ph test before and it was like solid blue (basically darker blue than the highest color on the low ph scale). @JettsPapa oh oops. Yea, maybe I'll leave it alone. I'm all about low maintenance and if I can get away with not having to fight against the natural PH of my tap, I would rather not 🙂 Oh general question, I've read that PH naturally goes down in the tank over time. What are the causes of it and typically from your experiences how fast does it drop (like weeks? months?) and by how much ?

Where can I find this design? I'm not familiar with it.

@nabokovfan87 @modified lungWow so this is completely unexpected. I couldn't wait a full 24hours 🙂I had 3 samples to test. RO water tap water tap water added to a nano tank (it has no fish, just a mini HOB filter and some gravel). This was to simulate an air stone (since I don't own one and the mini HOB was what I had). The water samples were added in the afternoon and I tested the water around midnight so about 8 hours or so. And here are the results Fresh RO Water 6.6 PH 8 hour RO Water 7.4 PH Fresh tap water 7.6 PH 8 hour tap water 8.2 PH 8 hour tap water in nano tank w/ HOB 8.0 PH no clue why this PH is lower So even if I'm misinterpreting the color hues for the API test kit, judging by the pictures anyone can make a relative comparison and it's no question some vials are darker than the others. I do use a water conditioner (not water softener), but I don't think that's supposed to change the PH. I can get a sample of water that doesn't go through the water conditioner and test that perhaps. I was excited that my fresh tap water was 7.6 PH b/c that's the perfect range to grow beneficial bacteria. Now that I"m facing 8+ PH, I think I need to consider methods to lower water PH (thanks for your post @rockfisher ) picture of fresh RO water I'm guessing around 6.6 PH