AllFishNoBrakes

A medium sized ACO pre filter works great on mine. I have a ton of shrimp in my tank with my 107

Guppies are difficult for me. The only way I’ve been able to get them to work is if they breed in my water. Then, those raised in my water do well, and they breed, and then we’re off to the races. According to your test strip, the pH and gH look low to me for Guppies.

Ya, that’s a tough one, especially with the move being far away and all in one shot. I have 14 tanks, and have been in my place for 5 years. I often think about what I will do when I eventually move in a couple of years, and the best answer I have come up with is either 1) pay double rent/mortgage for a month to be able to have 30 days to move everything or 2) sell/gift all the fish and potentially the tanks and start all over in the new place. No easy answer, unfortunately.

If you don’t have fish, you can do nothing. If you do have fish, then yes you want to water change.

I have a 107 on my 29 gallon tank and I like it! Can’t really add much to what @Pepere has already said other than I enjoy the filter and it’s great for my needs on that tank.

Ya, TDS is everything, all the “stuff” in your water, and gH is general hardness or calcium and magnesium. Apples to oranges in my opinion.

When I first got my canister filter I put the canister in a small plastic tub behind the tank, and put one of these water alarms in the tub. Thankfully, it has never gone off, but if it ever does I’ll be thankful that I spent the $10 on the alarm!

Have you checked Craigslist? That’s where I got my first 15 shrimp.

You can do that. Personally, I dose for the whole volume of the tank when I do a water change regardless of the amount of water I’m changing. My thought is that cities can flush lines and perform other changes without notice, so by dosing for the whole tank I give myself a bit of a buffer against those unknowns. Prime and Complete are safe up to 5x, and I’ve never had an issue dosing for the whole tank volume.

Hmmmmm…. I’m really not sure. If it was my tank, I would probably be doing some large water changes and see if that does anything. The carbon could also help.

Should be an interesting combo. Best of luck!

I would assume the driftwood is responsible for the tannins. Water changes and/or carbon will reduce tannins. Personally, I love tannins and have a couple blackwater tanks. I know they’re not for everyone, though.

Find the shrimp that you want bred locally and you’ll have way less issues. My water parameters say that I should be keeping caradina shrimp. However, I’ve never kept them, and my neos crush in my water. That being said, I started with shrimp that were bred locally so they were born and raised in local water.

Prime doesn’t cause driftwood to release tannins, but a lot of types of wood will release tannins naturally. What kind of wood do you have in your tank?

I had a thermometer like that break in one of my tanks, but it broke at the top and I found it submerged on the bottom of the tank. Your guess is as good as anyone else’s I would say!

Looks like it! Your plan of dosing ammonia again, and then ensuring it’s able to convert all the way to nitrite in 24 hours sounds excellent. Assume that happens, to a big water change like you mentioned, and you’re off to the races!

It’s possible that some of the bacteria could die, but beneficial bacteria is on every wet surface in your aquarium. The glass, the substrate, on your plants, etc. Assuming your tank is well established, it shouldn’t be a problem.

Interesting. The reason I asked is if I saw one fish flash every once in a while, I would assume it was a random itch. I’ve definitely seen this in my tanks, but it’s pretty rare. If I saw multiple fish, doing it more often, and multiple “episodes” per day, I might question it a little further. Did you quarantine your fish? The reason I ask is because I do, and I use the med trio on all fish brought into my house. I know some people don’t like to use meds prophylactically, but I see it no different than the vaccines I give my dog, or even myself. All that is to say, if you think you need to medicate your fish you totally can. Also, salt can be magical. I’ve beaten ich and other cysts and things with just salt in the past. @Colu is the resident expert on disease and treatments. What do you think, @Colu?

How often are they flashing? Is it all the fish, or just some of them?

Tuning in on a Thursday evening this time! My posts have been all over the place between getting ready for vacation, being on vacation, and then being sick af starting Thursday last week. Normally, I can give it a few days and it clears up on its own. Not this time… Had to get some assistance and get some antibiotics (erythromycin, ironically enough) to clear things up. I take my last dose tomorrow, and I’m finally starting to feel pretty good. Still did all the maintenance yesterday and just cruised through the water changes. Besides scraping some glass on the Pea Puffer tanks, filter maintenance, and air collar cleanings things are basically on autopilot and it feels pretty good! It’s been a long time coming over the past several months with filter upgrades, air pump upgrades and swaps, CO2 upgrades, etc but it has all paid off and things are cruising. Still looking to acquire a couple fish. I was actually gonna go pick some up last week and then I ended up being super sick and not going. Oh well, the fish will come home when they come home. I’m wanting to boost up the Chili Rasbora and Green Neon schools, and I’m patiently waiting for the LFS to bring in some Rummynose Rasboras. Outside of that, things are happy, healthy, and moving right along. Some pics: 29 Blackwater feeling complete with the wild caught Black Neons. They love hiding behind that PSO and the Swords, but man do they look good in this tank. The Java Fern has a nice little baby growing up in there and I’m stoked for that! I’ll probably grow it out in here, and then maybe move it to a different tank and see if it takes hold. Java Ferns elude me for whatever reason… Also picked up a new drop checker and popped it in here this evening. CO2 levels are fine, but the $6 security that tool provides is worth it to me. 20 long Blackwater. Looking forward to beefing up the fish numbers. Could probably move 10-12 of the CPO’s out of here, too. Pea Puffer tank. CO2 is pretty dialed on this tank where I’m constantly getting a solid green from the drop checker. Not a bright lime green, but definitely a decent green. I still deal with some algae issues in this tank, but that’s just the nature of the beast with the Murder Beans. 6 gallon cube. Salvinia is actually doing quite well in here. Those roots are wild! The 8 Blue Axelrodi Rasboras are cruising right along. Still a little bit of green water going on, but it just is what it is at this point. 55 grow out tank. Ton of fish in here! I tapped the lid and they all came swarming to the top. The Java Moss jungle created some cover for some Platy fry, so I’ve seen a good chunk of tiny ones growing up. The Java Moss has died back a bit, and that’s alright as I don’t want a ton of Platy fry. They’re hard to move for me, so a couple here and there is nice, but I don’t want a ton. Cheers, homies. I hope you’re enjoying your tanks!

Either one would be fine. Personally, I would probably do it under the tap in the hopes that if anything was on/in the sponge it would be rinsed down the drain. Normally, I squeeze my sponges in tank water that I took out during a water change, but in this instance I would probably use the tap.

I was just thinking that maybe there was something on/in the sponge or the components to the sponge from manufacturing, and if you didn’t rinse it off whatever was on/in the sponge could’ve gotten into the water and changed the viscosity or could be the reason for the bubbles not popping at the surface. I would remove and clean the sponge, do a 50% water change, and see what happens. From there if I was still having the issue I would run some carbon for a few days in a HOB or a little internal filter and see if that doesn’t do the trick.

Did you rinse off the sponge filter before you put it in the tank?

The only time I’ve ever had one of my tanks do that is when I went suuuuuuper heavy on the tannins. It doesn’t look like your tank is a blackwater tank, though. Interesting. What types of food are you feeding? Did this just show up out of nowhere, or has it gotten progressively worse over time? What’s your water change schedule like?

Like @jwcarlson said, change more water, gravel vac/siphon it out, and/or upgrade filtration. You could also add something like Corydoras to your tank that sift around the bottom to suspend the detritus back up in the water column to allow your filtration a second, third, fourth, etc. time to actually catch the debris. What kind of filtration do you have on the tank?