AllFishNoBrakes

Agreed with the others that it’s hydra. I’ve used a dog dewormer on them to get rid of them before. I’ve also just left them, fed less fine foods, and with no food to support them they die off. Hydra are often found in shrimp tanks where the shrimp will not eat them and you feed lots of fine foods. I agree that a food dish for the shrimp can help prevent fine floating particles which the hydra feed on. Overall, they’re part of an ecosystem. I’ve never personally seen them eat any shrimp but I bet ones big enough could eat a baby shrimp. Many ways to get rid of them if you don’t enjoy having them.

@Samuel ACO test strips read like 0-5 nitrates for me while the API liquid test will read 40. I use the strips more for pH, hardness, and buffer than I do for nitrates. Also, I agree with the others that the tank is super lightly stocked in my opinion. I wouldn’t worry about it much.

Word up. I’ve been itching to do a blackwater tank so that’s the main goal here, for me. Just stoked to find which shrimp will do well in that environment

Appreciate the notes and in-depth response! Most of my tanks run in the low 6’s with basically 0 buffer. TDS runs like 50-100 in my tanks, yet my Neo’s have thrived for me for years. I think it’s because I originally got them from someone locally so I agree with you 100% on that. I’m not sure the botanicals/tannins will do much to my water other than tint it because of where the parameters already sit. My cherry shrimp tank already has a slight tint due to the cholla wood that’s been in there since the tank was set up over 2 years ago. Regardless I’m excited to check it out and if the cherry’s can’t make the change I’m definitely looking towards some Caradina’s to try out.

Yup. Gotta break out the step ladder to do a little bit of the maintenance on the top tanks, but thankfully I’m tall and knew what I was getting into when I set it up. Just one of those things if I wanted that many tanks, and I definitely want that many tanks lol

@looney_trout I run 5 tanks on a Tetra Whisper 150. Both outlets of the pump feed into the pvc, and then there’s 6 taps in the pvc tubing. I could probably pull off 6 tanks, but I’m happy with what this set up can do for 5 sponge filters. I’ll also add that this pvc outlet goes in all directions (pvc and pump is sitting on middle rack, 2 tanks on top rack, 2 tanks on middle rack, 1 tank on bottom rack) and several of the tanks have a HOB in addition to the sponge. The biggest issue I see with your proposed set up is that the tanks will be on opposite sides of a room. 20 feet is a loooong airline run that will greatly deplete the pressure from the pump. Me personally, I would use 2 pumps. One for each side of the room. Just my $0.02 with this pump running these 5 tanks for coming up on 3 years with additional filtration via the HOB’s.

@jwcarlson I’m curious about your recent experiences as well and am rooting for success! On Saturday I went out for a night (weird for a fish nerd, right?! Lol) and when I came back on Sunday afternoon I realized that my usb air pump died (no idea when it died but I believe it was out for a long time) and so did my hatch. For the first time I saw some “parachuted” brine shrimp, tons of eggs floating at the top, and basically nothing hatched and swimming around in the water column of the hatchery. I swapped out the dead usb pump for a new one I had on hand and had another 7 hours until the 36 hour usual harvest mark. I decided to let it ride and see what happened over the next 7 hours. Come harvest time, it was definitely the worst hatch I’d ever had, but honestly better than I thought it would be. Let’s just say I didn’t freeze and save a whole tray like I normally do, but had enough to feed live what’s usually leftover from a full hatch. Essentially, a 10% hatch rate with 0 air for idk how long. If I had to guess, we left at ~3pm on Saturday afternoon and got home about ~12pm Sunday afternoon, so almost 24 hours, and I bet the pump was out for the majority of that time. I’m curious to see if you’ve narrowed down what is getting you better or worse hatches in your trials and tribulations. The air pump dying on me made a HUGE difference and was literally the only change. Hope you’ve found some success with hatching BBS!

As I was changing out of my work clothes I saw a Pygmy Cory that definitely wasn’t the size of the adults and has to be a fry that survived in this tank! I guess the eggs have been there longer than I realized. Man, this hobby is so great. Add Pygmy Cory’s to the list I’ve passively bred and I’m excited to actually try to hatch and raise a batch!

I love when Angel fry start to actually look like little Angels. From that point, they really grow up fast!

Shrimp look great my dude! I’m about to convert my 20 long to a blackwater tank and I’m curious to see if my cherry shrimp can convert to that environment as my water is basically already there without the heavy tannins. If they can’t, I’m definitely gonna try out some Caradina’s and I’m excited about the potential whole new shrimp world that could open up for me. What parameters do you keep these guys at?! If I’m totally honest, I don’t really watch my parameters a ton, but I’m curious as to what you do as I know you’ve had plenty of success with these guys

Hey @Robin . Sorry you had that experience! My understanding is that the higher the temp, the less oxygen the water holds. I run air in all my tanks, and especially at that high of temp I would definitely run air stones. Meds definitely cloud up the water, and it is always recommended to run air when using meds. If I was in your situation, and was concerned about parasites, I personally would do 1 round of Paracleanse (with air stones, per the instructions on the box) and then give them a couple of weeks off. From there, you could consider something like lavamisole if you wanted to further deworm. Simply my $0.02. Best of luck to you moving forward!

I add the tiniest little dash to my Hatcher per I think it was @Irene as we are in the same area and it works great. Good tip!

@NanotankBank My first recommendation would be to feed less. I’ve had populations boom which told me I was feeding too much, and when I cut back (over time, obviously) I have tanks that have very few ramshorns now. If you want to get a predator to help with the situation you’ll have to consider the other inhabitant. My Pea Puffers demolish snails so that’s how I deal with them when they get out of control (snails get fed to the Pea Puffer tank). I’ve never actually seen my puffers eat shrimp, but over the six months I kept shrimp with them the population declined where it should’ve exploded. I’ve never kept assassin snails so I can’t comment on them. Just my two cents on the other factors though!

@Schuyler While I don’t know how old they need to be to hit maturity to be able to breed I would guess that a couple months old is too young, and I’ve never rushed it with any of my fish. I get them, i quarantine them, I move them to their home, and then I feed them up and enjoy them. When they start breeding, then great! I’ll start collecting eggs and attempt to raise the fry at that point.

@Schuyler Great question. I actually got this group from Aqua Huna. I just searched my email and they were delivered on 4/20/22. They came in super tiny, so I’ve spent the last year feeding them up and raising them.

@nabokovfan87 I have 3 types of Cory’s. I have the Albino’s, the Julii’s, and the Pygmy’s!

When I was first setting up my tanks a couple years ago I was certain an alien betta would be in one of mine. After keeping a couple betta’s, I’m not really sure betta’s are my thing lol I will say that short-finned bettas are much more up my alley and seem to have less issues in my experience and with everything I’ve seen online. Makes sense as they don’t have those giant fins that are always tearing and getting infected.

In all honesty, the usb nano air pumps are so cost effective that I’ve never had to use 1 to run multiple filters. That being said, I wouldn’t hesitate to use a T airline splitter and run 2 sponges with 1 nano air pump for a short period of time. You only need a little bit of air to keep the water circulating to keep the bacteria alive. I wouldn’t do this for a long term solution, but for a bandaid I wouldn’t think twice about it. Also, if that doesn’t work or you simply don’t want to rush to set up that 20 gallon, there’s no harm in recycling the tank/filter. As long as you know what you’re doing, have the time, and have the patience it’s not a big deal at all.

You guys like fish? I like fish. Specifically, I really enjoy making more fish. Breeding going crazy over here! Just wanted to give y’all a little update. Julii Cory eggs all over this sword And a few more on the glass. Fry doing really well in the box, too. Panda Angels spawned again. Time to start raising the next batch. Couple pieces of wood picked out for the inevitable 20 long blackwater swap. Paid for these pieces in store credit so that’s always fun. Literally so much breeding going down, but I feel like I have a good plan for it. -Current Panda Angel batch is going to be moved to the 55 grow out in the next week or 2. -7 Albino Cory’s and 3 Julii will probably just be moved to the home tanks. It’s going to be an experiment to see if they’re big enough to survive, but obviously I believe they are or else I wouldn’t do it. -Panda eggs will be hatched and will begin growing up in the 2.5 they’re currently in -Moving the 10 Cory’s to their home tanks will free up the other 2.5 and will allow me to try to hatch some Pygmy Cory’s! I’m through the Super Bowl so I really wanna try something new. -Pleco’s will continue to grow out in their 10 gallon they’re currently in. Really looking forward to moving some things around so I can try my hand at Pygmy Cory’s, and really looking forward to selling some things off to boost that store credit. I’m hopeful that I can set up my girlfriends shrimp tank and my 20 long blackwater (livestock, at least) for basically free using my existing and future store credit. Time will tell! Cheers, Nerms. Hope you’ve had a wonderful day.

I’ve never done it but I’ve heard things will begin to revert back to “wild type” coloration, or a brown color. You have to cull for even a single color to keep that line strong. Me personally, I would stick to one color and keep that line as strong as possible.

I personally am not a fan of the large sponge as I find it hard to get into a bag without fluffing a bunch of mulm off into the water column. For that reason, I would personally use 2 mediums. For tanks 10 gallons and smaller I use just a small sponge filter. For 20 and up I like a sponge filter on one side and a HOB on the opposite side. I like that I always have air via the sponge, multiple water circulation points, and I can alternate cleaning filters without worrying about breaking the seasoning on the tanks.

I don’t remember exactly. I bought it on Amazon like 3 years ago and have since sold it to a friend. I made sure the pump was rated to lift water from the ground to the top of my tallest tank (~7’). From there, I made sure the pump was adjustable (on the front it had a dial for less or more water and therefore less or more pressure/lift), and the outlet had several different sized barbed fittings so I could use whatever size tubing/pvc I wanted.

If it was me, I would do a small layer of gravel (maybe), floating plants, and then just huck some cherry shrimp in there. They’ll breed up a storm and you’ll have the never ending gobstopper of cherry shrimp at your disposal. Like Cory said, hopefully it doesn’t bow too much when filled with water.

I can’t say for sure what is going on with your fish. I used Expel-P because one of my angelfish actively had Camallanus Red Worms.

I used Expel-P a few weeks ago and had no issue with the tons of snails in the tank and the giant PSO