Comradovich

1. Probably not very much, if at all. 2. Yes, but I believe you have to really go overboard to cause harm. I'm doubtful that double is enough. Fish aren't made out of chlorine molecules. Neither the chlorine or anti-chlorine treatments are really set up to be in caustic concentrations. 3. I'm assuming you're asking about adding conditioner to the water in the tank, (which has been lowered by the python), before adding in the new tap water? If so, then I doubt it'll hurt. You're almost immediately diluting that concentration. See below for "exposure interval". 4. This is overkill. The water in the tank has already been "conditioned", any free chlorine and chloramine has probably also bonded with whatever it is in there to treat and broken down. Probably won't harm your fish, you're just wasting product. Think of it a bit like over-feeding your fish or over-fertilizing your plants. These don't make the tank "better", they just end up promoting algae growth. I'm going to link you to Prime Time Aquatics' YouTube channel: Prime Time Aquatics I'm doing a channel link as my brain has forgotten exactly which video this is discussed in. I'd imagine you can find the correct one with only about an hours worth of viewing. But Jason has a biology specialization degree of some type, so he definitely knows his biochemistry. If he tells you: "Here's how this works", you can be pretty certain that's exactly how it actually works. He discusses water conditioning at length in one of these videos. Here's what I remember as the main take aways: 1. The scientific paper Jason cites, (I think he might actually link to it as well), on water conditioning mentions that the concentrations are done at a very specific exposure interval: 1 hour. So, to get bacterial kill rates consistent with "clean" drinking water from a tap, it's expected that the bacteria you're treating for are going to soak in that treated water for at least an hour. 2. Gist of the above was that if you're adding water conditioner within about an hour of adding the untreated tap water, then you're probably not messing with your tank's biological filter bacteria all that much. This seems to be the main point of adding conditioner, as if the biological filter dies back, then it treats ammonia build-up less effectively. Granted, whatever bacteria survived are just going to repopulate the tank again, but that does take a week or so. So, worst thing you might have done is make your ammonia levels go up for a little while. 3. The chemical reactions breaking down chlorine and chloramine in tap water start happening as soon as you add conditioner to the tank. Remember that you're also diluting the new tap water with whatever water is already in the tank. The chlorine concentration is constantly lowering over time. 4. Your tap doesn't have the same chlorine concentration as a swimming pool, which is set up to kill bacteria like Cryptosporidium. Most of us can't smell the chlorine in our tap water. Dropping your fish into the local swimming pool might kill it. Exposing it to tap water... not so much. I know as new fish keepers, most of us stressed about tap water conditioner. We probably shouldn't. Sometimes it might be worse for the system to panic and massively overcorrect our mistake, than it would be to just acknowledge that the mistake was made and let the tank recover. It'll also depend on your tap water. My tap water is low enough in chlorine/chloramine that I've gone months without adding conditioner to water changes. No ill effects were observed in my fish. I only decided to add it again for the slime coat protection. Your tap water might be higher in chlorine than mine is, and thus conditioner is required not optional. I can almost guarantee that it isn't swimming pool water, though. You can probably make a mistake or two without causing lasting harm to your fish.

There are two schools of thought here: 1. Those of us keeping more traditional tanks, (as others in this thread seem to be), will be somewhat confused by the microfauna. Having microfauna appear after three weeks is kind of a surprise. You usually don't see those for much longer out. It takes awhile for them to get established and build up to noticeable levels in a traditionally planted tank. (I.e. Aquasoil, sand & gravel substrate, chemical fertilization, etc.) 2. If you're running a dirted tank setup, similar to what Father Fish runs, then congratulations. Great Success! High fives all around. You've achieved exactly what you want, test for ammonia and nitrates, then see if you feel comfortable adding fish. Dirted's different. Might be a leak in your sand cap, but otherwise it's okay. What you're experiencing is actually a necessary step in a dirted setup. You'd be adding fish to control the microfauna and balance out the system. I think you're right that they came in on the plants. Yeah, you got them from the Co-op, but even their plants have microfauna. Most of us would be planting in a tank that already has fish, and fish eat the microfauna. You're planting in an empty tank, and the tank stayed that way for three weeks. As long as there is nutrient-inflow, then there's near-limitless space for microfauna to build up. Your source of excess nutrients is your twice a week fertilization schedule. This is probably more than your new plants need. You might also have root feeding plants instead of epiphytes. Epiphytes like java ferns and annubias feed from the water column and Easy Green style ferts work well for growing them. Root feeders like Amazon Swords and Cryptocorynes are looking for food in your substrate. Easy Green doesn't necessarily penetrate this layer as fast. Chlorella is naturally occurring in tap water. If your tank has a slight haze to the water, that's Chlorella. The excess fertilizer is feeding the Chlorella, and everything else is eating it or each other. You may also have your lights on for too long during the day, or there's a south facing window in your room. Excess fert + excess light = algae like Chlorella. Try dialing one of these two things back a bit and see if it helps. Assuming your water tests come back okay on Nitrates and Ammonia, I don't see an issue adding fish. They'll gorge themselves on the microfauna. Maybe don't feed as often while they control it. You've got an algae problem, but so did pretty much everyone else in this hobby when they first started out. My algae problem is on my plants and I'm kind of stuck with it as I'm keeping the lights on long enough to convince the pitbull otos that it's summer/baby-makin' season. You just learn to deal with your strains of algae. Wanna know a secret? I have a jar of greenwater/Chlorella, daphnia, and copepods that I'm intentionally growing to inoculate my tanks with. My pygmy swordtails and tiger teddies are going to be in hog heaven. It's under an LED desk lamp and seems to be a wriggly little mess. Got two backup greenwater cultures bubbling away on the window sill, too. Your problem could always turn out useful.

All else fails, you can grab some takeaway containers and make your own from that starter. Here's a video link of Random Bits explaining how to culture from a single worm: Culturing Blackworms from a Single Worm - YouTube It's not fast, but that's one way to ensure that you get a leech free colony going. Once you're sure you have eliminated the planaria/leeches, then you can upscale into what modified lung has going on. Alternatively, Greg Jones has two YouTube vids describing how he set up an Aquaponics flood table to culture blackworms off his fishroom sump: Here's one of those. Greg's setup would be upscaling to either create your own sustainable culture for a fishroom, or trying to breed them for profit. So, either way: you'd probably first want to separate out a few worms into a few different containers. Get them dividing and ensure that you get all the leeches and planaria out of the containers. You can start combining clean cultures into a super culture, and then decide how you want to keep that culture going. Maybe also keeping a few of those containers going as backups.

I spend a lot of time trying to work out just how my Tiger Teddies have managed to survive for as long as they have. They like to squeeze themselves into snail and planaria traps. Had to give up on the old water bottle snail trap as they'd swim in, get trapped (despite an exit several times bigger than they are and at eye level), and wedge themselves into the seams until they were crushed to death. Other fun behavior? "Let's all see where this siphon goes, I'm sure there's something good on the other side." I will say that the same things that make them a pain to keep also make them very easy to catch for a fish club auction. I dip the blue net into the tank to snag a single juvenile and every other fish in there swims over to see what it is.

Foxsfish, as someone who breeds Pitbull Plecos (Parotocinclus Jumbo), I can definitely confirm that these are not them. These are definitely parotocinclus, and closely related to P Jumbo judging from the head and body shapes, but the previous species ID is probably right. Normally with P Jumbo, the confusion is between them and some of the Chaetostoma plecos, (Bulldogs & Rubber Lips). Your LFS seems to have found an all new way to get the species ID wrong. P Jumbo does color match, but you'll notice that these fish are against a white background, which would make P Jumbo gradually go super light, not dark. Unless there's a whole bunch of black sand or gravel off camera, you're looking at the default color for these. If you do find a source for these, do share. Cool fish.

My most recent batch have slowly learned to eat Repashy Super Green and Bug Bites Algae Crisps. I have to crumble the crisps up a bit so they can compete with the amano shrimp. I've tried zucchini with limited success. I do think the key with prepared foods is to have another species in the tank to teach them what to eat. I also kept pygmy cories with a prior batch of otos and they also palled around with the little guys. A lot of the smaller corys and otos practice mimetic schooling with like patterned fish. (Like Hastatus with Serapinnus Kriegi, Aphyocharax Naterreri, and Hyphesobrycon Elachys). Barring a similar school of friends, the other thing you can try is preparing your foods in a way that the otos recognize as a normal food source. What I mean by that is that otos hang out on rocks in the current or just off the current. They'll suck up aufwuchs from there as they go, grazing on whatever is in the general area where they're at. They only really get brave and explore the rest of the tank on their own after lights out. If you've got a blue light setting on your tank, you may notice that they only really stick to the glass where you can see them if the blue light is on but the room light is off. An oto isn't really going to check the bottom of the tank for pellets, crisps or gels unless it's either dark, or their school buddies are looking for food there. So you might want to try feeding just before it gets dark in your tank. On one or two of Cory's livestreams he had a throw away line about painting his rocks with Repashy for his otos. I've actually tried this, and it may be the most aggressive I've ever seen my otos eat. Green stuff stuck to a rock seems to bring out the little sharks in my otos. Once they got that the gel was food, I noticed them more interested in competing with the other fish when I dropped cubes of Repashy into the tank. I've not tried a side by side comparison between Super Green or Soilent Green yet. I have noticed that the Algae Crisps must taste enough like the Repashy that they're also on the menu, though. They definitely know what to do with these now. They'll also go for fish flake after awhile, but the high protein can make them bloated. My current batch of Otos palls around with some Pitbull Plecos/Otos and a few habrosus corys. As long as these fish are eating, the otos will at least check out the edges of the feeding zone. They've learned that whatever these fish are gobbling up is probably worth snacking on.

While I don't have experience with either CPDs or Pencilfish, I will caution you that sometimes the fry of a particular species prefer the opposite end of the tank from their parents as a survival mechanism. For instance, my Tiger Teddys are top dwelling livebearers who spend all day in amongst my floating plants. Newly dropped fry head straight to the bottom of my tank and hang out in the driftwood and plantings there for awhile. They're not really fry eaters, but I figure the fry aren't taking any chances. That little guy's staying close to your plantings, which could potentially be either species's MO for fry. Either way, congrats on your surprise!

Some considerations if you decide on Hastatus: 1. They're very seasonal. Right now, end of summer/early fall is about the only time you'll see some in shops. If you see some other times of year, either there's a local breeder or the wholesaler is down to the last of the tanks and discounted them. Thus, you want to make your decision quickly, or put that off until the end of next summer. 2. Wetspot sometimes has Hastatus, I think they've got some in now. Your other source is Aquabid. You rarely see them elsewhere. Aquabid is a bit like dealing with early Ebay, you'll need to familiarize yourself with the bidding and payment structure before you buy. Some of the buyers there aren't real patient with new users. A lot of sellers will send you paypal invoices, but some are still using postal money orders, which require you to visit the post office and buy/mail the MO to the seller before they'll ship. That last bit may be a non-starter for you, but know that anyone with over 100 positive feedback is usually a safe bet. 3. They're supposedly one of the harder pygmy cory species to breed. 4. As part of 3, you might need to get yourself some tetra to go into the tank. This might seem like an odd requirement, but you want the tetra species that look _*exactly*_ like hastatus. Hastatus are a mimic species, they shoal with fish that look like they do. The three species you want to consider are "Serapinnus Kreigi" (Kreigi Tetra), "Aphyocharax nattereri" (Dawn or Panda Tetra), and "Hyphessobrycon Elachys" (Reed or Veiltail Tetra). While these tetra are cheap, they're not real colorful, so it can sometimes be hard to find them. You might have enough hastatus to get them out and schooling in the mid-water without tetras. I've got 7 in a 20 H and they mostly hide in the back. I'm not sure if they'll calm down once they're no longer juveniles or if I'll have to bite the bullet on tetras. I'm in a "wait and see" mode. Rachel O'Leary had a video on Hastatus where she mentioned adding Tetras if you want confirmation. I don't think she told you which species to add, though. I had to do my own research. If you want something closer to Pygmy corys in terms of breeding ability, look at Habrosus instead. I've got a school of 10 in with my Hastatus and they've decided to breed on their own long before I was going to try conditioning the Hastatus up. It's a nice surprise, but dang are they terrible at hiding eggs from other fish. Habrosus are prolific enough that I think Dan of Dan's Fish mentioned breeding them for college money. Maybe I'm mixing up my fish-tubers. Triggers on all the dwarf/pygmy cory species are: 1. Presence of live/frozen foods. (Daphnia and blackworms seem like good choices here). 2. Soft water. (This can either be in a soft water change, or your house could be on a water softener system like mine is). 3. Storm front rolling into your area. 4. Cool water change as said storm front rolls into your area. (If you're on hard water, make this a cool and soft water change using R/O mix or the like). You'll want to condition them up in the weeks before you intend to breed with some higher protein foods. Frozen daphnia and live blackworms pull double duty here. Once you see your females plump up, then you can start worrying about spawning triggers. Spawning is always one female chased by 1-2 males, with T-poses. You really can't miss it. If you see a small group motoring around the tank, see if it's one fat cory with two skinnier ones chasing it.

The kuhli loach looks suspiciously like he's removed some of his scales when you zoom in on that pic. Which could be because the ammonia irritated him or it could be a post-mortem effect of your baby ramshorns chowing down on his body. (They are doing what you put them in the tank to do, after all). I don't think that's an open wound or puss filled sore, I think he's just showing skin you'd normally see covered in scales. He might be a bit bloated, but he's also dead. Again, if snails are cleaning up the body, that's normal. Check the healthy kuhli loaches and see if any of them are also showing signs of scale loss and bloat. While you're looking at the kuhlis... check the gill covers for redness. Red gills are a sign of ammonia burn. In any other fish, I'd also tell you to watch for glass surfing... but these are kuhli loaches. I have black kuhli or java loaches. They're always glass surfing. It's because a storm is rolling in, or I changed the water and they like it. Maybe I just fed them. I've taken to collectively referring to the four of them as "Beavis", so that I can just tell the tank: "Uhhhh. Settle down, Beavis," whenever they do it. So, I'd ignore any advice about glass surfing you find online about ammonia levels. They don't apply to these particular fish. Stick with checking the gill covers for a bright red, inflamed look. Pink is okay, red is bad. If you're not seeing signs of distress, then you may not need to do more than you're already doing. The rainbow fish behave normally in regards to glass surfing, IIRC, so seeing that behavior in them would be a reason to worry. They'd also have the reddened and inflamed gills, though. Ammonia can get into your tap water from a naturally occurring source, but it can also be added as a way to enhance the chlorine treatment your water company is using. Removes some of the carcinogen effects of the chlorine additives. EPA doesn't really regulate it tightly, and your water company is trying to provide you with water that is safe to drink/bathe, not safe for fish to breathe. I'm guessing at this point you've already tried AmmoLock or similar products. You've probably got an Aqueon/Tetra filter with the ammonia insert in the little blue tray? That's what I use when I need to drop ammonia. It's fairly cheap, but then I don't have ammonia naturally occurring in my water. If this is going to be a longer term problem, then I'd start looking into an RO water system for just the tap that you do your water changes from. A single tap system will seem a bit expensive at first, but you're looking at removing a problem over several years at least. Although, if it is a natural part of the water, then your fish could be adapting to it over time. Might not want to stress them out right after you change the water, but that new water might be fine. I mean, on my API test kit 0.5ppm is the first column next to 0. Beyond that... try increasing your plantings. Things like Pothos planted in the filter or mangrove saplings dangling into the tank can help take out more ammonia and nitrate. Floating plants will also do that if you cull them regularly, but they would require more light. If you can solve the issue with plants and filter inserts, that might be the way to go over an RO system. You might also be able to solve it long term by using a filter designed for a slightly bigger aquarium. Your bigger filter would be converting more ammonia into nitrite, and then nitrate. Which the plants would then use up. So, you'd be water changing mostly to remove nitrate, salt, and heavy metal buildup; and just doing spot gravel vac cleanings in between. It'd be a cost of inserts to the current filter vs. cost of a bigger HOB decision. Which would both potentially be cheaper than RO. If your fish have say gill flukes and are scratching, it's often very obvious that they're scratching. They'll suddenly dart at the hardscape or gravel and glance off of it. It's a burst of movement you can't really miss. If you don't see that, then the Para cleanse probably did its job. Since both the snail and the loach died after you treated, it's possible they both just succumbed to wounds from the parasites you just cleared out. They might've lingered on for a bit and then just not quite made it. The problem could already be solved. That's why I'm telling you to check out the survivors carefully. Their symptoms would tell you which steps you need to take next. As for your assassin snail. He will eat whatever is roughly his size or smaller. Fully grown mystery snails and nerites are generally safe. Both often move faster than he does anyway. Might want to raise up your babies somewhere else, but once they get bigger than he is they're probably safe to reintroduce to the tank. He will also go for carrion, though. If you find him on something in the morning it's less likely that he killed it so much as he decided not to turn down a free meal. Assassins sometimes get a bad rap from new fish keepers because they think it killed their fish. What happened was the fish died and your assassin snail isn't going to turn down a perfectly good buffet. Same deal with your ramshorns, they're scavengers not killers.

Yeah, if you can measure into inches, we're talking a real leech. Those do require some kind of host to feed off of, so if you're just keeping plants still, it'll probably be fine. Likely starve on its own. Probably came in on a plant, or found driftwood or rocks. Not a major infestation to be super concerned about. Still might be worth looking up Reverse Respiration, but the element of panic is no longer there. You can definitely relax a bit.

I've noticed MTS opinions fall into two categories here: 1. @Irene@Dean’s Fishroom are more in the "nuke it from orbit, it's the only way to be sure" camp. 2. Those of us with sand substrate in our tanks tend to treat these more as an intended feature of the tank. I also intentionally bought some MTS from my LFS, they were surprisingly cheap... which tells me they were probably not intending to sell them so much as removing an infestation. Nothing really churns your sand over quite like an MTS colony, though. Even Corys and Earth Eaters can't really compete. You will not get anaerobic bacterial blooms down there with some MTSs. They also go around plant roots, which keeps your root tabs down where they're supposed to be. They'll definitely eat a dead or dying plant root, but they leave the lives ones alone. However, you need to be planning how you'll manage that colony. My suggestions: 1. If your substrate is finer, like sand, then you can get an ordinary blue Top Fin style net. You siphon the tank as normal, sticking the end of the siphon into the sand until it swirls up. Now just pop the net over the end of the siphon before that sand swirls fades and let it all drop into the net. Shake the net to "sift" it, and most of the sand will fall through the net. Snails stay. 2. If you've got coarser substrate, like your gravel looks to be, then you want to introduce a predator. Something like some Dwarf Chain Loaches, or Assassin Snails. Stick to one type, though. My DCLs decided my Assassin Snails were also on the menu. Now I just have DCLs. Also, predators will pick off whatever is the easiest meal first. Which means you'll want to have some place for your bladder snails to hide out. If your filter is a HOB variant, they'll be fine if you drop one or two inside of the cartridge area. That'll breed often enough to supply the rest of the tank with babies. Or just have some hardscape or mesh areas that the predators have trouble getting into. MTSs come out of the substrate at night, and they don't really hide out in driftwood, stone, or the like. So long as the bladder snails have places to hide, they won't ever be completely exterminated by your MTS control measures. 3. The old sunken piece of lettuce trap. Pop one, (may require a weight), in there just before the lights go out and take it out with all the snails first thing in the morning. Best part of this method is that you'll be able to pick off the bladder snails and put them back in the tank. You won't need to control them much if you keep your feedings manageable. They really only become a menace when you overfeed, and that leftover food is available after dark. Just like the Aliens, "they mostly come out at night, mostly."

Honestly does look like a leech. When I had a planaria outbreak in my 5.5 gal, I reverse respired all my plants in there. The combination of High CO2 followed by the PH bomb at the end tends to wipe out all non-microbial life but plants. How big is it? If it's not much more than about a single cm, then you're looking at something more on the lines of planaria. Bigger than a cm is likely a true leech. Usually the planaria the home aquarium gets aren't quite that large. If it is around planaria sized, look at the head. Bad planaria have an arrow shaped head with visible spots for eyes. These are not going to play nice with your shrimp. So you will have to do something to deal with it. Again, look up "Reverse Respiration" on these boards. It deals with planaria very effectively, it also gives your plants a major boost. All it costs you is several two liters of club soda, too. I was recommended to try the product "No Planaria", which you can easily source online if your LFS doesn't carry it. I didn't need to go this route, but I'm keeping it in mind for later outbreaks.

I uh... need to make a small Mea Culpa here. Seems I have not been following the "be the fish" advice nearly closely enough. I don't even think I was even following "watch the fish" advice. I spent a little time observing my tank and managed to catch the actual start of the behavior I was worried over. As it turns out, my attempts to make the tank Tiger Teddy friendly worked a bit too well. I have instead made a neocaridina paradise. They can graze on pretty much everything in here, and have been dropping Pumpkin Spice shrimplets all over. It also turns out that baby pitbull plecos don't like to be touched. I guess the pitbull plecos have spent enough time down in the mulm chowing down that they've picked up a bit of algae, which the shrimplets are super happy to help clean off of them. I remember @Cory saying in a livestream that neocaridina shrimplets are "the tacos of the aquarium". So my actual issue with this tank was not gill flukes, but "taco attacks". 🤣 ...Yeah. So anyway, I've checked the plecos and their little bellies are nice and plump. Their fins also look good. I'm noticing they're spazzing out a lot less over time. I guess I'll just assume they're getting used to being cleaned by "tacos". I feel pretty stupid now. Thanks for the help anyway.

Those nitrates aren't likely to be your problem. You can keep water changing to fix it, but I'm doubting that lowering it is going to be much help to you. By way of example, I run a planted tank that regularly has 15-20 ppm when I test, and I'm adding nitrate fertilizer to it to raise that amount so I don't start losing plants. Fun fact: those of us with planted tanks tend to avoid mentioning our nitrate levels to fish keepers who don't, because all those shocked gasps get old quick. Adding so many fish at once is a stressor on all of the fish. (You may want to go for closer to 2-3 at a time). Main thing is you're adding something that's already feeling stressed, to a tank with an established pecking order, which just adds stress to everything else. This stress leads to either the fish getting "stress ick", or getting weak enough from stress for regular "ick" to set in. This is why the quarantine med treatment is suggested in YT vids, (I seem to remember you mentioning a med trio). The other problem with adding many fish at once is that your biological filter has to catch up to the sudden increase in bioload it has to process. It does this by breeding bacteria, which is why there's usually a lag between adding fish and getting your parameters back to the usual balance when you test. I'm mentioning this because I suspect you'll be looking at a relatively minor disease outbreak soon, and you shouldn't panic if you're already planning QT meds. This is probably not your cory issue, I'm just being proactive. What I suspect is your issue is self-poisoning. Julii's have venom glands. Your albinos are Aeneus, most likely. I can't remember if they also have venom or not. Point is that corys with venom are not immune to their own venom. While this sounds like a stupid evolutionary trait, you also have to remember that these are shoaling fish. A given cory isn't dumping venom to save himself, he's making sure that his predator remembers fish of his type as the guys that put said predators entire face to sleep for the rest of the day. That way, it leaves the rest of the shoal alone. Here's a story from one of the YT livestreams that happened over the holidays... (I want to say this is Rikostan's story, but I can't quite remember, I think it was one of Chattanooga Ed's streams): So, fish keepers go to a shop during one of their convention visits. They see these neat corys they definitely want to bring home. Shop employee starts netting corys, one or two get stuck in the net. As they're putting them into the catch cup, they notice the catch cup water is slightly cloudy. Shop employee bags up the corys from the catch cup, and starts ringing up the corys. Bag water is definitely slightly cloudy now. Fish keepers notice at this point that some of the corys aren't moving. Get them back to the hotel, corys start dying. What happened? Well, getting stuck in the net broke or snagged one of the corys' venom spines. It panics and dumps venom. Other corys get stressed and also dump venom. Everyone in the bag is now slightly poisoned. Since they're already a little weak and stressed from the supply chain getting to the store itself, venom doesn't help at all. How do you avoid these deaths? You use new water for the bag from the shop RO system or a QT tank. Catch cup water gets tossed. This minimizes the amount of time a given cory spends in water that has been envenomed. You also don't dally on the way home from the shop. You want to minimize the amount of time a cory spends in a bag where it might panic. If you have kids, you don't let them look at the bagged fish on the way home. Because to a cory, it's like Godzilla just started peering in to find a tasty treat. When you get home, you want to assess the bag before you decide on how to acclimate. If the bag's got cloudy water, skip straight to "plop 'n drop". Cory will take less stress from a sudden change in temp and ph than it will from sitting in its own venom. Maybe temp acclimate, but you don't have time for drip acclimation if that cory already dropped venom. You however, are past this stage. Save those little nuggets above for future shop runs. You did two water changes since the Corys hit your tanks, so they're probably out of any venom they may have dropped. Whatever filter you're using probably got rid of it. You may want to google "Corydoras self-poisoning" just to check if there's anything else you could try, but you should mostly be in a mode of making them as comfortable in the new tank as possible. What I would suggest instead is get this colony of Julii and Albinos healthy, and if you decide you need more of these particular fish, see if you can't spawn them yourself. That allows you to skip any supply chain or shop mishaps. What's happening to your fish is a combination of venom and stress, you kind of just have to ride it out. Body count is 5 Julii, 1 albino, and two guppies? I mean, the Julii decimation isn't a stunning result, but you didn't know any better. Albino Aeneus and Guppies are pretty hard put upon in shops, that's a relatively normal outcome. I definitely wouldn't beat myself up over this episode. I would definitely make plans to spawn what's left, though. You didn't pick up the final outcome for your tanks, you picked up the building blocks to get yourself to that final outcome. You can totally recover from this.

So, I'm noticing my juvenile LDA 25s (Parotocinclus Jumbo) are starting to flash. They're young enough that it could just be zoomies, but I'm keeping an eye on them anyway. Should just be a simple Prazi-pro treatment if gill flukes, right? Except... this is also the tank that I keep as natural as possible. It has detritus worms, it has moina, it also has some greenwater and a fair few paramecium that I've been seeding into it. (There may also be some walter worms or banana worms that haven't drowned or been eaten yet). I'm trying to provide food for a pair of Tiger Teddies that I want to start a colony. There's also a growing colony of shrimp, but I'm less worried about them, since they're breeding like crazy. Tiger Teddy fry are tiny enough that they'll need the live stuff in the tank. The Pitbull Pleco juveniles are just keeping the place algae free while they grow out. Does anyone have experience treating prazipro in a tank with other microfauna that you'd rather keep alive? Worst case, I can always move the juveniles back into the main tank with their parents while I treat them, it'd just be a real pain to get them back out of there when I'm ready to sell. The pair of Tiger Teddies are completely calm, I don't think whatever agitated the plecos is getting to them.

So, final update of this thread. Below are two pics. The one with the cherry shrimp is from three weeks old, and the second one is from a month on after I moved the oldest seven into the 5.5G. I separated the oldest batch out so that the younger group would have more of a chance at hitting the food. This batch has made itself super busy looking for any stray green spot algae I may have missed in the 5.5G. If you are finding this thread using the search command from the future, hello from 2023! I have submitted a breeding report to Planetcatfish.com on Parotocinclus Jumbo, you can find that right here. I'll have to remember to update it with 3 month and 6 month pics. All of the data from this thread is contained there in what I hope is an easy to pick through manner. It is apparently worth 73 points, and I have no idea if that's a good or bad amount. Maybe I can spend it on one of those rubber pop up toys from the 80s, since that's what I sank all my ski-ball tickets into. I'm hoping info like this will convince people to give this pleco a try. It's the sort of hard working algae eater people look for when they pick up otos, (although it specializes more in rocks and glass instead of plants). It also isn't super difficult to breed successfully. Perhaps @Irene or @Bentley Pascoe might consider giving these a try as a video project. They're a little spendy when purchased from Dan's Fish, but not a purchase you can really regret.

I was going to say that those looked like Ramshorn egg cases to me. (Of which my three remaining Ramshorns have helpfully provided me with a few for comparison). I wish my bladder snails were leaving me those clusters like @FLFishChik has. We're down to one or two survivors, and those I actually see working. Unlike my curly brown freeloaders, who just muscle into my fish/shrimp food and leave me presents all over the glass.

I was honestly going to suggest exactly what @nabokovfan87 just did. But I would also add in some walter worms just to test the waters. If they seem to like the worms, I'd follow the progression to banana worms and micro worms until they're big enough to take whatever you're feeding the adults. The LDA 25 fry I'm raising are all about Repashy Super Green, (started with dust and worked up to mixed), but every other time I offer banana worms they'll start acting nuts. It's not every time, but worms still get the response when they're ready to take them. Since those L134s are omnivores, I'd expect the worms to get a stronger response than with these aufwuchs eaters. I'm not sure how big your fry are, but if they're big enough maybe vinegar eels are worth a try?

I would guess that it can. I'm growing Amazon Sword, Red Melon Sword, and Crypt Pink Flamingo, which all have similar "Moderate" lighting needs to the Montecarlo. I'd look at the specifics of whatever type of Ludwigia you were looking to grow, though. I know L. Repens will grow in a moderate light, but requires a high lighting to really flourish. As a light, the 957 is a relatively cost effective option, but it's by no means the very best option. If you have a few hundred to spend, I'm sure @Bentley Pascoe could probably recommend a better one. For around $40, though? It's a very solid light. Also look into your substrate options. I'm growing on sand w/ root tabs. This means my C. Pink Flamingo isn't exactly exploding in growth, but it is spreading out from the initial root tab placement. It would take more advantage of my light if it had a bit more root fertilizer. EZ-Green is doing wonderful things for my epiphytes, but it doesn't get much sand or gravel penetration that I can see. You could layer aquasoil beneath a sand or gravel substrate. You could also adopt the MD Fish Tanks method of filling a filter media bag with aquasoil and burying that where you plan on planting a root feeding plant. Both methods work well without requiring you to completely cover the bottom in Fluval Stratum or the like. Your inputs on the plant equation are lighting, fertilizer, and water quality (GH, KH, micronutrient density, etc). Oh, you're fine. Yeah, I was one of those Dan's orders that got stuck in Memphis Monday night. Bit cross with UPS right now, would've been faster/safer to just chuck it on an 18 wheeler headed down the interstate. I think everyone else is catching unintended fire when they cross my path. I only have one survivor of a tiger teddy pair, so I've gotta hope little "Sauron-ette" got knocked up in Dan's quarantine tank.

I use a 957. It works great. I actually bought it over the 999 specifically for the controller being on the light itself not the cord, pretty much the opposite of what @nabokovfan87 suggested. I don't really like having to reach around to the back of my tank to adjust the light settings. I'm never really in a situation where the light is in contact with water, the lid is always in the way. (Dry state, we're pretty water conservation conscious here). I guess it's possible water could damage the light, but in my experience that hasn't happened in the two years I've been using the thing. I treat the light like it's a hair dryer over a bathtub. We always remove the light first if we're going to do anything that might require removing or adjusting the lid. Hasn't failed me yet. It's a pretty good light overall. I like the LED screen, and I don't do enough with light timings to need much more than the sunrise/sunset ramping features. Grows Süßwassertang, Java fern varieties, Crypt Pink Flamingo, Amazon Swords, Anubias Nana, Hornwort, Java Moss, Crypt Lutia, and Dwarf Sag all perfectly well. I don't have a ton of pearling, but I do get some, and I'm overstocked a bit on fish.

To remove the eggs, try using a plastic pipette. If you buy live foods, (or even some prepared foods), on Aquabid some of the suppliers usually include 2-3 of them with the product. I don't have a good suggestion for seeing the eggs in the first place. I am so near-sighted it almost qualifies as a super power, so I usually just take off my glasses. The pipette is a solid strategy for getting a hold of a bunch of them. Also handy for separating them in a breeder box. You'd be surprised what you can do with a tiny bit of suction.

I've had good luck recently with methylene blue. I had some spawns of pitbull plecos. First two batches I went a bit light on the MB, only 7 out of 60 hatched for me with fungus really taking over most of the spawn. (This was separated out individually in a breeder box, mind you). Next batch I probably overdid it with a shade darker than Mountain Berry Powerade. It was only a nine egg spawn, so I really wanted to get most of them going. All nine hatched. Just dipped them in a specimen cup full of MB while I collected them up. Longest dip in there was probably five or so minutes? Then I split them up again and transferred to the breeder box. Eggs were slightly blue tinted by the time they hit the box, so I know the shells absorbed some of the dye. First batches lacked this tint, so maybe that was my point of failure. Dunno if that helps. I was also doing a pimafix treatment in the main tank at the same time as the MB, so maybe a combo was what did it for me by the last batch.

Reading the fine print on the Kat's Aquatics bottles.... 1. 3-1 limited edition appears to be a mix of all 4 of her varieties. So if you were unsure, maybe this is the one to go with. 2. Calcium + protein seems maybe geared more towards shrimp or crayfish. (Although it also lists turtles in the description). 3. I'm torn between Calcium + Immunity (because my horned nerite is losing his yellow), or Calcium + Nutrition (because I'm reasonably certain said horned nerite will eat anything with spinach or beets in it). I dunno, lots of good answers in this thread. Has me feeling all sorts of guilty because I don't really feed anything that the nerite or bladder snails would specifically like. He has been fading to a mostly brownish mix from his original blacks and yellows.

Wow, today was busy. I managed to confirm that they can lay again approximately two weeks after the first spawn. Did a test 80% water change on the 20 G yesterday and they left me some eggs on the glass again. Much smaller spawn this time, and they were slightly better at hiding them. Took forever to get 9 eggs off the glass behind the amazon sword. Yeah, 9 wasn't so good for a spawning event. I suspect that I need to give the females more time to fill up with eggs in the interim. They could be bred like Bristlenose, but probably should be given longer to rest up. Fish are smaller, and clutches are smaller, but the fry seem to develop faster than BNs. Then as long as I was already in the tank grabbing eggs, I netted and separated out the neons I originally intended to breed. Into two shoe-box storage tubs in the closet with them. We'll see if they work out how to get things done tomorrow, I guess. I do have all this new live food culturing. I know baby neons are live food eaters. I dipped the eggs in methalyne blue again, probably overdid that. Specimen container looked like it was full of Powerade that the ice had just melted into. Unless YouTube is washing out the color in videos a bit, this is likely at least a shade darker than I needed. I put the eggs in with their siblings, who do not seem to really be interested in them. Last ones didn't get enough MB, this batch may have got too much. I'll be dialing this in on the next try, I guess. Fry have distinct ventral fins now. Can't really see if they've got dorsal, adipose or anal fins, but they tend not to really flare those as adults, either. All 7 fry are free swimming, and will hide if I get too close to the plastic. They seemed interested in the walter worms yesterday, but they didn't really move for either them or the banana worms today. I've been using the "rubber band trick" from Chris "The Mad Aquarist" Biggs' last video on corydoras breeding, and that does work well to get worms into the breeder box without getting your culture media in there too. So far, that pencil eraser sized blob of Repashy gel is the biggest hit on the food front. I do notice them sneaking closer to that whenever the lights are lowered. It is a pain to siphon out the waste each day, but it is nice to know they're definitely eating. I dunno if they're necessarily attacking the gel so much as waiting for it to melt and then picking off the leftovers, but they are often in the mess when I go to clean in the morning. I started the paramecium culture I ordered, giving a few drops to the breeder box to seed it, just in case. Gotta get an air pump and some tubing to get my chlorella culture started off before I order some daphnia. I'll be rounding things off tonight by starting cultures of micro worms and vinegar eels. There's a lot of foods I can throw at these to test responses. @nabokovfan87 if you were planning to assist with Google-fu earlier, I can probably save you a search. Thus far the only real breeding reports I can find are: This "Shane's World" report from 2004, which is the go to link-back on breeding. And this guy from Aquascaper.org which has some additional details from 2017. I've read these reports in the past as this species is one I've kept and unintentionally bred at least twice. I'm trying to get together something a bit more detailed and useful here so that future searches will have some actual meat to them. Breeding reports are great, but they tend to stop once you have wigglers or fry. I'm hoping to help others work through the follow up questions of: "and now what?" So far, the answer has been: ensure they get cycled tank water moving through, remember to feed them a little, clean them in the morning, and leave them alone. I am still amazed at how young this fish is spawning, I figured they'd need at least a year after I first purchased the juveniles. I guess when they decide it's time, it's time. I have started the Planet Catfish spawning report, but I can't seem to get all six of them to line up on the glass so I can measure pectoral fins. Some of these are definitely male, but I may have to dangle some lager near the tank to tell for sure. {Edit} I have included the following pics as an edit, rather than doing a complete update. @Odd Duck asked for pics, well here you go. Pic one has the best focus I could manage on the fry. In pic two, you can see a wiggler and one of the fry. I notice the fry in pic 2 is pooping, which was not planned. Wigglers hatched out almost immediately after being moved to the breeder box. Which tells me that the 2-3 days both of the previous links mentioned might be an average hatch time. Both of my results were outside of this range. I know I got to this latest batch within 24 hrs of triggering the spawn. There may also be a hatch trigger, possibly either the presence of food interacting with the egg membrane or the storm front I used to trigger the spawn moving out of the area. It's the 28th today, first batch of fry hatched on the 19th in the night, so we're only looking at around a week of difference between that fry and his wiggler tank mate. The vent fins are really hard to get into focus, but believe me they are there. Egg to wiggler ratio on the 2nd batch was 6/9, so maybe I didn't overdo it on the Methalyne Blue. {Edit #2} Another daily small update. After an additional 24 hrs, the rest of the 9 eggs hatched, so from 6/9 to 9/9 on this batch. I guess slightly darker than a sports drink is the prime Methalyne blue concentration. I guess the tip here is not to give up on the eggs until you see them go white with fungus. I had an unreported wiggler death on the first batch, 8 actually hatched, but only 7 made it to the fry stage. The death was almost immediately after hatching, so I'm not sure what I could've done differently. Seems about par for the course on wigglers, though. {Edit #3} Here's a May 4th pic where the oldest are two weeks and the youngest are a week. You can see the growth difference in these. Big ones are pushing 12mm. They really start looking like tiny adults once they hit a full centimeter SL. Obviously, the breeder box is clear so they're not trying to substrate match, but you can see all the rest of the coloration starting to appear.

Good to hear, hope the tub goes well for you. Yeah, I'm kind of the king of starting cultures in Kirkland Mixed Nuts jars from the ol' Costco. Lost count of the number of times I've looked at a test strip a day or so after I set something up and blurted out: "Oh, {BLEEEEEEEEEEEEEEPPP!!!}" Thing to remember about any new setup is that it's going to test high for something early on, stuff drops back down to normal levels if you just leave it alone long enough to cycle through. I know Father Fish isn't a big fan of the nitrogen cycle, but it's a useful construct to work from even if it isn't strictly true enough for some aquarists. Jars are like very finicky nano-tanks. Once you get them dialed in, they last and last, but they'll shock the life out of you at the start.