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Birdsnstuff

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Posts posted by Birdsnstuff

  1. It should be find to put in the main tank as long as you are okay with have more snails. I like snails - I have a fine crop of rams horns, Malaysian trumpet snails, and bladder snails in my tanks. I have to weed them out occasionally and I was taking them to my LFS for their puffer. It's died ( they took it in from someone and it wasn't well) so I don't know what I'll do now. But they keep my tanks relatively algae free and are fun to watch. 

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  2. Hi - I'm feeding my current betta Betty a variety of things. 

    Omega Betta Buffet Pellets - the goto unless I'm feeding something else.

    As the mood hits me with all my tanks....

    Xtreme micro pellets

    Small Bug Bites

    Vibra Bites

    Tiny bits of any of the San Francisco frozen Freshwater Multi-pack 

    Omega flakes 

    frozen BBS

    dried brine shrimp

    The cardinal/habrosus Cory tank gets more of the sinking small pellets, the Black Phantom tank gets more floating food (with sinking things for the ottos), and the betta gets her betta pellets as her primary food. But being a believer of variety is one of the keys to good nutrition, I mix it up.

    As Cory said in a video once - you Will buy too much food. Guilty! 

     

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  3. This thread has inspired me to test my tanks later today. I had surgery last Friday that prevents me from picking up more than 2lbs per hand for a couple of weeks. I did water changes before surgery but I'm curious to see how the tanks are doing. Something I can do under 2lbs. If I have to I'll have my carer drag the buckets over to the tank in need and I'll siphon then they can drag the buckets out to dump them on the garden beds. I go through waves of over feeding and under feeding so we'll find out what phase I'm in now. Plus it will pass the time while I'm healing. 

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  4. Betty got back up in patrolling the tank... Ashoka Tano and the force! I also added a tunnel for her to swim through. I haven't seen her swim through it.... but it's new yet. I had a coconut one but it was too big for the space, I thought. So it is now the "Death Star" in my 20 gallon. The Black Phantoms are avoiding it but the snails have already checked it out. I figure it will add another source of biofilm/algae for the otos.

     

    IMG_1369.jpeg.2430c9fb48ab940bc1ea01931f19611e.jpegIMG_1370.jpeg.03dcc9bda38bf9cf9438e8f796299ab8.jpeg

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  5. On 3/28/2023 at 9:17 AM, Chick-In-Of-TheSea said:

    I do my best to conceal the fact that I'm using the meat thermometer for the fish tanks...

    I was designated a digital meat thermometer of my own… specifically marked for fish use only! 😆 They are awfully convenient though. 

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  6. @TankedI find my black phantom tetras are very top water focused for food. It's like it becomes invisible 3 inches down. So if I turn off or down the flow, they seem to see the food better. Less of it ends up feeding my crop of ramshorn snails. I only have 7 tetras and 4 otos in the tank so for the most part I'm specifically feeding the tetras. I drop wafers and veggies on the substrate for the otos.

    My cardinal tetra/ habrosus Cory tank feeds differently. Both of those will go where ever the food is. So I broadcast that food generally. 

    The Betta eats where ever as well. She likes floating food or sinking food she can chase but she'll hunt the leftovers off the bottom. 

     It is good to hear how other people do it and how different fish react. You never know when you might need to change it up.

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  7. Hi - I have adjustable HOB filters on two of my tanks. I turn them down to feed but  I periodically turn them up and down just for the heck of it. I feel like it adds some variety in the environment for the fish and moves the water around in new patterns. I even turn up and down  my sponge filter.  Does anyone else do this? Thoughts?

    Video for attention. Betty the Betta

     

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  8. I’m reading Ahab’s Rolling Sea … A Natural History of Moby Dick. Which is interesting from a fish keeper / naturalist perspective. The author references contemporary books to Melville as well as modern science. Fun to read in bits. And a medieval murder mystery that kinda dragging so I may not finish it.

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  9. @Theplatymasteri have a tetra whisper on my 20h and I find it to be super quiet. But it’s relatively new and in my living room. I have a Azoo Mignon on a tank in my bedroom that is pretty quiet too. Though I take the lid off the Azoo before I go to sleep because it changes the tone of the filter. Oddly I can sleep to that tone.  My whisper doesn’t rattle but I did put a little black electrical tape around the edge so the lid was more muffled.

  10. This is my most recent dirt tank. I floated the big chunks and most of the perlite off of an organic potting soil and covered it with a larger sand. I have another tank that is about 20 years old with just plain dirt from the yard covered with gravel/sand. The potting soil tank was much easier (plus I know a lot more now). 
     

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  11. Her book says that plants use up available CO2 in about 4 hours (if I remember correctly). So a “siesta” lets CO2 build back up so the plants have it available again for the second photo period. I’ve noticed it does seem to help with algae. I have an older Walstad-esque 15gal tank plus a new 5gal. But @Streetwisemight explain it better. I run either 4on -4 off- 4 on cycle generally or 5-4-5. 

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  12. So I floated some organic potting soil in water to separate the big floaters and perlite from the soil particles. Then I put down about an inch with about a quarter cup of crushed Flora Max I had laying around mixed in. I sucked up a turkey baster worth of soil out of my other dirt tank to inoculate (in my mind anyway) the new dirt with some old microorganisms. Covered it with an inch / inch and half of larger grain sand. Added an Indian almond leaf.  I put in a sponge filter I had running in another tank and off we go! 

    So far it's tested well - time will tell. I actually have two little heaters in there - my first one didn't keep it warm enough so I added the second. I have a more powerful adjustable one coming in the mail.

    There are bladder snails that came in with some of my plants - I'm going to move some trumpet snails over too. Once it's settled a bit in a week or two  I'll add Betty.

     

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  13. I decided I wanted to set up a betta tank with a dirt substrate with a sand cap. I set up a tank with dirt a long time ago and it's still up as my least demanding tank. So when "assorted female" Betty came home with me by accident from the big box store, I took the opportunity to set up a 5 gallon for her. Here she is in her quarantine / plastic aquarium tote. I put an almond leaf and it's been melting down so the bottom is a little dirty. But the test results are good and she's happy. 

     

    Betty the BettaIMG_1317.jpeg.530c8c18a7b296d15b73effb4c44afed.jpeg

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  14. A friend’s young teenager has a betta in a 3? Maybe? Gallon tank kit. They asked me about the algae problem they were having. It had about 4 inches of glowing gravel, a large skull with a cap of algae, some small rocks with holes (too small for the betta), algae covered anubias and java fern. The tank was only about half full at best but the hard scape was taking up a lot of the swimming space. It did have a filter running. We talked about the plants, talked about how algae wasn’t bad entirely but it could take over. She said his fins were looking ragged but he’d been shoving himself behind the filter tube lately. She had added a little salt. I suggested doing a 50% water change using the water conditioner she had, cleaning the algae off the skull and the plants, and raising the water level to the top to give him more swimming room . She said she could do that!

    I am a known info dumper - I get excited to tell  everything I know about something. While i don’t know everything, I had more suggestions for her but decided  the best thing to do was feed it to her slowly and as she asked. I told her mom to let her have my number if she wanted to talk about fish with me. When she texted me, I sent her a picture of the betta female I have in quarantine. 

    Hopefully I make a new fish friend and together we improve her fish’s life. 

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