Lennie

Thanks for the help guys! @TheSwissAquarist @Colu I thought the same. I've dosed some seachem stressguard to the tank. Assuming it will help if it is just a wound. If I see no progress I will consider salt bath. But last time, it took around 2 days to recover for my honey gourami. I will dose stressguard once again tomorrow. I wonder how they can be this clumsy. I intentionally avoid any sharp stuff in the tank. Smh :') I can't dose salt to the tank as I keep rabbit snails and nerites, including shrimp in that tank. So salt bath seems to be the only option but I would not like to stress him further for now. Hope he gets well soon. Thanks again,

Hey guys, hope you are doing well. Today, when I was watching my tank, I’ve noticed something like a red dot on my pygmy cory’s body. I once saw something similar on the tail on my honey gourami months ago, but it disappeared in a couple days. I have never lost a fish in this tank in a year since it has been set up, no new fish addition recently whatsoever, and currently running two established filters in the tank, one HOB and one sponge. I tested and everything seems good, just like I always have my tank being kept. It was also good back then when my honey gourami had this on its tail. Even nitrates seem to be between 10-20 and tomorrow is the weekly water change day. Even it is a bit on the overstocked side, it is also well seasoned and planted. here are the picture of my lil cory: It seemed to me more like a scratch maybe? All i think of is maybe driftwood branches as they love being active around anything. Just to make sure it is not a disease or whatsoever, I wanted to post it here. thanks for the help in advance!

Hey Becky! Welcome to the forum. I don't think Purigen is meant to help ammonia readings. But I wanted to ask if you have ever searched for false positive API ammonia readings. I have never had a chance to use that test kit myself as it is not sold here, but I remember coming across so many topics regarding people having false ammonia readings with API for 0.25. You may like to search further on that one as there are lots of discussion have been going on. Those might be helpful Cheers,

That's exciting!! As I'm kinda new here, it is my first time seeing about your dream fish. They look so tiny and unique! I've never seen them before. They look like a bottom dweller version of mini African Butterfly fish :D. Hope these little buddies have a great life ahead

That's a good suggestion to keep in mind! I only sent the video for the part where he examples the scenarios of black/frosted backgrounds and what suits better in which situation. But it is still good to know. 🙂 My warning could be, I've experienced that some soapy water mixtures damage the background. Mine damaged the color black a bit but I felt too lazy to go get a new one, and it does not seem obvious. Next time, I would spray and test on a small piece I won't be using and if I see no reaction, then I would move forward.

Mine is Discus I guess. I always love the way they look. Big size, schooling behavior, good parents, colorful and interesting body shape! They share similarities with Angels which I also really like but never had a chance to keep yet. I also really like the look of Vampire Pleco. I fell in love with one when I see the baby in lfs. Probably vampire pleco could still remain as a dream fish even if I kept one. As dreams are the only place we can see the plecos anyway. Nocturnals, yay😒

Same. Second spot goes to them, especially my only boi. The ladies are less skittish. But the guy, oh boy. I've seen him confident and on the front glass only once, and it was when he was breeding. 😄 They are usually active during the night tho, in my case. But rather sleep during the day until it's meal time

L199. I love him, a lot. But do I see him? Not so much. He is like an old friend you never lose contact and glad to know he is there somewhere safe and sound. Whenever you see him, you spend a good time. And then you don't see him again for ages. yeah. Love you pleco buddy

Hello I'm feeding mine the following. Always had a good growth, and lately some breeding action as you know!🙃Probably not all of them meet the standards you are looking for tho. Just sharing all I feed during the week. 1- JBL Novo Tab 2-NLS AlgaeMax (their main course is not algae, so I feed this randomly, but you may like some ingredients it has!) 3-Tropical Nanovit Tablets 4- Hikari Algae Wafers& Shrimp cuisine (mainly for snails and shrimp but they love to eat some too) 5- NLS Thera A+ and Tropical nanovit pellets that fall to substrate when I feed my tetras and gourami 😄 6- Sera O'nip, mostly once a week. Everyone deserves a treat!🙃 7-Spiriluna Brine shrimp and bloodworm cubes, once a week. I feed the algae ones much less, as they like protein side more, and they mostly share the food with my L199. Peace!

I'm so sorry to hear what you have gone through even when this was just meant to be a fun project. I feel you well. I probably would feel discouraged at the time as well. Yay! I'm looking forward to see about the future improvements. And to see if you still go for the same stocking plan 😄 Whenever I visit a store, I fall in love with something new. I always fail to stick with my stocking plans! :' I love the apistogrammas btw. Definitely in my potential stocking list for my new tank too! Never kept dwarf cichlids before.

Here is the video part that may help with what I've been mentioning above. I marked the relevant part for you. Hope it helps,

I use none on my 29g and black on my new 33g. I'm still think of removing it, as my wall behind it gives the frosted look already. I will keep it on for now. I would say, black helps to cover the stuff visually in case you use a dark colored HOB with a black prefilter sponge for example. And also help with the lenght look. If your tank has black frames, or black/dark silicones for example, black background will go well with the look generally. Meanwhile you will hardly have the depth look with a frosted background in such tank and it may not look pleasing. I would advice checking MD Fish tank's videos on youtube. He has plenty of aquariums that he uses different type of background, probably except blue. If you wanna get an idea for black, frosted or bare backgrounds for tanks that are similar to yours, it may give you an opinion! Also black backgrounds help to cover algae look, if I'm not wrong. Also the type of scape you wanna follow may also affect your choice! Black does pop plants and colorful fish. Frosted gives a nice depth. However, If you are planning to keep black or dark colored fish or shrimp for example, A black background may not be the best choice. But make sure to take your frames and silicone colors etc into account while making the choice. They do affect the look of the tank, at least imo. Cheers,

Any updates on this one? The reddit pic looks amazing. It has been a bit of time since the last update I see. I'm curious to see what you will end up with or if you made any progress!!

Definitely, especially considering I don't own an ammonia test kit rn. Better safe than sorry!🙃I will try to get one just in case. Btw, I use a clay based substrate on my 29g(JBL Manado). And rabbits directly started to bury in a few minutes after I've put them in the tank. I'm surprised. They seem to love it already. I've been keeping them in sand, but they seemed to struggle to move. Then I added some small round gravels except the places they like to sleep, it helped with their movement but still no burying on the sand. And now, they enjoy burying! I guess what they like is not actually the sand nor gravel. Experience teaches a lot. Gonna keep observing them. Cheers!

@Rube_Goldfish !!! I love the fact that you are searching a lot to help me. I'm really happy to see. 😊 Thanks again. I've searched a lot too, but after my finals pass this weekend, I will look into it even more! I agree!! I've watched so many MD videos and he always put fish on day one, or even sometimes 1-3 fish without a cycled filter, if I'm not wrong. But he usually plants very densely, mine is not dense enough I believe. I guess I won't rush and risk it anyway. Potentially hurting my fish is the last thing I want. I usually wait until I see nitrite in the tank and then I never see it for a couple days and all I read is nitrate. I've watched so many videos about fishless cycling, but after @Irene's video about testing the Dr. Tims cycling kit, even when the established filter dealing with normal fish but the drops. It feels kinda unnatural to me. When she tried keeping 2 poop machine mollys in a tank with only an established filter but in a fresh new tank with no plants or whatsoever, she only saw the readings of nitrate! However, the 1 year long established filter still couldn't deal with 2ppm ammonia standard/per day. But yea, the topic is kinda aquasoil leaching here. So light stocking with an established filter especially with lots of plants seems to be the key in general. And in my scenario, the best way to be safe seems to be lots of frequent water changes while my two filters getting seeded and cycled in 29g. Plans for now: - I will do around 50% water changes every 2-3 days for the for a couple weeks. - I introduced my rabbit snails to 29g now after the lights are off. If they seem to do well, then I will put the sponge filter in to start cycling it more. Didn't want to put it in directly because it could be hell to try to get rid off all baby mts and shrimpies on it if things go wrong :D. It really is. At least cutting test strips into half helps a bit but liquid test kids, not so much, especially considering they only show one thing and even more expensive then any test strips in general. At least here Here is the Irene's video I was talking about:

People always think I work there at my lfs too!😄 But whenever they ask a question, I say I don't work there but try my best to help people as much as I can do. But I feel like it kinda depends on the person you are talking to. A while ago, once, a guy who is keeping "100L KOI FISH TANK AT HOME" who decided buy more fish for the tank..... He was looking at CLOWN LOACHES. I couldn't stand, just made a move, and informed about their needs and how big these fish get. They were planning to rehome the kois and did not get clown loaches. But a couple days ago, when I was there looking for some driftwood and stuff, A guy walked in holding around a 1L sized bowl, to buy a fish super confidently. He gave a vibe that even if I attempt to talk, He would say none of your business. I didn't say anything. I thought about this a lot. Maybe I should've tried to talk to him no matter what. Idk. I kinda regret not doing so.

Hey again @Rube_Goldfish! Many thanks for your detailed post. Very much appreciated. Btw, I wanted to dip my plants in accordance with the seltzer water method you have shared but we seem to not have it available in here. All I could find was mineral water and I'm not sure it would meet the required conditions as their statistics even change a lot from one brand to another. 😓So I had to go with my classic alum dip again. Your recommendations and ideas seem to be very familiar of what I was expecting when I ask the questions. So I feel relieved! I'm almost out of water test strips, only 3 left and probably gotta get a new ammonia test kit. All test kits are so expensive here sadly. I can easily go and buy an average sized tank and scape it instead of buying a test kit. That's kinda sad. Or even fully stock a tank. 😥 I normally add a pinch of fish food to a planted tank after it shows a sign of plant growth, and then after a couple days of adding fish food, I dose seachem stability for a week or so. When everything seems fine and I see readings on the test kit, I start stocking very lightly. But when I move an established filter to a new tank, I don't think I will need any of it right? This filter is currently keeping up with 23 fish+ tons of MTS and shrimp colony bioload. Would throwing it in an empty tank or 1-2 small fish tank would starve the bacteria? Thanks for the help again!🙃

Update time! I planted the tank and filled it an hour ago. Couldn’t find a huge wood piece, so I decided to be creative and try something on my own. Tried to give this tree and root look with lots of different pieces combined. Just added an usb airstone to help with circulation until I put a filter in. I got some inspiration from MD’s video, but I wanted to try the plants I like but never given a chance before! Assuming the new LED will be home this friday! I have some questions: 1- I used tropica aquasoil. I have never used an active substrate before. It advices to make water changes twice a week for a month. I read some people saying it may leach ammonia and stuff. Should I avoid adding fish for a month? I have a cycled filter that I can add anytime. Would like to hear about experiences 2- I have a really hard water, 20kh. 8.2 ph. Would this aquasoil mess up my parameters? 3- I wanna transfer my HOB filter from my 29g to this cube, and use my sponge filter I have in quarantine tank with rabbit snails/shrimps in my 29g. What would be the best idea to make sure sponge filter gets more bacteria to handle 29g bioload so that I can safely move the HOB to the new tank? Keeping them at the 29g together for maybe two weeks? 4- I’ve used frodo stone as I love its look. Some people say it has an affect on Kh/ph. I did some vinegar test but no bubbles. Also considering my ph is already 8.2, and kh is 20, would it increase it even more or nah? Any suggestions and opinions are surely welcomed. I have literally 0 experience with all these plants this time, except for java fern. Tried a lil bit of monte carlo too to see how it will grow in my new light. If it performs well, I may carpet some area

@Andy's Fish Den Hey Andy! Do you think that keeping around 2-3 juvinile angels in a community tank is a good idea? When they grow up, do adults still do well in small groups even if they are not paired? Or do they still be agressive versus others in a community tank and/or versus each other? Would like to hear if you have such experience :)! Thanks in advance!

This seems to be very controversial when it comes to Angels. I've been searching on this for myself for my new 125L cube, or even for my 29g a year back. Some people say 55g the least for a group, others say you can keep some in a 29g. Aquarium coop has a video about Dean's experience with angels for 50 years. I'm sharing the video below in case you haven't seen it yet! He also suggests 29g minimum and up to 4 adults especially in a community type of tank. The thing is, when u start keeping them as juviniles with a school, it is likely that they get paired at some point and likely you gotta seperate them afterwards as they are tend to be "not realy an angel" at that point. No? It sounds like you gotta be ready to seperate them anytime even if you keep them in 50g+ I thought about keeping a few in my 29g before, but I ended up not going for it. Looking at my 29g with plants and everything rn, It feels like way too small even for a few angels, and the substrate on bottom and floting plants on top really cuts the height of the tank. At least in my scenario. The thing about angels is, the height seems to play an important role as much as the gallons. I think 50cm(about 20'') seems to be the minimum height they need from what I've been reading. 40 breeder also has about 40cm height right? Also I'm not sure an angel couple will do well in a community tank. They tend to be agressive, even versus each other sometimes as a pair. I would love to hear about others experiences as I've been always cautious of keeping them in my tank sizes. Will be closely following this one! Cheers, Here is the video in case you've missed it!

I'm sorry for your loss btw. I'm not experienced with big fishies, but coming from the schooling fish perpective and thinking of them being old age and some saying goodbye to the friends over the time, how many clown loaches do you have in the school rn? I couldn't see any more in the video. New tank is also always a stress factor for sure. Beneficial bacteria do live on surfaces of the aquarium, substrate, plants, etc. But they mostly colonize around the filters as such place meets their needs more. Therefore, if you managed to move filter media to the new tank, then yes, in total, moving everything from the old tank and the filter definitely helps to keep the cycle. But I am not sure the amount of surfaces in the substrate/plants from old tank is enough to keep up with a big schooling fish like clown loaches. So there is a chance that there are beneficial bacteria in your tank, but currently not in a level to handle to complete the cycle safely for the fish, which means maybe there can be ammonia in the tank. If you are dosing fertilizers it is even harder to comment on the cycle situation, even if the nitrite seems to be 0?, maybe majority of your nitrate can be coming from the fertilizer, or even tap water. Unless you get your hands on a test kit, water change and dosing prime based on reccomendations sounds like better safe than sorry option here. Just making some assumptions. Hope your puppy gets well soon

It is nitrate yea, I use JBL test strips, which have a similar look. Top two are nitrate and nitrite

Can be hard to come by sadly. I can only find it on farmers market during this season. Planning to keep some frozen in my freezer before the season ends😄 What's your community fav? 🙃

Hello there! You may want to check this part of the video! Cheers,

At this point I feel like snails really are picky ngl 😄 They all seem to like something different. Which makes feeding a tank even harder. I found the success on snellos when I limit the veggies with what they ALL love and by observing their behavior versus every veggy I drop to the tank each day. You are right. We have to please everyone. My snails favs are Collard green, green beans and pumpkin. They literally avoid the snello in total if I add stuff like broccoli. 😄 If you have never tried Collard greens, give it a try!