Lennie

Noted for the future me if I ever get one 😄 I am personally more interested in green spotted ones. They look so silly. I don't wanna steal the shine of @Gannon and their new friend under this topic with my unrelated questions. But please feel free to dm me if you would like to help with spotted green puffer care whenever you have time. @Beardedbillygoat1975. I seriously want to have some one day. And having 10 free tanks sitting empty for my fishroom is triggering whenever I visit my LFS and see those silly faces 😄

@beastie May share her experience regarding hatchetfish. They are usually fragile due to being wild caught, extremely jumpy, will find any open tiny gap on top and will jump to death. also needs to be fed on surface strictly. If I were you, I would add something with orange-red-yellow colors that would pop between those beautiful green plants. Hatchetfish would add some activity on top, but in terms color, they would not pop up. I wanna make some suggestions but I can't trust angels 🤣 Maybe something like a honey gourami, or red robin? + A colorful mystery snail with a light foot, like a gold, magenta or ivory, if you think your angel wouldn't bother it. I said light food because u have black substrate. Something adds color but also won't be bothered by the tankmates. You know your angel's temperament better than us. Here are some pictures of what I would consider, only if you have a friendly Angel. The pictures are not mine: Magenta: Ivory: Gold: Honey gourami: Red robin (thicklip):

I sadly never saw any being sold here. Markets only sell them without shells for human consumption. And stores only sell freshwater clams between 5-7cm as pets. So that is kinda hard for me to source. And I love snails too much. snails>puffers 😄 that's why I always step back from puffer keeping. I can buy the frozen clam packages, but they need shells for their teeth right? I used the have guineapigs. Same mentality I think. They also needed hard foods for their teeth growth control. I know they feed them mealworms at my lfs. Not sure if they are good in terms of nutrition or hard enough to help with teeth health.

What about a breeding challenge? 😛 I'm super hyped to challenge myself for breeding some puffers. After seeing @mountaintoppufferkeeper's journals I'm so hyped! The only thing worries me is their dietary needs

Also tagging @Fish Folk @Peaceful Fish based on the fact that they shared some opinions on blue acaras on another topic. Maybe they would help about the stocking

Super cool fish you got there! Hope it survives the quarantine period safe and sound. Would love to see pictures later on. Please tag me when you share some.

Kind of good news 😄 People used to buy them a lot due to having sort of piranha look, without considering their adult size and needs. Let's hope same goes for fish like bala sharks, iridescent shark, red tail catfish, etc.

Ah, the betta makes it even better not to combine the tanks. You never know who these guys won't like and decide to kill 😄 I have 8 bettas, 5-girl sorority, and 3 seperate male tanks. The common point mine ALL hate is male guppies. But also, they hated clown kilis too. If you have anything flashy by any chance, then likely he won't like them. And believe me I tried my bettas with honey gourami, sparkling gouramis, angels and even rams. All went amazingly peacefully. That being sad, you can make betta tank a desk one and combine other 3 in a bigger tank. See whatever floats your boat!

My blood parrots ate my kuhli loaches like a worm when I was a kid. It was traumatic. So yes, don’t keep the two together please. Other than that, I only have experience with angels. Never had diamond tetras or blue acaras. however, to play safe, I would personally keep only one type of cichlids in a community tank. What if those 2-2 options pair up? Angels may have weird personalities when they grow up. So you should Ideally have backup plans all the time in case anything goes wrong. Like after months of peaceful living and growing together, my friend’s angels decided to kill all rams over a night. I personally say “cichlid is a cichlid” 🙂 I don’t trust any peaceful behavior I see today. Who knows what happens tomorrow. That being said , 75 gallon offers A LOT of options to keep. I think you may go for less risky setups with increased peaceful environment. Also when I kept blood parrot and witnessed the deformations, I told myself I would never keep such fish ever again. They are legit human made hybrid with lots of problems. Also besides all the problems they have in terms of quality of life, they are sadly being abused for the look as well. Like idk how but some of them legit have their skin painted and marketed like that. I won’t share such pics here as I find it very sad but you can find plenty of stuff to read and see regarding the ethical way of blood parrots. I had 3 as a kid. They were amazing fish but I was constantly witnessing them not even being able to close their mouth or even chew. Never ever kept them again. What about orange severums instead? They look as cute, and dont come with well known quality of life issues as far as I know. @dasaltemelosguy could you please share some info about your beautiful severums to help @FishyGirl?

I think your tanks are pretty. And if you ask me as a third eye, I personally believe you don’t mention any actual reason that is worth to take them down. It just sounds you are being adventurous which is surely fine. But is it worth taking 4 perfectly working pretty tanks down? That part is very questionable 😄 Yes, fish do love big swimming space much more. Totally agreed. But also, fish don’t like changing environments and stress is never good. So upgrading a tank also comes with negatives for fish. like maybe one tank shows no sign of disease but once combined, fish on another one will show some. And so on. Also extra costs come with it ofcourse. Plants don’t like changing environment as well even under same water stats in my experience. I took my 29g bcoz well at that point it was a 15yo tank, I used it to return to hobby in the cheapest way by utilising what I had sitting in the basement, but at that point it was worrying me, and the stand sucked. It was giving me anxiety everyday. Yours seem pretty as it is. Moreover, the new setup comes with a stress factor on you regarding the floor support. Living with anxiety of is my tank still holding well was really killing my enjoyment in the hobby. Be careful with that one. In addition, we as fishkeepers tend to try new setups a lot. In this current 4 tank setup, you are allowed to have different setups for 4 tanks and you can play around the options in the future freely. Yes the size is limiting for big size fish due to tanks being nano, but again, you seem to want to keep the combination of them in a big tank anyway. And it will be hard to add a big fish with what you have on hand probably anyway, as big fish usually slurp the small fish. I hope I don’t sound dis encouraging . Even if you decide to go for the big one after having enough research for the floor support, pretty sure you will end up having a beautiful tank. Easy to tell when I look at what you currently have. Update is in the future! 🙂

I can smell the tank from here with the broccoli :DD Cutipies ♥♥

@Guppysnail @TOtrees Thanks guys! So I will be ordering 10 bloodymarys soon. They are the only ones I am currently lacking in the fishroom. Like the trio I got are only 2 days in their new tank. But holy cow the tank looks so dead with them hiding 🙂 Maybe shrimp may bring some life to the tank! I also considered adding my red lizard whiptails there for breeding. However they enjoy a carnivore heavy diet instead. So I better don't mix the two. I have also a lot of snails I can add. Mysteries, japanese trapdoors, spixis, assasins... But 3 bristlenose poop enough. I vacuumed the tank and messy food eating everyday already in 2 days :)))

Soo here I am coming for your dms Colu. Besides my constant IS MY FISH SICK questions, here is another topic. ARE YOU READY! 😄

Actually, from what I know, they get close to end of freshwater where it meets saltwater and use current for eggs to reach saltwater if I’m not wrong. So larvae ends up hatching in brackish water and then move to freshwater after some time. So adults don’t go to saltwater. Yes you should. Cherry shrimp need certain amount of gh and kh in their water. Kh because they like higher ph and a stable environment. With very low kh, your ph wont be balanced and shrimp like stability. without proper gh, you will face molting issues. Too high gh, they cant crack the hard shell and cant molt. Too low gh, the shell is elastic, so they again cant crack it and molt. Molt failure usually means death. https://www.shrimpscience.com/species/neocaridina/red-cherry-shrimp/

Well I am a guy who LOVES snails. But sadly, they are subject to many conflicting opinions when it comes to egg layer tanks. I started a 1m:2f super red BN breeding project yesterday. The tank is 100cmx40x25h. Quite simple. As I avoid snails in such tanks, I consider shrimp as my second fav clean up crew member. Has anyone tried keeping the shrimp and BN together in a BN breeding tank? Would they potentially disturb BN, or cause any negative impact on the breeding project? I know there are people who keep the two together. The crucial part here is, it being a "breeding project" tank. So I need them feel safe and well to breed. Normally, when I was keeping my L199 with orange sakuras, they were randomly crawling around his driftwood picking around nonstop. That is why I wanted to ask this question to be fair. Like this unintentional behavior can be problematic for some snails for instance. Would love to hear some experiences!

+1 to Gup That being said, I personally think 8 days is kinda long. Also how seasoned and planted your tank is, whether there is any algae, biofilm and critters, and how healthy the fish are could play a role on that one. I would personally obtain an auto feeder. I have one at home to use whenever needed. You can buy it once and use it whenever.

@Odd Duck @Colu What do you guys think? @HelplessNewbie could you please share detailed background on when you got them, tank parameters (ammonia, nitrite, nitrate, ph, kh, gh), what is the temp, how long the tank has been running etc.

If you want caridinas, then you should follow their specific needs and not a general rule I believe. Caridinas in general do not tolerate well. for normal tanks you can dose like that. Kh keeps the ph stable. Caridinas need active substrate and substrate controls the ph and keeps it at desired level. Having kh in such tank would prevent soil to do its job.

she gets pale after meal time to be fair this is how her friends look like. You can see her behind @Guppysnail

Here she is

Plants don't need kh. Kh shows carbonates and bicarbonates in the water. Plants usually just tolerate it. "KH has no innate value to most plants (some plants can use carbonates as a Carbon source and will grow better in higher KH water when deprived of other carbon sources, but this it is very energy intensive for the plant to extract carbon from carbonates rather than CO2). It's sole purpose if any, is as a buffer to prevent tank water from getting overly acidic. " https://www.2hraquarist.com/en-mk/blogs/ph-kh-gh-tds/kh-explained

Snails and shrimp snack on it. Also if it doesn’t bother you, you don’t have to do anything really. Just let it be

My fav is my ghost wood in my 42g tank. I also really like mangrove but I struggle finding good looking big pieces sadly I wish ghost wood could remain whiteish under water after some time. I really like their beautiful color, but it turns out brownish after some time

I have been keeping all colors of neocaridinas; blues, bloodymaries, yellow fires, green jelly, black roses, orange sakuras.. so I can try to help based on my experience. I would not keep ghost shrimp with others myself as they are mainly carnivores to my knowledge. here are my answers; 1) Ideally, yes. Shrimp are naturally food to fish. So basically if given a chance they will indeed snack on them. Especially babies. Lots of plant cover, hiding tubes, driftwood, rocks, hiding spots all increase the chance of survival. Shrimp are fragile during molting times as well, so hiding spots surely help them. However, keeping small mouth fish usually helps better for better shrimp survival. Anything aggressive or has a big mouth better be avoided in general. but know that all fish will snack on shrimp at least the babies. It is about having a healthy colony going on with increased survival rate if you wanna keep fish and shrimp together 2) that basically depends on what fish and shrimp you want. If you want caridinas, they usually like low ph and 0 kh. Meanwhile if you wanna keep livebearers, they want hard water, high ph and kh. So yes in this scenario they are conflicting for sure. Neocaridinas are usually more flexible in terms of parameter ranges. 3) if you wanna keep them in a community tank with stuff they cant cause damage to sure. But again, I would not keep them with small fish, fry or other shrimp tanks myself. Best way is letting shrimp colony going on for some period and adding fish later on. Meanwhile, while they have their population rising, also plants grow a lot offering them a good environment and hiding points for the future. Meanwhile, if I started with shrimp in a cycled tank, I would also keep snails in order to keep the cycle going on for potential fish addition in the future. Otherwise, shrimp bioload is so low. Some people keep ancistrus with shrimp as well, which would also help cycle going on. Also both ancistrus and snail poops are good for shrimp imo.

I keep mine as a centerpiece. however, I personally believe 5g is waaaay too small for honey gourami. Mine is super duper active. I personally wouldn’t keep anything other than shrimp or dwarf rasbora type fish in a 5g. my honey lives is a 42 gallon. And believe me, He is everywhere nonstop. He really enjoys swimming. He would feel like trapped in a 5g in my personal opinion. I used to keep him in a 29 centerpiece fish, even then, It feels small for him and his behavior to me. If I were you I would aim a planted tank with some neocaridinas and very tiny fish like dwarf rasboras in that tank size. Or maybe just shrimp. The thing is, honey gouramis also like some action going around them. They don’t seem to mind being the only honey gourami in the tank but they seem to enjoy and active tank very much in my experience