Jessica.

Seachem equilibrium, or add crushed coral to your filter or substrate. Equilibrium is the easiest for me to figure out the dosing on.

I've got some Vallisneria flowering like crazy. Thought I'd share. I wonder if anyone knows why Val flowers? I've never had it do this before. It's sending up dozens of little blooms. The tank is an a greenhouse. Maybe the shorter days are triggering it? Temp ranges between 75-65. It's gonna be time to break this tank down for the winter soon, and I will miss the val. I started with 5 plants in the tank in May. The flowers sprout up in these long curls, then bloom when they hit the surface. (Forgive the reflections. There's not I can do to take photos in the greenhouse without getting them.)

I thought the same thing. Maybe try erythromycin? If it's cyanobacteria, erythromycin should clear it up.

Wow, what a cool project. I'm envious, I'll admit!! Please do a photo journal for the set up and planting! I would love to follow along. I don't think you "have" to do co2 to have a successful planted tank, no matter the gallons. It'll depend on what you want to do in plant selection and scape. If you want to carpet it in dwarf baby tears, then co2 and high lights will be needed. If you want lots of val, crypts, bolbitis, java fern, buce, etc maybe you don't need co2. Sometimes I run co2 for the first few months on a tank to get the plants fill in quickly, then wean it off to maintain (and lower the light intensity and ferts dosing while weaning off co2, to prevent algae). In terms of what you should use for co2, I use GLA's regulators and diffusers and I'm happy with them. I don't have any anything near the gallon size you do, but I do have 2 planted tanks that are 30" tall (a 110 and a 75 gal). If you want to get spendy, I love the kessil lights for their shimmer effect, and I can tell you from personal experience they will carpet monte carlo, dwarf hairgrass, stauro repens and marseila crenata through 30" of water.

Frozen foods are great, if you're up for the extra work and have a local store that sells them. Frozen daphnia, bloodworms, and frozen brine shrimp would all be good for guppies. If you want dry food, I think aquarium co-op sells some of the best foods on the market. The xtreme krill flakes, extreme spirulina flakes and hikari guppy food would both be good options. You can look at them here- Aquarium Fish Food | Flakes, Pellets, Freeze-Dried, & Gel Fish Food - Aquarium Co-Op WWW.AQUARIUMCOOP.COM Not sure which fish food is best? Browse our curated list of high-quality fish foods to make sure your fish get a wide variety of essential nutrients.

I don't know much about these guys, but hopefully someone who does can chime in. It might help if you could get some more photos- it's a bit difficult for me to see what's going on in that one. Can you test your water and tell us the parameters? Nitrates, Nitrites, Ammonia, PH, GH, KH would all help. What size tank are they all in?

How many guppies do you have, and what size tank? Per guppy would be a very small amount This is the amount of flake food I would feed 10 guppies, 2x per day. A small pinch. It's a teaspoon in the picture, for size reference. They will beg all the time. You'll have to remind yourself (at least I do) that you'll do more harm than good if you overfeed, generally speaking. .

I have used both together when my filters crashed after a power outage. No ill effects were obesrved. They're both just bacterial colonies in a bottle, so I don't think there's much possibility of issues cropping up. In my experience, the Fritzzyme is a superior product. I've tried stability a few times in different tank set ups or situations, and I don't think it did much of anything for me. If you run out and have a choice when buying more, I would go with that one.

@Lynn Val not working out for ya? Bummer. If you want to provide more info, maybe we can help? Sometimes vals take a loooong time to adjust to your water before taking off. I've had them sit and look sad for months after getting them, then they slowly start to adapt to your water. 6 months later your tank is full of vals.

If you're keeping relative low gallons for your betta, could you buy some distilled water in 1 gallon jugs and mix it with your tap? If the GH/Kh is an issue for you, you can cut it down by mixing distilled. Not to take over your thread here, just thinking out loud. I buy fish only pretty often (working on self control...) and usually they are fine. The koi bettas I've seen are gorgeous. I hope you'll post of picture of whatever your next one is1 That strategy of not looking at fish unless buying is smart! I'm always going into the fish store "just for the one supply item" and coming out with some new shrimp or plant or fish.

When I'm not keeping fish (aka my full time job) is in ceramic arts, and I studied glaze chemistry in college. 99.9% of ceramic surfaces are fine, but if something has you concerned, you can do a lemon test to see if it will leach. Copper is probably the most common thing that will leach. If you have a green or blue glaze that turns pink when you leave a lemon on it for 1/2 hr, it is leaching copper. Occasionally barium will leach also. Rarely lead (because it's almost never used anymore in ceramics, but if you were putting an antique ceramic pre-1950 in your tank, you might worry about lead). A matte surface is more likely to leach compared to a glossy/glassy surface in ceramics. Ceramic Lemon Test Instruction Edit to add- Bisque ware will almost always be fine, unless it is a red earthenware that was made with barium. If it's work you're making, you can ask your clay supplier if they have barium in their clay recipe. Barium is nasty stuff, some manufactures put it in to stop surface scumming (aka white buildup of sodium) on greenware in red clays. If it's commercial purchased work, it probably doesn't have barium.

Hi Ramie, welcome! Hopefully the forum can help you figure out your water issues. I admire your willpower to only keep one betta. Any ideas on what color your next betta will be? How do you choose just one?

Hi JRed, welcome! I'm rather new here myself, but it's a great group so far. Isn't it nice to have fellow fish people to share with? Would love to see some pictures of your tanks! Do you keep live plants as well? Probably not many with the rift lake cichilds (don't they eat them??)

What shapes of glass are you looking for? I got a few "candy jars" from Michael's and use them for little emersed set ups. One has water and a snail in it, second is growing out some buce, and third is anubias nana petite. I think the brand DOOA also has some terrarium products. I've never used them, just saw some ads for them at one point.

I bought this drop checker because it looked cool. I could never get the plug that holds the green reference solution to stay in. I tried to make this thing work for 6 months and finally gave in and switched back to the standard drop checker. I even tried super glueing the plug into the bottom. Now it's a $50 glass ornament in my tank cabinet. This could have been user error, sure, but just did not work for me. Also, it's larger than the normal drop checker. That's a negative to me, as I want the smallest visual footprint for tech in my tank. The fancy GLA one collects dust in my cabinet now.

Thanks @Andy's Fish Den These are the plants in the photo. This picture is from spring, and I've switched out a few (not because the didn't do well, but for aesthetics). I'm aiming to do some maintenance this weekend and get a current photo. I do inject co2, but I do it a very low a level (about one bubble every three seconds, on for 8 hours a day), and I also run two ziss bubble filters in the back. I'm not sure the co2 is doing anything at all. I had a drop checking in the tank, it would always stay blue. The discus probably produce more co2 than what in inject. I could maybe take it off, but I've got the balance keyed in on this tank and hesitate to change anything. I also fertilize with micros only and potassium sulfate (I don't add any nitrates or phosphates, the discus produce enough, and get unhappy when nitrates climb). My tap well water has 5ppm nitrates, the tank stays between 10-20 ppm nitrates. I water change 2-3 times a week, depending on how heavily I've fed that week.

Hi Kimo, Could you describe the problem you're having? The more info you can give, the better. I see your picture, but it's not immediately obvious to me what you're asking for help with. 🙂

Some women have children. I have discus. 😉 Though I'd start a journal for my planted discus tank. It's been running a few years now, and these fish are my babies. The tank sits next to my desk, and I work full time from home. We all spend a lot of time together. Photo from Spring 2020 (and the best photo I've gotten of this tank!) Here's the tank in Dec 2019, a few weeks after planting The layout for the tank was inspired by an ADA tank I saw in a youtube video, this tank: (this photo is a screenshot from a youtube video of the ADA gallery in Japan. It is not my tank) Stocking in the tank is currently 10 discus, 5 Sterbai Cories, 4 oto cats, 10 Amano Shrimp, and some random guppies who snuck in on a net as fry and grew up in the tank. I had 12 discus, but decided to re-home two who were pairing off and picking fights a few months ago. I hear some people say discus are skittish. That is not my experience. They are nosy, always up in my business when I'm trying to do maintenance. I end up pushing them away so I can see what I'm doing.. lol! Thanks for reading! I'll keep updating as the tank evolves.

@T.H. FishkeepingJust realized you said high tech. Are you talking co2 injection? That's upping the difficulty level a few more degrees. My experience is that discus do not appreciate the large ph fluctuations in a co2 injected tank. Also, at discus temps, water holds less dissolved gasses. Discus need well oxygenated water, so you're really narrowing the margins for error when injecting co2 in a tank at 82-86f. Many people use Ph controllers for their co2 in a planted discus tank to help mitigate ph changes. I do inject very low levels of co2 in my discus tank, and it's a real balancing act. I also run an airstone. I have tried turning it up a little when I get greedy for plant growth, and the discus did not like it. You might have more success starting with discus in a non co2 tank and getting to know them. Then when you add co2, you'll be better able to recognize the early warning signs if they're unhappy. Some other ideas are to grow the plant out with co2 in the tank, then wean the plants off it, then add the discus.

I've been considering flex-sealing all the walls and floor our 1st floor guest bedroom. If I cut a hole in the ceiling above it, I should be able to feed through it while standing on the second floor and jump in to do maintenance. Should be about 5,000 gallons, filled. Gonna stock it with 15 arapaimas. 😉 In all seriousness, I set up a little 2 gal tank for buce and a few shrimp last month and I'm loving it. I think I might set up a few more mini tanks soon.

@JimmyGimbal Thanks, a comment from Jimmy made my day! 😊 I'm planning on stocking this with Altums in a few weeks/months, once they're out of quarantine. Assuming I don't manage to kill all the altums before then.

This is interesting. Were your domestic strains asian bred or german bred? I've never kept wilds, but my limited research indicated they would be fussier than german bred domestics discus. You're giving me some interest in trying them out soon. I've seen videos of some asian breeders keeping their discus in antibiotics laced ro water 24/7, and it makes me wonder if they would be far more susceptible to infections once put in a hobbyist's tank – a sort of "bubble boy" issue. I have an LFS near me who imports asian strains and they often crash on him. @Andy's Fish DenDid you notice any behavioral differences in the domestic strains vs the wilds?

Stendker, a major german breeder, has this handbook online. It offers some great basic info (specific to their discus, but also good for discus in general) You'll find they recommend the min school size is 10 discsu- DISKUSZUCHT STENDKER GMBH & CO. KG - Diskusfische - Diskusfutter - Diskus- und Aquaristik-Informationen DISKUSZUCHT-STENDKER.DE Discus can be challenging. If water quality isn't good, they will go downhill fast. Even more so if they're stressed because they're not in a school. It'll be challenging to keep water quality good in a 40 breeder. If you buy smaller discus, you're going to want to feed them heavily with high protein foods to grow them out. If you're set on keeping discus in a 40 breeder, I would do it bare bottom and do lots of water changes (like, every day or every 2/3 days), plan to upgrade the tank in 6-8 months, and no tankmates. This is my tank. It's 120 gals. It has 12 discus (10 now, I rehomed 2 so the bioload would lighten up), gets 2-3 50% water changes per week. It's been running for about 2 years now. I do the water changes at that level because if I don't, the discus will get sick. Work got especially busy for me a few months ago and I didn't stay on top of it. Discus pimples, aka little white bacterial infections in their fins, all cropped up from high nitrate levels. Water changes fixed it. I definitely don't water change because I love it, but it is what is needed for this fish to stay healthy in my experience. I notice mine get fussy if nitrates get about 20/25 ppm. dosing ferts is a delicate balance with keeping plants and discus happy. Your question depends on your goals. You might get away with 3 discus in a 40 breeder with rams and rummynose, but the discus probably will never reach their growth potential, and it's likely you'll have health issues down the line. If you want to invest in discus, I'd do it in a 75 gal and keep only discus, at least for a few months while you get to know their care and behavior. You can always add tankmates down the line.

Did some work over the weekend on this tank. Added lots of mini leaf buce, and removed some of the java fern to let more of the driftwood show. I can't wait for the buce to settle in and put on some new growth. Hopefully this is the last re-scape on this tank for a few years.

Is the first photo the before, and the second photo the after? What's the time between the photos? What fish are stocked in the photo for the second tank? Did a fish just eat all the leaves off the stems in the second photo?