Tony s

I would just scrape it down and let the hob do its job. Possibly gravel vac and water change at same time. Then give it a couple of hours and rinse out your filter cartridge. And reuse. I believe green spot is harder to get off than green dust. I usually just clean and don’t worry what type

you can use mr clean magic erasers, unscented. if any actually have scents? no idea

it feeds of the silicates in the water. which it needs for its structure. perfectly normal. it goes away over time when the silicates disappear. or snails and otos will eat it have you checked parameters recently. when you start to get diatoms. you should mostly be cycled

I have an air stone on back up for that. So I can understand. As for cleaning, my 8 yr old daughter likes to help and play in the gunk. We do make a bit of a mess, but nbd. This is actually house work she likes 🤣 I run an fx2 in cabinet so never hear anything from it at all

Except if you run canisters. Then they’re great at knocking debri loose and getting it back into the canister. Or at least my skunks are

And yet there are a lot of aquarists not like you. and a lot of other pet owners. Who don’t take responsibility and do. So they can’t take the chance.

My thoughts, your canister is louder than your sponge. I’m thinking your canister has issues. I almost never hear mine. agree with @AllFishNoBrakes sponges are not good at polishing the water, they work best for biological filtration. And cleaning, bags or whatever usually doesn’t work good, and a lot of junk ends up back in the water. I think I’d figure out why you’re canister is so load

ok, reading that again. You grabbed fish and plants from the wild? Are the new ones showing the issues or all of them? Did the ammonia and nitrites spike? If old fish are showing the clamping, I think I’d remove the new plants. Into a bucket with an air stone. Then check parameters. Next question do you know what the plants are. Do you trust the location where you got them. It may have something in the soil or water. Or pesticides or herbicide on the plants

Good lord. If she dropped 50 in one day. I think she’s probably ok. I’d give her some blood worms as a treat and extra protein for a few days maybe. Mama has got to be wore out. If you have an in tank breeder box. You could put her in there to get her some rest

Pandas would be great. And they’re so much fun

Or… if it’s an older tank it could be just bits of detritus stuck to the plants. As @knee said. I struggle with that in my angel tank. I keep the water parameters good. But don’t have time to do the maintenance like I should. You know. Getting the dirt and gunk off the substrate. It eventually floats around and gets stuck on plants and things. And hopefully doesn’t cause the bioload to get too big. That’s an easy fix though. Gravel vac and get the substrate clean. And it won’t necessarily go away right away. But it does go away

If your tank is new @doktor zhivago is correct. You have what’s known as diatoms or brown algae. Completely normal. It will go away on its own. Eventually. Every new tank gets it to some degree. And yes. Looks horrible. I’ve had it in tanks where you could barely see it. I’ve had other tanks where it covered everything in a 1/4 inch of brown goo. Where I thought it was going to kill my plants. It mostly depends on the level of silicates in the water. Diatoms make their bodies from it. They go away when the silicates drop. you can gravel vac it off. Use an algae scraper on it. Or enlist help in the form of snails. My bad tank I gave up on. Until it got infested with pond snails and it cleared up.

one of my favorite tanks

There's a guy in Elkhart or Goshen. built a two-story garage. fish on top floor. we were wandering around after going to the south bend zoo. freeked my 8 yr old out. Dad! you can't go into somebodies house! really neat idea. for the tax purposes i think, it's first purpose was for the garage on the house. really nice place. but, yeah, you have to work all the angles

I did try sexing and sorting the platys when they first had tons of babies. but they keep having them. so, I put them all back together and let them live their platy lives in piece.

If it’s ich. Everyone in the tank. I haven’t seen any thing like this. @Colu might have

Well, okay, that looks much different than the first picture. Looks like it’s shedding something

I keep 6 bettas in 6 community tanks. Have had a few go after snails, but not after anything else, ever. Except each other. Tried a sorority. Wouldn’t do that in les than a 40. And have one with a group of pandas and neons. No issues. that being said, bettas are highly variable in their aggression levels. It’s entirely possible it’s the betta. Some bettas are just born nuts

That depends on the platy. Variatus platys can go lower, but the standard platy likes it 74 or so @RetroFeesh yes, around 30 platys. With regular water changes. And hornwort. They build up to a point and usually around the third generation the numbers stop growing. Now with 30, it takes a bit more gravel vaccing than the normal tank 🤣

Platys will do their own population control. They have no parental instincts . I have a platy only tank with one betta. She doesn’t count, she thinks she’s a platy. The population has stabilized around 30 on a 20g tank. It has anywhere from 2 yr old adults to a couple day old fry. I use mostly hornwort for both fry protection and to help with nitrates. It’s also a really stable tank. Counting population and parameters. the hornwort is great, it’s a floater and when it gets overgrown, just pull most of it and chuck it. Keeping a piece to put back in. Same for algae if it gets any. Find a clean piece and keep it. Discard the rest

Not sure if it matters, but I have better luck with mystery snails

The indecision is just so suspenseful 😂. And really, one of the best parts of the whole thing 🤣

Pandas would be good And a snail. They can find lost fish

Oh yes. Kinda turns into a very week salt bath

or.... how about orange lemon tetras🤣