Dacotua

I have (6) six reticulated hillstream loaches and at least (6) Cory's in my 40 gallon tank. They seem to get along fine, I haven't seen any aggression towards each other at all.

Regardless what you think, it probably has it in it if you are on a city water system. I always recommend you put PRIME into the water you are putting back into your tank.

If you want to kill ALL the snails (You'll also kill your ghost shrimp), its time to treat that tank with ICK treatment (MAKE SURE IT HAS COPPER). You'll kill all those snails. You'll have to do some massive water changes later (over and over), if you ever want to kill shrimp in that tank again after putting that much copper in the tank. Alternate Method - Put 5-8 Assassin Snails in that tank OR put 2-3 Large Goldfish in that tank. Goldfish LOVE snails and so do Assassin snails. (You just can put both in the tank, the goldfish will eat the assassin snails). Since you posted you don't mind snails, Make a couple DYI snail traps and put food in them. Remove as many snails as you can. TRUST ME, you will not get them all. You'll probably get 80% of them, if you can live with the remaining 20%, thats all that matters.

I only keep shrimp in a 5.5 gallon tank. Shrimp have such a small bio-load it doesn't really matter. (I use the 5.5 gallon tank to raise red cherry shrimp for my other tanks). You'd be surprised on how many shrimp you can raise in a 5.5 gallon tank and not have the water go bad. (Its a ton)

If you want the snails to stop breeding as much, stop feeding your tank as much. Odds are you are over feeding your tank, hence the snail explosion. I like having Ramhorn snails in my tank, but I rarely get a population explosion as I watch the amount I feed my tank.

My opinion : Its all about the quality of the fish supplier to your local fish store. I have a Cardinal tank and a Neon Tank. Sometimes when I buy 10 of these fish, I'll put them in the tank and over the next 2-3 days I will lose 1-2 fish on each day. None of the existing ones die. Sometimes I'll buy some of these fish and lose absolutely none. I've kept fish for many many many years. My gut tells me that the transport of the fish from the farm, to the fish store, the transfer from the shipping to the fish store tank, then the transport from the fish store to your tank puts a lot of stress on the fish. Some poorer quality fish can't stand this stress and simply die. Higher quality fish can handle the stress and can handle the stress. Best defense against this. Simply ask the fish store, when did you get this batch of fish? If they say less than 3-4 days, you may want to consider waiting a week before buying any from that batch. Again this is just my theory and experience.

I'd recommend one 36" wide light for your aquarium. Hygger is the brand. Honestly when I compare it to my Fluval Plant 3.0, I really can't tell the difference in light quality. Only major difference is the Fluval one is controlled by bluetooth while the Hygger is controlled by a inline control panel. (Price is a huge difference too, its 1/3 or 1/2 the cost of the Fluval). If I had to do it all over again, I'd probably use the Hygger on my 40 gallon vs the Fluval I already have (Thats how much difference I see in light quality). They both grow plans well. (Sent you a PM with a link to amazon).

Don't panic. There is no need to do water changes in a planted tank during a fishless cycle. 1. Stop putting Ammonia in the tank. Just start dosing ferts for your plants. You keep doing this until you notice the plants starting to grow and have "new" branches. Once you see this, test your water. 2. Do not do a water change, your planes love Ammonia, Nitrite and Nitrate. They will eventually bring those down. 3. It took my tank almost 3 weeks to fishless cycle with plants. I stopped putting ammonia in the tank after week 1, after that, I dosed Flurish and Excel daily. When my Water Sprite grew extra chutes and more leaves, I checked the water, Everything was going down fast. 4. If you REALLY want the Ammonia, Nitrite and Nitrate to vanish, put some Salvinia in the tank (Floating plant). It will multiply fast and those floaters will eat all the Ammonia, Nitrite and Nitrate in the water. Once Ammonia and Nitrite goes do zero, do a 80% water change, then throw your fish in. I would leave the Salvinia in the tank for a bit, as you COULD get a Ammonia or Nitrite Spike, however the Salvinia WILL prevent this. (You could do this with Duckweed, however duckweed is difficult to remove from the tank, Salvinia is EASY to remove from the tank if you want it gone, large leaves, easy to spot)

Honestly, if you have plants, just start dosing ferts. You can stop feeding your tank of fish food. Once your plants are growing (new growth), odds are your tank will be cycled. Start slow with fish and gradually increase the population.

Clean your glass, drain a little water out of the tank so the bubbles water splashes dont touch the lid. Another option which I'd also recommend, buy the easy flow kits for your sponge filter from Aquarium Coop. You can divert the water and bubbles so it glides across the water.

I use cuttlebone for my shrimp & snails. I just put it at the back of the aquarium behind a plant and put a rock on it so it doesn't float. You can stick them in your filter if you want. They will dissolve into the water column over time.

Just change 50% of the water twice a day for the next week or so. Whenever I've done this on accident, I change the water in the tank (after testing) when I wake up in the morning and again before I go to bed.

When I had a BBA breakout in the past, I went out and bought hydrogen peroxide (Spelling). I pulled everything out of my tank and dipped it into a bowl hydrogen peroxide. After I dipped each and everything I could, I put it back in the tank. The next day all the BBA turned purple and started to die off. This was on my driftwood, live pants, rocks etc.. Now I warn you, your plants will melt some from doing this, but I managed to kill off the BBA in my tank. I monitored the amount of light that was in my tank (Had the take timer switched to 8 hours of lighting max). I also added a lot more plants in the tank and started dosing EXCEL and Flourish. So far my plants have exploded and BBA isn't showing up anymore. My thoughts were to put enough plants into the tank that would use all the reasources that the BBA would use. I cut lights from 10-12 hours a day to just 8 hours.

Honestly, I"m not going to do that. I generally run plants with sand. I utilize root tabs and I do water changes and test my water. I have done the whole put a ton of plants in the tank and just let nature take care of it. I didn't do water for over a year. I suddenly started had all my shrimp die off, fish dying, etc... I tested the water and it was 0ppm Ammonia, 0ppm Nitrite and almost 0ppm Nitrate. (I didn't have old tank syndrome, at least my tests indicated I didn't). I ended up doing nearly a 90% water change for 3 weeks straight and my tank turned around. I believe there was something in the water that was killing my fish without the ability for me to test for it. I now run a sponge filter and a canister filter in all my tanks, I do weekly water changes whether or not the test kit says I needs it or not. Since I've been utilizing this method, I have not had a mass die off since.

Not sure if I can post links to stuff or not, but buy and put one of these in your tank https://www.aa-aquarium.com/gkm *IF* you have a canister filter, you can buy for the canister filter as follows: (But I assume you're only running a sponge filter) https://fluvalaquatics.com/us/shop/product/uvc-in-line-clarifier-series (I use Fluval canister filters, so the inline clarifier works well with me. I have it run for 6 hours each day..)

Did you check Nitrite also?

Took mine two weeks with a sponge filter from a established tank. I didn't get a instant cycle like people say the did. I hope your tank cycles quickly for you too. Mine would cycle off the ammonia quickly, it was Nitrite that took forever to go to zero. Guess the Nitrate population wasn't enough for 2 weeks.

It looks like a defective collar to me. Stuff happens. This being said, I'm a big fan of the collars on the sponge filters.

I'd go out and buy a Aqueon Standard Open-Glass Aquarium Tank, 5.5 Gallon, (They cost 10 bucks at my local fish store). The 5 Gallon tanks are small and fit just about anywhere.

I like having snails in my tank. Good cleanup crew. If they explode in population, its a indication you're over feeding. Being mindful of the amount of food you put in your tank, directly controls the snail population.

This is MY OPINION: In my opinion the instructions are too much. *I* Use the dosage 1 drop per gallon. I go to measure the amount of ammonia then I check 24 hours. I once tried 4 drops per gallon but I could not ever get a tank to cycle with that dosage. Think about it, Is your fish really going to mess the tank soooo much over night to equate to 4 drops per gallon? NOPE. More realistic is 1 drop per gallon. Unless you plan on WAY overstocking your tank, I believe the instructions are wrong. If you do manage to get the tank to cycle with 4 drops per gallon, and you stock your tank with fish that don't give out equiv of 4 drops of ammonia per gal, you will have a BB crash because they will not be getting enough food. When I do 1 drop per gallon and if I can dose that each day and 24 hours later, I get 0's on all tests except nitrate, I'm good to go. I then SLOWLY add fish to my tank. (As in, add 3-4 fish, let it sit for a week, then add 3-4 more, etc..) just to make sure bioload isn't exceeded. *** Thats my experience and opinion *** PS : I've fishless cycled a tank with plants in it, plants love the Ammonia & Nitrite. Plants are good to go.

Get some "DrTim’s Aquatics Ammonium Chloride Solution" and put 10 drops or so into the 10 gallon tank (Yeah I know they destructions say 4 drops per gallon, but I believe that is way too much. I usually do 1 drop per gallon and have had better success with it.). After 30 mins or so measure the Ammonia. Wait 24 hours, measure the Ammonia and Nitrite. If both of these are NOT zero, you're not ready to add fish.

Last night I put in 4 drops of ammonia and tested the tank. It read 0.25ppm Ammonia, 0.1ish Nitriate and 5ppm Nitrate (Then went to bed). Today I just checked the small tank, got 0ppm Ammonia, 0ppm Nitrite, and 5ppm of Nitrate. Looks like it took two weeks to cycle with a "seasoned" sponge filter from a well established tank. I'd say, never trust just a sponge filter to "instant" cycle a tank. This is the first time I tried to "Instant" cycle a tank with a sponge filter and it didn't quite work out to be instant for me. In the past, I had a 60 gallon tank crack, I replaced that tank with a 40 gallon breeder. I moved all my plants, put in NEW pool filter sand, and my season Fluval 306 filter. On that tank, it instant cycled with all my fish. (I had no choice on that one because the 60 cracked). I checked that tanks water religiously for a good 3 weeks. My theory is that the motorized canister filter just turned over the tank much more. The sponge filter just couldn't turn over the 5 gallon aquarium over fast enough. Who knows. I just knew I wasn't going to throw fish into the new tank with a seasoned sponge filter until the water conditions were correct. Everyone on the net has said that throwing in a sponge filter into a new tank instant cycles it. Thru my own personal experience, I would say this is not the case. You should check your water daily as it may or may not "instant" cycle your tank. My medium sized aquarium coop sponge filter that was in my seasoned tank for over a year, took two weeks to cycle my new 5.5 gallon aquarium. Just be careful guys 🙂

If you use A LOT of driftwood / Leaf Litter, it will lower your PH naturally.

I added ammonia because I wanted to be 100% sure the tank was safe for shrimp. Without any Ammonia producing fish/shrimp in the tank, the "established" filter BB would not have any food. I needed to add something so it wouldn't die off. Everyone says you can add a sponge filter from an existing tank and go, but I like to check and verify. I'm not going to throw a bunch of cherry shrimps in that tank to have them die because the tank isn't ready. I put a sponge filter in the new 5.5 gallon tank from one of my other tanks that has had the filter for over a year. I always test and verify before I do anything. I'm just verifying my "fishless" cycle is complete, but I still get nitrite readings. EDIT: Just checked my water again, this time I got 0 Ammonia, 0.1ish Nitrite, and 5ppm Nitrate. Nitrite went down for the first time in two weeks. Perhaps my tank finally decided to cycle. Going to add a couple more drops of Ammonia and see what the readings are in the morning. I just want to know for sure before I go and put in 10-15 cherry shrimp into the tank. I don't want to poison them.