Moose

@T. Payne with the pipes -- do you cap off one end or leave it open? I'm looking at ceramic tubes like the pleco breeding cave and most are sealed at one end (makes sense if you're trying to remove eggs/fry, which I'm not planning on doing). The coconut hut is really dark and I worry I won't be able to see into a capped/sealed tube much better than the current set-up but maybe that's more a cave shape issue.

gorgeous blackwater tank...I love the look of plants in blackwater. Do you use botanicals or dose a blackwater extract directly into the tank water?

Hello! Got a pair of peacock gudgeons about 6 weeks ago. At first they were both really active all around the tank, but after about 2 weeks the male went into the coconut hut cave and now basically never comes out...I see him briefly maybe once a week. Pretty sure looking at egg development times he's not always brooding (or at least, not always brooding the same batch: based on abdominal yellowness levels my female has probably laid eggs at least twice). When I do see him he looks healthy/not too thin and really nicely colored up, which is a relief because I do not see him come out at feeding time, so, at least he's eating something. I'd love to see him more, if possible. Is this level of reclusiveness just how male peacock gudgeons are? Would adding more gudgeons to the tank rather than a single pair encourage him to come out more? I have the space and filter capacity....started with a pair bc I only have 1 more structured cave. Tank is 15 gal, total inhabitants are: 1 male gudgeon, 1 female gudgeon, 2 otocinclus (sex unknown) and 1 mystery snail.

Haven't tried myself but this video goes over a lot of options...personally I'm leaning toward 'sandwich roots in filter foam and wedge behind hardscape' for my next tank (current one is lid - on lol) Definitive Guide to Growing Houseplants in an Aquarium

All right, tank matainence day today, and I dipped the cholla log in a 5ml hydrogen peroxide/2 gallons water solution (rinsed before and after) and a lot of algae definitely came off....we'll see how that goes. Curiosity also got the better of me and, especially since Gale the snail was in the coconut hut and I was worried that maybe somehow my nitrogen cycle was just so efficient that the gudgeon was dead in there and the tank was just processing it without any ammonia or nitrate spikes, I lifted the hut a little today. He's definitely alive and really nicely colored up so, I put the hut back down on top of him. No sign of eggs or fry but it was dusty from the hut being moved + disturbing the sand...and I didn't look super closely before replacing it. So we'll see when he comes out again. I miss seeing his stupid chonky head, which maybe is another indication in favor of 'get more gudgeons'

been a minute but here are some updates: - I've got a filamentous algae breakout up by the cholla wood at the top of the tank that I'm having trouble clearing out....not sure if it's that I increased fertilizers a bit over a month ago or if it's that the cholla wood is maybe breaking down too quickly. Planning to do some research on how long cholla usually lasts in tanks; I've seen it at fish and aquascape places of course but that's no guarantee it's actually a good call lol. I did notice (pretty quickly after adding it tbh) that it's a lot softer and spongier than before I added to the tank, and there's some greenish algae deep in the wood that doesn't bother me so much because, unlike the filamentous crap, it isn't spreading in to the roots of my floaters. I've been thinning out the floaters a bit more the last week or two, mainly to pull out heavily algae'd roots, which in turn is increasing light in the rest of the tank so, hard to tell if that's helping anybody or not. The cholla wood is easily removable (see re: break down, the glue points to my spider wood did not last very long) so I might take it out and dip it in a hydrogen peroxide solution this weekend. It has some bucephalandria well-rooted in to the top that's actually growing mostly out of the water since the cholla sits so high in the tank....I like it a lot, and I like seeing the contrast between the fully submerged vs emergent growth. Might replace with a different piece of cholla or with a ceramic pleco cave it it turns out that all cholla degrades so fast. Anyone else had issues with cholla wood? - last Sunday 4/14 the male went in to the cave -- the actual coconut hut this time. For the first couple days I did see him come out at feeding time and quickly go back in, but I haven't seen him since. It sounds like peacock gudgeons usually take about 5 days to hatch so I'm getting a little nervous. I don't want to disturb him but also like, I do kind of want to make sure he's alive? Water parameters remain good and everyone else in the tank is acting normal so, I'll give him until the middle of next week if I can restrain my curiosity, just to make sure the longer end of 'about 5-7 days' is well past before I go poking my nose in his business. Maybe the first couple days he was still in the 'enticing the female' stage and she hadn't laid yet, and that's why he was willing to come out? - I'm debating my stocking plan again. I was thinking 'upper water schooling fish so there's activity in all levels of the tank and I get to see a variety of behaviors' but a) the floaters are so thick -- would they have sufficient access to the water surface? would they be visible given the floater roots and the fluval's waterline dots or not so much? and b) the female gudgeon at least does come up to the water surface; maybe I should just get more gudgeons instead? Originally I thought, 'only 1 pair of gudgeons because I only want to put in one cave' but it's now coming to my attention that, even though I didn't build in other intentional caves, these guys are not that picky. At first I heard some advice that was like, 'include one more cave than you do male gudgeons' and I thought 'well that's a no then' but now I'm wondering if that advice wasn't geared toward optimizing breeding instead of general peaceability in the tank, because I've also seen a lot of stuff that's like 'they're not aggressive with each other or other fish and are a great fish for aquascapes'. Certainly mine are not aggressive with Gale or the otos at all. And 'great for aquascapes' implies to me that maybe the cave requirement isn't as strong a necessity? Also I'm kind of worried that if they are somehow successful in hatching fry and any survive to adulthood, we'll have inbreeding issues since it's a pair and not a colony. Obvs one way to avoid this is to net them out and sell them. But on the other hand, maybe I'd like to maintain a colony instead? The most likely outcome is that they will eat the fry. But as the plants increase (fingers crossed), I know sometimes without netting out to a separate tank folks are successful in a small amount of fry making it adulthood. As always any input is strongly welcomed, especially on the stocking front 🙂

as @Lennie said, Marimo 'moss' balls are in fact algae. I've seen aquascaping videos where folks cut it up the ball it's sold in and use it essentially as an epiphyte plant. Haven't tried it myself but could work for what you're going for. Moss in general could not only get the look but, tbh, moss is a bit of an algae magnet. I was warned by George Farmer in both his book and the occasional mention in his tank build videos, but I still planted moss in my tank right away...only to find that indeed, a lot of it got severely diatom-ed. The other thought I have is that you could do what people often recommend as a supplement for feeding otos: take some dechlorinated water, put river stones or similar rocks in it, stick it in the sun somewhere, and once the rocks develop a nice green slime coat, transfer to your tank. The most extreme/dramatic version of this concept I've seen is the usage in this tank build: Using Algae to Create Shell Dweller Cichlid Fish Tank (SerpaDesign)

yeah seconding @FLFishChik -- the dose you need is going to depend on your plants and the bioload of your fish (more fish = generally, less need to fertilize as plants are getting more nutrients from waste). The 1 ml (1 pump on the larger bottle) per 10 gal is a good starting point, but it's one of those 'observe and adjust' things....I've got the opposite situation going on with a heavily planted 15 gal tank that has at the moment, very few fish, so I've found twice the recommended dose of fertilizer is a better level for my tank, at least with the current amount of livestock. I'd pick a consistent starting amount, give it about a month so it has some time to make an impact, and adjust based on what you're seeing.

@mrPickles Strawberries is a goal of mine with the aquaponics set-up I'm thinking of...for both melons and mb peppers (depending on the variety), it might be worth thinking about trellis-ing somehow, maybe with string or wire on the wall behind? this is mainly a 'planning my raised garden bed for the spring' thought though, I don't know how melons behave in aquaponic systems.

amazing, I'm planning to set up a much, much smaller aquaponics set up as well so I'm definitely excited to see the specs on yours. Are you planning to add plants to the tank or keep it more bare (in keeping with that spooky vibe)?

I like my fluval flex a lot and given budget limitations with my first tank, I'm glad the 15 gal flex is the one I went for...I had spec'ed out an 'ideal' rimless tank set up with good growing lights etc and it was a lot more $ to get up and running than the flex, especially as a first timer needing to build up from scratch (didn't have the tools needed to make myself a lid to prevent jumping, etc). I agree with what others have said, that the built-in filtration can be kind of limiting. I'm happy with it in terms of: it definitely is a solid filter system with a lot of capacity, and I like that it's hidden. I've added an aquarium co-op nano sponge filter to the open filter compartment (back left) as a power outage backup and to have 'seeded' with bacteria for my hospital tank. Personally, based on where I live and the grid stability while I've been here, I'm not too worried on that front though. The way the lid works, pretty much anything you attach that needs a power cord or airline running out has got to be in the back filter compartment. This can limit placement for things like a CO2 diffuser, which ideally you would want by the filter outflow. Seems to be working well enough for me with it in the back, and again as others have said the availability of aftermarket 3D printed or specialty parts is really nice. Here's my latest full tank shot! I've got a journal feed up about it with more info if anyone is interested. But now that I'm more experienced and have more supplies already at hand, I do plan to have my next tank be a more customizable cube without built-in filtration. The other thing that takes some creative thinking is the bottom vent on the filter intake (have to think about how you're banking your substrate so it doesn't get covered, I set up a small 'retaining wall' with rocks so it's higher on the rest of the back of the tank) and the filter outflow nozzles (originally had my hardscape too close to it, very hard to adjust/clean etc) The lights are great though, and Fluval now includes little grate covers over the filter vents. I think the openings in covers are probably a little too big still if you've got fry or shrimp...BUT I bought a pre-filter sponge and cut off little chunks to fit into the curved gap between the vent covers and the vent, and that's working really well.

Listen, I know we're not going to have anything remotely tropical or really within the types commonly traded for aquariums in terms of size/color/etc. But like many of you (maybe all of you?) I really like staring at fish, I have snorkel equipment, and I'm looking for some spots for a long weekend trip this summer. Anyone have recommendations for lakes or rivers (PNW ocean is too cold lol) with good clarity and at least some kind of aquatic life?

I don't have a comprehensive recommendation, no, but I'm also very interested

This morning the male was out swimming through the tank again so it looks like he abandoned his nest...fair enough, I wasn't really expecting them to be successful on their first spawning attempt given the female already was carrying eggs when I introduced them to the tank so, I figured it would be a little soon. The eggs are still in the driftwood divot he selected. I've got to figure out if I should try to remove them or not. The nitrogen cycle in the tank is quite robust so I'm not too worried about that, more like, 'will removing them encourage or discourage their next attempt' etc. The tank's not set up for breeding and I wasn't (and still am not) planning on hatching the eggs in a separate tank myself....I'm indifferent on if I get surviving fry, mostly just curious and along for the ride.

The gudgeons definitely spawned! I was thinning out my floaters and came across a substantial algae patch I'd previously thought was maybe just moss growing off the cholla wood in the top of the tank. I went to remove a section of it and a very cranky little gudgeon face looked back up at me, surrounded by small white eggs. Clearly they decided on 'indent in the driftwood toward the top of the tank' as the way to go....I of course apologized and put back down the algae mat lol. We'll circle back to clearing that out once the parental care period ends. I'm glad they've spawned, since I hope it means they're settling in to the tank well and feeling healthy overall. I know the male probably won't exit his hiding spot to eat while the eggs are hatching. They're still so new to me and so small that I do worry about him having the body mass etc to maintain that....I'll look into gudgeon breeding more. I saw one source say they would hatch in 8-10 days and another say 2-3. Pretty big difference there!

This is the first I've seen/heard of the Annie's Goby but that is a great shot of them, they look super cute....time to research lol

With the first layout, I had thought I would get a betta for this tank, so I was intentionally baffling the flow a lot. When I re-did the layout one of my key changes was that the big piece of driftwood had been too close to the filter outflow nozzles, so I had been struggling to manipulate them. That piece is now a lot more to the center of the tank so I can get my hands around the sides of it better lol. Anyway. I did increase the flow a bit, but by that point I already had tons of floaters going, so I could see when they were getting pushed around more than I'd like and I redirected the flow to the hardscape (on one side) and the side of the tank on the other to slow it down a little. TBH I worried about the inhabitants too which is definitely just me projecting because at that point it was only the otos and Gale and if anything they'd probably prefer higher flow, but they looked like they were struggling with it compared to what I was used to seeing and I felt bad. By way of a tank update for today, this morning my gudgeons were huddled together under the moss ball. Here they are from the side...they must've both moved the moss ball and moved the sand around a little because I swear, it was more even last I checked The female seems to be carrying eggs, which the seller mentioned to me when I picked them up this past weekend (he'd special ordered them in from his wholesaler for me). Here's a shot of her from earlier in the week -- they've both colored up a bit since and her belly is now looking a bit more yellow. So at first I was worried they were trying to spawn in like, the weirdest and least cave-y place in the tank. But later in the day they were both swimming around more actively so, now I think maybe they were just sleeping? Given that they've recently moved in etc I'd be surprised if they are successful if they spawn soon...but you never know. We'll see. I'm not planning to remove the eggs from the tank and hatch them myself -- my plan is more along the lines of 'if any successfully get to be free swimming and I catch them before they get eaten by their parents, I'll try to grow them out a bit'. Both of the current pair are eating well and generally pretty active when it isn't within the first hour of the lights being on.

Thank you! It's a mix of red root floaters, amazon frogbit, and duckweed that I did not intentionally add but I'm not mad about either lol. The frogbit is definitely winning out overall. I'd say it's 80% frogbit, 15% red roots, and 5% duckweed. I thin it out a little bit every couple of days to make sure light still gets down below but I love the green hue it gives everything and the root structures. Gale does weird acrobatics hanging off them, which is also fun. So I never thin them back particularly aggressively 🤪

I mention the specific tank as it's a popular recommendation for first-time aquascapers, which is why I got it...I looked at a bunch of scapes in this tank model before making mine so, I wanted to make this journal easy to find for similarly-situated newbies I started my tank with plants (...and hitchhiker bladder snails) only in November 2023, added my first intentional livestock mid-January 2024, re-did the scape with the same materials (plus some more plants) at the beginning of this month, and added my centerpiece fish, a pair of peacock gudgeons, on March 30. Here's how the tank looks now: and how it looked when I first set it up: The inhabitants are: 1x Mystery Snail (Gale of Waterdeep), 2x Otocinclus (Dot and Dash, named for the respective shapes of the markings on their tails), and 2x Peacock Gudgeons (as of yet unnamed). Temp is 74 F, pH about 7.2, GH a work in progress (6 at the moment, adding Seachem Equilibrium to bring that up 1 degree at a time every 3 days bc I'm worried about Gale's shell, but I don't want to shock anybody by changing it too quickly), Nitrate about 10 ppm -- actually trying to increase that for the plant health, Nitrate/Ammonia both 0. I'm running CO2 using a DIY system (the kind where you mix citric acid and baking soda in a reactor) with a solenoid. Usually, the drop checker goes green by the end of the CO2 period but is blue most of the day -- all the plants are easy/beginner plants that don't strictly require CO2 so this fine by me, as I'd rather have less CO2 and not risk fish health issues. Goal with the CO2 is to speed up things growing in for a jungle-y look...and Gale was eating the plants I'd added from in vitro pots so I figured they could use a boost.

Great to know and also, excellent logo. Not sure the auction is my speed at the moment but I'll definitely poke around the GSAS website 🙂

I redid the substrate system in my tank recently because I'd put aquasoil in filter bags and capped that with sand but I was having a very hard time planting in to it (also soil bags were too thick + sand cap was too shallow, wasn't banked appropriately toward the back, etc....noob mistakes). Process looked a little different because I reused my substrate but the plants I took out of the tank seem to (approx 3 weeks later) be doing well. Here's the basic rundown of what I did: filled hospital tank with water from main tank filled 3 gal bucket with tank water, placed hardscape pieces that had plants attached in there. Also put some potted plants I was planning on adding to the tank in there. gently pulled out plants with tweezers and placed them on a small baking sheet (half-sheet I think?) I had lined with wet paper towels. Once all the plants were removed, I covered them with another paper towel layer. took a break (got sore lol) siphoned out as much of the remaining tank water as I could and pulled out the bagged soil realized I did not have the skills to siphon the tank out entirely, so my partner helped me carry and gently pour it in to the bathtub. The wet sand stayed pretty well in the tank during this process (sticky) Scooped sand out with a plastic container. Didn't get out all the remmnents because a little sand here in there in the bottom of the tank wasn't an issue for what I was doing, but you definitely could do a deep rinse at this point to get everything all the way out Arranged hardscape Mixed substrate (gravel, aquasoil, wet sand in my case) added substrate, capped with sand sprayed everything down generously with a misting bottle to keep hardscape plants sufficiently damp took another break planted in remaining plants re-filled tank water was pretty cloudy from all the substrate disturbance so I added some filter floss and it cleared up pretty quick All in all, took me pretty much the whole day from start to finish (I move slow); plants held up really well. Your mileage may vary depending on what plants you have, how dry your air is, etc, but I would highly recommend the wet paper towel plant sandwich for smaller/more delicate plants. It worked great and they didn't get as separated as I'm sure they would have if I'd just dropped them in a bucket of water. If what's holding you back is worrying that the plants won't make it, I say give it a shot bc mine turned out way more durable than I was worried they would. I haven't done a dirted tank though so I don't know anything about waiting for the tank to mature vs changing the substrate out. Editing because I forgot to add: when I took longer breaks I placed the tray with the wet paper towels and plants in a plastic bag to prevent anything from drying out.

Hello hello! I'm 28, my pronouns are he/him, and I started my tank (15 gal fluval flex with an aquarium co-op nano sponge filter added to the main built in filter -- mainly so I can use it on my hospital tank when necessary) last November...I'll get a journal post set up for it soon I think, haven't gotten around to it mainly because I don't feel like I take very good pictures yet and it annoys me a little how much better my tank looks in person than in photos. I added the centerpiece fish to my aquarium today (a pair of peacock gudgeons!) and once I sort out what I want for a mid/upper level schooling fish and the tank's had some time to adjust to the increased bioload I'll probably make a trip up to the Edmonds store again. I'm really into more naturalistic planted tanks, and the efficiency of aquaponics is also very appealing to me...I'm planning out a nano (30 cm cube) tank attached to a DIY aquaponics system to grow salad greens and strawberries on my windowsill. I'd get a larger tank I could have more of a bioload in to feed the plants but space is a major constraint at the moment...I figure, I'm doing pretty well fertilizing my 15 gal twice a week so that can help the plants thrive even if the fish doesn't produce as much waste as would be ideal. I'm thinking of having a solo betta (...and maybe some snails. I mean, I've got bladder snails in my main tank so I'd be shocked if some didn't make their way in when I get the new tank set up) as the inhabitant in that one but I am very open to suggestions. I'm sort of interested in in-person fishkeeping events or groups? I don't know. I sometimes have trouble making friends when I don't have a structured event or activity as a way of meeting new people...I used to perform/do logistics stuff for a performance group at Ren Faires but I've got an autoimmune disorder and that activity has historically been pretty hard on my body. I've taken some time off of it for a while now and am deciding if or how much I can manage going back....Anyway. I love my tanks, I love staring at fish in general, while traveling over Christmas I binge read the last like, three years of Practical Fishkeeping (magazine's available through King County library's Libby app, if anyone else in the area is interested!), so if you've got a local club (preferably south of Seattle) you're involved in and would recommend, let me know. I know Aquarium Co-op does some member events, which I'm considering....haven't taken the plunge yet mainly because traffic up either I-5 or 405 is such a headache with the construction at the moment (classic Seattle problems).

@Ken Burke Me too! I don't have many fish I'm feeding right now so to keep things about the right 'dose' (for lack of a better term) I went with the smallest candy molds I could find at Michael's Crafts...little stars. They work great, are super easy to clean, etc. I've been adding a little extra water to my repashy as I mix it up and I've had an easier time demolding as a result, though the reason I'm adding more water is not for demolding but to keep it liquid long enough for my not-very-coordinated hands to get it poured into the mold lol. I freeze mine (because again, not a ton of fish, so it takes me a while to get through even the smallest batch) and the molds are extra useful for that compared to just cutting in to squares....way easier to separate in my opinion. I did make a mistake the first time I made repashy and, because I'm using it to feed my otocinclus and they like grazing off rocks, painted some on some lava rock. No. I can now say for certain -- it will not set on the porous surface of lava rock. Came sloughing off in the tank within a day and was a bit of a mess to clean out. I haven't tried a smoother river stone or similar yet (because the stars are working so well tbh) but I've definitely heard it can be painted on rocks so, I assume that's what more experienced minds are using.

Thanks Tony, I was leaning in that direction but it's always reassuring to learn someone else is thinking the same way and I haven't missed something obvious. I moved her over to the 15 gal yesterday morning just after I saw your post. For the rest of yesterday she was sticking to the tank walls and her gils looked a little inflamed/like maybe she was hyperventilating....but I'm happy to report that she's back to her usual behavior moving throughout the tank and grazing off the wood hardscape today! I got a glance when she was against the side of the tank and her gils look their normal light pink as well, so too soon to declare it a definitive success but I'm optimistic. I really appreciate you taking the time to respond to my post, it helps a lot for a nervous new fish keeper ❤️

Hello all -- I've lurked for awhile but have finally wound up with a question particular enough that I made the jump to creating an account to post. Here's what's going on: Yesterday I embarked on a re-scape of my main tank (57L/15 gal, heavily planted). Knowing this project might take me a while, I got my quarantine/hospital tank (17L/4.5 gal plastic tub) set up to hold the fish while I worked (filled with water from the main tank). It's got a sponge filter that had been running as an extra filter in my main tank for approx. 2.5 months, a heater, a couple catappa leaves, a plastic hide, and a ton of floating plants both to help with possible stress and because I needed somewhere to store them while scaping. Unfortunately, while transferring one of my otocinclus in to the hospital tank, her (pronoun chosen arbitrarily) barbels got stuck in the net. I'd heard this was a risk with corys and other catfish but since otos are so small I actually hadn't realized they had barbs as well. Initially I left the net in the water bc I'd read (elsewhere) that otos in this situation may be able to get unstuck...no luck, so I trimmed down to a small piece of net to see if she could get herself out of that. As of early this morning still no dice, so as carefully as I could I snipped down and pulled off the remaining bit of net. Obviously this whole ordeal involves a lot of stress for the fish, and in addition I don't know if she may be injured. The conundrum: The hospital tank had some ammonia this morning. Initially I'd thought she might be sucking on the net rather than tangled so I dropped some repashy gel in there to entice her just in case....between that, my mystery snail, my other oto, and the tank being newly set up, clearly the sponge filter hit it's limit. I did approx a 50% water change to bring that level down. On the other hand, my main tank parameters are much more stable. There is no other livestock in the main tank at the moment. It's a larger body of water with a much larger and more established (approx 4 months) filter and I reused all of my substrate when re-arranging so that's rife with bacteria as well. I don't want to stress the fish further, and the hospital tank is easier to find her in for visual checks and of course easier to dose if meds are later needed. However, the main tank is fully cycled and more stable (I did water testing on it to confirm as well this morning in case moving things around disrupted anything -- all good) and I worry about the ammonia particularly if she's injured. She might be more comfortable in the main tank as well from the perspective of: more places to hide, lots of wood decor with biofilm that she loves, anubias leaves to nom algae off of, etc. What would you do? (ps: I know 2 otos and a mystery snail is drastically understocked for a 15 gal....I'm new and ramping up my stocking slowly. These guys were added back in January and acclimated really well. In addition to repashy, the otos are even accepting hikari mini algae wafers! I also know that from a 'schooling behavior' perspective 2 otos is not ideal. I went with that number based both on Cory's video about otos + advice of an employee in the Edmonds store from the perspective of 'want to make sure there's enough algae and biofilm to sustain them'. Since they're taking wafers, I'm thinking of adding a couple more. Full stocking plan is to add a pair of peacock gudgeons and 10 of some kind of small upper level schooling fish...that's a post for a different day)