[Betta with Hole in Head?]

Thanks for suggestions. I'm giving the classic med trio a shot. Partially through it now. I'll update if the spot changes.

[Betta with Hole in Head?]

Have had this betta in a 6 gallon planted tank for a few months. The mark on his head is noticeable and has me worried. Water parameters are great and it doesn't share the tank with anything except a couple snails. It seems to be behaving normally and eating immediately when fed. Still flares just fine at a mirror which I only use every few days for a minute. Fins all look good. It's a giant betta.

Only weirdness in the tank is a consistent hair algae problem that I'm working on.

Thoughts? Treatments?

Thanks so much

[LiveStream Live Blog]

The moment of stream-death for your memeification.

[What did you get done today?]

Flooded my dry-start yesterday. I didn't wait until everything spread extensively. I really just wanted to get the plants rooted and growing. This is going to be a betta tank. It's a Landen 7.1 gallon, seasoned filter, CO2, ADA soil, seryu stone.
After one night, have no ammonia, 0.1 ppm nitrite, 10 ppm nitrate. Will change water every day for a week. Every other for a week, then weekly if all is good. The CO2 level is intentionally a little bit "too high" for a while to help the plants transition.

Plants:

Dwarf hair grass (Eleocharis belem)

Mini Pellia / Coral moss (Riccardia chamedryfolia)

Phoenix Moss (Fissidens fontanus)

Alternanthera Reineckii Mini

Downoi (Pogostemon Helferi)

Shoreweed (Littorella Uniflora)

Bucephalandra Red Mini

[Aquarium Memes]

New Otos be like
 

[Leeches]

No, they seem harmless to me. Haven't ever seen them attacking fish/snails/shrimp. They just hang out in the substrate and occasionally pop out for a swim. Creepy? Yes. Dangerous? No.

I occasionally put a trap in the tank if I get tired of seeing them in the substrate. You can use those glass planaria traps if you don't mind catching some tiny snails too. I doubt that you'd end the infestation, but you can decrease the numbers if you want.

[Staghorn algae and causes?]

Mine was also a 20L. Fluval 3. Had the lighting at 50%, but it was a lot of hours of lighting. I cut it down to about 6-8 total hours. 2 of those hours were ramps. I trimmed out the worst of the staghorn, and the rest receded very fast. I was surprised how fast it dropped to a minimal level... which is fine by me.

[What did you get done today?]

New year, new tank. Today's project.

Also put CO2 in both my tanks!! woot! Never tried CO2 soooo, here we go!

[Moving plants to a second tank. Algae challenge - Staghorn]

On 12/18/2020 at 6:24 PM, Colu said:

Drop your lighting time to 8 hours a day 

This worked! Thank you. Dropped the lighting down and kept treating and the staghorn is very quickly receding. Less grass growth, but stem plants are thriving.

[Moving plants to a second tank. Algae challenge - Staghorn]

Thank you both.

Is less light each day generally better for getting rid of this stuff in planted tanks?

 

[Moving plants to a second tank. Algae challenge - Staghorn]

I'm working on a new tank. I've got plants ready, but I'm going to move some cuttings from my other tank because it has so much java moss and hydrocotyle tripartita. That tank has a staghorn issue that I'm battling. How can I move the plants without the chance of transferring the staghorn with them? I can pick and choose easily, but tiny bits are all you need.

Also if anyone has advice about dealing with staghorn... the tank is well planted. No CO2. I'm dosing easy green. No more iron in case that's making things worse. I've been trying to fight the staghorn with Easy Carbon (shooting it right on the algae, 1ml/10gal) and aggressive trimming. ...It's still growing and it's getting a bit frustrating. Advice appreciated. Can you up the dose of easy carbon? Should I stop the easy green?

Thanks!

[Questions about attaching plants to wood]

You can use any brand of cyanoacrylate gel glue really. It cures very fast, so no real wait until it can go in the tank. Minutes. I have large gravel like that. It's not super easy to get some plants to stay sometimes, but it's really a minor inconvenience. They'll stay fine, like lefty said. Don't go yanking on them though. They'll come right out. You could weight the roots if it becomes an issue.

And you can also glue the java moss to it if you want the cool effect that causes.

[Progress pics]

First tank after 20 year hiatus. Really starting to like how it looks.

Shrimp still won't mate, but meh.

Fist plants, first fish:

One months later, below... I gave the Zebras away (too feisty for my shrimp), lost the penguins to a really fast-acting disease, added some plants, new light, lots of tiny fish (embers, albino cardinals, celestial pearls),

One more month... more plants, lots of growth. Shrimp have grown. Pond snails, scuds, and a couple leeches have moved in because noob ¯\_(ツ)_/¯. ...Going to trap the leeches. Snails and scuds are welcome. (Use some easy green, root tabs, no CO2)

[3-D Printed Aquarium "Stuff"]

1 hour ago, TheDukeAnumber1 said:

@Another Jake

What CAD software are you using?

Autodesk Inventor. I'm not in love with it, but I have an Autodesk license and haven't really tried much else.

(The screenshot is just from MeshLab, because it opens faster.)

[3-D Printed Aquarium "Stuff"]

Working on a corner filter. The pics below are of the version 2 model and version 1's actual working print. Air stone powers the flow up the tube in the back and out the outlet. This pulls water in through the grid at the surface and down through the filter media. There's one inch of depth so it fits cut sponge, two layers of filter floss, and a bag of bio-media. It moves 22.5 gal/hr with the air stone on high using one of the pumps sold on this site... which is a little low even for a 10 gallon tank, but I might give it a go anyway. If I raise the waterline above the outlet, that might improve, but I won't have any way of knowing or measuring it.

Have to print it in halves because it's just too tall for my printer. It's otherwise designed to print easily without support. you can use cyanoacrylate gel glue with baking soda to glue the two halves together air-tight (just don't screw up because it cures fast and permanently). I use t-glase filament because it's FDA approved non-toxic and doesn't absorb water or get brittle. Thinking of going with black for the second prototype since you can see through the clear t-glase... the sponge is too noticeable.

If you want to give it a shot, I can send the files. It's not ready to go on Thingiverse.

I'm super open to improvement ideas. This is really for fun and learning CAD a little better.

[3-D Printed Aquarium "Stuff"]

On 11/3/2020 at 11:50 AM, Daniel said:

I now know what I want 3-D printed. Earlier today I thought I could see a little aquarium inside of one of @akconklin's aquariums. This would be a really cool piece of decoration.

But what would make this decoration even cooler would be that the little piece of aquarium decoration then had an even littler aquarium as decoration inside it as well. Sorta of a recursive surreal hall of mirrors thing.

[Leeches]

... But seriously, what do you do? Can they be trapped?

[Leeches]

Nice timing. I just found this in my tank today:

...

...

Only one thing to do I guess.

[Fluval Plant 3.0 Scheduling and Programming]

I stole this program from a youtube video that I don't remember, but it makes for some great variation throughout the day and definitely in the evening. Question: The blue-lights-on-overnight thing... I'd like to do that for the effect. Does it have any effect on anything other than appearance?

... This is a 20L tank, hence the 50% max. 100% is blinding.

 

It's from this (Thanks Streetwise), but I made some edits (slower redder sunset, brief moonlight):

 

[Gotta love the weirdos]

Lol. Nascar. Nice.

He eats with the others. Less, but he's been that shape since he was tiny. Big googly eyes and a derpy overbite. I think he might be of royal heritage if you catch my drift.

[What did you get done today?]

I finished version 1.0 of a custom corner filter for my new 10 gallon. A tad large-looking, but getting there. Air-stone-powered. Bio/Sponge/Floss and surface intake. T-glase FDA certified non-toxic plastic.  

[Mysterious Consistent Deaths]

Update: Ick-X at the start, and a full course of Maracyn and ParaCleanse and all deaths and illnesses have stopped.

Thank you for the help.

[Gotta love the weirdos]

Meet Squirt. I only name the weird ones. He's a little funny-lookin, but I love him anyway. 🙂 

[Mysterious Consistent Deaths]

Thank you! That bacterial infection possibility does look promising.

[Mysterious Consistent Deaths]

This little guy survived the night, but is in even more serious shape this morning, barely able to navigate the mild currents of the tank. Symptoms seemingly coming from nowhere, rapid degradation. Loss of color came overnight. No visible fungus. All other fish well colored and doing fine. I'm including a couple tank pics just to show what it's like.

No predators in the tank. Some small number of hydra 😞 but I'll deal with them later. Healthy shrimp, pond snails, some few scuds that tagged along with something.