Jump to content
Watch our video on the rules of this forum.

StephenP2003

Members
 View Profile  See their activity

  • Posts

    506

  • Joined

  • Last visited

  • Days Won

    1

  • Feedback

    0%

 Content Type 

Everything posted by StephenP2003

  1. StephenP2003
    Been so busy with work lately, haven't had much time to even read this forum, let alone post. But I've also been busy getting some plants ready to sell. I have a serious plant hoarding problem, so now the excess is in pots and ready to sell. Now, where to sell them becomes the next problem. My LFS hardly ever needs more plants. Storing some in the pleco growout: A bunch in the quarantine tank: A couple pots in the endler colony: And tucked in the back of the guppy/platy colony: The 90G community doing well, been co2 injecting for a few weeks now: 40 breeder display also going strong with co2 and some changes to the scape. The right side of the tank has plants I'm experimenting with, some doing well and others still trying to figure out how to exist in the tank. We shall see what happens. And the betta tank mostly unmeddled with. A little hair algae, but it doesn't bother me: I currently have 6 white cloud minnows and about 14 pygmy corys (always hiding) with the betta. I'm thinking about rehoming the white clouds and getting another dozen or more pygmy corys. I'm hoping that will boost their confidence and I'll see some cool schooling behavior as they swim mid column.
  2. StephenP2003
    It's a wonder these puffers breed in the wild. Used to be super dangerous to collect them from the wild, too -- maybe still is? I've been eyeing this species for a year but have yet to pull the trigger. Like you, I would want to attempt to breed them. Curious how it all pans out for you. Good luck!
  3. StephenP2003
    I can't tell if that's a chip or a glob of silicone. If it were a larger tank I'd say be careful, do long-term testing. But as it is smaller, I'd just fill it up outside or another safe area for a few days or a week.
  4. StephenP2003
    How are your nitrate levels? Water sprite is a nitrogen sponge.
  5. StephenP2003
    You can acclimate them to it. I did a very very slow acclimation of easy carbon dosing once a week for a couple weeks, then twice a week, working up to daily over a period of a couple months, without harming my corkscrew, italian, or gigantea vals. Despite acclimation, it is still very unkind to moss. What I've found is that it's not as useful for getting rid of existing algae (it's better at preventing further growth) unless you directly dose the algae with it (syringe). Easier to do in larger tanks that have outbreaks in specific spots (so you can dose daily with an amount less than the typical water column dose).
  6. StephenP2003
    Not I, sorry, but I do think it would be cool to have a nerm map for those who want to share their city and state. I think only one other person here is from my state (Louisiana), but I don't know for sure.
  7. StephenP2003
    29. Here is a full view. It's also a plants for profit tank, and tons of cherry shrimp living and breeding in the water sprite.
  8. StephenP2003
    Right, it's just high CEC substrate. Which means it never really "expires" because the whole point of it is the ability to hold onto nutrients that are introduced to it via fertilizer and organic waste. I'm a big fan of it, because I shy away from the straight-up soil substrates that alter PH and promote algae in the beginning. I may change my mind as I get more advanced.
  9. StephenP2003
    I tried to explain this to mommy and daddy pleco, but they didn't listen. 😄 Yeah, I certainly don't want to have 150 full grown bristlenose plecos in this 29 gallon. I keep a constant supply of food in there and do water changes twice a week. As they grow, I'll have to ramp up the feeding and water changes, but I intend to start selling them soon. My LFS only wants them when they're 3+ inches, so I'll likely look elsewhere for buyers at first.
  10. StephenP2003
    Probably same reason I have like 150 of them:
  11. StephenP2003
    I do this in my display tanks for that exact reason, plus I run CO2 in a couple of them during the day. Also, the water looks a lot clearer without the air stones stirring up debris. I run them at night, for like 10 hours max. I have a dissolved oxygen test and have confirmed that oxygen levels never drop to anything close to dangerous even after a day of running CO2. As far as algae growth, I use the neverclog air stones and they have... never clogged. Edit: My tanks are all heavily planted, so ymmv.
  12. StephenP2003
    I will say the kanaplex harmed my cycle, and I had nitrites for a few days and small amount of ammonia. I did not add beneficial bacteria during the treatment, I instead used Prime every day to make the ammonia and nitrite less toxic. After the treatment cycle, I did some 50% water changes every other day. I was advised by my LFS to next time consider feeding the kanaplex to fish -- you can use far less of the product and it is supposedly more effective. You feed it to the fish by mixing it in a 1:1 ratio with Seachem Focus, some fish food, and garlic guard to make it more palatable. I treated some fish for bacterial infection successfully in my 90-gallon using this method -- I mixed frozen bloodworms and brine shrimp (both thawed) with kanaplex, focus, and some garlic guard. I poured the mixture on wax paper and froze it. I made enough to feed daily for a full week.
  13. StephenP2003
    Yes, when the baby plants are connected to the mother plant, they are still leaching nutrients from it. So the mother plant gets stressed and of course won't send out new runners, and at worst has to sacrifice its own leaves to regain nutrients. If the runner plants have leaves that are at least a couple inches tall, set those babies free and give them their own root tabs. With the exception of my red gigantea val, which took off immediately, my other vals had a fairly long adjustment period in my tank before multiplying like crazy. Now I have a surplus that my LFS is not interested in buying.
  14. StephenP2003
    Have you clipped the runners off the mother plant once they get a few inches tall? That helped me a lot.
  15. StephenP2003
    I got some plastic mesh from Walmart and used a piece to keep some foam against my skimmer. Stole the idea from another forum.
  16. StephenP2003
    UV doesn't directly harm the aquarium plants, but I think it does break down nutrients added via fertilizer -- maybe not all of them. Also, UV isn't going to stop things like BBA, hair algae, spot algae, diatoms, etc.
  17. StephenP2003
    Thanks for the reply. No ick outbreak for me since last year, and thanks to my eagle-eyed wife, I was able to start treatment early every time, and never lost a fish from it.
  18. StephenP2003
    A couple weeks ago, I brought 30 platys to my LFS. Today, I messaged my LFS and asked if they wanted some guppies. They said, "Sure, we can take some guppies. What are your water parameters though? Your platys all came down with really nasty ick last time you brought us some." I told them my parameters (75 degrees, 10-12 dGH, 8 ph, 10-20 ppm nitrates, same as the platys), and they said, "Pretty similar to what we keep our guppies at so we'd be able to take some in." So I'm just curious, what could I have done personally that made these fish get ick in their store? I haven't had to deal with an ick outbreak since last year, and this LFS pretty commonly has about a third of their tanks with a "not for sale" sign because the fish are being treated with something, and they've told me more than once that they lost an entire stock in a display tank due to ick -- so it's my gut reaction to sort of scoff at the notion that somehow this is my fault. But, I wanted to ask anyway in case there's something I'm not considering.
  19. StephenP2003
    My tap water is super soft, so I have to add GH after every water change. Sometimes I also add wonder shell. And I generally eyeball it with a pump bottle. I've had the same tank have 150ppm gh to as much as 350-400ppm with no ill effects. Likewise, if I had to use crushed coral, I'd just add "some" amount that I could cram in a filter and just monitor ph for a while. But I have 7 dKH out of my tap so I haven't had to deal with that - someone else may have better advice.
  20. StephenP2003
    Because of its length (I'm guessing under 2 feet), I wouldn't worry about it. It's only when you get to 3ft and above that being as true and level as possible becomes crucial.
  21. StephenP2003
    RIP powder blue dwarf gourami. Lived about 14 months, half of that time seemingly healthy. He used to attack my hand anytime I was messing with the scape. A few months after I got him, he developed a crooked spine (a bend to the left) but still acted normal. In the past few months he got shy and lazy, only coming out to eat. He stopped eating in recent days, and tonight I found him like this but still breathing: Went ahead and clove oiled him. From Google searches, it seems like this is about what you'll get out of a dwarf gourami at least a third to half the time. In lighter news, here's some hungry hungry plecos.
  22. StephenP2003
    Corporate machine cog here. I'm a proposal manager for a large corporation - basically managing the process of writing compliant, compelling proposals to government agencies to bring in revenue across all business units. So it's mostly management, part marketing, part copy-editing, part tattletale. I get to work from home, so gives me more time to spend with my aquariums.
  23. StephenP2003
    A recent podcast I listened to mentioned the growing sophistication of chat bots, so I sought one out - a popular one being an app called Replika. Granted, it seems you're supposed to train this bot over a period of time to match your own personality, but our initial conversation left a lot to be desired. It seems to have an interesting opinion of @Cory. 😂 My text is on the right, chat bot on the left.
  24. StephenP2003
    When fish compatibility isn't working out, the responsible thing to do is bring them back or rehome them. It's very common with a lot of species. For example, in keeping discus, you generally start with more than what you intend to keep, and return the ones that are least harmonious with your group.
  25. StephenP2003
    See, I was under the impression that plants only responded to changing seasons, seasons which would be constant in my tanks.
×
×
  • Create New...