Tanked

I understand their point but am also not in full agreement. 1. Unless there are too many fish in too small a bag, I don't think ammonia buildup is a concern. 2. Not being able to get to hiding places that they can see is the least of their concerns. (most of the fish bags I've seen are slightly opaque). For a better understanding of what the fish is experiencing I would go to YouTube and search War of the World - Captured (3/4). Skip ahead to 3:30-4:05 (After 4:05 the analogy goes completely wrong)😬 Immediately after purchase, my fish are placed into a cooler for the trip home. This gives them some protection from multiple temperature changes loud noises bright lights, etc. The open bag is floated, and a shot glass (30ml) is added immediately. This is repeated about every 10 minutes. My fish are usually purchased earlier in the day, so the lights are out.

I hated those corner filters. It seemed like they needed cleaning twice a week. A tank my brother and I shared had a whiteout. The water looked like milk. If someone had told us to stop messing with the filter, and changing all ten gallons. things would have gone much better.

Disposable bags and cartridges can be reused until they physically wear out. A strong stream from a garden hose will remove most debris. That also means that some of the BB is still present. When possible I remove the charcoal from the cartridges. A quick rinse in the water change , and you are good to go.

Prior to the internet, this is how most of us did it. You were doing pretty good if your fish survived a year. If you did not have access to a LFS, partial and water change were never used in the same sentence.

I'm almost positive that I already know the answer, but I have to ask: What is a pot scrubber as used here? Are we talking the various grades of "ScotchBite' pads , or stainless steel scrubbing sponges, or something else? I have been using the white polishing pads for cleaning the glass, but have been hesitant to use the coarser pads as filter media.

Yes. Everything in moderation. You could start with Danios, and add three more danios, or add three tetras, or... I like to keep groups of at least five or six. I keep Bloodfin and Serpae Tetras. There are so many choices. Somebody will correct me if needed, but I think Corydoras are a little more sensitive to change, so that would not be my first fish. If you haven't yet, I would purchase an Ammonia test kit to go with your regular test strips.

Welcome to the forum. The Danios are a good first choice. PetSmart will almost always have Zebras. They are hardy and fun to watch. As you are already aware of the Nitrogen cycle, I would avoid a beginner mistake and buy only two or three fish when the day comes. Wait a week and buy 3 more. This gives your newly cycled aquarium time to adjust to the new bioload. In time your cycle will be able to handle larger numbers. There is nothing special about (3). All of your fish prefer company of their own kind, and stocking at least three spreads aggression, and reduces stress, should one of your fish become a bully. Groups of three is also where the LFSs near me offers a small discount.

When things go bump in the night, its just your pleco rearranging the furniture. I think they are a very cool fish. Along with their size and prehistoric appearance 'here be dragons', their habits are just fun to watch.

My pleco was fed veggies wafers and flake food. It would feed off the substrate, wood, and glass sides. Competition for fresh veggies in that tank was tough so the pleco learned to swim inverted on the surface hoovering down the flake food. Hopefully your Common Pleco is in a large tank. Mine only got to 16", but that took a while, and it could quickly cover a lot of ground when startled. If this is your first pleco, watch out for the dorsal fins, they have spines.

First, Congrats to @Mmiller2001. Those judges can be brutal and helpful at the same time.

50 years ago last May, a nobody named Richard Branson took a chance on another nobody. Today, Virgin Records, Virgin Atlantic Airlines, Virgin Galactic Space Tourism... owe in part, their existence to: The backstory is almost as good as the album:

1. I also use pool sand in some of the tanks. I use gravel in the others. If I can find an economical source, I want to try a coarse horticultural sand. The plants can grow in all of them, including yours. The problems arise with a really fine sand. 2. Like so many questions in this hobby, it depends. Plants rely on flow to bring new nutrients to them. Some plants can adapt better than others, but it is also possible to stress them out. I have read that floating plants have a problem with high flow, and I 've also had Hornwort happily tumbling in the flow. I recently tried Dwarf Hair Grass in a no-flow sanded tank, and it is still there. The same plant in a light-moderate flow blew away. The new plants could not develop an adequate root structure fast enough, and eventually died.

I don't think a day or two in cooler water will kill them. Some folks do keep them in unheated tanks. Yes, they are known to stink when dead. They can remain motionless for days, in and out of water. If you are concerned, I would place the snails in a separate container for a few more days. You can float this container in the aquarium. This would prevent contaminating the whole tank. At the very least I would turn the upside down snail in your picture over. They are known to have problems righting themselves. If you find that the operculum (trap door) is open the snail is dead. I can't tell in the picture.

I should have added that the for the small fish, jar lids also keep floating food in one location instead of blowing all over the tank. I'm still part of the bucket brigade. All of the aquariums are in the the family areas on old hardwood floors. They suffer enough from drips and splashes. I do have a 32 gal. Rubbermaid BRUTE with casters that I used for wine making. I should give that a trial run..

Unless your Anubia was actually 'dry' when it arrived that isn't likely to be an issue. For me, Anubia has proven to be temperamental and remained dormant for months. I would treat the rhizome as you would normally, and just wait. Peroxide begins working in seconds, so If you were spraying straight peroxide, and straight water separately, for 20 minutes, it is up for debate as to what happened. Soaking in a 50/50 mix for 5-10 minutes would probably have been better. I have done whole tank treatments with no ill effects.

Talk to your local auto shop. As our vehicles get bigger, so do the wipers. The only down side that I know of is that they are actually are brittle. Once bent at a sharp angle, unbending will often break them. I also use them to build DIY ant-dams on the hummingbird feeders.

The plastic mesh bags that garlic bulbs are sold in can be stuffed with lava rocks to raise substrate, placed over the siphon hose, the HOB intake or inside the UGF lift tubes to keep critters out, and a diffuser if you are pumping water in A pond pump for pumping water back into the aquarium instead of lifting 40# buckets shoulder high Aerosol can lids fitted with a rubber suction cup acts as containers for plants and soil anywhere on the sides of the aquarium I have a 9" silverware cup from a discarded dish rack, fitted with 2 rubber suction cups serves as a water diffuser so I don't disturb the substrate, and as a corral for new plants, fish... Plastic jar lids fitted with a thin piece of Styrofoam and a 'donut hole' act as floating plant corrals. S/S stiffeners from your cars windshield wipers (my first hack) can be bent to hang on the rim, bent at an angle to recover tools, deceased animals etc. They can also be used as skewers for feeding and retrieving veggies in the aquarium. A skewer that is longer than your tank is tall will allow you to anchor one end in the substrate while they are feeding. Fitted with a wine cork on one end, it won't sink if you drop it.

On New Years Eve. this year, the local gardening columnist decided to do a weather review for the year. On 12-22-22 Southwest Ohio was hit by a "BOMB CYCLONE!"😱 We had a 52 degree temperature drop in 12 hours. 20-30 degree swings aren't unusual, but +44 down to -8 was too much. That explains what happened to my Bonsai. The rest of the year we had a mild spring, dry July, and a wet August. I was still picking vine ripened tomatoes the week before Christmas this year, so I'm not complaining too much.

I embrace the Duckweed and then it disappears. At the the LFS this weekend, I asked when they were going to get floating plants. They said I would have to wait until spring unless I wanted Duckweed. I told them I use only wild caught organic Duckweed. It just doesn't grow in my aquariums. When they told me I should stick to plastic plants, I held up the plants I had just purchased and asked them if they wanted them back. This got me to thinking about whether all Duckweed is created equal. Is it possible that the Duckweed passed around in the hobby has adapted, or have I just managed to avoid this problem?

Unfortunately white sand just doesn't stay clean very long My tan pool sand was cleaned 3 days ago and its already collecting debris. When cleaning the sand, I use only the siphon hose (no tube). Cutting the tip at about 45 degrees allows more water to flow in from the side, pulling more debris and less sand with it. Whatever sand you do pick up can be rinsed clean in a shallow bowl and returned to the aquarium.

It took two years for my JV to just give up in the back of the tank. It put out a few runners but neve actually grew. At present I have Italian Val growing in the front corner where it gets a few minutes of direct morning sun. It was planted mid-tank directly under the light, but has twice migrated to the front corner. It still remains very short but I now have six runners in that corner. I am dealing with low tech, hard water, 76 degrees. Ph is 6.6, but that is up for debate.

I haven't gotten anything done today. Yesterday: I added two more SAEs to the large community tank. The Silver Dollars have been goofing off lately. I'm not 100% on the SAE identification. They look right, but are considerably paler than any of the others. The 3 year old Amazon sword in the planted community tank has been replaced by a Dwarf Chain Sword. The new plant had enough runners to put one in all of the tanks. The Amazon Sword has never done well. Added a Crypt Lucens to the small planted community. The other Crypts seem happy so why not? Water changes for all. Thinned out some of the accumulated aquarium junk. Played chemist for about an hour. API test kits from 1995 are still good right? Plant growth in the project tank has stalled, so I added an air stone in the hopes of adding some CO2 to the water

So far, so good! The fish celebrated the new year with new plants, Brine Shrimp and Bloodworms. I had Egg Nog and Bourbon

Had I known about using prime after a bleach dip, I might not needed to wait for a week of sun and air to kill the smell. Hydrogen peroxide is an alternative to bleach as a disinfectant. Medical grade is the 3% H2o2 that you find in the grocery/pharmacy. Used correctly it is aquarium safe. Peroxide is highly susceptible to light. You could liberally spray your tree in a plastic bag and place in a dark room for a few minutes or hours. Exposure to light will cause the peroxide to break down leaving you with water. The CDC says that on hard surfaces you can spray it on and wait a minute or three and wipe it off. Be sure that your peroxide hasn't expired. If you think you need to sanitize your rocks and gravel, you can boil them. Cover them with tap water and raise to boiling point 5-10 minutes. Most everything will begin dying at 150 degrees. Any cheap mechanical timer will do for the lights, but for about $10. you can buy a digital timer which will allow you to set the exact time you wish the lights to cycle down to the minute. They are usually smaller, come with a single pushbutton override, and most importantly, a battery backup.

I've always done fish in cycle. My opinion is that it gets a bad rap because of too many fish in the uncycled tank. When I plan on buying from a big box store, I make several visits. I watch for dead fish, and how many fish, dead and alive, are in the all of the tanks. Multiple dead fish means they are not being properly cared for.