Jess

@Colu I have A TON! Red root floaters and hydrocotyle (that I had added to soak up more nitrates). I want frogbit but I've never seen it available where I live. But I remove handfuls of red root floaters every few days. The filter being off was a huge problem, I guess...still not exactly sure though why that caused nitrates to increase. More bacteria = more efficient processing of ammonia -> nitrite -> nitrate ... so less bacteria should have meant higher ammonia/nitrite, not higher nitrate. No? At that time this tank had very low pH and KH so maybe that had something to do with it.

@Colu thanks so much for this advice. I have catappa leaves from the Co-Op, I'll throw 4-5 in there now. I think you're right about my problem. It's useful to learn that nitrates have a negative effect on immunity. The nitrates have been back down to 25 ppm since 12/21 but maybe the period of high nitrates was long enough that it lowered their immunity and that's why I'm just kind of slowly losing them. They slowly succomb to secondary infections. That makes sense because what was so frustrating is I could never tell what's going on - any time I saw a sick one, they look a little bit different. The gouramis only thing they have in common is their stress coloring - as soon as I see it I know in the next 1-2 days he/she will die. According to my records, my nitrates were high for about two months - I did more frequent water changes but I was struggling with that for awhile and couldn't figure out why they were high. I have to order the Seachem Garlic Guard and Focus online; nobody near me carries it in store. I'll most likely loose these two fish before those arrive but maybe I can save the rest of them. I think there is nothing else I can do other than keep my stupid filter on and test water frequently to make sure nitrates stay low. Thanks again for your help! I didn't think about administering antibiotics in food. That's a good idea.

Oh good call! Temp is 78 degrees and has been stable for at least the last few months. I use Cory's heater. Thanks for linking this video - I had seen it before but it was a great reminder to watch it again.

Stats: 45G planted tank. Last water change was 12/30, 25%. Since then, water parameters have been: pH 6.8, KH 80 ppm, nitrates 25-50 ppm, nitrite 0 ppm, GH to be honest, I'm not sure. It just doesn't show up properly on the test strips (it's faint lavender that doesn't match any of the squares even closely). With the API test it's usually 4-6. Inhabitants: 6 crossband chocolate gouramis, 18 T. hengeli rasboras, 4 Adolfoi corydoras, 6 habrosus corydoras, 3 Tengah halfbeaks. Notable history: On 12/11 I noticed that my canister filter wasn't running. I'm not sure for how long it had been off. I had previously measured nitrates at 50-100 ppm and was suspicious about it, but didn't connect it to the filter. I actually noticed it because the rasboras were schooling in the middle of the tank way more, and everyone just seemed to be using more of the middle of the tank. I felt 50-100 ppm wasn't obscenely high, so I did a 25% water change and left the filter off (I just cleaned it out). 10 days later on 12/21 I again measure nitrates at 100 ppm so I did a 40% water change and I turned the fully-cleaned filter back on. I had by then fished out 2 dead bodies - both gouramis. Originally I had 13, and they've slowly dropped off; by 12/21 I think I had 8. I also found I had lost 4 halfbeaks. I decided that 50-100 ppm nitrates must be too high for my fish, and while I don't fully understand the relationship between the filter and my fish dying, I just knew I needed to go back to filter-on mode. (Maybe this sounds really stupid...but I've heard from a lot of people that canister filters are probably not necessary in a low-to-medium stocked tank because there's so much bacteria everywhere. I wanted to test the theory in my particular tank.) Water parameters went back to normal- pH 6.0, KH 20 ppm, nitrates 25-50 ppm, nitrite 0 ppm. 9 days later on 12/30 I added 1lb of crushed coral (that's 25% of what's recommended...I wanted to go slowly and observe). I'm trying to grow crypts and having trouble, and I felt that bumping up my KH and pH might help enough without hurting my fish. That brought me to the parameters at the top of this post. Present day problem: Since then, 1-2 more fish have died - always the gouramis. And I have one rasbora who looks like he has dropsy. Now, if you look through my post history you'll see these friggin gouramis have always given me problems. They're crazy sensitive. I have other Indonesian gouramis that are totally flexible and fine (licorice, samurai) just these are such a mystery. I really love them though. The first 12 I got I guess 2 years ago, and I lost a couple after a temperature drop due to a cold spell and then 1-2 randomly during the next year. Since then up until the filter fiasco, they'd been fine. That said, they arrived to me with cloudy eyes - just about all of them. I read that's a sign of infection? Anyway, in October 2022 I got 6 more, bringing my total to 13, because they were really aggressive in smaller numbers. Everything was going ok until the filter thing. Now I have 6. They died off slowly and mostly I don't find the bodies (I believe I've buried 3 out of 7 lost). One died a few days ago. I saw him "sulking" in a corner with stress coloring, then a few hours later he was dying, looking terrible and heart-breaking. I have one that is currently struggling - stress coloring. The only thing I have noticed, visible in the video in link below, is swelling on one fin and possibly tail. Yesterday he was flashing that fin against plants. Here's a link to all (it includes videos and captions) https://imgur.com/a/s722e2j The questions: 1. All I have is the Med Trio - Maracyn, IchX, and ParaCleanse. I have a 10G tank, cycled and ready to go, it has a sponge filter, airline tubing, bolbitis on driftwood which I'll have to find a place for, and one danio who I'll need to move as well. Are these meds suitable? Treat all or just one or two? 2. Who (besides the two sick ones) should I treat? All the gouramis at once? They are a problem fish; I think it's possible they arrive with latent infections that just got exacerbated by the high nitrates and now possibly by the high pH and KH which they probably dislike. I'm just not sure...what if I treat the healthy ones and they die? They've been healthy for 2 yrs so maybe I shouldn't push my luck? 3. What about my other 17 rasboras that show no signs of issues? Thanks everyone. Sorry for the long post. I felt the back story about the filter might be important. I appreciate your advice!

I guess I forgot to reply to this... this is AMAZING!!! Yeah I'm gonna be addicted to this. So far, mine are doing ok - I see thin little roots at the bottom of the cup which makes me sooooo excited! (Pic below - they look bushier too!!!) Also, the crypts I left in their pots in the tanks are still alive and doing ok. I've planted about half into aquasoil, and they melted back a little but not too much. So I really feel comfortable saying that, at least for my tanks where the parameters are on the "extreme" side (aquasoil, pH 6.0-6.4, KH 1-2, GH-6, temp 76-78), crypts do much better acclimating if I leave them in their rock wool and pots for a few weeks before planting them.

I’m glad!! I think they are perfect for a nano fish tank. Probably the bigger the tank, the more you need for them to feel safe. I found that the more the plants grew in (that is, the less empty space there was) the more colorful they got.

For sure!!! I think they don’t get full color until they are fully grown.

Yeah there’s no filter or increase in vibrance/saturation here - this is really how they look! I’ve had them maybe a year and a half. They only got this colorful after I moved them to this tank (maybe 4 months after I got them). The tank has a sponge filter and a lot of plants, including floating ones. They never hide. There are about 13 in that 7.5 gallon and there aren’t any bigger fish with them. I think they just feel comfy.

Yep...alas, here we are many inventions and improvements later, and death is still just a part of life.

Challenge accepted, LOL. My nano-est nano fish!

This is adorable. I think I might just start calling them "gukkies," too. Too cute!

This is 99% of the reason why I will not get another dog after my old boy is gone. "The decision" has never been taken out of hands, and as a spiritual (but not religious) person, it's hard sometimes not to resent the "invisible hand(s)" for this fact. I've had dogs all my life; there's a very obvious shift when "it's time" and I've always felt it my duty to minimize suffering so I do take on "the decision" responsibility...but geez just for once I would like one of my beloved pets to go peacefully in their sleep when the time comes. Preferably while I'm around, so they're with me and not alone.

It's kind of my dream to feel this kind of peace about an animal passing. I worry so much during my fishes' lives that I'm providing them with the most "natural" of habitats (and I'm not even talking about water parameters...just like, do my fish feel safe and not stressed in their environment, are they hungry, etc.), When one of them dies, I almost never know why...and it bothers me because I don't think any of them (so far) have lived out their full lifespan when they go. I've had a few jump before I got lids; I feel especially horrible about that. The worst was a panda garra I had shipped. It was recommended for my 17-gal, and what arrived was a 3-inch fish. WAY too big for my 17-gallon with plants and hardscape - just not nearly enough swimming room. But there he was...I couldn't very well leave him in the bag. So I got him in there and pulled out my bigger 45-gal to set that up for him over the next couple of days. Overnight he tank surfed his way out of the tank...I was heart-broken. I almost gave up fish at that point. That was my first loss, too. Most recently, just last week I got 5 halfbeaks (also online) and I followed their acclimatization instructions instead of Cory's. They had me drop acclimatize for 1-1.5 hr, monitoring for signs of distress. 3 of them died the next day, and I know it was all my fault. Now I know halfbeaks cannot handle that acclimatization the way other fish can, and from now on I will always just follow Cory's way. Even with my dogs, all but one have died from old age and I still don't feel at peace about it. I think I just have difficulties with the idea of death and I experience a lot of guilt when I'm the caretaker.

@OutBout ok here is my first experiment in high humidity environment! I found that box at my local Target and I had just received this C. ferruginea 'Sekadauensis'. I didn't have enough aquasoil so cover the whole bottom of the tupperware, so I used these takeout cups, filled water up to the top of the soil line (the leaves are not underwater but the roots are) and poured a layer of water in the bottom of the temperature to keep the humidity high. What do you think? Do I also need to mist these guys? I'm also busy on the other experiment - I put some potted crypts in my tank that doesn't have aquasoil in it. But it would be better to have first added the crushed coral...waiting till next pay period to place my Co-op order because there's a lot of stuff I want to get anyway!!! Once I do that, I'll get some Co-Op crypts, another 10 gal, and set up that experiment. Then I can compare inert substrate+crushed coral, inert substrate, and aquasoil. Not a perfect experiment but it'll do. Now, someone give me some ideas of where I can hide this extra tank from my partner.

@TheSwissAquarist I love the tank in your post!!!! That looks amazing. Really beautifully scaped and I love your choice of fish inhabitants. This is a great post. I love reading about other peoples' history and experience in the hobby! As a child I loved the 29-gallon fish tank in my dentist's office, and when I was in middle school they offered it to my family, and my parents agreed (one of the BEST DAYS EVER!). I kept the tank through high school, and stopped in college because I went away from home to school. I read everything there was to read about freshwater aquariums and tried my hardest to grow plants but never could (I still don't know why I couldn't, to be honest). I experimented a lot, but I had very little budget and back in the late 90s/early 2000s the internet wasn't what it is now. I got back into the hobby in late 2020 - my partner helped me build an aquarium stand and I really wanted to try aquascaping because I was so inspired by Takashi Amano. Fast-forward 2 yrs and now I have 3 tanks, almost 4, and none of them are aquascaped (anymore - they started out that way though), but they do have a lot of plants. I love all my fish. Parasphromenus sp. (licorice gouramis), Sphaerichthys sp. (chocolate and vaillant gouramis), Hemirhamphodon sp. (little halfbeaks), Sundadanio sp. (neon rasboras?), chili rasboras, and Trigonostigma hengeli (glowlight rasbora maybe?), and habrosus and Adolfoi corydoras. They are all amazing, with distinct behaviors and little personalities. My job is stressful, and I find fishkeeping a very relaxing hobby. I can't think of an absolute favorite fish (species or individual fish). But all my gouramis are extremely fun because they beg for food.