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Fish Folk

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Everything posted by Fish Folk

  1. Fish Folk
    I'd love to someday turn a 55 gal or 75 gal into a native North American species tank. I'd love to keep Rainbow Darters along with a school of Rainbow Shiners, if they'd all get along. As for why not yet? Well . . . finishing up goal of Advanced Breeder Award (BAP) with my fish club, and all tanks are dedicated to that presently. Plus, I'd like to tear down a lot of the nano tanks I've got, and invest in a larger tank. So it's a matter of goals . . . time . . . and transitioning. We only have a couple tanks that could possibly work, and they're already occupied. Would rather wait until one of these can be recommissioned rather than buying more tanks. Mom is . . . not a fan of more tanks . . . 😅
  2. Fish Folk
    We added a small school of Brilliant Rasboras to a 20 gal long with a breeding pari of Kribensis to get them out from hiding. Worked like a charm! Those Kribs raised two batches of fry, and never bothered the rasboras. Got a small school of neon tetras to help bring some Apistogramma bitaeniata we were trying to spawn out of hiding. Worked well -- got the apistos out, and really happy. But when the apistos spawned and started to escort fry around the tank, the Cardinals turned into sharks and ate the fry. So we tried a school of young coral red pencil fish instead . . . but they just hated our water, and the whole school died off.
  3. Fish Folk
    There's an old proverb: "When the student is ready, the teacher will appear." I started getting really into this hobby a few years ago, and began watching a lot of YouTube videos. At first, I watched certain (unnamed) high-energy, high-intensity YouTubers. They definitely amped up my interest in the hobby, but over time I ended up sitting on the couch riveted to watching this dude just sit and talk about fish for hours at a time. This guy from somewhere out in Washington State . . . totally transformed my hobby. Then one day, he showed up at our fish club in Virginia! I'd say that the brand Aquarium Co-Op, and this whole forum exists for the purpose of aquatic education. HUGE THANK YOU CO-OP TEAM!
  4. Fish Folk
    Sorry to hear... Photos might be helpful. You might also try posting this under the heading about fish sickness and disease. It is possible she has bloat / dropsy. We have lost a few fish to that. A combination of factors can cause the bacterial infection. Mollys of the balloon variety can be hard to diagnose. If you have before and current photos to compare, that might help.
  5. Fish Folk
    Fascinating! Looks like they look interesting when mature. March 2012 TFH mag cover photo - Chinese Vermilion Goby.
  6. Fish Folk
    Hmm . . . I've not heard of this practice. Perhaps it is about how large of a container the fry are growing out in. If they are growing in a tiny jar or specimen container, it may be that the assumption is that in the absence of biological filtration, the betta fry require clean water to grow properly. But you're using a 10 gal aquarium, so I'd imagine the problem is not this. What I've seen, in general, is that the fry do well when the water level begins fairly low in the 10 gal. tank. Seasoned / treated water is then gradually added to increase the overall volume as the fry grow, their labyrinth organ is formed, and they are stronger swimmers.
  7. Fish Folk
    Had a guy in our region, on a different water system, who was getting high levels of ammonia in tap water. Would “age” tap water awhile in large heavy duty trash can that had the bottom filled with lots of bacteria-colonized red lava rock. (Could probably just use a ton of bio thingys used in sumps) His goal was to lower the ammonia some before adding. (Probably could use a few primed sponge filters too... the aeration would circulate water and gas off unwanted chems, etc)
  8. Fish Folk
    Yeah, saw this (I think) with our discus he other day. We changed water at night after lights out, and they were acting pretty stressed ("bendy") the next day. Good tip on cold water / excess gasses.
  9. Fish Folk
    This happens to us occasionally. But when, from the same can the odd batch doesn't properly hatch while others before and after come out fine, the trouble is usually that the bubbler is not adequately dropped to the bottom of the hatchery, and / or that the salt crystals are not properly dissolving into the water column. Try taking a coffee-mug, putting HOT water in it, and vigorously stirring the measured aquarium salt into it until it completely dissolves. Then, add that to your empty hatchery and top off the rest with cold water to render a tepid (room-temp) solution. Then add the brine shrimp, eggs. Be sure that your airline / bubbler reaches all the way to the bottom of the hatchery. A rigid airline is preferable, as it doesn't coil up and keep the eggs from churning. If this doesn't work . . . then I've got no ideas! 😂
  10. Fish Folk
    The other night, I did a late water change after the lights had gone out. In the morning, several fish were struggling like I’d never seen before. They were pointed at bottom, gills “breathing” heavily... almost looking like something was wrong with their swim bladder. By the end of the day, they’d come through ... but it got me thinking about this topic. I’d love to know who all really ages their water? How do they do it? And what are their reasons?
  11. Fish Folk
    So... questions for supr nerms on the forum: What’s the deal with “aging water”? Is it to let chloramine gas off? Stabilize pH? Rest so that gasses can surface? Confession... we don’t “age” or “rest” our water before doing water changes. We’re pretty consistent with changing our water on most tanks. Not sure we’ve ever had problems. But I’m trying to learm, so bring on the nerm!
  12. Fish Folk
    Yes! Spawning behavior. She may lose her stripe too, and go mostly yellow. She’ll do that awhile. With Apistos, it’s the females that determine when it’s time to spawn.
  13. Fish Folk
    We keep and breed mostly small tropical fish. But when we first came across the Electric Blue Acaras in our LFS, we got a "fish crush" and determined to get some . . . and try to get them to make more! We bought 4x moderately small, and fortunately a pair formed. Here are our breeding journals prepared for our fish club BAP. The Andinoacara pulcher is a sweet, colorful, mostly peaceful mid-sized cichlid.
  14. Fish Folk
    If that's wisteria, it's grown emersed. Those leaves will change if it's now growing underwater. I think your algae troubles may be due to (1) tank is trying to figure out how to balance -- assuming it's newly set up (2) it appears like you have a lot of light. Maybe dim the light (we use black cupboard liners from WalMart cut too fit) or lower the exposure time of the light. Did you pull that wood from outside? Or purchase as wood for scaping? You may find that wood brought in from the out-of-doors tends to bring along a lot of interesting stuff . . . that may or may not be good over the long haul. We always boil anything brought in from the outdoors before putting into our tank. And even then . . . we cautious! If you're really not happy with algae, and want to cleanse your wood, you can pull the hardscape, and squirt on H2O2 (hydrogen peroxide). Let it sit out of the tank then for a bit, wash off, and put back in. That's at least how we deal with blackbeard algae. Just avoid trying to use H2O2 _inside_ the tank water. That can be problematic. Always does outside the tank. But, hey if you're breeding fish, algae is good to have! Stocking-wise . . . I'd recommend considering just Fancy Guppies and Bristlenose. If you're still bored, add neocaridinia shrimp. (Cherry Shrimp, etc.) Make a little rock pile of medium sized rocks in a back corner for the shrimp to hole up in to colonize.
  15. Fish Folk
    What are all the fish in your community tank? I’m seeing tail that looks bit. May have gotten caught as a secondary issue??
  16. Fish Folk
    Preston John got it! Was just going to guess petrified wood. So cool that it shows up near you. Jealous!
  17. Fish Folk
    Once they’re free-swimming, they’ll need to be fed. They can survive a bit on remainder of yolk sack, but rams go through that fast, especially if your water temp is above 80 degrees. What we do is mix a bit of sera micron fry powder into a cup of tank water as one source of food, and also try feeding some newly hatched bbs. Here’s a video illustrating how we do this for rams:
  18. Fish Folk
    You'll know if you shine a flashlight in there at night and see a mass of orange eggs!
  19. Fish Folk
    Well, this info comes courtesy of advanced breeders in several clubs we’ve been a part of (PVAS, MAKO). The general way it’s described to us is this: (1) Using a funnel, squeeze about 1-2 inches of gross stuff out of your sponge into a 1-2 liter container (polar spring water bottle, or large clear wine bottle) (2) fill up the rest of the container with “clean” tank water (3) let rest for a day or so. The solid particulates fall to bottom, bacteria blooms (cloudy water) and infusoria— which eat the bacteria— begin to “clean” / “clear” the cloudy water. If you have an excellent magnifying glass and proper lighting, you may be able to _barely_ make out the infusoria wiggling around. (4) harvest using an airline piece attached to a syringe. Do not over feed this... it can cause problems. If this method makes you nervous, you can always check out Mark’s Aquatics video on making infusoria the “stinky / smelly” way:
  20. Fish Folk
    Most helpful video I found specifically about the Aphanius mento: Jimmy made a quality video, overviewing killifish with annuals featured as part of the discussion: For an instructive, general introduction for beginners to killifish, Bob Bock in our fish club (PVAS) posted a beginner's guide:
  21. Fish Folk
    Not sure. But, if you’ve never reached out to Greg by e-mail, you definitely need that merit badge! His e-mail replies are legendarily helpful!!!
  22. Fish Folk
    Just took a quick snap of our little school. They’re young yet... and SUPER ACTIVE!
  23. Fish Folk
    Yes! He’s got a few videos. Here’s a recent one:
  24. Fish Folk
    Cool! We got a school of BFTs recently. They're a lot of fun! If it's an established tank, we'd do this: [Prep] Be sure you're just running sponge filters. If all you've got is a hang-on-back, get a coarse pre-filter sponge. (1) Make sure you've got a thick amount of java moss across the bottom of the tank. (2) Let the adults spawn for a few days. (Live food triggers them) (3) Remove the adults / parents to another tank. They will predate on eggs and fry both. (4) The fry will be very small once they hatch. You may want to dim the lighting on the tank some. We use black cupboard liner material over the glass lids to diffuse light. (5) Once you see fry - they'll look like tiny shards of glass - you can feed on infusoria drawn from sponge filter squeezings (I can explain if you want), or grown in separate container using decomposing vegetables in tank water. You can also feed vinegar eels early on. We also use sera-micron dissolved in tank water. It may take a week or two before they'll be large enough to eat baby brine shrimp. If you want to see a similar set up, you can watch some of the videos on this forum under: Fish Breeding > Breeding Brilliant Rasboras Best of luck to you!!
  25. Fish Folk
    Good recommendation!
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