Will Billy

Flat out honest, i have an incredibly dangerous job. I give thanks that i come home everyday in one piece and spend time with my family. But when i have my moments from being super dad, and i have my quiet repose in my mancave with my fish tank. Only 1 thing is better than watching my fish pets swim around like floating angels in a 3D aquatic world, with their tiny but beautiful splendor. That 1 thing is watching my daughters face light up as we learn and bond over this amazing hobby together. The look of wonder in her eyes as i answer her 10 million questions about our fish pets. Yep, thats what makes me happy.

You know, ive thought about this a lot, but havent had a chance to respond to it yet. It would be a low tech tank, but i would still have a small sponge filter for the trifecta of water movement, filtration, and oxygenation. I have often contemplated taking a 20 gallon long, and taking the plunge into a dirt substrate. I think i would do a carpeting plant across the entire bottom. Maybe something like monte carlo, or S repens. Just a field of green, with a few spots broken up with some dark slate rock and some bits of drift wood. Glue some water column plants like java moss to the slate and some anubias to the driftwood. And top it off with some simple floaters like giant duckweed or red root floaters. Keep the stocking simple with bladder snails, some cherry shrimp, pygmy corys, and oto cats for cleaners, and some neons and harlequin rasboras for my pretties, with a dwarf gourami for my centerpiece. I think (and i may be deluding myself here) if i were to properly maintain the soil, and detritus i could primarily depend on the plants for filtration, with the 1 small sponge filter helping with my bacteria, oxygen / CO2, and water movement. Being honest though im quite nervous to try a dirt substrate tank.

CT_ is correct, seachem equilibrium boosts your GH, and seachem alkaline buffer boosts your KH. A few things i will caution you about tho. Alkaline buffer will boost your KH, but it will also boost your PH too. Those 2 are interdependent. Your KH of 35.8 is low, but as Koi points out, are you having health problems with your fish? Are you having problems introducing new fish? If you arent having any issues, i wouldnt fix whats not broken. Especially if you have otocinclus catfish. Otos are not the best adapters to wild changing water parameters like some other fish. Wild swings in PH or temperature isnt good for any fish technically, but especially otos. Have you tested your tap water? If your tap water is the origin of your problem, and you adjust your PH and KH, you will have to continually adjust it with every water change. Thats gonna be a bit extra hassle, and more bottles of alkaline buffer ( more money spent ), with every water change. If you are having issues, i am un-aware of any natural way to boost just your KH without also boosting GH too. Off the top of my head alkaline buffer is the only solution i can come up with.

Back when i got back in to the hobby after a 20 something year break. I successfully cycled my tank, and started slowly introducing fish to my tank. Why it didnt dawn on me at the time, but when i replaced my first filter cartridge, the directions said rinse the carbon dust off. Thats exactly what i did. I ran it under my chlorinated tap water to remove the dust per instructions, and stuck the wet chlorinated filter cartridge right in my filter. My poor fish rode an ammonia wave, followed by a nitrite wave, followed by me performing extra water changes while my nitrogen cycle restarted itself. I knew better at the time, i just didnt think. Most fish survived, my poor pygmy hatchet fish didnt. 😥

I will admit ive watched a lot of youtube videos, and read a lot of online materials, and when it comes to the topic of top 10 cleaning crew, i feel like the mighty little pest snail often gets overlooked. I have 2 rather large mystery snails in my tank, but i have aquired some bladder snails from my LFS through hitch hiking in on some live plant purchases. Pound for pound it has been my observation that these rapidly reproducing snails put in more work and have less bio load than my large mystery snails. Their small size allows them to get into nooks and crannies my fat large mystery snails cant get to. Much like my schooling otocinclus cats, they tag team my tank at impressive speeds when working together. The biggest downside to these “ pest snails “, is what i find the most invaluable aspect to them. They reproduce quickly and a colony can get out of control if your tank conditions are just right for it. These snails populations can easily be controlled by food, or more specifically a lack there of. When food sources for these snails gets scarce, they begin to starve and stop breeding, and when there is an abundance of food the population explodes. It is this trait that i find the most invaluable. I use it sorta like a check engine light on my tank. Not only is a population explosion an early indicator of an algae problem i havent noticed yet, but the snails have already mobilized and are meeting the problem head on before i have had a chance to react. And finally the best thing by far is my community of bladder snails were 100% free of charge. You cant beat that value. For all the benefits of these tiny little work horses and they were a free bonus from purchasing my plants. They have earned there keep 1,000 times over vs my large mystery snails. It might just be my jaded opinion on the matter, but hands down i think they are the best cleaning crew critter you could ever have. 10/10 i highly recommend.

If im not mistaken, it appears to be staghorn algae. From the picture it looks like you may also have the beginnings of some black beard algae forming as well. You can treat it with some 3% hydrogen peroxide, or Seachem flourish excel. Here is a link that will better help you understand the root causes of your algae problem, as treatment will get rid of it short term, but a little knowledge and preventative measures is cheaper and goes a long way. I keep this website book marked as it is a great resource that i return to quite often. https://www.2hraquarist.com/blogs/algae-control

When i had bacopa, it seemed that it wasnt a super fast growing plant, but is was definitely faster than anubias. I do recall it took them a while to get established to their home, but once they did they took right off and were quite happy and grew tall. Mine wernt tiny baby plants when i got them though. They were already established. What are your water parameters and what kind and how much light do you have?

That is super cool and cute!!! I love it.

Here is a pic of one of my babies. Their names are Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious and Bob.

I feel like they should be good then, i would still keep a watchful eye just to be certain. Im pretty sure its food related. I have had instances where it wasnt quite aggressive behavior per say, but i have seen my dojos kinda push my cory doras out of the way getting to an algae wafer. Best way to a dojo loaches heart is through his stomach. Ive trained mine to eat bottom feeder pellets from my hand, and they let me and my daughter pet them from time to time.

Thats the fastest and easiest way to quickly cycle your quarantine / hospital tank if you need to set it up in a hurry, If you dont keep it running all the time.

I have 2 golden dojo loaches in a 55 gal nano community tank and they get along great with neons, rasboras, guppies and even guppy fry. My guppies are breeding like crazy and the dojos dont bother the tiny babies that i know could easily fit in their mouth. Shrimp are another story, i have none in my tank and they are the reason why. My dojos do come up and peck at my hand while doing water changes. They are light pecks, almost like kisses lol. Do they seem aggressive in their behavior or are they lightly plucking at them? Do they have enough food? Most hobbyist focus on not overfeeding, in my experience you have to try very hard to overfeed a dojo loach. Mine are like greedy pigs. They come up and eat at the surface while i feed my other fish, and when most the food is gone they are constantly scouring my tank like living gravel vacs. Except for when they are sleeping they are non stop rummaging around for food. Other than that, sometimes some fish have different attitudes and personalities. I got a buddy with an oscar that is a down right cold blooded killer, and my brother has an oscar that is pretty friendly with fish less than half his size. Both are oscars, but are behaviorally complete opposites.

To be fare, so you can formulate your own informed opinion. It is quite possible, and undoubtedly there are many people who do not quarantine. Your success or failure from not quarantining involves no skill at all, it is pure luck at that point. Ive gotten many fish from my favorite LFS with no problems, and only once did i get a small ich outbreak. But thats just my experience, and that makes it difficult to formulate a statistical probability. My LFS may deal with a more reputable whole seller than your LFS. Maybe your LFS has better quarantine procedures than mine. With so many unknown variables i stick to what i can calculate. I add up the price tag of all my fish and plants together and compare it to the price tag of a cheap plastic tub an extra filter with an airstone and a small heater. My quarantine / hospital tank cost me about $30 maybe $35, is totally reusable, and multi purposed. When not in use as a quarantine tank, ive cured driftwood in it, and have it stored away in a closet ready for an emergency hospital tank. For a one time, up front cost of $35 that is definitely cheaper than all my fish put together before counting up my live plants. Here is my quarantine tank.

Not 10 minutes after making that post, the aforementioned cracked test tube just came apart into 2 pieces trying to remove the cap. Perhaps the universe is trying to tell me something lol.

You know, that is quite simple and intelligent. As i sit here now carefully placing my wobbly test tubes on my table to begin my water test, staring at the one tube that has a small crack in it from where it had previously fallen over. I realize i need this little invention in my life.

One trick ive seen on a youtube video, where this guy had 30 tanks. He would use the double barrel sponge filters so he could swap one sponge and seed a new tank with beneficial bacteria. If you got 30 tanks like that guy, then i see a clear advantage to the double barrel sponge filter, otherwise the difference in filtration ability is hardly noticeable.

Well lets see how we can help. I saw your other post about the tiger barb i believe it was with the cloudy eye. Am i correct in assuming both fish are in the same tank? If so there may be a bit more to unpack there. To begin, it is a little difficult to make accurate diagnosis in a picture. You may be able to more accurately diagnose then i could, with some simple internet searches. I wouldnt want to freak you out and say, “ that looks like red spot disease” when it could be a parasite or an infected wound from scraping something sharp. Since you have a planted tank i would highly advise you to have a quarantine / hospital tank. I have one so in case i need to dose aquarium salt (which is bad for certain plant species) i am not dosing my planted tank with fish medicine. If both of your infected barbs are from the same tank you might have something going on in your tank water. In which case you can reverse and separate your plants to the quarantine tank and dose medicines to your main tank with your fish only. Keep in mind some medicines may need to be removed after treatment is completed with activated carbon in your filter. If you dont have a quarantine / hospital tank you can make one on the cheap with a plastic tote. Here are some pictures of mine and accompanying equipment. I used tape on the side to mark 1 gallon increments for more accurate medicine dosing, and drilled holes in the top for air exchange, and cut a slit on the corner for tubing and wires. This tote is 53 L, and only cost me $5 U.S. Hopefully somebody else can help you diagnose the problem. I wish you luck with your little barbs.

Thats so wonderful to get a care package out the blue like that. Congrats to Alesha, ADMWNDSR83, and Fish Folk ! I said it before, and i’ll say it again, I love this community, for all the help and advice we share with each other. Enjoy your gifts my fellow nerms.

I think i got it figured out now. What i finally landed on was to use the 1 inch thick sponge pad just like before, but instead of using exact same size polly floss in front that went all the way to the bottom, i cut the floss in half and cut another block of sponge filter for the other half. I then had to trim the new piece of sponge down to about 1/4 inch thickness and stuffed it at the bottom underneath the floss and placed the half sized floss on top, in front of the full sized sponge. So far it has solved my overflow problem, ima give it some time and see how well it performs. If anybody has any thoughts, ideas, or suggestions, im all ears.

Yeah, i was wondering about that too. Just trying to figure out the most efficient way without causing massive overflow. Albeit 2 small strips is less material off the large piece of floss i purchased vs the 1 big piece. Surely there has to be a more efficient way. Dang aqueon, i like it because there is no priming like an aqua clear and it is incredibly quiet. The filter box is just so dang small.

So i recently purchased from the co op some sponge pads and filter floss to optimize my aqueon quiet flow 20 filters. I wanted to keep using filter floss to help polish water without the need of activated carbon or purigen. Doing the math, co op filter floss is much cheaper than the aqueon cartridges. In my first attempt i sized up a piece of sponge and filter floss and placed it in the tiny (compared to other brand hobs) space the disposable cartridge would go and i had quit a bit of overflow. Removing the sponge did not reduce the overflow, meaning the filter floss was too much blockage just by itself. For now my latest work around (depicted below) is 2 small pieces of floss before the sponge instead of 1 big piece after the sponge. Would this setup work? Are there any flaws i should be aware of placing the floss in front of the sponge vs behind it?

I always quarantine, no matter the source. To quote one of our fellow members Maggie, “an ounce of prevention is worth more than a pound of cure.” I have rarely had issues, but the only way to be certain is to quarantine. And yes I quarantine my plants too.

Hmm, interesting. I was looking at that one because i have flakes and crumbles for my nano fish, and i use bottom feeder pellets and algae wafers for my cleaning crew. I thought that one would be best for mixing different types of food vs the rotating cylinder looking ones. My only concern now is that i have nearly max stocked 55 gallon of nano fish plus 2 dojo loaches. Now im not sure each chamber would hold enough food for everybody. ( especially the dojos, they are glutenous pigs lol)

I have never used an auto feeder before, and was just looking at some online and on amazon. I was wondering if anyone has ever used these devices before? Did they work well? Are there features i should look for in a good model vs a more mediocre model? Or are they even worth the time or money? Any thoughts and opinions are more than welcome. *oops, i thought i was in the general thread, didnt mean to post it to the plants thread. *

Wow! Good call there Marko, I learned something new today. Apparently some people aqua scape with the stuff too. Not sure how invasive it is tho. Here is a comparable pic i found.