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Odd Duck

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Everything posted by Odd Duck

  1. Odd Duck
    I’ve been contemplating putting opae ula into my 2 gallon jar but haven’t pulled the trigger on it yet since I NEED to get my mountain of a fishroom project done first. I’m considering putting it on the dining room table for hubby’s entertainment - he doesn’t know this yet. He sits at the table and watches videos whenever he’s not in the garage fiddling with “stuff”. I figure watching cute little shrimp moving around will be a good break from videos. 😆
  2. Odd Duck
    Always plants.
  3. Odd Duck
    If Spike isn’t improving significantly by the time you’ve done the full deworming, then try Maracyn-2 in the water if he isn’t eating, in food if he will eat.
  4. Odd Duck
    Anything that can help is worth trying, but as @Colusaid, there will be bacteria in the substrate, etc. In regard to the fenbendazoleor flubendazole, I would directly substitute for levamisole. You can absolutely do the every other day for 5 days, then repeat in 3 weeks. The goal is to reduce the parasite load right away but also to catch the parasites at the right stage in their life cycle where the drug can affect them.
  5. Odd Duck
    So funny that he’s showing off and trying to be all enticing and sexy and she just wants a snack. 😆 This guy. Every time I see him. And this guy.
  6. Odd Duck
    I agree with @Colu, worth trying the switch to fenbendazole or flubendazole. These would be in place of the levamisole. It would also be worth trying to “crowd out” any mycobacterium present by dosing heavily with beneficial bacteria. FritzZyme 7 is a good one but would be pricy to dose heavy and daily for any length of time. Some of us have been playing with pond beneficial bacteria since it’s cheaper and more concentrated. Try PondWorks, dosing at twice the label dose and dose daily for at least 2 weeks. It appears to have some immune boosting effects as far as we can tell. To make it easier for you, I dose at 2 mls per 10 gallons and have used higher doses without worrying a bit about using too much other than I make certain the tank is well aerated. If that doesn’t help, then you’ll have to go nuclear - replace substrate, spray the entire inside of the tank and all hardscape thoroughly with straight peroxide. Clean the filter and spray with peroxide or soak in peroxide. Replace all filter media with new. Soak all plants in seltzer water for at least 3 hours (6 might be better, this isn’t something we tested against). You can’t “disinfect” the fish, of course. It’s impossible to prevent mycobacteria in the tank, but keeping fish as healthy and stress free as possible is the best thing you can do to minimize risk.
  7. Odd Duck
    So sorry. Always a tough loss.
  8. Odd Duck
    @Colu exactly on point again. And Maracyn 2 can be in the water or in the food. With a cloudy eye, I tend to go in the water since since the blood doesn’t really circulate through the cornea. Beware what the antibiotics can do to your biofiltration. Take pics if you can so it’s easier to compare daily.
  9. Odd Duck
    What are you doing for fertilizer? The leaves should not be this pale unless this is a new Java fern variety I’ve never seen. Nearly all varieties have medium to dark green leaves. A few, rare varieties have slightly lighter green and some even develop a bit of orange on the tips with enough light. But these leaves don’t look like those varieties. Can you tell us more about your tank, lights, fertilizer, parameters, filtration, bioload, livestock, etc? We can give smarter advice if we know more about your set up.
  10. Odd Duck
    I prevent mine flowering since they always die back quite a bit afterwards and they’re messy when flowering. I let mine flower once and it looked like I was going to get seed but I probably missed a step (should have done more reading) and didn’t get plantlets.
  11. Odd Duck
    Sorry to hear you’re having back issues. That’s a lousy feeling. Hope you’re feeling better soon!
  12. Odd Duck
    Have you tried the pumps with the fluidized bed to see how they do? I would probably try to arrange the tanks so that you could have one pump running one of the fluidized beds plus whatever other airstones you wanted on 2 tanks. Then the other pump running the other fluidized bed and the airstones for the other 2 tanks. A few airstones are going to be minimal draw on pumps that size and the rest of the air would go to the fluidized bed. Have a big battery UPS on each air pump so power outages are as covered as you can make them short of a generator. Diaphragm pumps will fight each other, so don’t put them on the same air manifold. You can put 2 linear air pumps on the same system but not diaphragm type pumps. If you haven’t purchased the air pumps yet, I would consider buying a small linear air pump. It’s going to be much less pump noise overall. It won’t be less air noise (you can reduce that by only producing fine bubbles), but the pump itself will be significantly quieter. It would be more cost in the short term but likely to be much less cost in the long run from better durability than diaphragm airpumps. https://www.amazon.com/ALITA-INDUSTRIES-Air-Pump-LPM/dp/B006H5WNBQ/ref=sr_1_3?crid=OUWMKC1RSMJX&keywords=alita%2Bair%2Bpump%2Bal-15a&qid=1700842661&sprefix=Alita-15%2Caps%2C119&sr=8-3&ufe=app_do%3Aamzn1.fos.304cacc1-b508-45fb-a37f-a2c47c48c32f&th=1 This is the same brand that ACO sells, just their smaller version. Edit to add that I have this exact airpump but only recently finally set it up. It’s currently running 14 drops/lines but some of the drops are split up to 3 airstones or bubblers per tank. Overall, running at least 20 airstones or other air outlets. It could easily run more, possibly (hopefully) as much as double that. It will get moved into my fish room (if I ever finally get that done) when this rack gets moved. I’m expecting it to run my whole fish room with about double the total drops/airstones - 8 more tanks and 2-3 jars, one bubbler on each jar, 5 tanks with single drops, 1 deep tank with 2 drops, and 2 deep-ish tanks with 3 airstones in each.
  13. Odd Duck
    Use what you can get and the aquarium salt and give her pristine water for the best chance. I’ve seen some miraculous recoveries, so it’s worth the extra effort, for sure. Here’s hoping for the best.
  14. Odd Duck
    So well said and a far better business model than so many out there! Thank you for doing what you do! And Happy Thanksgiving!
  15. Odd Duck
    Agree with @Colu but add there could also have been n injury which is impacting the health. I have to,be honest, it’s a bit of a long shot to get this kiddo back to good health, but it is still worth trying. Keep us posted on any changes.
  16. Odd Duck
    Solid advice from @Colu. If the low dose of Epsom salt isn’t working, you can do a higher dose as the brief “bath”. As much as 1 tablespoon per gallon but must be watched like a hawk the entire time for this bath, especially for whiptails. I would tend to look for a male first, before going high dose on the Epsom salt, as long as she eats and acts fine otherwise. The color of that belly makes me think she’s excessively eggy and possibly getting toward egg bound. Fish often won’t eat when truly egg bound.
  17. Odd Duck
    They are very nearly interchangeable in their actions. Sometimes one will be more effective than the other or vice versa, but with appropriate dosing I would consider them essentially interchangeable until proven otherwise on a specific case.
  18. Odd Duck
    I have been known to leave the room, wait a bit, then crawl back into the room (with room lights out, of course) below the level of the bottom of the tank. Then have phone camera ready and slowly lift it up to where the fish can be seen and click away until I have a half decent pic. I often forget to delete the bad pics so it’s no wonder I have so many bad fish pics on my phone! Plus sometimes I keep bad pics of specific events like seeing a male pleco on eggs so I have the date for laying and can predict the best date reasonably well for pulling babies. Then I forget to delete those bad pics. 🤷🏻‍♀️
  19. Odd Duck
    All of what @Colu said except the Metroplex for now, see below for the reason, but I would ask if there’s anyway you can get a pic straight down over him/her since that might be helpful. It also might not be helpful with the fish that bloated. I can’t tell either if egg bound or bloated for other reasons. Try the fasting as suggested but I would hold off a couple days on Metroplex just in case it’s eggs she can lay (if it is a she) since metronidazole can cause birth defects in other animals. Everything else I would do exactly as suggested. If she is female and can lay the eggs and if you have a male, she might just need the right incentive. Do you have appropriate caves? My understanding is they like very narrow ones, or very flat I guess I should say. I’ve also heard they like wood caves so a very flat piece of driftwood that’s slightly hollow underneath. And they like some current through the cave or at least across the mouth of the cave. I’ve been contemplating getting some whiptails. 🤷🏻‍♀️
  20. Odd Duck
    I’m so sorry for your loss. I would be incredibly bummed and have tanks melt down and total loss before. It’s awful! If those were the only fish, I would drain the tank as low as possible. Pull all plants and soak in seltzer water for 3 hours (look into Reverse Respiration). Then I would spray the inside of the tank and everything non-living with straight 3% peroxide. I would clean out the filter, discard the biofiltration, and disinfect the filter itself with peroxide and essentially start over. If there are live shrimp, snails, fish, anything in the tank, I would instead try to bolster the immune system by using beneficial bacteria, like FritzZyme 7, as much as you can afford at the highest dose on the label. There are some that use bottled bacteria at an even higher rate, but you should add extra aeration any time you dose BB’s, especially if you add high dose. A few of us have been fiddling with some testing and I have converted to being a believer in some brands with FritzZyme 7 being one of them. Don’t lose heart, it will get better!
  21. Odd Duck
    I’m so very proud of you! Congratulations - well deserved! Following along has been so fascinating and a true privilege. Plus your tank is gorgeous, of course! What a nice dedication and tribute to @gjcarew! You are an exceptional human to work so hard and be so dedicated to your goal, then have the consideration and take time to dedicate it to your friend and mentor. Someone on this forum inspires me in one way or another, every time I start reading. Today, it was you! You have inspired me to keep pushing forward, keep learning, and keep working towards the ideal. Even if you don’t think things are going perfectly, you might be surprised at what you can create or achieve. This is what I need to tell myself and yes, I know I’ve told you essentially that many times. 😆 We should all be easier on ourselves and more forgiving to ourselves. We are almost always our own worst critics. We need to practice kindness to ourselves more often. Keep up the good work and I can’t wait to see next year’s entry!
  22. Odd Duck
    I missed that you did 2 full scoops. AE isn’t “beneficial bacteria” in the same way as the beneficials that are part of biofiltration. It’s food for shrimp, but doesn’t benefit the filtration and I have heard of it upsetting the balance on tanks before. So we may have a situation where it’s a combo of factors that came into play. I suspect the move dropped some biofiltration capacity, the substrate change dropped some capacity, the dying leaves from plant transition added bioload, and the AE added bioload and the sum total was too much for the tank to process. You should be OK if you can keep up with water changes and hopefully the added biofiltration bacteria will tip the balance for you in the right direction. Just make sure you have some extra aeration for a while as the new bacteria establish.
  23. Odd Duck
    They look fertile so far! You’ll know in the next couple days.
  24. Odd Duck
    I agree with @Fish Folk, these numbers don’t say fully cycled to me. The only dates where you have 0-0.25 on ammonia are the first 2 dates you started recording values. The rest all have at least 0.25 or higher. It looks like you had a couple small spikes but haven’t fully converted yet. Your ammonia and nitrites should be really no doubt they’re zero, especially nitrite. The ammonia can be a bit tricky if you have chloramines in your water you can get that in between tint, but nitrite isn’t tricky at all. It should be clear, obvious, light blue, no purple at all. If in doubt, stand the tube on a white part of the test card and look down through the tube with good lightning. That will concentrate the color so you can see the true color more clearly. I suspect moving the tank stirred up the mulm and has caused a spike. Did you keep your biofiltration media wet during the move? If it dried out, it’s going to take time to come back on line. Bacteria take time to grow, especially the ones that act in the nitrite to nitrate stage. Do water changes as needed, don’t clean your filter, and use Prime. If you have another tank that can “donate” filter squeezings, do that and make sure it gets into your filter. Or try some bottled bacteria like FritzZyme 7.
  25. Odd Duck
    This won’t be fun, but you might try pulling it out and see what happens with your parameters. Put it in a bucket to keep it wet then test your water parameters in your bucket after it’s been in there for a few days. If your bucket water climbs and your tank sorts out, you probably need to soak the wood for a few weeks outside the tank or boil the wood a couple more times at least. I would have thought any problem would have shown up much sooner so I don’t think it’s highly likely the wood. But there’s nothing else I can think of that hasn’t been covered already.
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