Odd Duck

I read LOTS! A little of everything. I am slightly addicted to YouTube but all kinds of different things, not just a few. We play paintball most every weekend that it isn’t too hot, too cold, or raining. We jetski when it’s too hot for paintball but not nearly as often as we used to when we were younger. We also ride 4 wheelers (not 4x4, racing style but we don’t officially race 😆). I’ve done loads of different hobbies over my life. I used to do a big variety of them, but not as much anymore. Some still come in useful sometimes - I designed and sewed up multi-layer cloth masks when we couldn’t even get surgical masks during COVID. Then modified the design to fit over the N-95’s that have vents in them so we wouldn’t be risking anybody else if we were contagious. I used some jewelry making tools to make veggie skewers for plecos that hook on the lid so I don’t have to stick my whole arm in the tank to retrieve the skewers. I’ve assisted the hubby with various engine and other mechanical assembly enough times that I’m pretty sure I could do an assembly myself as long as I had the right Chilton’s. The middle knuckle on my right hand will never be the same after mashing it replacing the stock rear end on our 1969 Dodge Coronet with a Dana. I know how to clearance bearing journals, use a torque wrench properly - one click, not 2, clearance rings, use a piston ring compressor, find top dead center, 18436572, mix BONDO, use a cheese grater, spray paint, block sand, color sand, wet sand, etc, etc, etc. I don’t even remember how many coats this thing got and I never did get around to doing the wet sanding. But I sanded for HOURS and HOURS doing prep. Ignore the scruffiness, this was shortly after completing most of it. I need to take a finished photo but we’re always at the lake when it’s out plus I never got that wet sand done. 😝 The stupid nose piece doesn’t fit right now due to layers of paint so I still need to work on it. 🤷🏻‍♀️ It’s got scratches now so that’s a bit demotivating on final finishing. A buddy managed to put a gouge in it the first time we took it out. We have the registration sticker over the gouge now.

Seltzer water soak for 3 hours. I tested Susswassertang in a sealed, mildly pressurized container. I renewed the seltzer water daily for 3 days. I was trying to kill duckweed and Wolffia - didn’t kill it but it did lift it up out of the Suss and Fiss so I could overflow the container and clear it. The Susswassertang (and some Fissidens fontanus) did just fine. If anything, it boosted its growth since it grew like mad even after transferring to a new tank which Suss doesn’t always like to do.

Is that driftwood new? Sometimes wood can be a source of ammonia / nitrites. Was it cleaned well and well aged?

Susswassertang. It’s essentially an immature, aquatic form of a terrestrial fern. It forms lovely mounds of bright green like this when it likes the conditions. It can be a bit picky and randomly disappear when you first get it. Remnants of it often adapt and you’ll find regrowth when and where you least expect it. It is also a bit fragile and pieces that break off can spread elsewhere in the tank whether you want them to or not. It is pretty easy to control by just plucking it off from where it’s attached and moving or discarding (or selling) it. You can also scissor it back if you want it more controlled, but you’ll want to corral all the stray bits unless you don’t mind if it takes over random spots in your tank. Terrific for tiny fry and shrimplets to hide, impossible to catch fry and shrimp out of it.

Yep, need pics to confirm if it’s red root floaters. Lots of people have been sent other plants that were mislabeled.

I’ve never tried it so I don’t know if it would work or not. I think variety in the diet is the best thing you can do.

And now here’s what he’s NOT doing! This boy is about to be removed from the local gene pool. 😠

That is somewhat true in general but there are sword varieties that have more rounded leaves even in their submerse form. It is definitely true of Amazon swords - Echinodorus bleheri.

Was looking at the tank yesterday when this little guy popped out of the slate stack. I suspect he/she is a bronze cory (Corydoras aeneus) due to early color flashes and timing on who was laying relative to his/her age (about 2 weeks old) but too soon to say. https://youtube.com/shorts/QKETRM-jDnU?si=8LSc8TYlNPLVWtWF

I’ve not had any luck getting pea puffers to eat anything but live foods and sometimes frozen bloodworms. They won’t even eat all live foods, definitely won’t take all frozen foods, and have never even considered any dried or prepared foods. They just get hollow-bellied if they don’t get their live foods.

You should be able to source more with the scientific binomial also. The L numbers are usually only used before a species has been scientifically described and given a binomial. The binomial Genus species assigned is the official name. The L numbers are only stop gap designations.

Yes, exactly, with other causes more likely than flukes. Gram negatives far more likely in our fishy friends and their aquatic environment. There are so very many Gram negative bacteria that are opportunistic pathogens and water is their normal environment.

I think you’ve hit it dead on with Parotocinclus spilosoma. That looks exactly right. Cute little pleco that stays about 2” and I might have to find some of them for myself, now. 😆 I’m sure I can set up a group in a 10 G. Well, as soon as I clear out some guppies. 😂 🤣

Flukes should have responded to the first treatments with PraziPro, so I don’t think flukes are the issue. Flukes should be visible on the fish’s skin if you can see close enough to notice these much, much smaller black dots. Flubendazole has some antimicrobial effect as well as the anti-parasitic function. It is even being studied for anti-cancer effects because of how it acts inside the cell. I would be far more inclined to think this might be a bacterial skin infection vs flukes, largely because I think you would have seen flukes since you’re looking so close. I think salt in the water would be a good thing, but I’d probably only do 1 tablespoon per 5 gallons to start, then over a couple days, potentially increase to 1 tablespoon per 3 gallons. That dose is likely to affect plants, so pull anything you want to save. Add at least one airstone and let the fish rest from the meds. They’re pretty safe but you don’t need to treat flukes that aren’t there.

Mine were too, until about 3 or 4 weeks ago. They would stir things up a smidgen here and there, then suddenly, full on digging wars. It was like they decided this was how they were going to prove what good daddies they could be. Ignore the female going in and out of the cave she prefers and completely dig out underneath the hardscape. Sure, that’s going to impress her. 🙄 It’s like the wife asking for jewelry for her birthday and hubby gets her a vacuum cleaner! 🤦🏻‍♀️ Not the same, dude! 😂 🤣 😜

I thought the air (and therefore flow) was reasonably equivalent and didn’t do any sort of testing to speak of, but I wasn’t going to not post something when ACO was kind enough to send me a freebie. I had the pump output adjusted to make the healthy stream of fine bubbles I like from the Ziss adjustable airstones, then just swapped the airline straight to the air collar. Either airstone or collar could have run at a higher volume but that doesn’t necessarily increase the water flow through the sponge. @Cory has a video about adjusting sponges for maximum efficiency but I’m terrible about saving them after I’ve watched them and I can’t search YouTube on an iPad as stupidly, there isn’t a search function within a channel on an iPad. 🤷🏻‍♀️

Poor thing! Such a confusing thing to happen when he was just checking for any leftovers! 🤣 I often tell my pets, “Everybody makes choices in life!” It’s useful for my techs, too, or friends and family with the right timing. 😆 😂 🤣

@mountaintoppufferkeeper No guesses from me but love all the pics and clips!

Out of stock now.

Be prepared to be extremely frustrated because they have not shipped well in my experience. I tried for well over a year to get a colony established and finally gave up. I spent well over $500.00 buying from various vendors, trying to get a higher survival rate. I was ordering 10-20 at a time only to have as much as half or more dead by the time they got to me and more died in quarantine with more of the males dying than females. They almost all came in with some of them having spots of fin rot that needed treatment. With only about 10 tiny fish at a time in a 10 gallon that has massive biofiltration (that same quarantine tank is currently supporting about 30 young bristlenose fry, about 10 otocinclus, and 2 subadult Rio Paraguay plecos) but has no excessive current, fairly dim lighting with frogbit for cover - should have been an ideal quarantine tank but still had substantial losses during QT. I never got more than 15 at a time into the display tank and they would slowly pass, always the males first. It was very hard to find any in between orders. I would get as many as I could afford as soon as anybody had them in stock (they’re pricy when you can find them), then couldn’t get more for weeks to months at a time. Someone (I don’t remember who) posted that they got in a bunch when they worked at an LFS and they did well, but I could never get anybody local to order them for me except the guy that handed me a bag of dying fish. They were literally going sideways in the bag over the course of 3-4 minutes as we spoke about what to do about them. He didn’t charge me for them, none survived past an hour. I would LOVE to see if you can get a group established as I had zero good luck with them and believe me, I tried very hard! If you have good luck and yours do well, PLEASE post up your water parameters and how you did it.

I want one when you start manufacturing them, please? 😉

I don’t mean that you have to physically measure them, just asking if you’re estimating standard length (to tail base) or total length (to end of tail). There would be at least 1/2” difference between those measurements in sterbais, more in larger species of cories or longer finned species or varieties. It’s like the difference in length between a betta’s body vs his length including his tail. Or a veil tailed angelfish. Many fish are measured by body size, not total length. Cories are generally reported in total length since they don’t typically have exuberant finnage like a long finned pleco, for instance.

It is funny but annoying at the same time. It’s like she’s trying to launch her suddenly vicious self right out of the water at me! I keep expecting to see her flying out of the tank at me a bit like the Monty Python rabbits! 😝 Mine have no less than 5 caves of various sizes and locations for 2 boys and they’ve become digging fools! At least one of them is now using the tiniest cave he can squeeze into but the eggs haven’t gotten kicked out like last time, so . . . . . . Sure, Daddy-O do whatever you feel you need to. 🙄🤪 You’re not wrong. I’m well trained by all my pets. 😆 🤣

They will do just fine in gravel. My very first ever fish tank back in 1975 came with gravel that was infested with MTS. It was left dry for at least a couple weeks in an attempt to eliminate them when picking and plucking wasn’t successful. It didn’t help. So I think as long as they’re wet, they’ll survive no matter what substrate you have.

Sterbais are slightly smaller on average compared to many cory species, 2”-2.6” (total length) I think is the general expected. Mine are almost all about 2” with a couple females a bit bigger. @beastie Are you measuring total length (nose to end of tail) or standard length (nose to tail base)?