Odd Duck

I’ve used it on a couple kinds of moss - Fissidens nobilis and Christmas moss. No apparent damage to the moss.

I don’t know how I hadn’t found this thread sooner! I love this reenactment of a mid 30’s tank! It inspired me to dig out my very first fish book. I started with a well used, leaky, slate bottom, asphaltum sealed tank (no hole drilled in the slate). I have read all 11 pages of your adventure so far and can’t wait for the next update. The coarse sand/fine gravel you have is pretty much identical to the stuff I had that came in my first tank. I gathered wild Val and Daphnia in my early years of fishkeeping because as a kid, I had minimal money to buy plants and there was no live food available to buy at my local fish store (a mom and pop basement store). Thank you for bringing back some of my earliest memories of fishkeeping. I was fascinated to read this book back in 1975 when I bought it, and many times since, but hadn’t in decades. But guess what I’m reading again! This is my edition of Mr. Innes book. One of my favorite fish has always been the harlequin rasbora.

Peroxide treatment, then the fish, snails, or shrimp eat it or it just fades away. Use 3% peroxide, I’ve heard up to 10 mls per gallon but have never come close to that. Turn off all filters/pumps and let the water go reasonably still. I use a pipette or a syringe with tubing attached and squirt it directly over the affected area. Leave the filters/pumps off for around 10 minutes, then restart all circulation. It usually takes a couple days and you should see the algae go pinkish or grayish. Then snails, shrimp, or some fish will eat it or it just dissolves away. May need to repeat a few times depending on your parameters. If you have the wrong balance of nutrients to light, it will return there or somewhere else. Ask me how I know. 😆 🤷🏻‍♀️ If you have a particularly troublesome spot, you can pull it out and treat with a higher concentration of peroxide for a short time. You can also significantly damage plants that way, so do it with caution. Especially plants that don’t like to be uprooted, like Crypts. I have done this when transferring affected plants to a “no algae yet” tank. Used about 2/3 water and 1/3 peroxide and just the leaves, not the roots, until I could see fine bubbles coming up for about 3 minutes.

Vibra bites don’t lend towards dispensing small amounts smoothly, FYI. As long as your mixtures are fairly consistent, they dispense reasonably well from automatic feeders. If you put the foods into week long pill boxes and have somebody come in and feed, then you can have a mix of whatever dry food you want since they would dump one entire compartment into tank. This would hold 2 weeks worth unless you have some extremely big tanks. You can also find smaller ones for smaller tanks. They do also make some very small auto dispensers that dump straight down from a compartment vs the rolling, “measuring” each time type dispensers (which are fairly unreliable for small amounts).

Thanks!

I don’t do CO2, but mine are doing reasonably well. The ‘Pinto’ has more green and less variegation than I had hoped for, despite being pretty close to the light. But I also don’t have fancy lights at all, just the Aqueon planted tank light.

I don’t do high tech, so can’t answer your question. Instead I have a question for you. What part of Texas are you from? I’m in North Richland Hills, northeast of Fort Worth. Do you happen to be close enough that I can assume my water is similar? I’m guessing not too dissimilar based on the parameters I can measure that this also covers.

I thought this was the better option, too. Seems like it would disperse flow better.

Another option. Found both and others on Amazon. It won’t let me post an actual link to the Amazon items.

Here’s one option. I didn’t search out best price, just a link.

I doubt your flow rate is going to bother cories. Some seem to really enjoy playing in current. Don’t worry, the intermittent dashing around is perfectly normal. That being said, adding holes or finding tubing that fits and doing a custom outflow can work. You can also create a baffle around the outflow to disperse the flow. They make pre-filter intake covers that should be fairly easily adapted to be a baffle over an outflow. Some are intended to go over a sponge pre-filter, some are just a wide, screen type pre-filter themselves. You won’t need the sponge filter itself, just the cover or screen pre-filter.

On your whiptails,I know they are good at hiding. You might be alternately seeing each one. I worried for almost 2 weeks thinking that one of my young lemon drop bristle noses I added to my 100 gallon had passed away. 2 weeks. Then I FINALLY saw both at the same time. I also thought I had lost most of the otos I had added to a 20 long since I only saw one for the longest time, weeeeeeks! Then I saw 2. Then I saw 5! Very heavily planted tank. Who knows how many are in there! They could be breeding in there for all I know! 😆

Nana ‘Golden Coin’ is a very pretty, bright, lime green. My favorite Anubias so far. ‘Petite Pinto’ has been less impressive than I hoped for, but is finally looking better. It’s a bit tricky to get exactly the right balance of light to give it the best color, and the nutrients in the water column at enough for growth, but not enough for algae. It’s currently in a 6 gallon cube with nothing but snails and a single Amano for poop producers. Plenty of plants with it. It’s on a piece of petrified wood (so no nutrients from wood or substrate) and I wonder if that’s an issue (I do Simple Green and Iron at a bit higher than label). Anubias always does a bit better for me attached to driftwood. I think it gets more nutrients and does better when it can start to sink it’s roots into wood or it’s roots can get down into a nice nutritious substrate. I had one of the two plants I got in the tissue culture in a different tank on wood, but it’s a pea puffer tank that has too much poop and it got excess algae growing on it. I finally removed it, hit it with peroxide and moved it to this tank with its friend. Apparently a tiny bit of rhizome was stuck to the wood, though, because I have a new, tiny plant starting in that tank where I removed the bigger plant. It has some algae. 🙄 For a big Anubias at the other size extreme, hastifolia is very cool looking.

They like water flow, so an open end tube would likely be best for them. Or a stabilized slate stack with gaps.

That’s a flower on your Anubias. I’m apparently very mean to my plants because I bleach dip them all to minimize risk of pests and diseases. I’ve very rarely had any issues unless I didn’t dip long enough (hello, bladder snails). I did have one group of Anubias start to rot, but they all recovered. And I had one group of Buces nearly all rot. But I don’t believe it was from the bleach dip in either case because I have loads that I’ve dipped that way and never had issues. I use 3/8 cup regular bleach (not splashless, it’s not concentrated enough) per 1/2 gallon of water for 3 minutes (3/4 cup per gallon). Then rinse in tap water, then soak in dechlorinated water (4-5 times normal amount of dechlorinator) for at least 10 minutes. Wear a nitrile or rubber glove when swirling the plants around, or any time your hands might go into the bleach water. Don’t wear your nice clothes, either. 😆 Edit to add that I don’t do anything specific to acclimate. Just try to put them where they’re going to stay if they’re root feeders. But I’ll put attached Buces or Anubias in whatever tank I think will give them the best start if I intend them to eventually go elsewhere. Like if the intended tank isn’t ready or it’s a plant I plan to sell at a swap meet. I have a couple tanks that are plant grow out tanks. If I get crypts in and the package got too hot or too cold (crypts will get a little too “soft” feeling), I sometimes plant them in containers first and put them in shrimp tanks because the shrimp will clean them up fast for me as they melt. Once they’re recovered, I’ll plant them where and when I’m ready. Crypts are notorious for melting under adverse or changing conditions. If they come in great, I’ll put them directly where I want them (after their dip).

I wash it by putting about 1/2 the bag in a bucket. Put the garden hose on pretty high flow and start moving the hose around in the bucket, pushing down to the bottom. It will fluidize the sand and the trick is getting the water flow just right for the depth of your bucket. Too much flow and you lose too much sand over the side. Too little flow and you’re fighting to push the hose around in the sand because it isn’t sufficiently fluidized. Then I just repeat the same thing in what’s left in the bag. No matter your container, rinse until the water runs clear. I’ve rinsed 5 bags this way and have black sand (medium grit) in 7 of my tanks now, from 2 gallons to 100 gallons and that’s dirt bottom capped with the sand, so not full depth sand. Working very well for me on moderately to heavily planted. I’ve also rinsed pool sand the same way. It’s easier and faster than rinsing through a sieve, for me. The pool sand did rinse a bit faster, but it only takes about 10-15 minutes to rinse the whole bag of black sand this way. All oil traces cleared.

Make certain that your tank cover is strong and secure enough to hold your cat’s weight if they are inclined to sit on them. Ask me how I know! Don’t worry, nobody was harmed, lol!

If you were only holding plants/fish/wood/snails/shrimp/etc, to *watch* for sickness and there was no sickness showing during the quarantine, there’s no need to sterilize the tank. I would clean out all debris between quarantine batches, though. That mulm is not your friend if you need to medicate anybody. Mulm can bind and inactivate medications if they’re needed. If you were treating/using medication for an actual disease, I *would* disinfect the tank afterwards.

There were plenty of metal frame tanks made after slate bottoms were no longer made. I used to have a step back bank of 15 tanks (3 levels of 5 tanks each). I bought them with the stand from an older couple that had a basement fish store. I bought it when they retired in the early 80’s, but I first bought fish from them starting in the mid 70’s and they’d had it for *years* before I knew them. They were all original tanks and had slightly textured glass on the bottoms. Edit to add that my tanks came with long, stainless, strip lights with a single incandescent bulb over each tank and a metal flap lid for each tank for feeding, etc. They had glass pieces over each tank that went between the water and the lights. The inner top rim of each tank had a lip where the glass laid and the metal flap laid when it was closed.

I have a medium coop sponge and an HOB filled with sponge with a sponge prefilter on my 20 gallon long. There is such a thing as too much current for some species, but I don’t think there is such a thing as too much filtration.

I’ve switched to using double diameter silicone tubing (compared to airline tubing) and end to end fittings to go with it. It corrals the floaters much better and limits the surface turbulence much better. Amazon has it (3/8” silicone tubing) for a decent price. You can see it from the underside in this pic. I had the suction cup a little low in this pic. I cut up a regular square feeding ring for the suction cup and hinged part. Usually I just loop it around a wire - heater cord or temp sensor to keep floaters in, or around the airline for a sponge filter to keep the floaters out.

My parents bought me an old slate bottom, metal-framed tank that came with a lid, light, and 2 tiny HOB filters that didn’t even have all the parts since it had been set up for one to run into the other, then back into the tank. I got it for my 13th birthday. It was 100% my responsibility and everything after the initial tank purchase was paid for from my allowance, then jobs. I had to reseal the tank before it was usable and I had to deal with a snail infestation immediately from snails that resurrected out of the gravel. That started me on a life long journey that included my first reef tank in ‘83, breeding bettas for a short time, having up to 19 tanks, etc. I had a very challenging job with way too long hours and finally shut down all my tanks for almost 10 years. Sold everything but one tank (that’s been a hospital tank for many different creatures) and a dab of miscellaneous equipment. Restarted almost a year ago after rescuing a pair of Jack Dempsey cichlids and I’m already back up to 20 tanks if you count live food culture tanks (they have snails and plants so they count, right?). I’m glad to be back in the hobby that I loved for so long.

If I remember right, I think Axelrod’s first book mentioned a recommended max of 2-3” of fish per gallon, but spent extensive discussion explaining that you must adjust for heavy bodied fish, round bodies (like discus - you can’t just count inches of length when the fish is very “tall”), thick bodies, heavy eaters, excess finnage like angels or Bettas and the like, and allowed some wiggle room for very slim bodied fish. You also have to consider the relative sensitivity of certain species. Some fish are very intolerant of higher nitrate levels and some are crazy tolerant of it. It’s not good for anybody, but they can adapt more than you might think. You’re risking making them sick the harder you push their tolerance, though. I think this rule evolved into the 1” rule to make it a bit more “idiot proof” so people would be less likely to try putting 5 adult angels in a 20 gallon tank. It really has no basis in the reality of what you can do if you have loads of plants, slim, small fish, lots of filtration, do frequent water changes, or any number of other variables mentioned. if you’re paying close attention and are certain you can keep up with water changes and plant maintenance, you’d probably be amazed at what you can do. Is it smart to push the boundaries? Not really! You’re just making life harder for yourself. Give yourself some wiggle room and the fishkeeping life is a lot easier. I’ve been keeping fish for a decades (since 1975) and had a fairly recently got back into fishkeeping because I rescued a pair of Jack Dempseys and they bred (twice 🤦🏻‍♀️). If I was smarter, I probably would have disposed of the eggs, but I didn’t. I ended up with 3 tanks full, and I do mean FULL, of Jack fry. I didn’t even want to test their water since I knew I wouldn’t like the results. But they happily ate their way through a ton of food and I had almost no losses! Raised over 1400 of the little devils before I got the parents put into a divided tank. I had a 55 gallon, a 46 gallon, and a 29 gallon full of fry. Not even *close* to what any sane human would consider enough room to raise 1400 fry to sellable/rehoming age/size but I got it done with *loads* of filtration and water changes. Would I ever recommend somebody do that on purpose? NO WAY!!!!! But I got away with it partly due to having a lot of fish keeping experience and just plain burying my head in the sand and ignoring water parameters since there really wasn’t anything else I could do. Nobody got sick, no Ich ever, and I only lost about a dozen or so fry. I list this only to give an example of what *can* be done with enough dedication and determination. But I use this really as an example of what NOT to do. It was WORK doing all those water changes! Be smarter than I was and be kind to yourself! Give yourself some wiggle room! The recent power outages and cold weather here in the Dallas, Texas area are a perfect example of why you should give yourself wiggle room. People lost *hundreds* of fish! If you don’t have a way to sustain your fish during an extended power outage, you need to give yourself more wiggle room. Can you pack up all your fish into coolers and take them someplace warm? Do you have a generator to run heaters, air pumps, filters? There were people that had generators big enough to run their tanks but their houses were so cold their heaters couldn’t keep up even with extra heaters added to the tanks and the tanks swaddled with blankets. Wiggle room!

I just recently learned that there is more than one variety of lace plant. Closely related, but some have narrower leaves, some smaller spaces in the lace, etc, and there appears to be some discrepancy on “varieties” vs “subspecies”. Let me see if I can find that link. This article has good information, but isn’t the one I was thinking about. It does discuss just a little about the different varieties, but doesn’t really go into too much detail about the differences between them. I’ll keep looking a bit to see if I can find the other article. https://aquaticworldinfo.com/madagascar-lace-plant/ Edit to add another link. This link is to an older set of what appears to be forum discussions that may imply there are larger differences than varietal differences. At least one variety has a significantly different flower type and behavior and it appears to have the biggest difference in leaf type. It may have more differences in cultivation technique also. Some appear to consider it a separate species. There is a fair amount of repetition in the posts because it seems to be a fairly random collection of correspondence between a group on a forum. I’d like to find out what current thinking is among experts on both cultivation and species vs variety. Most of this link says 3 varieties, more current info says 4 varieties. https://www.thekrib.com/Plants/Plants/madagascar.html A lot of the information I can find on cultivation is contradictory. Some are growing in very rich substrate (some in manure!), and some say that will cause damage and rotting of the leaves. Some say a cool rest period, some say warm rest period, some say no rest period is necessary. About the only thing consistent is they all say the rest period should be in the aquarium and not dry like so many other Aponogetons. I’ve always been fascinated by them and have a few bulbs now that will be getting spread around to assorted tanks. I’ll let you know how I do.

I’ve got a similar rack, 24” deep x 48” long by 72” high. I have tanks on the middle 3 shelves, but not all are filled, yet. I have the center 2 of the top 10 gallon tanks filled and 4, 5 gallon tanks half filled that are live food cultures. I could see the shelves sagging more than made me comfortable. So, after spending time time sealing the thin, particle board shelves that came with the shelf unit, we cut 3 new boards from marine grade, 3/4” plywood, and sealed that. Those boards finally went in today. Quite a project that included mostly draining tanks, moving them, sorting out cords better than they were, replacing shelves, replacing and refilling tanks, installing new powerstrips, etc, etc. My advice is to check how thick your boards are and make certain they are more than the 1/2” particle board that came with mine. Or get the metal grid shelves and add polyurethane sealed plywood on top of them. We had the hardware store cut the boards so we didn’t have to haul out the table saw, then sealed them ourselves.