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Daniel

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Everything posted by Daniel

  1. Daniel
    I usually put the airstone near the heater near the bottom of the aquarium, but not into the substrate. I put the airstone near the heater so that the aquarium stays evenly heated. I put it near the bottom so that the bubbles cause the most amount of flow. If you want less flow, you can put the airstone in at a more shallow depth.
  2. Daniel
    Always remember that one of the options is having no filter. If there are plants in the aquarium they can perform all the biological filtration needed. Bettas can breath air directly with their labyrinth organ, so in a betta aquarium aeration is not usually an issue either.
  3. Daniel
    That is exactly what thought too. I was beginning to rationalize it to the point of taking the 'dry river bed' part to mean that there wouldn't be any actual water in the aquarium. 🙂
  4. Daniel
    All thermometers are likely off a degree or two so I calibrate my thermometers with thermometer of known and proven accuracy. But wait..that sounds impossible because aren't all thermometers off a little bit. The solution is to get a NIST (National Institute of Standards and Technology) certified thermometer as reference. The one I use is guaranteed to be within plus or minus 0.1°F of the actual temperature by a traceable certification (just like other high precision weights and measures). The other less high technology way to determine an accurate temperature is to use three thermometers and take the average. Not quite as good a calibrated thermometer, but probably not too bad either.
  5. Daniel
    But no photo?
  6. Daniel
    What does it look like now? A photo would help.
  7. Daniel
    It isn't a problem. Don't worry, enjoy your Corydoras.
  8. Daniel
    I love your enthusiasm! And just judging by your profile photo it seems you have a lot of it. 🙂 But back to chemistry stuff. Nitrites are converted to nitrates by bacteria and not by alkali metal in the water. The fish of the Amazon basin which is mostly very demineralized soft water are definitely not noted for a 'general malaise'.
  9. Daniel
    That is a lot to go though so I won't try a deal with everything in one reply but I will start with an easy one. African cichlids prefer hard water, but the most common cichlids in the hobby are from South America and generally these cichlids prefer soft, sometimes extremely soft water, discus for example.
  10. Daniel
    I use a Neptune Apex controller. Its pricey but it can also control as well as track parameters.
  11. Daniel
    Watchful waiting would be my course of action.
  12. Daniel
    The week before last I had just such a dilemma, a small tank and conflicting urges. I had been reading the excellent new George Farmer book 'Aquascaping' and was thinking about a Farmeresque aquascape. But I also reflected on just how valuable and interesting my pygmy sunfish were so instead of the formally aquascaped nano aquarium I went for the eco-zoo wonderland fry raising nano tank. First I added Daphnia and green water and let it percolate for a week. Then on Monday of this week I added nano versions of a nano fish, that is, I added newly fertilized pygmy sunfish eggs. As of today, I have a little tiny aquarium with little tiny invertebrates and little tiny fish.
  13. Daniel
    I order them from Eastern Aquatics out of Pennsylvania and they ship them overnight. The best local mom and pop shop in my area carries them also.
  14. Daniel
    Here one map of the ranges for the different species of Elassoma: Here is a similar map showing specific drainages and which clade of Elassoma zonatum can be found there: The only three I have collected in the wild were E. zonatum (North Carolina), E. boehlkei (North Carolina), and E. okatie (South Carolina). I have never collected south or west of South Carolina.
  15. Daniel
    I generally do not put lids on any of my aquariums. While I do get evaporation, I've never had a problem with fish jumping out. I have had a consistent problem with plants jumping out witness this photo from July: But now I think I know what is happening: Anyone one else have a problem with plants being jumpers?
  16. Daniel
    Oh the irony, but yes!
  17. Daniel
    I pulled the eggs from the breeding action in the video up above and put them in this aquarium on Monday. Today is Friday and I see lots of pygmy sunfish fry when I wiggle the plants. They rain down from the plants and then ineptly swim back up to the plants again, so they are not really free swimming yet. But that gives some idea of a breeding/hatching timeline. As you may know I don't do anything about hydra and there is a pretty good infestation of hydra in this aquarium. But, even I gulped a little bit when the tiny little slivers of fry that they are would brush up against hydra tentacles. Luckily, so far, I haven't seen a hydra eat a baby pygmy sunfish yet.
  18. Daniel
    Some of that tattering is probably permanent. I had a similar event with a female betta that was out of the tank for long enough to be crispy dry when I found her. Eventually she recovered and she went on to breed, but her fins were never the same after that.
  19. Daniel
    My guess is that it fairly safe to ship shrimp right now. I have cherry shrimp living outside right now in water with a 1/2 inch layer of ice on top of the water. It probably safe to say that they wouldn't overheat either if shipped. Assuming I was buying from a reliable seller, if that seller thought it was safe to ship, that would be good enough for me.
  20. Daniel
    I think it is a fairly inexact science, but here is a rough idea of the terms used:
  21. Daniel
    It funny, and I don't have the energy to document it, but probably about 75 - 80% of the products that people have asked for on this thread already existed. Even the product that Cory wished for as it turned out already existed.
  22. Daniel
    The carbon dioxide you are adding to the water combines with water to make carbonic acid. Carbonic acid after exhausting the kh of your water begin to lower the ph. This is likely why you have a pH of 6.0 and a kh of 0. PH is also a function of the time of day you measure it. If you measure in the morning, pH is much lower than if you measure in the afternoon. It can vary by a full point over the course of a day in a planted aquarium.
  23. Daniel
    Angelfish babies do sometimes feed off their parents slime. Below is a still frame from a video and all the babies are pecking at the parents slime just like discus babies.
  24. Daniel
    With all sincerity, isn't this what plants do? They absorb nitrates and reduce the need for water changes.
  25. Daniel
    I get 3 lbs of blackworms every couple of weeks from Eastern Aquatics and they always arrive in good shape.
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