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Daniel

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Everything posted by Daniel

  1. Daniel
    I bought this back in August and floated it. It is like an iceberg as there is more of it underwater than above. This is the above part.
  2. Daniel
    It is not super common, but they definitely will jump. On the good side since they have a labyrinth organ, you have extra time to find them before they die.
  3. Daniel
    Just me, but I like the natural.
  4. Daniel
    At the time of this screenshot all the pH probes were in pH 4.0 buffer. So it looks like I can trust the pH probes to give a pH I can trust at no worse than +/- 0.1
  5. Daniel
    I just calibrated my probes. In theory the temperature of each tank is +/- 0.2 F of each other. At the time I took the screenshot all the pH probes were in a 7.0 pH buffer.
  6. Daniel
    That is what I would do. I think your analogy of 50% water change is correct.
  7. Daniel
    Ammonia is not good. You should begin with a water change. Could a snail or something else have died? Something is off with the nitrogen cycle.
  8. Daniel
    Here is the layout of each tank.
  9. Daniel
    I just planted all three tanks with the same layout. I have left plenty of room around each plant for its growth to monitored. I have some Amazon swords coming shortly and these will go in the back right corner of each tank. I am monitoring pH with an Apex controller. I will also be controlling the lights and heaters with the Apex.
  10. Daniel
    It is not necessarily a small volume. When I have discus like I do now, I change anywhere from 100 to 500 gallons of water a week in the big tank, or 50 to 100 gallons a day. When I had angelfish, I might not change 100 gallons in a month. I never tried re-mineralization until a couple of months ago, and then as an experiment I gave it a whorl. The result was a lot brown diatom algae. I am sure if I stuck with it long enough the brown diatom algae would have resolved, stuff like that always finds a balance eventually. I may try again in the future. But for the preceding 13 years, I have just run RO water into the big tank. From 2007 until 2010 I was dosing minute by minute with a Blackstone dosing pump (below) using 18 M Phosphoric acid to keep the pH in low 5's to help facilitate breeding Heckel discus (unsuccessfully) though other discus in the tank bred during that time period. If the dosing pump was turned off the pH would rise back into the mid to upper 6's. Many people have reported pH crashes but I have never seen it personally.
  11. Daniel
    Just a platy? Maybe a hi-finned variegated platy?
  12. Daniel
    @Streetwise You read my mind, I do need another probe holder. The Apex ones are finicky and it is clumsy when turning the set screws.
  13. Daniel
    As part of this project I am monitoring each tank with its own set of pH and temperature probes connected to a Neptune's Apex Fusion controller to see if there are any pH differences between the 3 aquariums. As a bonus when I get the Felix set up where I can also measure temperature, pH, Ammonia and PAR, I will have a trusted reference to compare the Felix measurements to. It is always good to have reference which is why I use a NIST traceable ( +/- 0.1 F) grade thermometer to compare against the Apex probes to see how accurate they are.
  14. Daniel
    @Kiddsgames My cats really like to chew on the armrests on the chairs. I should have a post on the BD substrate and the 2 other tanks sometime today over in the Dirted Tank thread. I have never used blasting sand before so I don't know what to expect. So far it looks pretty. I didn't rinse it but the clarity is good, or as good as the other 2 tanks. I am not a HAM, but I need a microphone to do the voice overs for my fish videos.
  15. Daniel
    I my opinion the highest quality for the money are those offered by Bulk Reef Supply. I have been very happy with mine. 4 Stage Value RO/DI System - Bulk Reef Supply - Bulk Reef Supply WWW.BULKREEFSUPPLY.COM
  16. Daniel
    I like the big Rubbermaid Brute trash can aging water in the background. I think I can even see an airstone going in there. You guys do your unboxings in a more organized fashion than I do! I got the plants for the Dirted Tank project yesterday.
  17. Daniel
    @akconklin I was asking myself that on Wednesday of this week. Below is my baby sparkling gourami tank and I use the green water to feed the babies. My goal is to keep the water green. When I look at it under the microscope it looks like thin little green footballs. These are the free floating algae called phytoplankton. There are also quite a quite bit of rotifers swimming around and these are green also because they have been eating the phytoplankton. There are Daphnia in this baby gourami tank that also eat the phytoplankton so unfortunately if I don't add more green water, it begins to clear up. I get the fresh stock of green water from this tank below. The trick to keeping the water green is extra heavy feeding of the fish and plenty of light. I feed the swordtails several times a day with generous portions of Vibra Bites and blackworms and baby brine shrimp. I also run extra lights on the tank for at least 10 hours a day, sometimes more. And finally this tank does not have a Daphnia population (swordtails eat them all) to consume all the phytoplankton.
  18. Daniel
    Guppies! You got to love them. Welcome.
  19. Daniel
    @Bill Smith Your documentation of your projects is always the best. Great low cost easy to implement and effective project!
  20. Daniel
    @Paul, I think I would be using your option if the large aquarium were not so large. There are 2 slight differences that were important to me. First, the water change on the big tank happens with a push of a button, and the water is pure and clean with no need for any additives. With a tank that large convenience and water quality begin to loom large. Secondly, for the gravity part of the water changes, again the water is not tapwater (or well water). All the water changes are with very old aged water from the big tank. I have the same good old python experience as everyone else at that point, but the difference is that the water is of much higher quality. Sadly to get those 2 difference took planning and great expense, but having lived with the system for 13 years, I cannot imagine not having done it.
  21. Daniel
    @DavidR was asking in another thread about automated water changes. My water comes from a well into my utility room where I run it through an reverse osmosis (RO) system. The big pump (red circle) takes the water from the RO system and pumps it through PEX tubing embedded in the concrete slab for our house and pumps the water over and into my large aquarium in the living area. The large aquarium has an overflow standpipe that only lets the water get to the top of the aquarium before it goes down the pipe and out to the summer tubbing ponds. This is the automated part of the water change. The second part is less automated but only uses gravity. Once the water is in the big tank, it is 7 1/2 feet off the ground and will readily flow downhill to the aquariums in the fishroom. The picture below is of doing a water change on the green water tank this morning. The floors are concrete so spilling a little water isn't the end of the world. It is nice to not have to use buckets.
  22. Daniel
    @KBOzzie59 posted a link to a webinar where I believe this was mentioned as the 'Redfield Ratio' Here is a chart And mg/l translates to ppm directly.
  23. Daniel
    The likes run on their own clock cycle. Give it a few hours and more likes will become available. I sometimes run out likes in the morning and then suddenly in the afternoon they come back.
  24. Daniel
    It is hard work being a baby sparkling gourami chasing down rotifers and whatnot all day. Sometimes you just have to take a big yawn!
  25. Daniel
    @Brandy came up with an ingenious solution:
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