[Fish that come in self breathing bags?]

I never float anymore. I plop and drop u less there is a huge temp difference. Then I drip acclimate in a small container

[Vacation Fish Tank Problem]

Your plants will be fine for 8 days. You probably don't actually need someone to come by and feed the fish either they will be fine not eating that long, I'd be more worried about someone over feeding my fish and causing problems than my fish not eating. 

The wifi timers are awesome, but if you can't get them in time don't sweat it. 

[Organic Soil Aquariums]

Dirted tanks are great! I currently have a 29 hex that is mineralized top soil tops with play sand, and a 25g mini pond that is a mixture of organic soil, crushed coral and safetsorb capped with more safetsorb. I also previously had a 5.5g that was mineralized top soil capped with fine aquarium gravel. 

Soon I'll be breaking down my 29hex to switch to a 40 breeder. My plan for that tank is to recycle the mineralized top soil from my hex and mix it with safetsorb and crushed coral then cap it with safetsorb. 

I find that mixing coarser substrate (saftesorb/crushed coral) help prevent messes because I move/add plants pretty often. 

Anyway there are as many ways of setting up a dirted tank as there are people keeping them. Hell there's even different types of dirt people use. 

My recommendation for a first dirted tank is buying an organic top soil and doing a very fine gravel cap. Then you can see what you do or don't like about it and make changes for the next tank you set up. 

[Outdoor pond chlorine problems]

I've had a similar problem with my mini pond. It's a barrel planter from tractor supply and it always shows a small amount of chlorine on my test strips. 

I haven't seen any negative effects on my guppies or plants so I'm not really worrying about it but it is odd. 

[Backyard Goldfish Pond Dye]

There are commercially available pond dyes. The tractor supply near me sells a few different ones. Never had heard of it before I found it there.

If I were you I'd Google it and do some research on them. I don't see this forum being a good source for info on it though because most of us prefer a more natural look. 

[First outdoor pond in Ohio]

I had the same thing happen a week after setting up my guppy pond in NJ. Luckily I had a couple spare heaters I threw in to keep it warm enough. 

[Water temperature for plants]

Most plants will do fine at lower temps. Many aquarium plants are native to the US and actually prefer cooler temps than we keep them at (we heat tanks mostly for the fish not the plants). Non US natives should also do fine at lower temps their growth will probably just be slowed. 

[Water temperature for plants]

Any of the moss varieties should work, as said previously java fern and anubias may also work. Buce could possibly as well. None of those plants need substrate either. They all attach to your hardscape. Subwasertang (spelling?) has also been reported to do well in little to no light. 

[Plant suggestions]

Do you have a Pic of the tank? Might help if we knew what it looks like/where in the tank you want plants 

[20 Gallon Dirted / No Filter Tank]

Looks awesome! I'll definitely be following this one! 

[What are some Nerm Membership Perks You'd like to see?]

3 hours ago, CalmedByFish said:

Speaking as someone who isn't *officially* a Nerm:

I think it would be detrimental to the rest of us if there was a member-only forum or forum section. I think the social dynamic would be that Nerms would gravitate to each other, unintentionally leaving out nerms when it comes to providing information that would be of benefit to them and their fish. 

In fact, it would take benefits from Nerms that nerms could've given them if they'd stuck together.

It totally makes sense to give extra benefits to members, but it doesn't make sense to take benefits away from non-members. 

I think the only way it could work is if the members only section is only for membership related stuff or possibly beta testing new forum features before the entire forum gets access. 

I agree that if there are members only versions of anything that's already part of the main forum it will take away from both

[What are some Nerm Membership Perks You'd like to see?]

Free shipping on all orders, or a lower minimum order for free shipping.

Exclusive merch. Member only color variants on the stickers would be cool.

Early access to new products, not crazy early, but a week or 2 so that members don't have to worry about it selling out before they can place an order.

Maybe member only pricing or a discount offer once a few times a year

[Aquarium co-op fertilizer crystalized??]

I had this happen to me about a month after I bought my fist bottle. Shaking it before every use fixes it. A toothpick helps clear the spout of any crystals that form there. 

[Changed water as garden fertilizer?]

I use it to water my house and patio plants. I heard about a guy once who plumbed his auto change system to drain into a rain barrel which his sprinkler system pulled from. Apparently he never had to fertilize his lawn again. Not sure where I heard about it/if it's true but it sounds plausible. 

[Chef's mini deck pond]

So the fish have been in almost a week and everything is going great! It looks like most or all of the females are pregnant, which I'm guessing actually happened while they were in quarantine since I noticed like 3 days after they went in the pond.

I added 2 small heaters I had around because I jumped the gun on adding the fish and temps aren't high enough over night. I also tucked a softball sized portion of moss from my shrimp tank under the milk crate shelf so that there will be more cover for fry. 

The crypts have pretty much melted back to nothing, we'll see if they recover. The rest of the plants seem to have adapted and new growth is starting. I'm still looking for more ideas for plants that will do well in the pond. 

I've had one run in with wildlife. I came out to feed them the other morning and my sweet flag was knocked over and the dirt spilled out so you couldn't see anything and everything was moved around. I replanted the sweet flag and waited for the dirt to settle so I could see if any fish were missing and luckily none were. I'm guessing the cat that's always walking through our yard jumped in. 

 

[Chef's mini deck pond]

@Fish Folk

I hope I'm as successful! I wanted to do some thing larger like a 100 gallon stock tank, but my wife shot it down. This is my proof of concept so she hopefully green lights a larger one or multiple next year.

[Java Babies! How to manage?]

I've had success with all 3 options! 

Glueing then to small rocks seemed to work best though. Just leaving them eventually leads to them floating, and floating works but mine end up tumbling around and growing in odd shapes. 

[Good or bad to change water every other day?]

It depends on your stocking, amount of plants and fertilizing method. If you're doing some form of EI dosing then it usually calls for weekly 50% changes. If your tank is extremely heavily stocked than a drop system doing constant water changes might be best. If you are supper heavily planted then you might only have to do top offs weekly and a change once a month or even less often. 

Outside of EI dosing or extremes in stocking or plant density the best way to determine how often to change water is test often. Once nitrates get above where you want them it's time to do a change. How quickly they build up and how tight of a range you want to maintain will determine how often and large your water changes are. 

[Chef's mini deck pond]

Haven't had much time for projects the last couple weeks because we welcomed my second daughter into the world on the 19th, but I found time yesterday when everyone else was napping to set up my mini pond! It's just a small one to get my feet wet, and if all goes well I'll start a large one next year. 

It's roughly 25 gallons. The shelf I made from a milk crate if supporting a fabric planter with sweet flag in it. The fiber pot to the right is a pond lily. I also added a few stems each of cabomba and rotala to see how they do and crypt undulata red both in the open area in front and the shaded area under the shelf to see how that does. After I took the pictures I added some dwarf water lettuce and Frogbit. 1

I want to add more aquarium plants to see what does well(preferably heavy root feeders), but that's what I had on hand. If the crypts do well I'll add some pink flamingo I'm growing and I have another fabric planter if I decide I want another bog plant. 

I have a medium sponge filter and nano air pump coming from the coop for filtration and it should fit under the shelf. 

For stocking it will be mutt guppies and ramshorn snails. I added 5 snails from my shrimp tank when I set it up, and the guppies are in my QT tank until the temps outside are warm enough (I'm thinking once the lows are in the high 50s for at least a week). I'm starting with 6 females and 4 males. 

The substrate is a new mixture I'm testing out. It's 2 parts organic soil to one part safetsorb with a little crushed coral added in. It's capped with 2 parts safetsorb to 1 part crushed coral. I feel like safetsorb mixed into the soil gives a better mix for planting in and I hope the safetsorb can absorb the excess nutrients that's common in the begining of dirted tank setup and store it for plants to use later. The crushed coral is added to help buffer the water. 

My hopes for this pond is just to make some guppies and hopefully fund a larger pond next year. If I'm able to propagate plants in it as well that's just a bonus. 

Any thoughts on the setup or plants that would do well in it? 

[Aqua Huna Breeding?]

@Maggie don't worry about those females I doubt anything bad happens to them. For fish that don't pair off for breeding the farms would rather sell more males, because it impacts their production capacity less to sell males. For example say I have a colony of guppies with 50 males and 50 females and my LFS want to buy 40 guppies. I could do 20 males and 20 females, but my production rate would drop. Instead I could just give them 40 males and my production rate would not be impacted at all. 

[Real Jobs vs. Hobby Jobs...why do they feel so much better?]

I had to deal with making the choice between a career that I truly enjoyed and one that would pay enough that I could both support my family and actually be home enough to spend some time with them. 

I'm a chef, and there is nothing like working in a good restaurants kitchen. Creating new dishes is a creative outlet unlike any other because food is something experienced with all the senses at once and there's no rush like being just a little in the weeds for an entire service but never falling behind. I loved being a restaurant chef, but fair pay and benefits are virtually non existent in the restaurant industry. 

I left the restaurant industry where I was a Sous Chef about a year and a half ago to work in the kitchen at a senior living community as a line cook. I started at a higher wage, have amazing medical coverage and more paid time off than I know what to do with. Oh and every other weekend off.

The downsides are the food is basically inedible, we aren't allowed to season anything, all my coworkers are completely incompetent, and most off the food comes in already made and just needs to be heated up. This job crushes my soul but it's worth it to be able to both support my family and actually get to spend time with them.

In order to keep my job from crushing my soul completely I've done a few things. Until covid hit I was working one day a week at one of my old restaurants so that I still got to cook food I was passionate about and found rewarding. I also started spending time trying to make money through my hobbies, at least enough so that they support themselves. I collect knives and had been sharpening knives for coworkers occasionally so I started a business sharpening and repairing knives. I also started trying to breed fish, and have plans to set up several tanks to breed fish and grow plants to sell locally.

I don't make a ton of money from the one day at a restaurant, the fish/plants or the knife sharpening (I actually make more per hour sharpening than I do at my real job but don't do that much volume) but the feeling that you get earning money from something you are truly passionate about and enjoy is so much better than when it's just a paycheck. 

[Don’t tell the wife]

Don't sneak a tank that big in, it's a bad idea also a tank that large will most likely require reinforcing any piece of furniture not purpose built as an aquarium stand. Like many others here my wife is accepting but not really supportive of my hobby. I'm allowed one display tank upstairs (upgrading from my 29hex to a 40 breeder once I find a piece of furniture I can reinforce to make a stand) and one mini tub this year as a trial to see if she'll be OK with a larger one next year(my wife is unable of visualizing what things will look like until they are actually finished and in front of her). My other 2 are in the basement, which once finished I can have one rack of tanks.

[What would be the perfect North American tank?]

Okefanokee pygmy sunfish have my vote. I probably spelt that wrong though. Planning to set up a tank for them within the next year hopefully. 

[Help - The leaves are growing but in brown color.]

From the leaf shape it looks like a dwarf aquarium lily which is supposed to be a reddish brown to full on red depending on nutrients and light. 

[Plants arriving Friday what do I do]

They will probably survive at those temps. You'll probably get alot of melt but as long as the roots survive they should bounce back. 

That said if it was my tank I would move the fish and treat with high heat and salt until the meds arrive. And put the plants in the tank set to the temp they are going to be at regularly in order to give them every advantage because until they are established in you're tank they are at their most vulnerable stage.