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Fishdude

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Everything posted by Fishdude

  1. Fishdude
    It actually sounds like maybe you'll have plenty of filtration and a sponge will never be a bad addition to any tank. Be sure when you set up the airline that it includes a check valve so that a power outage doesn't inadvertently drain the water from your aquarium! Cycling will take time for sure, but you can speed it up either by adding a little filter media from an established aquarium (from a friend or local store) or you could try the tetra safe start if you'd like to get the ball rolling. Having your ammonia around 2ppm is where you want it to be to get the process going with conversion to nitrites and nitrates. I would actually recommend adding a java fern, especially if it's one from a cycled tank. The nitrifying bacteria make their home in places other than just the filter and so more surface area can be helpful. If you're adding a plant be sure to look into fertilizer (and iron/carbon as per Aquarium co-op). The java fern will be fine in there while the tank is cycling. The biggest thing is just to keep testing everyday and keeping the ammonia levels up so that the colonies of bacteria are always growing - if you stop feeding them ammonia the colonies will die back and the cycle will stall. It takes patience but it's definitely worth the wait! Best of luck!
  2. Fishdude
    Well, so they all need different things to be successful in breeding - I'd focus on one fish to start, and probably something like a livebearer (or an egg-scatterer that doesn't eat the eggs or fry if you've not bred fish before). Corydoras can be a challenge unless you have the time to pull the eggs and monitor them, and then they need special fry foods to get to the right size. I'd suggest maybe guppies or killifish maybe? I have a tank with platys who just breed like crazy all the time too. I'll kinda leave this to other breeders who've done more of this to suggest species, but regardless you'll want to be intentional about the environment the fish are in and how/what you're feeding them if you want successful breeding to happen. So either way look up information about the fish you'd like to breed and the processes involved, water temp, etc... Good luck!
  3. Fishdude
    This is super helpful, thank you! What's the length of PVC you can run without limiting the air pressure? Like this looks like it runs through a whole basement but at some point I would think that distance from tanks would become an issue, yes?
  4. Fishdude
    Okay so you mean like a larger open valve at the end that I could adjust so the pump isn't overworked for only a handful of lines? I assume the actual pump output isn't adjustable?
  5. Fishdude
    I'm tentatively planning to set up a linear piston pump and loop for air lines in my upcoming fish room. I had a couple questions about the products themselves (and some of them may be silly but I'd rather ask than have problems later): 1. Is there a major difference between the 45B and 45C models of the linear piston air pump by MEDO? Aquarium Co-op carries the 45B model and on Amazon I see only the 45C model. 2. The metals valves are listed as one-way - does this mean they effectively replace traditional check valves in the airline or do I still need to include a check valve for every aquarium line? The last thing I need is a power outage and a mess! 3. Is there a minimum number of lines that should be run off this system to make it worth using? I'll be starting with around 10-11 tanks but planning to expand to a second rack. I'd like the build this when I set up the fish room though so that it's available when I need it. Thanks fellow fishkeepers!
  6. Fishdude
    Ironically, I too have a now short-finned betta. Poor boy never fully regrew his fins after treatment, but he looks happy otherwise.
  7. Fishdude
    THANK YOU for the test strips, I bought two jars and they have saved some lives already. I looked at the color and said "my pH is WHAT now? My nitrates are how high? With plants?" Those are going to have a permanent home in my fish room.
  8. Fishdude
    Also meant to add, if you're new to the hobby try not to be too down on yourself if something goes awry - experienced people will tell you that we all mess up at times!
  9. Fishdude
    I've been at this for several years now and with multiple tanks set up. My maintenance schedule has been erratic due to the pandemic and a planned move. I did not realize how badly one of my tanks needed some work until I hit up the multitest strip and now I'm realizing why I have some problems! If you're new to the hobby, test that water. If you're not new to the hobby...test that water. Needless to say, these fish look a lot happier.
  10. Fishdude
    Man I'm loving these tanks, nice work.
  11. Fishdude
    You know you're going to build one of those custom 2000 gallon setups right? Like if you're not putting in a dovii tank like Mel are you even really in the hobby?
  12. Fishdude
    Looks good - nice work! I always love it when the patience pays off. I agree that there's a decent chance plants have kept the nitrates down (that's happened in all of my tanks).
  13. Fishdude
    At what level is it considered liquid rock? I have tap water that's coming out at like 8.6 and the hardness is almost entirely calcium carbonate. I'll have to get the test kit out again but I'm pretty sure this is going to take a lot of work to reduce.
  14. Fishdude
    yeah this part is absolutely true - if you've ever had to replace things a hot water heater in a place with hard water you know how quickly that calcium can build up. I imagine the RO/DI system wouldn't work long at all with our tap water so I'm glad to hear you and others have had success removing the sodium.
  15. Fishdude
    This is super cool and I can't wait to see how the 180 turns out. I heartily approve of the pepper cories especially!
  16. Fishdude
    Yeah this is all stuff I've had to consider as well. There's not an easy way for me to collect rainwater into the basement where my fish room will be unfortunately. I do think the waste produced by the RO/DI system has made me rethink the best approach. There is so much calcium carbonate in the water from our town because it comes straight out of a limestone aquifer, so I need to do something to dilute that. This is where I've come to the idea of cutting the street water with RO/DI water so that I'm eliminating the excess salt content but not having to remineralize the RO/DI water. I'm thinking a 70/30 split, with the 30% being RO/DI water might be the way to go. Then I can adjust as necessary in the event that I decide to set up a Discus tank in the future to make the water softer. It's tough because the tap water from my current house is perfect so I'm having to rethink how I do water changes in the new place (and I don't see how an automatic water change system will be possible).
  17. Fishdude
    Hey everyone, I'm in the process of buying a house that has very hard water but also uses a water softener. As I have planted tanks I'd prefer to remove sodium from the softened water before putting into my aquariums. I've decided to split my outdoor hose line (which uses the regular hard water) and make it accessible to my sink as well as using some RO/DI filtering on the soft water to cut down on the mineral hardness and hopefully maintain some control over the pH. Does anyone have experience with this process? Has anyone installed an RO/DI to remove sodium ions from softened water?
  18. Fishdude
    Hold up, this is your FIRST tank and that's the aquascaping you landed on? This is spectacular. Really nicely set up, I'm loving the hardscape choices.
  19. Fishdude
    Really nice, lush greenery. I'm loving the choices you've made in this tank friend.
  20. Fishdude
    Yeah this is a great point about Purigen. You have to kinda be committed to changing and replacing it for it to work and it can take a lot of polishing and replacing Purigen bags to get the desired result.
  21. Fishdude
    Also with a GH/KH kit you can find out approximately how much magnesium is in there (since the hardness is either from calcium or magnesium). I don't have the calculation handy but it's in the kit that you can estimate based on how much of the hardness is calcium carbonate.
  22. Fishdude
    See I'm concerned about using tap water from a water softener. I did find that the softener lowered the pH from 8.6 to about 7.5, but the sodium content is substantial from our system (because we're basically softening water from a limestone aquifer). I'm curious about this because I expect to need RO/DI water that's remineralized to keep fish in the house I'm moving to. I've had a lot of success with plants but not with hard water and not with a water softener.
  23. Fishdude
    Depending on the wood it will leech tannins for awhile. You could probably boil and soak for days and still have tannins. On the one hand tannins aren't necessarily harmful, but the best way I know of to polish the water that's browned because of tannins is using a purigen pouch in your filter. It'll soak up the tannins and then you can actually recharge the Purigen pouch. After a few days of Purigen use the tea color should subside. As I mentioned before though, tannins can be beneficial for certain types of fish.
  24. Fishdude
    Oh man, this whole story hits close to home for me. I have a supportive but skeptical spouse and I have a bunch of tanks I've put a lot of time into that just aren't looking great. It is so frustrating to lose plants too. Thanks so much for putting this into words, you are not alone about the downs associated with this pandemic and the hobby.
  25. Fishdude
    I like this idea too, although I don't have any experience with designing or building a sump system. It's a bit intimidating, especially when I use a lot of plants and sponge filters already and it seems to do the job for the number of tanks I have. At what point is it worth having a multi-tank sump?
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