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anewbie

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Posts posted by anewbie

  1. The single biggest obstacle I face is keeping them all alive. The most frustrating current obstacle is finding detail information on behavior of the current fishes i'm hopeful to obtain. It is amazing how little information is known or shared about some species. Like will they bite my fingers when I feed them. This is very important to know because I need my fingers for typing notes and when bitten i hate to type.

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  2. On 5/19/2023 at 9:21 AM, Mmiller2001 said:

    Yesterday I learned there are 4 different kinds of SAE's sold in the trade. 2 of which will eat plants as adults. They are incredibly difficult to identify and as such, I'm rehoming him Tuesday. He's going into a 220. So he should be quite happy. 

    So hopefully, this will free up some algae for the snails if they are the culprit. The other sites I visit are suspecting it's this type of SAE and he's the culprit.

    https://www.seriouslyfish.com/species/crossocheilus-langei/#:~:text=Members of Crossocheilus are characterised,jaw via a thin membrane

    Scroll down to the Notes section if you want to read about them.

    Yes - and one of the four LOVES bba 😉

    More precisely: crossocheilus langei

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  3. On 5/18/2023 at 11:07 PM, Odd Duck said:

    Oooh, I want some!

    Remind me in 6 months; if it spreads i can send a few out - of course if it withers and die - you will have to find another source 😉

    It was inexpensive so i expect the former to the extent of becoming a weed. Now on to my pet peeve why can't stores sell some of these more interesting plants - why do we keep finding the same 'junk' 😉

     

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  4. On 5/19/2023 at 2:08 AM, Lennie said:

    I keep my honey gourami at 80F with my GBR.

    I have seen them going up to 89F last summer with zero issues as I live in a very hot city. Outside reaches up to 122F during summer....

    I find these sort of comments troubling because people see a post like this and think that 89F isn't harmful to the fish. What I think you mean by 'zero issues' is that the fish didn't fall over dead or hover near the top gasping. However - frequently a fish might die at a later time and the person will say something like 'the fish was in perfect health' why did it die. Heat even can have long term health impact; though short period is usually not going to have  a serious impact - but this largely depends on duration and extreme. However when a fish with a life expectancy of 6 years only lives 3 years obviously there was something that cause it to have a shorten life span - though it could be many factors ranging from inbreeding, improper water condition, stress from fighting, too hot, too cold, .... i would speculate about 99% of fish keeper just know their fish died but lack proper detail records or have method (dissection for example to study organs and tissue) to determine actual cause of death. However - this doesn't mean extreme temp didn't cause some latent issues that will show up at a later date.

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    I wanted to bring up a related topic on heat effect on fishes; while the temp has only risen a few degrees the past 3 decades; it has cause many species to go extinct and there is a fear that with further increase many more fishes will soon go extinct. Naturally those which are found in shallow lakes and similar where the fishes cannot adjust the temp of their environment are most effective. These effects are frequently over a period of time not due to a single event on a single date because of the long term impact on the fish and their habitat. 

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  5. On 5/18/2023 at 9:16 PM, tolstoy21 said:

    This is pretty accurate with my experience as well. I find that apistos will either co-parent well, or one of them winds up a floater. Some species might naturally be better at co-parenting than others, but I don't yet have enough years/experience in breeding fish to address that.

    This is species specific - it isn't a matter of 'skill' it is nature of the fish; nijjensi complex will mostly co-parent (pair forming); mac and hongsloi is a bit grey; agassiz, cockatoo, borelli, trif - only the mom parents - in a sufficiently large aquarium with multiple males/females you will see the male forming large territories with several females wondering into them for the sole purpose of breeding.

  6. On 5/17/2023 at 7:20 PM, TeeJay said:

    Been a bit of a hectic couple of days in the apisto tank. Yesterday as I was watching them I started noticing a fair amount of aggression from the boy. Kept chasing both girls pretty hard. Sometimes even trying to dive bomb them. So I made a video and sent it to my PIC @Guppysnail and she noticed as well one of the girls was going after the other pretty hard as well. 

    So I moved the girl that was getting it from the other 2 into the 29 gallon tank. We figure the other 2 were starting to mate up and didn't want the 3rd wheel hanging around. Within a few minutes of getting her out of there things were much better.  Before that I could literally watch the boy actively try and seek and destroy for lack of better term the other girl. Now he has calmed way down and the pair have more room to call there own. 

    One of those things you have to learn. Yes I guess you could maybe pull off a trio in a 10 gallon if you had 3 that have very chill personalities. Mike are not that lol especially the boy. But all 3 are doing well now with no permanent damage.

    The smaller of the 2 girls now gets to love her life in the 29 gallon.

    As well my boss is giving me a 10 gal tank that he no longer wants. So I figure I'll get it here in the next couple of days and get it ready for the boy apisto to have a vacation home when and if they have babies. Hey can have a vacation home while mom raises the kids. 😆

    As well I want to send a thanks to @tolstoy21 for helping in this matter.

    This isn't strictly correct. Borelli are not pair forming. Each female will establish a territory independent of the other once they are ready to breed - the male could care less about them other than breeding but if you have a younger female that is not of suitable breeding age the male might try to drive it out of the territory; conversely the female that is ready to breed will not want any bottom dwellers in her area - and definitely not another young borelli. As i mentioned before the aquarium you are using is generally consider a bit risky for 2 of this species much less 3; and while the plan to remove the male is a good one you might find timing extremely critical. Certainly once the female lay eggs there might be a window where she is close to the eggs and dont' notice the male but if she does she will attack him and he will need to quickly find a place to hide. The exact level of aggression is highly dependent on individual fishes so what actually happens in your case is hard to predict and some do have short term success in a 15. The problem here is the female can kill the male (or another female) very very quickly if they hit it in the right spot. These sort of attacks are not going to be fin attacks or lip locking. She will target major organs - how they know where to find them - i have no clue - i guess it is one of the thing the fish lord taught them when he created them. Fin damage and lip locking are more territorial dance or what i call bickering - and i find males more likely to bicker than females.

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  7. Someone ate my two year old blyxa nov (an expensive set of plants); I suspect it was a bunch of baby bn pleco but i suppose it could have been the panda gara - who knows - someone. My mystery snail (single snail) ate all my pearl weed and it was a forest - didn't take him long at all to munch through it all. thankfully he leaves my horn worth alone - though i think i kind of preferred the pearl weed.

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  8. I wanted to mention a new crypt i picked up that on the surface seems quite nice:

    Cryptocoryne Pontederiifolia Red Lips 

    -

    I've only had it for about 2 1/2 weeks so it is too soon to declare long term growth pattern but colour wise it is slightly deeper than Jacobensii pink and has the leaf shape of a pontederiifolia. 

    Here is an awful picture - the leaf below the one i circle is in critical focus but that how it goes - i can take another one later when i get home if you want:

    xx.jpg.e01adf6b067cc6291371b70b04431750.jpg

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  9. On 5/11/2023 at 1:17 PM, Patrick_G said:

    You do get a lot for you money and you can always add a second light later if necessary. 
     

    Two mid priced options: 

    Fluval Aquasky and the new Aquarium Co-op light both are priced somewhere between a Hygger and a Fluval 3.0

    My problem with the co-op light is that it has limited settings also (and more important to me) it doesn't have a sunrise/sunset and if you have fishes easily startled by the light jumping on at full from off then it is not a great option - other than that the speces seem good but i haven't checked it for colour balance et all and since you can't adjust the balance you either like it or not.

    -

    I'm not happy with the aquasky; the fluval 3.0 was my go to light but it is a bit yellow and i've not found an adjustment that is more neutral. I'm pretty happy (so far) with the new ai blade BUT it is not sealed like the fluval 3.0; does not have a 3 year warranty like the fluval 3.0 and is about the same price. It is quite a bit stronger - so this is definitely a high end light - similar to wrgb 2 and twinstar - maybe a little cheaper - not sure haven't compared them. I've not used the twinstar but was very unhappy with the wrgb 2 (though a lot of folks like it). All of these are overkill lights for your application so mentioning is probably not to helpful other than to state i would not buy the aquasky. 

    On the less expensive side of things a lot of people like the beamworks (not claiming it is better or worse than the various hygger models; just mentioning it as an alternative).

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    When comparing lights be sure to compare the same size (length) - sometime people make mistake and end up comparing two models at  different length which will mess up the comparison.

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    One thing you can do is search the model you are looking at and "par" to see if someone has measured par at various depths. 'par' is considered a more useful value than lumens.

  10. On 5/10/2023 at 4:03 PM, Chick-In-Of-TheSea said:

    I have this one. Great for plants. I love 24/7 mode. Sunrise/day/moon/off. Auto adjusts brightness throughout the cycle as world occur in nature.

     

    28301CAC-36B4-4F58-AC08-BD18F60AE923.jpeg

    072D23A9-E6F3-42AE-91B7-9203DC669476.jpeg

    Link doesn't work.

    On 5/11/2023 at 2:28 PM, Vítor said:

    Aquasky in here is about 100€ so probably the hygger is better

    Is it correct that you are judging the quality of a light based off the price ?

  11. On 5/10/2023 at 1:42 PM, beastie said:

    Embers are prone to being fat and lazy, pairing them with a feeder is a disaster in the making. I loved the brief periods of my honey gourami in my 54l, they enjoyed the space too 

    You do recommend an apistogramma pair for this size? I am toying with the idea of getting some but am afraid the tank is too small for two.

     

    For the OP, wouldn't it be easier if someone showed up week two and fed your fish? Many not nano fish survive two weeks very easily. Nano fish do only week, small mouth, small stomach, prone to starving.  For one week at xmass i wouldn't bother feeding at all, it is not like we all can't use a diet :))

     

     

    I guess you've had fat embers; i've never had fat embers. As to the lazy aspect that is what makes them a good candidate for a 15.

     

    I do not recommend all (or even most) species of many fishes to a 15. The species a. pucallpaensis is suitable for a 15. People get hung up on the genus rather than focus on specific species. It is like saying that all tetras are suitable for a 15 and that is not the case; there are many species of tetra that are not suitable for a 15.... 

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  12. All sort of options - you could do a pair of A. pucallpaensis; or badis. You could do a group of shrimps and Pangio shelfordii; you could do some ember tetra or guppies. In my 10 where i keep a. pucallpaensis - i use shrimps and mystery snails to eat excess food. They will breed (though the frys should be fed bbs after a few days if you wnat them to make it); they arean't as colourful as some fishes but they are peaceful enough to exist in such a small aquarium. Badis are more colourful but should be fed live food which sounds like a no-no for your setup. Btw you didn't mention your water hardness and that makes a big difference on stocking - for example i would not put guppies in soft water (i suspect your water isn't that soft since you keep platies such). A 15 is pretty small for a perpetuating group of guppies - of course if you don't add females that won't be an issue.... While the size of the aquarium does limit what you can keep there are still hundreds of options.... 

  13. On 5/10/2023 at 4:56 AM, lmhicks101 said:

    @anewbie I’m looking for something that’s green and purple like those plants. Preferably something that has mixed colors instead of one leaf green and the other purple. I’ve got pink flamingos and scarlet temples for pink so I don’t need anymore unless the plant has that too.

    All the swords I’ve seen are pretty much the same other then the ozelot and that one has what looks like spots and stripes of color  I’m looking for something that looks like that first pic in color and patterns. 

     

    In terms of pure colour the kleiner prinz is going to be pretty close but it requires a fair amount of light and it won't be streaked but solid wine colour; in terms of your description red flame or various ozelot hybrid are likely close but they are going to be mostly green with various amount of red streaks in the leaves; the amount depends on the exact hybrid (red flame and ozelot are closely related); but they all tend to have dark green with dark red (maybe too dark to your liking); also they stay reasonably small - after 5 years my red flame was never larger than 7 or 8 inches. red flame will grow larger  if grown submersed. The problem with these plants is they are not an 'exact' species and the label seems to be applied to a variety of similar plants so you never really know exactly how it will look until you plant it and give it a few years - also growing condition (light, co2, mineral content) will have a more noticeable impact on the exact appearance. 

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  14. Are you looking for a mix of red green or do  you want specifically pinkish or deep red - there are a lot of different sword plants ranging from pinkish (mixed with green) to deep red mixed with green - folks mentioned melon - there is also red flame; ozelot and a few dozen hybrids. Rubin swords are more uniform in colour though with good lighting and get purplish; and there are some other sword plants with pink to purple leaves that are not mixed with green like kleiner prinz and purple aflame. Towards the pink direction there is echinodorus rose and oriental - generally speakingi think the red ones do better than the pink ones. Another one is echinodorus micracle. Too many to keep track.

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  15. On 5/8/2023 at 8:24 AM, Mmiller2001 said:

     

    My understanding is soft or hard water is unrelated to KH. Hardness is Ca and Mg.

    That part is true-ish; but ph also influence plants (some require acidic water other alkaline; what I don't know is if this requirement is due to ions in the water or some other factor being expressed as ph (i.e, is it the ph itself; ion (which i think is ph); or kh. My guess is people measure the ph but don't narrow into the specific of what is impacting the plants.

  16. On 5/7/2023 at 6:02 PM, Mmiller2001 said:

    Thank you. 

    To be completely honest @Patrick_G, getting this tank was the best decision since marrying my wife. I've had to make some safety modifications as a few fish were sucked into the back chamber but it's turning out that tank turnover was more important than I realized. I honestly can't believe how much better the plants are responding and how much easier things are progressing. 

    I was able to sell the 75 gallon and the 40 gallon should be sold soon. I have way more time to sit on the couch and enjoy the tank. Filter cleaning take 5 minutes and doing a water change on 1 tank feels like a vacation. The new lights are a dream and I want to push them to 100% as soon as I can. I'm excited, but already getting nervous for the AGA. I think I have narrowed done a few more species and Tuesday they will be removed. The tank is already looking too crowded and I need the species I'm keeping to take off. 

    I've also been tweaking my GH and KH. I did notice a problem this morning with my Tiger Crypt and this could be why. Sadly, the Tiger is on the cut list. I just can't picture how it could make it in my scape I've envisioned. One thing I'm also noticing is adding KH is creating instability. 0dKH is just easier to manage and I'm almost positive I will give up on adding KH. Time will tell though.

    Why is the tiger crypt on the cut list; is this s dutch thing or just an issue of too many options something has to go.

    Btw what gh/kh are you using? My tiger has been roaring the past year but i'm not being nearly as precise as you are with the chemistry. The only issue with 0dkh is making sure that during changes to the aquarium the chemistry doesn't change too quickly as some fishes have problems with rapid change - it isn't so much the actual ph that upset them but the ion level (if that is the right way to express it) and raising the kh from such a  low level can have a large impact on the ion level.

    As for plants while i no longer remember specific species i do remember that across a large number of species some plants will have polar requirements to water chemistry (i.e, some prefer soft(er) water and other harder water; 'prefer' being an understatement for some species).

  17. One of these days i should post more pictures; but did the usual change on my 120; my lilies now completely cover the top of 1/2 the aquarium (that is 8 sqft of surface covered) and my jungle val leaves are exceeding over 8 feet (which at this point is getting annoying). I think next time i cut one i'll lay it out on the floor with a ruler. My festum snagged another serape and i still have another 7 weeks till i move (and can sep them). Oddly enough (or perhaps not) it is the females (which are relatively small - maybe 3 1/2 inches - that does the snagging  - so much for the theory they will only eat what fits in their mouth - i think the theory should be they will eat what they can break into small pieces to fit in their mouth.

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  18. On 5/5/2023 at 9:09 PM, jwcarlson said:

    My apistos have become my favorite fish to watch.  They're really interesting, relatively active, and curious little things.  They're not quite as 'beggy' as other cichlids I've had like oscars and discus.  But they do seem to get used to you being around.  

    Good looking fish! 🙂

    This seems to be both  dependent upon species and scaping; i have had some species where the male never accepts people - or at least haven't after several years. While the females generally seem more bold again exact behavior depends upon species.

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