laritheloud

Might be an unpopular opinion but I just do regular ol' maintenance and let all the diatoms and algae run its course. All of my tanks have had diatom and algae blooms, and all of them eventually reached a point where everything was in balance and matured enough to keep the algae mostly out of sight. Usually around the 3 to 5 month mark is when the algae decreases and fades away completely for me, depending on if it's a high or low tech setup.

That sounds like a great plan @Scott Stevenson! I really want to raise a colony of platies so bad. They're such fun, adorable fish.

As long as you love the fish and she's doing great in your tank, it's no problem, right? 😉 I..... think putting them with a betta is extremely risky, sadly. I'm so sorry you've been put in this position. They sound quite ignorant if they think this species is chuna and not labiosa -- chuna looks completely distinct from these guys. It's possible that your labiosas will get along with your honey. They are more likely to get along with the true honey gourami than they are with the betta. You can trial it out while you figure out if that'll be their permanent home. I originally had my thicklip in with my honey gouramis, and I only moved her to a 55 gallon with other labiosas because she was bullying my male honey with a lot of chasing. It took months to get to that point, and she never bothered my female honeys.

For the three spot gouramis I would recommend a 60 breeder and get a group of at least 4; 5 to 6 would be better. Females and males look very similar when they're juvenile so it'll be hard to sex. Try to stick to a higher proportion of females to males, but you should be okay even if you end up with more than one male. Gouramis are generally peaceful, but they can be feisty to other species if there aren't enough conspecifics around. By providing an appropriately-sized group in a large enough space, they will keep all their squabbling and aggression amongst themselves. You'll see chasing and some nipping as they work out their social hierarchy before things settle down, and that's normal. The same rules apply for most common gourami species EXCEPT dwarf gouramis which can be dicey. I'd suggest the same for pearl gouramis and any other color variant of the three spot, too. Hope this helps!

I'm missing some information. Which species of gourami are you thinking? How many gouramis do you wish to put in the tank, and how big is the tank?

Thicklipped gourami, not a honey! I actually think this COULD be a female. My male has very impressive fin extensions and an extremely dark-colored body.

@Nabaliss to help you identify labiosa vs chuna next time you go shopping for gouramis. I'm so sorry for your mix-up!

This isn't a honey gourami. This is trichogaster labiosa, a Sunset Thicklipped Gourami. Nice fish, but a little bit larger, a little bit feistier (about the same level as a pearl gourami in terms of feistiness, maybe a little less), and definitely a different species than Trichogaster Chuna/Honey Gouramis.

Absolutely not timid at all. They leap right into the fray and don't care what the other fish are doing. Just get a good group of them and you're golden.

Fingers crossed for you! They're wonderful fish, not picky to feed and just so fun. A really neat alternative bottom feeder to the usual corydoras (which I also love)!

Synodontis Lucipinnis (Dwarf Petricola) are hardier and less sensitive to softer water than true Synodontis Petricola, and I think it should be fine. I keep a group of four lucipinnis in my 55 gallon tank, and my municipal water this season has a GH of 0-1 and KH of 10... I add some minerals to kick it up to 5-6 dGH and they have no issues whatsoever. Growing nicely, too. I bought them when they were only about 1 inch long and they're breaking 3 inches now. 🙂 I love these guys, and I hope you will, too. They are so much fun to watch. Super fast, super elegant fish.

I'm quite confused about how you cycled your tank. When you did an initial cycle, you ran it for weeks with no ammonia, correct? Did you add ammonia and bottled bacteria at the same time, or did you just add the snails and the bacteria? Because what I'm seeing here is the normal course of a cycle. Ammonia and bacteria added to the start, ammonia is consumed by the bacteria, bacteria produces Nitrite, another bacteria consumes nitrite and converts to nitrate. The tank is not cycled until both ammonia and nitrite read as ZERO in twenty-four hours or less after the tank is dosed with ammonia. My 20 gallon took over 8 weeks to fully cycle (fishlessly), for instance. I do not think your canister filter is negatively affecting your cycle at all. Please leave it where it is.

Hmmmm. Well, I added a green bean this morning and no bites yet. Going to leave it in until this evening, then switch it out for something with protein in it (like one of the orange-bag Hikari tablets)... Hoping he'll eat for me soon. He doesn't seem lethargic or anything, it's just strange that he won't eat what I'm offering. Here’s a picture of his belly! Her belly? Don’t know yet!

This helps a LOT. And yes, his belly is nice and dark, so that's a relief! I'll try repashy soilent green and some veggies next.

Yep, I have an enormous piece of driftwood in the tank that was originally in the 55 gallon tank and I decided to remove to increase swimming space. Still plenty of wood in the 55! There's also a pleco cave and plenty of plant cover... And where does he choose to hang out? Behind the sponge filter and in the sponge filter tube, grazing on the airline. 🤣 He's (she's?) still pretty young, but I chose this guy because he was so active and out and about in the LFS tank!

@Beardedbillygoat1975 I have Repashy Morning Wood and Soilent Green. I still need to get my hands on Super Green! Can I leave the zucchini raw? I'm not sure whether to blanch or peel it before weighting it down in the tank. I have some green beans I can try, too. I'm just puzzled that he's been seemingly busy with the sponge filter and the glass but not touching the wafers.

So I've been offering my new red bristlenose an algae wafer (or a piece of one) from Northfin -- the Kelp wafers. I'm trying to offer veggie-heavy foods since I know Bristlenose favor algae and veg in their diets. NOW I've only had him for a few days, and I know he could totally still be settling. So far he hasn't touched the wafers I've offered. I'm leaving it in the tank until I get to bed at around midnight, I am trying to put it in when the lights are dim/out because he's still settling and seems to be most active at night. Now, this is my freshly cycled 20 gallon long... and in the two months it's been cycling it's grown a massive algae farm. Diatoms, green algae, staghorn. Should I not worry that he's not touching the wafers? I've tried Bug Bites Pleco, too. I bought Zucchini today and plan to try to feed him some tomorrow. I figure he's probably feasting on the algae buffet in the tank but I also want to make sure he's behaving normally! It's my first pleco! Thanks, everyone.

It's been awhile, but here's a quick update: My Aponogeton appears to have gone dormant and I'm not sure what to do about it. I got a baby super red bushynose pleco today, and he's been dropped into my 20 gallon quarantine. Very little, very cute. 🙂 My remaining fish are all healthy and plump! The synodontis petricola have reached at least 2 inches now, two of them are about 3 inches long!

Scales will grow back! My betta had a loose scale from some rubbing he did when he jumped through his feeding ring for food. I removed his feeding ring, kept his water clean, added some indian almond leaves and everything is looking ok.

I'd definitely try fasting before anything else. They don't look too bad to my eye and I hope that fasting them helps the bloat go down. Good luck to you and your pretty fish!

Thank you so much for this information. I hope this helps folks with snails in their tanks in the future, so they can be kept separate from all fish inhabitants for an appropriate period of time.

Update: After removing the feeding ring, giving him a fresh water change, and adding tannins, his eyes are clearing up just fine. The small bit of film is thinning out and I'm sure with a few more days it'll be gone. He's feeding all right without the ring though he's still slow and he misjudges his lunge. 🤣 We love this little guy!

If you use buckets to fill your tanks, definitely use SaltyShrimp remineralizer. I picked up some GH+ from Salty Shrimp and use it on my shrimp tank to get a precise GH. Great stuff! But you should mix it into your bucket of water that you'll be adding for your water change and not directly to the tank. Adding crushed coral to your filter would be smart for stable KH, too. Since your water is soft enough to have basically no minerals in it, I'm not sure WonderShells are precise enough to target a stable GH level, but you can try it out if you don't want to add powders to your buckets of fresh water.

AAAAAA African Dwarf Frogs are SO cute!!! I love this! Thank you for sharing!

I added a catappa leaf and a bag of rooibos tea, along with some Seachem StressGuard (though I'm not sure if it actually does anything) just to be safe with the kuhlis. I double-checked Nitrates and they're actually between 10 and 20 ppm, not quite 20. (used strips and liquid test kit) -- though I know it really makes little difference, lol. My gut tells me he's probably fine. I removed the feeding ring since I suspect he was rubbing against it with his jumping. He keeps looking at me and begging for food whenever I walk by! I'll see how he looks in the morning and change the water if I have to. 🙂 Thanks Colu. You know how I fret over my fishy friends a bit too much!