laritheloud

I loooove clover-like ground cover like what @Mmiller2001 suggested. That with a few splashes of hydrocotyle japan is LOVE. I've been trying Monte Carlo and haven't had luck with it, so I think YMMV and success is dependent on so many different factors (tank temperature, dry start vs. planting in a filled tank, ph, hardness, etc). Staurygyne Repens actually grows quite nicely in my low-tech 20 gallon, but it's not a super fast grower for me. You'd have to start with a lot to get the carpeting effect quickly. I do like how it looks a lot, quite pretty foliage and very green.

I’m in love with my tank all over again! Added the barbs and the pleco into the 55 and here is the result: https://streamable.com/ldmyd6 also scored a small group of African butterfly cichlids (anomalachromis Thomasi) that are now in quarantine! Stressed from the move but exploring! https://streamable.com/lq1ix9

I have cats and I'm thinking about risking philodendron or pothos just because I think they're soooo pretty.... I've never had cats jump on TOP of my tanks so maybe I'll be ok? 😬

Sounds just like mine! I love these fish. Enjoy him ❤️

Fortunately @jwcarlson I haven't really seen problems even in my male-dominated group. I notice sparring around feeding time and a mildly torn fin or two and that's it. They usually hang out pretty peacefully, especially at night when they're resting. Hope it's the same for you!

Yep, male. 🙂 Beautiful, too! I had a sneaker male in my group that had a rounded fin until he had room to stretch, then, boom.... male. I'm going to get more females soon.

Thank you again, everyone, for listening and for your heartfelt advice and support. You're right -- @Torrey, you absolutely did resonate with me when you spoke of control. I have clinical OCD with an eating disorder/exercise compulsion. I will always be in recovery or in remission; this is a lifelong battle for me. Life in general is absolutely bonkers and out of control and it feels like it keeps getting worse -- especially for this second-generation Ukrainian American in our current climate -- so I shift my focus to places where I can have control and hyperfocus to my and my focus's detriment. This includes my eating disorder and exercise compulsion, two things which are relatively 'easy' to fall back on and feel in control when everything else fails. On the bright side, perhaps counterintuitively, I've added to my plate by researching and purchasing some cat-safe houseplants to care for, and now I'm the proud parent of some prayer plants, a hoya wayettii and a few Ukrainian hybrid cultivars of African Violet that I'll be sharing with my family. My tanks are healthy. My quarantined fish are about to clear quarantine and I'm just about ready to think about looking at more fish -- more thicklipped gouramis since several of my 'females' turned into males, maybe some African Butterfly Cichlids -- and all is pretty stable. I have my ups and I have my downs. With love, keep NERMing. ❤️

Off-topic, but I love Luke's Goldies. I definitely withered and crumbled to dust a little when I realized he's only 21 (wow!) but I find him strange and hilarious in a good way. He loves all his animals so much.

I've had val take off in exactly 1 of my five tanks. It's gorgeous. I'm going to get more and propagate the heck out of it. But I tried it in all of my other tanks and it didn't take in any of the others.... Sigh. It's not your fault, Val can just be strange.

I've been enjoying a houseplant fever while I'm waiting to go outside and plant. Zone 7a/7b cusp in South Jersey, and the weather is already starting to warm; it makes me nervous, because in previous years, warming this early would mean a late cold snap in April. It's making me gun-shy to start planting despite a 70 degree day in the forecast this Sunday! Aside from that, the soil in our yard is really exceptional for growing. We have a small peach tree that should be getting into its fruit-bearing years quite soon, and I'm looking into adding some more fruit trees and bushes for a mini fruit harvest in our backyard.

These are all cooler water fish so I would go with a gourami that is happy with cooler-leaning water. Paradise Fish are an excellent candidate and would do well with mid-to-low-70s water temps. Most other gourami species you'd be looking at would do quite well at around 75 degrees, give or take a bit.

I just wanted to say that I'm glad you're okay and I hope your recovery continues smoothly.

You can also use a suction cup veggie clip for veg! That’s what I use in my tank. No need to make it sink that way. also I think I see a red spot on this guy so probably male???

Huh! Do you know why a patch like that would signal a male? I think mine has one but now I have to go look at other photos!

Oop, I'll assume I have awhile to wait! I can be patient 😝 Such fun fish, I love how active and unskittish bristlenose are.

My bristlenose started eating green beans SO happily and it's always adorable. Plus, my black ruby barbs munch on it, too. Nothing goes to waste in my quarantine right now. 😍 Love your little guys! By the way, do you know at what size/age bristlenose are able to be sexed? I'm not sure if I should be convinced I have a female yet or if the little fish is too young. About 2 inches long, maybe a bit more right now.

I added caridina babaulti to my neocaridina tank and they are coexisting quite peacefully. I don't think it's a good idea to mix most caridina (like crystal red shrimp) with neocaridina because they thrive in drastically different water parameters; for example, bee shrimp/crystal shrimp will not breed in the harder water that neocaridina like. Amano Shrimp and Caridina Babaulti are two of the very few exceptions to that logic, as far as I understand it.

I have trapdoor snails and find them to be less interesting pets than mysteries, rabbits, or nerites. They are very slow-moving, stay busy eating algae/biofilm in the tank, and will burrow in the sand for a week at a time just for funsies. You'll think they're dead, but nope, just a brief hibernation. I think they're best suited to cooler water to get the most out of their longer lifespans. It's fun to watch them have babies, because they're livebearing snails and the babies roll out fully formed. Most of my babies, unfortunately, don't seem to be making it very long, and I'm not sure why...

Agree. He has provocative angles and there are some good points in his site, but it's best to take a critical and skeptical approach to his articles the same as any other rando on the internet. 😉

Like @Schwack and @CT_, in an era when misinformation is rampant and someone waves their credentials in the air and expects us to take it on faith alone, I'm really wary of aquariumscience.org. I personally feel a lot of his information is misleading at best. He does not create rigorous study designs and IMO his own 'research' is akin to anecdotal accounts without peer reviews and replicable lab work to back it up. As a former statistician I cringe a little when I look at his articles. That isn't to say that some of his stuff doesn't have truth to it, I just wouldn't rely on him as a primary source. I've also heard through the grapevine and screencaps of his conversations on reddit that the guy is rather unsavory to speak with one on one and tends to fall back on petty insults with people who disagree with him or ask for further documentation. Not a fan. Regarding Seachem Prime and its claims, I don't really see any reason to doubt it, but I'm inclined to rely on water changes in the presence of ammonia/nitrite and not Prime alone.

Thank you Colu. I'm in this weird position where I'm reaching a point in my fishkeeping that some of my shorter-lived fish are just going to start dropping off. I'm still new to this hobby, no matter how much I read, research, and listen, and actually living through something of a mystery like this is puzzling. I get a little envious of people who lose track of how many fish they have in their tanks, enjoy them for what they are, and if some go, some go. I want to be like that! 🤪 If only I could RELAX!

Thank you. All I want is my thicklipped gouramis and my synodontis lucipinnis to stay healthy. None of them have ever fallen ill or shown the slightest sign that anything is wrong; it's just the rainbows, which were the first in the tank. Didn't even add the thicklips until two full months had passed of isolation, and they'd already been through a round of parasite and a round of antibiotic treatments (kanaplex in food). What would you do in this case? I kinda wonder sometimes if I'm just too hypervigilant and should just let them go as they go. My husband seems to think it's not catching, whatever it is, because none of our other fish in this tank have ever been sick.

I haven't seen the ulcers or loss of scales. The fish otherwise look unscathed after they passed. The last death actually didn't waste at all, just spun down and died. I do not share any equipment between my tanks. Call me paranoid, but all 5 of my tanks has a separate siphon, separate bucket, separate nets, separate cleaning implements. If I have to use a net in another tank I dry completely, disinfect in a methylene blue-based net soak, and dry again.

I'm not sure if it makes sense to medicate more after 6 months of having these fish and medicating so much. I can get another dewormer just in case, but the symptoms (swift wasting, stringy poop, weakness) could be signs of a lot of different diseases, all of which I've treated for with gram-positive AND gram-negative antibiotics, metronidazole in food, levamisole in the water, praziquantel... I did attempt to autopsy one, but I don't have a microscope. I didn't see any obvious worms. Just a question of what to do with struggling fish at this point. I'd considered that it could be viral and even fish TB, but I've had my hands in the tank constantly (and I'm ashamed to admit I've had my hands in the tank with scratches on those hands; I'll be more mindful about that in the future) and haven't caught anything. I'm just weary of worrying about them. It'll be a long time before I try another rainbowfish species again.

So sad to say, my pseudomugil issues haven't really resolved. I quit medicating the tank in December, and they're dropping off slowly, one by one. One male started spiraling out of nowhere and died. I am now observing a female that went from plump and well-fed to wasting and weak in the course of three days. It's very, very strange. Should I remove the obviously dying fish as they show symptoms? I'm not quite sure how to handle this. Also, I don't know what this symptoms means, but there is one rainbowfish (a male, the most vigorous of them all, actually) who has this 'patch' near the caudal fin that looks like an internal ... mass? or growth. It's been there for as long as I've had him. I initially thought it was a lesion or a sign of infection, but as it's never changed throughout my tank treatments and he actually acts healthiest of all the males, I guess it's just a growth. You can see it on both sides in the video and in the screencap here. Thoughts, @Colu? Just old and sensitive pseudomugils? EDIT: Seriously Fish tells me that these guys get less fecund after 12 to 18 months and don't really live past a breeding season in nature. They "can" live longer in aquaria but ... I suspect this is just their lifespan. When I obtained them they were adults and haven't grown larger. https://streamable.com/9vkifk