Solidus1833

you can always try the tile method after you soak them in a 35gallon tub/trashcan. drill holes through some tile, and use zipties to attach them to the wood. depending on your substrate, it may have enough surface area and weight to keep the wood sunk. I've always struggled to get my large pieces of wood to sink. even after boiling them in a large steel vat using some propane outside. they still floated. so you may still need to weigh them down. OR!, I've also seen some examples, where putting up a new aquarium, and they glue/epoxy the wood to the bottom glass using the tile method as well.

August 2020 here.

Some times I catch one of them trying to sleep on a soft stone. Or right under it. But most of the time they take turns sleeping at the apex of the bow front. Possibly because flow is strong there. They could probably just leave their mouths open and have water rush through the gills maybe?

Its difficult to get images when they nap because they 'alert' at the sign of any movement outside the tank. But I was just watching some F1 quals and noticed I had some Clowns napping. I enjoy these goof balls, one of my favorite species.

If you zero nitrite, I'd leave the tank until your nitrate hits around 80ppm or whatever your 'WC' target is. Good job, glad you recovered.

Just finished my weekly WC about an hr ago and noticed my Royal Plec is supper happy and leaving me presents.

I'm assuming CPD is 'celestial pearl danio'? First, I would try and keep your wet fingers from contaminating any food repository you use. I dont think this could 'poison' your food, but it will foul it up quicker. As for our CPD issue, it may not be disease related, and more water parameters related. Is your PH too high/low? is your water hardness too much or little for CPD's? What are your water parameters? What are the water parameters of the location you purchased the CPD's from?

Listening to my dojo loaches make 'machine gun' sounds at the water surface in the evening will always get me. And, dont get me started on the clown loaches. ARE U DEAD!?! oh.. no ur just sleeping... Watching them play water polo with bladder snails is also extremely entertaining.

you could try repashy, and when you mix up the repahsy paste it on some rock or wood. The hill streams will naturally graze that way. Dealing with competing fish during feeding can be a difficult task. I myself have to try and trick my dojo loaches to one end of the tank so my pleco's get their foods. Dam dojos are stringy water piggies. they eat EVERYTHING

Remember its a balance. Too much water change will result in a stagnant cycle or crash it. If you are referring to nitrite, then you must wait it out. Do 30% a day and detoxify with prime if there are animals in the aquarium. If you are referring to ammonia, you could be getting a false reading as water conditioners like prime will cause this. Beneficial bacteria will take care of that overtime.

I agree with @SWilson about the BN behavior, While I've not owned a BN for a while now, I've had 3, two that lived to about 11, and the third I rescued then rehomed. I've never seen a BN 'attack' the surface. I've seen em sort of graze above the waterline if you have calcium deposits or algae. My corydoras and dojo loaches do this all the time. Well the dojo loaches are more making their very own machine gun noises for fun. Also creating fish flatulence (on demand). You have an air-stone which was going to be my first question, so to be honest I'm not sure.

My first thought is, good on you. You seem to have really done an admirable job for your first aquarium. As for dosing stability, you shouldn't need to anymore. The BN pleco alone is enough to feed the beneficial bacteria. Stability works over a 3 day period. So say, you dose stability on day 1, and by day 3 the excess bacteria has come and gone 'cloudy water'. What's left is the beneficial bacteria keeping balance in the aquarium. As for 'he/she', if the fish has few/short whiskers, its a female, if long and numerous, its a male. The more you feed the more waste the pleco will produce. Besides that I'm not sure why you keep having ammonia. A plant could alleviate all ammonia from your tank, I highly recommend at least one plant. Is this also after a water change? Water conditioner's like Prime will give false ammonia readings for a few days after a water change. As for why you lost fish 'assuming you cycled the tank' it could have been ph shock. The damage could have already been done that's why the fish died later as well. Most pleco's however especially BN's are very hardy. How high is your PH from the tap? If the fish you purchase are coming from say, 7.0 and you place them in 7.8, that could be quite a shock. So for further stocking, maybe you should slowly acclimate new additions to your aquarium water. 'IF' your tank has not cycled completely and you find nitrites, then you can continue and cycle using the 'fish-in' method. Use prime to detoxify nitrite and do a 30% WC once a day. Too much and you crash the cycle, too little and the nitrites will take off. But you should not need to dose for waste cause that BN will do all of that for you. I've completed a 'fish-in' cycle with stability and prime in around 6 days using a BN, its definitely doable.

My first question is, is the tank cycled? Did you set this tank up then immediately add live animals or did the cycle complete? If this is the case, you are now going to go through a 'fish-in' cycle and need to treat the aquarium accordingly to save as much as possible. My second thought here is, 8.0ph is really high. Some species can live that high, but most like ph as close to 7 as you can get. You may need to remedy this.

The pleco looks nice and pudgy to me. Ahahah. That frog! Perfect belly

if anything its addition is negligible at best to changing water parameters. Even if its rotting, that just feeds the beneficial bacteria to catch up and consume nitrite. I've had a bulb that was squishy like you have described. My clown loaches sniffed it out dug it up and ate half the bulb, but the sprouted end still lived and thrived.

if there is 'any' growth I'd throw it back in your aquarium. Lily bulbs can take a notoriously long time to really get going. So if you see any growth, that's a good sign. I've had lily bulbs take a few months to get to a point where they start sprouting leaves. They are worth it in the end, but dang do they take a while.

This can differ between species, but mostly its should be between what water they are in, and what water you are placing them in. Me personally, I forego any quarantining because my source does this form me. So I place my new fish still in its bag in my tank and turn the lights out for about 30mins. Then I get a bucket and net, dump the fish in the net and place it into the aquarium. This is all because my source (LFS) has nearly identical water parameters as my own. Drip acclimation is beneficial for some species like shrimps. But mostly, you need to be sure the aquarium they are going into is not too much of a ph shock or nitrate shock to the fish. If you take a fish from 0ppm nitrate and throw it into an aquarium that's above 100ppm, that could spell doom. In some species, even going from 0-50ppm nitrate could be deadly. Before you ever get new fish you must be sure you don't have 'old tank' syndrome. Where your nitrates are high, but the fish slowly acclimated to it. Still not exactly health for your fish, but they can survive. However any new additions will not do well at all. Its a good idea to ask your LFS what their water parameters are and compare it with your own. An instant PH shift from say 7 to 6 or 8 can be lethal if its not slowly acclimated.

I've always thought about how much a disadvantage colorblind individuals have in this hobby. Especially with test strips and water testing kits like you mentioned. I myself am 100% disabled. I got out of the hobby when I joined the Marines in 2004, and I always wanted to get back into it except part of why I loved fishkeeping was the work, and the care involved. I didn't want to have someone help me or rely on others. I found the Python system my saving grace and was my avenue back into fishkeeping back in 2012 when I retired. No more buckets, 'unless I'm cleaning media from my canister. I can handle lifting one 5gal bucket but not 6-7 I would need for a 30% on my largest tank. I was thinking of getting a wheeled sled for my canister like what you would find for large trashcans, but my tank its connected to is literally 10ft from my front door where I do the maintenance on it. Not really worth it in my opinion, but I bet others would like some wheel device to move theirs farther. I really like your topic, its a rare one and one not really talked about as much in the hobby. There are two major things in the hobby a fish keeper cant get away from. Color coded testing, and removing/replacing water which is 'heavy'. I suppose you could always get some digital ph readers, but from what I've seen they need recalibration all the time which could be annoying. I wonder if there are digital readers for the other elements nitrate/nitrite.

Python hooks are neat, but I found I just don't spend the time to remove the syphon and replace it with the hook. When starting a new aquarium and filling for the first time, I generally use a rock/stone to diffuse the water so the substrate is minimally effected. I don't worry about the substrate after that point.

your tank is not cycled yet.

Birds must have dropped some wild blackberries in the bushes out front of my home. ITs also Where I dump any fish waste I accumulate whenever I use buckets for cleaning my canister. These wild berries are taking over my bushes and I couldn't be happier. I also noticed when I told my wife to grab some fish water for her houseplant that was doing poorly, it ended up growing more in 4 months than in 1 year.

Would something like Live rock create a really good platform for cycling a tank or would a marine tank need a cycle prior to live rock?

Every fish in my tank except the Royal pleco devours on the community+. Bosmani rainbow, dojo loach, clown loach, corydora, rainbow shark; they all love it.

Thank you very much! I really like your fish room. That blue acara i think it was is stunning! And your discus tank looks superb. I love black worms, i pick some up from my LFS every few weeks as a treat. I would like to get into maintaining a black worm colony, it would replace frozen bloodworms for me permanently.