Marnol D

So i have had multiple clutches hatch in multiple tanks. I say the biggest variable to growth is food quality and quantity. Just like with other animals the snails that eat more and are more gluttonous will grow bigger and faster. I feed boiled pumpkin hunks mine and the usually sit on it till its gone. No make sure you have a good supply of calcium in the water column and in their food sources. I use calcium tablets that sink to the bottom and the snails eat them. The more gluttonous snails can grow 4x as fast as their siblings who dont eat as much. I had a hatch recently and some made it to a dime size in a month while others were almost golfball size (i think these sat on the food chunks constantly and ate)

@Aubrey I was thinking i may be that and i just keep hitting pockets of it when i gravel vac. Is there any danger to the fish? And would more gravel vaccing eliminate it.

@MickS77 Should i take the preemptive strike and dose erythromycin? Im also not running a power head at the top of the tank do you think this would add movement near the substrate to keep water moving? (currently have a rainbowshark as the bottom fish so he doesnt move substrate really or anything)

Hello, I have had a 50 Gallon tank setup for over a year now. The last two times i have gravel vacuumed the tank the water coming out of the tank smells of sulfur(edit: this has been probably over a month that the smell has been there when gravel vaccing). What causes this and is it anything i should be worried about? Mulm is present around the root plants ( i dont vacuum these areas) Substrate is black gravel. (tanks does have 17 small mystery snails but all are alive and moving so i dont think its dead snail) ammonia 0 nitrite 0 nitrate 10~ ( running CO2 and have to dose ferts to keep nitrates readable) ph 7.2 sponge filter is the filter and sponge was cleaned 3 weeks ago.

hornwort is very good at using nitrates (however it can also shed tons of little leaves and create a mess). I started running CO2 in my tanks and went from 40+ nitrates down to 5-10 and my plants started taking off. Your plants could just be missing some nutrients that your arent dosing. (it may be hard to find out which ones) Hornwort grows super duper fast and depending on how much light it gets depends on how the leaves grow.

Hello, I have a community tank (60 gallons) that has a gravel bottom. It has 17 mystery snails a rainbow shark (5 inches very docile for their breed ive had mega aggressive ones but this one is chill) and they dont seem to break the poop apart at the bottom of the tank either by swirling it up or crawling over it. The tank has a a good amount of rooted plants and my nitrates hang around 5-10 and im running CO2. The question is... is there a good creature I can add that can help crumble the poop or mix it in the gravel better? (note i can gravel vaccum the open areas but its the areas with the plants that the poop and mulm seem to build up... im not looking for something that eats poop (idk if thats even a thing) just something that moves it around that will crumble it or move it to the water column for the filter to snag) (stocking is guppies rainbow shark and snails and one solo juvenile sword tail that i missed when giving them away)

i dont think a mathematical time frame baseline could be formed for STT. We should instead be looking at what the ecosystem of the tank is doing such as the channel "Life in jars" ( i think thats the name) does where they look at how an ecosystem will grow and change in an ecosystem that is closed off but has already been seasoned. I feel like the ability for a tank to grow algae should be a start and that mulm should be present for a tank to register as seasoned. I feel like algae would be a good start as that means there is nothing in the water inhibiting life from maturing and growing. The presence of mulm would mean that there is bacteria breaking down decaying matter. the problem with a mathematical standard equation is the variables. Substrate could create a better breeding ground for bacteria. Temperature of water and purification quality of water being used. The stocking of animals creating waste. how often the owner gravel vacuums the tanks and removes the mulm. instead if we look for key elements of a seasoned tank we could better give aquarist an idea of how far they are in the cycle of getting a seasoned tank. Stage 1- not seasoned tank is still inhibiting the growth of life (aka ammonia or nitrite present) Stage 2 - mulm and decaying matter is starting to form and the presence of ammonia and nitrite is gone and nitrate is appearing. Stage 3 - algae or other Life is appearing on its on within the aquarium and sustaining or growing itself stage 4 - the algae or micro life within the tank is plateauing and sustaining itself. this would be the fully seasoned stage if animals werent added that would eat the micro organisms. Stage 5 - fully seasoned and sustaining micro life with the present of macro life organisms such as shrimp who hunt the micro.

Welcome fellow Alabamian.

So I have recently had this struggle. In my shrimp tank I manually removed the plants that had the worst growth of BBA (just stem plants that I can replace by cutting one in half so it didnt bother me). I have started running CO2 and have not noticed it growing back and the few areas that still had bits of BBA is dying back. Now on to my community tank. I have found a few ways that have worked Hydroperoxide baths work great (taking out plants/decor that has BBA on it and soaking it in hydorperoxide) the BBA turns red and will be dead within a day or two. *I have done the baths with anubis and amazon swords and moneywort the swords were the only ones who showed a negative effect but they quickly recovered (this couldve been due to the BBA hurting the leaf already) I have also found that direct dosing floursih excel will kill off BBA aswell. I would take the excel into a syringe and directly spray it on the areas with the most BBA (doses were heavy easily over 10ML an inch not the best for livestock but I havent noticed any deaths or illness from my mystery snails or bottom dwellers). The BBA usually started to clear up with 4 days of doing this. I have since started running CO2 within my community tank and have seen a decline in BBA, and nitrates.(I was a bad fish keeper and let it creep back into my tank due to neglect) In my cases of BBA it was due to low CO2 in the water and high nitrates (i guess that plants werent able to utilize the nitrates due to not having the CO2)

If the tank has just a betta in it and has substrate and plants such as moss balls you could swap almost instantly as everything in the tank as beneficial bacteria. If you want to play it safe and your tanks are warm 78F+ I would wait a week (warmer tanks bacteria reproduces faster also if there is more food they'll reproduce faster but that is how a bloom occurs).

@James V. thatll work and you can float as that will speed up hatching time if the water is warm. It can be 9 days to 3 weeks+ for them to hatch just make sure they dont dry out. I dont think air holes will be mandatory unless you want to use PLASTIC WRAP to cover it instead of destroying your lid. Just keep them moist.

You can remove and place them in a damp papertowel if you want to keep them and then place in a container and keep moist. You can also leave them in the tank just dont flood them when you add more water ( I left a small clutch in my tank and now have 17 new mystery snails roaming around). They are easy to move by hand by lightly pulling them away from the edge of the tank or you can use a razor. I have also seen where people drop them into a breeder box before they hatch as the snails will eat the clutch for nutrients when they hatch. Depending on the size of the clutch you can be looking at 11-100 new snails if they all hatch , which can cause a bacteria bloom once the snails start growing.

(thought I posted this in diseases and posted it in general by mistake) Hello, First lets start with parameters 0 ammonia 0 nitrite ~20ppm+ nitrate 7.8 ph 75F temp Additives: Easy Green liquid fert, easy carbon, equilibrium, catappa leave, Background: A few of my guppies looked to be wasting away and were colorless (after a bacteria bloom my cycle crashed )so I begin to try and figure out what the issue was. At first I suspect it was nitrite poisoning so I dosed seachem prime and water changed till I read 0. I started adding equilibrium /baking soda, catappa leaves, and salt to see if that would help them. (fun fact it did and their colors seemed to really pop and the healthy ones looked healthier even). Then I also noticed (on one of the guppies that looked the worst )what I believe is Camallanus (reddish works) at the backend of the guppies. Problem: After doing what I did in the background the guppies started looking healthier and acting better but I dont know how to treat for the Camallanus. What can I order or go out and buy? All I have on hand is salt (aquarium and Epsom)

how much surface agitation do you have? (surface agitation can cause the plants not to do good sometimes) I would try dwarf water lettuce or frogbit. I have duckweed ( i clean it out everytime i do a water change) in my 20 long that does fine but when I add it to my 55 it doesn't spread and eventually disappears ( i think some of the fish in the tank like to eat it).

That buying a single bala shark for a 10 gallon tank would be fine. And then being told to buy 4 more to make a shoal for a ten gallon.... Welp now ive upgraded them to a longer 55 gallon tank and am trying to get a 5ft-6ft tank for them setup. Also sure having 5 bala sharks and a rainbow shark will be fine together.

Ill take the easy version as it suites my needs that aslong as I maintain around 20-40ppm nitrates in my planted tanks and dose micro and macro nutrients I should be fine. Thank you

I think it stops the gills from absorbing the nitrites. However seachem prime claims to detoxify nitrites. Im currently using it until my nitrites read 0. Im struggling with something similar with my guppies. Ive boosted my ph/kh/gh with equilibrium and baking soda to add minerals into the water and so far it looks like its making my guppies recover. I have slight nitrite readings (0 ammonia my cycle crashed or couldnt keep up when my mystery snails hatched) and it looks like some of my guppies (who were already weak from mineral deficiency probably) got nitrite poisoning.

I know nitrates are comprised of the left over waste from fish food and poop, so the question is is there a such a thing as good nitrates and bad nitrates when it comes to the makeup of the nitrate? I know adding something such as Flourish fertilizer and excel or easy green and liquid carbon are in this case "good" nitrates. Is there such a thing as a bad nitrate , which would be defined as something a plant cant consume?

females about ~4-5months maybe. I have salts in the tank and the plants havent had any negative reactions yet.

Hello, Two of my female guppies are looking rough. They have developed an arched back and have lost their color (they are almost 3 inch long guppies my largest who was over 3 inches passed away yesterday and had the same issues). My tank cycle crashed recently so that could be the issue and they haven't recovered yet. The parameters now are 0 ammonia 0 nitrite 20-30 nitrate with a ph of 7.8 (mineral additives from equilibrium keep the tank mineralized this has been a very recent thing i have started doing to try and help the fish ,however since i've started doing this the other guppies seem to be healthier being more active and colorful) temperature is 78F. A week and a half ago (when noticed the water turning cloudy) I tested the water and it was less than .2 ammonia and around .25 nitrite but has since established back to 0s . Its been maybe 3 days since the tank has cleared up from the bacteria bloom and looks to have stabilized. The fish have regained some colors but still look weak ,however they are being slightly more active now. Should I give it more time to see if they bounce back or is there something else I can do for them?

I was struggling with staghorn and I used liquid carbon sources (flourish excel and co-ops liquid carbon) to get rid of it. I would apply directly to the infected areas with a heavy dose of the liquid carbon from a syringe and about 4 days later I noticed it dying off. You can also do the same with hydroperoxide but i've only had luck treating BBA with it and even then the liquid carbon did better to treat it.

Ive never tested it with excel (ive pulled plants out with hydro peroxide and it kinda worked) but I suspect as long as you coated the problem parts with enough excel or carbon it would kill it. You could also take a glass jar or glass bowl (one of the 5-10$ ones from walmart) and fill it with water and dose heavy with excel and keep the plant in a mini quarantine tank until you see improvement and just set it in a window for light.

Usually if you trim plants or the plant is growing itll do this. As the plant photosynthesizes to grow or produce more food to repair itself itll release oxygen.

well in theory, just like if snails have to much food, a larger presence of food (food being ammonia) more bacteria would breed so you could keep more as long as you gave it time to reproduce.

Im currently doing this now (im waiting for my easy carbon to ship)but am using excel and am seeing good signs when I spot treat with it!