NanoNano

PSA time- Summertime is a time when you *especially* want to make sure that your hands and forearms are absolutely clean before you put them in your tank or touch your creatures. Sunscreen, insect repellent, bug sprays, residues from gardening and "summer projects", plain old perspiration and dirt, etc. can leave behind harmful residues even after liberal washing with soap and water.

I've also read that as SAE mature, they show less interest in eating algae and more interest in being omnivorous and aggressive to other tank mates (e.g. sucking slime coat off other fish). Can anyone confirm or deny?

If you're really bothered by them and want them gone, search for "planaria traps". They seem to work for just about any types of worms with the right bait.

While flatworms are...uh...visually unappealing, they can be an essential part of a healthy biome. Planaria worms (which have a very clear triangular head when you look at them closely) can be of concern as they've been known to prey on baby and adult shrimp. Other flatworms generally are benign besides the "yuck factor". My experience has been that with worms and other "pests" is that there's often an initial population explosion when they first are introduced to a new tank and that they will shamelessly be out and all over things at all hours. Give them 10-14 days- their population should "normalize"(your other tank mates will likely discover that they are delicious as well) and they hopefully will become more nocturnal in their behavior.

Quick FYI - There are commercial pre-made "dark water" formulations made from IALs out there for people that aren't comfortable making tea themselves or who might have problems sourcing IALs. https://fritzaquatics.com/assets/files/uploads/Fritz_Dark_Water_Product_Info_Sheet.pdf

Woke up one morning not too long ago to find one of our older more fragile (Rosetail) male Betta's had passed from what looked like age. Let the tank settle for a week and then took the family out to pick out another male...annnnnnnd we came home with two, so now the "hospital tank" has a full time resident on the kitchen counter. I get it...boy, do I ever get it.

I'll add my voice to the chorus of "my bettas like to sleep against the filter intakes as well". It takes a good amount of energy to move those big fins through the water, so it's very typical that males will fins a spot where they can either prop themselves on something or have the water flow hold them in place and take a cat nap. Very normal behavior. If the previous owner gave you food with the Betta, check and see if it has an expiration date on it. Betta food is high in oils and proteins and can easily turn rancid after a couple months of being open and exposed to air and that can further complicate water quality in a small volume tank.

I have what might be the worlds laziest Betta that will literally let neo shrimp in his tank crawl over him as he sleeps...but the second he sees an Ostracod (seed shrimp) swimming free in the water, he takes off like a flash and gobbles them up.

It looks like it may be a Placobdella Parasitica or "Turtle Leech". It's a blood sucker you're likely going to need to approximate something similar to the body temperature and blood characteristics of a turtle to get it to feed. I think earthworms have hemoglobin but no red blood cells, so they might not work as food. Ramshorn snails have both hemoglobin and red blood cells if I remember correctly (thank you Youtube videos on Assassin snails)- were those the types of snails you tried?

To me "cycled" means that the tank's biome has been stabilized and is working as it's going to work (with the combinations of materials, plants, fish, etc. working/competing together)- you're not there yet in this short a time period. Nitrifying bacteria is one of the slower growing aquatic bacteria (supposedly doubling in size every 8-10 hours under optimal conditions) and with all bacteria- the colonies of it grows and dies off in direct response to it's available food source(s). You're currently in a good place, but don't be surprised should your water tests give dramatically different readings several times in the next few weeks. It's part of the process. One thing I think I should call out is that Fluval Stratum has a well earned reputation for trapping and releasing ammonia when new. I see it in your tank and I see that it is capped. You may very well run into ammonia spikes if that cap is broken or at a later point as water slowly leeches from the Fluval through that cap.

@Mr.Dropp- When you say "pea gravel" are you talking about one of the commercially available substrates like Fluval Stratum? Some substrates (e.g. those made from volcanic rock) have a reputation for releasing ammonia for a period when initially submersed. You may be running into this. My experience is that using chemical water treatments like Prime isn't effective. Chemicals work by combining with and removing other things in the water (usually oxygen) which then throw open the doors to other imbalance related problems. @Guppysnail is calling out the exact right path- you want to be doing daily partial water changes to remove the ammonia from your water column. Aeration where you're breaking as much surface tension of the water as possible (without turning your tank into a blender) to encourage gas exchange between water and atmosphere is also hugely helpful in speeding up the permanent dissipation of the ammonia. If you don't have an air stone / air pump, I would encourage you to get one. This type of ammonia problem is a total PITA frustrating situation for the short term, but if you can dedicate time and discipline to doing the water changes and aeration, you'll beat it and it should never return unless you replace the substrate again.

If they're precooked and from a newly opened can, I would rinse them and feed without heating. I always give any fresh veggies quick soak in boiling water from the teapot to dispatch any surface bacteria and soften them slightly. I also always crush the "seed" parts of the bean before putting it in the tank as the membrane on them can be tough for shrimp and snails to get through.

One other thing I'd think about is PH. You list your PH at 8.0 which is at the upper end of the "comfort range" for many aquatic creatures (I have the opposite problem with a PH that often struggles to stay above 7.0). I've noticed that inverts in particular can often be lethargic and not so interested in foraging (sometimes for weeks) while they acclimate themselves to my water's PH.

A couple of questions and thoughts: * What substrate are you using? I've had snails and shrimp struggle with some of the cheaper pet store brand gravel that's coated with epoxy to give it a uniform color. My hunch is that the epoxy either off gasses something or small granules come loose and get ingested by bottom dwellers foraging off of it. * What is your gravel cleaning routine? There's a huge focus in the hobby on water chemistry (because you can get almost instant result both with tests and dumping chemicals into the water column to change it) but little knowledge sharing and/or focus on water biology. Waste left in the substrate will encourage the growth of "bad bacteria" that can make aquatic creatures sick either through direct bacterial attack or by waste products produced by the bacteria. If da intermetz is correct (big if), it takes "good" nitrifying bacteria 3-4 times the amount of time to double their population than it does for "bad" bacteria. You want/need to be assisting your good bacteria by vacuuming your substrate and removing potential food sources for the bad bacteria. I "spot clean" with a turkey baster between vacuuming at weekly water change time. * I agree with supplemental feeding as well. I use both veggies and commercial Sera shrimp pellets which every species of snail and shrimp I've had seems to eat with some degree of enthusiasm. * My personal opinion is that there's a lot of "not so robust" populations of Mystery Snails and Ghost shrimp out there right now. In fairness, my local chain advertises ghost shrimp as "feeder shrimp", pretty much setting expectations that they'll survive to the next mealtime- after that they're living on bonus time. Shipping issues and the recent surge of growth in the hobby have both constrained supply of aquatic creatures and lead to some stores (and big chains) sourcing from new breeders- sometimes rank amateurs that simply bought two of something (perhaps already weak, diseased, and/or overbred) at retail, managed to get them to reproduce, and boom were a business. Maintaining genetic diversity is extremely important in captive bred populations and I think things are "slipping" on that right now- especially in invert populations. As a result, for me it's worth paying an upcharge (sometimes hefty) to buy from stock that can be traced back to being raised by a professional large scale breeder.

Most people seem to have success baiting their traps with standard protein rich fish food. A small piece of sinking wafer for bottom feeders would likely do the trick nicely.

This might be helpful- https://aquariumscience.org/index.php/10-13-4-aquarium-leeches/. An Asian Leech (Barbronia weberi) would be high on my list of suspects.

So sorry for your loss...Mother Nature is the house, and while the house always wins in the end, you and Puff Puff had a solid winning streak for a long time. As far as a parasite goes...most internal parasites don't let their host survive more than the generation they need to spawn, so I think that scenario is unlikely. I'd like to think that it was simply age that got him. As far as the worm goes...I was searching on aquatic leeches after reading another post (yeah, not how envisioned spending my time in my adult life, but here we are) and there's a species of asian aquatic leech (Barbronia Weberi) that look remarkably similar to earthworms. These leeches eat other worms and crustaceans (not fish), but it might be taking a look a them closely as I don't think you would want them in your tank. Planaria traps appear to work for them, so *if* that's what you found in your tank, you might be able to eradicate them without having to carpet bomb the tank with a dewormer.

I'm not a vet or even too well versed in Betta illnesses. While it's concerning that there's so many lumps in such a small area, the good news is that they look pretty transparent as if they're fluid filled cysts rather than solid tumorous masses. I'm with @Colu that removal by a fish specialist would be best...but I wonder if the cysts aren't a response to some sort of parasite or bacteriological irritation and treatment with salt (to reduce the fluid retention) and something like Paraguard (as a topical anti-septic/anti parasitic) might give some relief and show some improvement. @Colu or other Betta experts- thoughts?

It looks like Planaria traps are effective at catching just about any worm like thing when baited apppropriately. I found this primer on leeches and worms (hold off looking at it if you just ate something) that might help you rule out and/or ID what your critters are.

I'm with @Colu - the one on the left has it's read end anchored and is moving it's smaller head/mouth back and forth which is typical of a leech (not exclusively however). There are some species of leeches that prey on worms and inverts and leave fish alone so they may possibly be one of those species. Can you post some more pics of them (especially the heads)?

The good doctor @Patrick_G is correct on my confusion. I recently got some Sulawesi snails and my brain and fingers went to Sulawesi Cardinal shrimp (instead of Caridina shrimp) that I wanted to pair with said snails, but can't as they require the high PH I rambled about. Obviously way past time for me to go get something to eat. Apologies. Edit- Have Neos in tanks with the Fluval stratum and they are breeding like wild fire. Comments above about needing to let the ammonia and PH settle still apply. I've had shrimp literally keel over and die as soon as they touched Fluval substrate that was still "too new".

Similar situation to you @GameCzar- apartment dweller without a lot of space or easy way to transport large quantities of water as well so I have a bunch of 3 gallon Betta tanks scattered in various rooms. My thoughts and ideas: * Really good selection and start with the Fluval stratum. Small tanks simply don't have enough surface area for the needed size colony of nitrifying bacteria without some additional help from an active substrate. Adding some more porous features (stone or wood) to the tank for bacteria to grown on would be helpful for the bacteria colony (and shrimp to feed off of) as well. * Live plants go along way to helping stabilize water parameters in small tanks. I think you mentioned in another thread that you have plans. I like Amazon Sword and Cryptocoryne Retrosprialis as root feeding background plants- they grow quickly so they absorb a lot of nitrates and excess nutrients from the tank. They're also easy to trim and grow back quickly if cut things a little too aggressively or lopsided. For foreground plants I like Anubis nana petite which can often be found at chains already mounted to porous stone as "Betta Buddies". There's some compact species of Crypts (Lutea?) that work well for foreground plants as well. * Watch the strength of your light in a bare tank- Floaters like Amazon Frogbit might help short term to help diffuse the light and absorb nitrates as you cycle your tank. * I dont have much experience with the sponge filter that you have. I have successfully kept small tanks with small filters (Top Fins), but I've needed to clean the sponge often and I had lots of porous features in the tank to assist. Watch your filtration effectiveness with a critical eye and don't be afraid to make a change to a HOB here if need be. * Consider adding snails - a burrowing species would be best as they will aerate the substrate and help the beneficial bacteria colony. * The challenge that you're going to have with multiple fish in the tank is "air traffic control"- you'll have a lot of activity in a very confined space, so some sort of schooling fish that will "follow the leader" will work better than independent fish zig zagging all over. Remember to plan for the potential of breeding- ideally no breeding would be best with such limited space so having all the same sex might be a plan (assuming the species you select would tolerate that). * Cardina shrimp prefer a higher PH (7.5-8.0) and are generally more sensitive to changes and stress and harsh language than Neos. Edit- See posts that follow. The Fluval substrate tends to lower PH and trap ammonia- both of which can be lethal to shrimp- especially Cardina, so you want to make sure that your tank is fully cycled and sure that your substrate is no longer trapping or leeching ammonia before adding shrimp. As with fish plan for the potential of breeding and have a plan for what to do with shrimp lets should you have them. Hope this help. Will send more ideas as they come to me.

Check the ingredients list- the first 1-3 ingredients on most "algae" wafers is almost always fish protein of some sort and not vegetable matter. They're designed for omnivorous bottom feeders (e.g. catfish) that need a high level of protein in their diet. I see people often state that their Nerite snails won't touch these things and the ratio of protein to actual algae is why.

Not an expert, but it looks similar to pictures of Bryozoan colonies that I've seen. I've never seen an actual one "in the wild" though. Edit- Also not sure if Bryozoan colonies are or are not considered "sponges" formally or informally. Exciting to see!

That's not normal behavior- next time you go to fish store note how many of the Nerites are above the waterline or attempting to escape the tank. "Chilling feet away from the tank" could very potentially be an indication that they are going in search of food because there is not enough available for them in their tank. Edit- I should clarify that snails (including Nerites) *do* occasionally hang out at the waterline and feed on minerals and "bio goop" that tends to collect there from evaporation....but if they're parked there for extended periods of time. that's not a good sign.