RyanR

Most of the time, when I do water changes, if I forget to clean the impeller, the motor won't run in my Aquaclear. It's very simple, Make sure you do this over a sink. Remove the motor by turning it a quarter of a turn. You will see the impeller. Simply pull it out (it's magnetized). Rinse it under water and get the gunk off of it and slide the impeller back onto the pin.. At this point, I plug the motor in for a second just so that I can see that the impeller will spin. Put the motor back on, put the filter back on your tank, prime the filter and plug it in. You are good to go (hopefully).

Yep, I've never seen that before and I didn't notice it until I posted these pictures. Those are (were) the only two snails in that aquarium. I ended up taking the male out because he was on the female close to everyday for a couple of weeks. The female was much more pretty and I didn't want her to get too stressed out and die. Also when the first picture was taken, she had already laid about 5 clutches of eggs and I didn't want anymore.

(To the tune of the song Baby Shark)....Baby snail 😁 The before and after photos. The crazy part is in the first photo, the females flesh turned black while breeding. The snail in the second picture is the same one that's on the glass in the first picture.

A gravel vac is definitely a #Nerm product 🤣

I moved him to my QT and put 3 tbsp of aquarium salt in 10 gallons. Does someone has a different suggestion or am I on the right track? BTW, water temp in the QT is 78 and in his regular tank it's 80.

This is the last Rasbora left out of 6. My water parameters are 0, 0, 30 with a PH of 7.8. I have a lemon blue eyed pleco, an amano shrimp, a betta and nerite snail. It looks like maybe he's getting beat up, but I look at this tank a lot and I don't see any aggression. There's nothing sharp in the tank for him to brush up on. Can anyone give me an idea of what's wrong? Sorry for the "snow." I fed bug bites and that's when I noticed it.

Definitely Krill Flakes. All of my aquariums go nuts over that stuff. Also, think about feeding a variety of food on different days. My fish eat something different each day of the week and I think that they have really good color. This thread might help you to see what some other people are feeding.

My plecos can be a little picky. I found that they all love blanched zucchini, canned green beans and the only algae wafer I found they like are the Bug Bites. I've tried the Extreme Sinking Wafers, but no one but the snails will eat them.

What are your plans for the extras, out of curiosity? I will probably have the same problem shortly and I don't have enough aquariums to put them in. And my LFS already has a mystery snail source.

I wouldn't test everyday either. You can test every 2-3 days to see how it's going. Also, when you test, test before you feed or put any fertilizers in the aquarium. Slow growing plants (java fern, anubias, etc) will use fertilizer much slower than fast growing plants like water sprite or hornwort. So the type of plants matters how much or how often you will dose. There's discussions on here that debate weather it's better to dose more fertilizer less frequently or less fertilizer more frequently.

I dose to between 20 and 40, but I've gotten to know how much my tanks need based on how my plants\fish\algae look. For example, my 10 gal QT is almost completely covered in floating water sprite. I know that tank needs more fertilizer than the bottle recommends. I put two pumps in that tank twice a week because I know the plants will use it quickly.

I'm surprised not many more people have these. Do you use the nano or the mini?

I know it might be too late for this batch, but bought on of these breeder boxes from Petco for the snails. I took out the bottom screen. Let us know how it went.

Wow and I thought I had a lot.

Repashy is on my list for my bottom feeders too, Probably the Soilent Green. I just don't know if I want to put that much effort into feeding...lol, but it looks very healthy for them and it's a little expensive for food.

Really only the snails ate it. I have a zebra, clown, and lemon blue eyed plecos and a few ottos (in different tanks) and none of them ate it. I had to vacuum most of them out. The lemon blue eye is a ravenous beast 😁 when it comes to eating...he is so much fun to watch. He took a little while to get on one of the wafers and when he did, he was off about 10 seconds later.

@Irene you were the one who made me realize I wasn't too crazy...lol and to not be afraid to expand my fish food pantry. I haven't added them to the freezer yet, but that is my next project as I get new food. What is your biggest disappointment? Something that you hoped\thought the fish would love, but you were let down by the results. My biggest disappointment was the Xtreme Sinking Wafers. I had such high hopes for that food, but I love their Krill Flakes and I'm going to keep trying some of their different foods.

I'm curious about this, but I' wondering if most people rotate a lot of food or stick to one or two foods. I try to feed a different food each day of the week (Sunday they don't get fed). I like that the fish get a variety and I think it's a little more healthy for them and it helps their color, in my opinion. Beside the vegetables that I keep in the freezer, I don't have any frozen food. I'm about to start hatching some baby brine to see if it's a pain and how much my fish like it. Below is what I feed, some of it is going away and some of it is for bottom feeders, so it looks like a lot. Blanched zucchini and canned green beans - everyone loves these two. Xtreme Krill Flakes - I love this one and will keep reordering Xtreme Sinking Wafers - I'm not crazy about it because my fish don't like it Fluval Bug Bites Algae Crisps - My fish like it and I like the ingredients - going to try the smaller version below Fluval Bug Bites Tropical Formula (small bites) - I like this one also and so do my fish - I'll keep reordering this one. Fluval Bug Bites Bottom Feeder Granules - New - Trying to see if my plecos, shrimp, snails and ottos like this. Fluval Spirulina Flakes - This is new also to see if the fish like it. Hikari Betta Pellets - I'm not crazy about the ingredients in this. It will be replaced as soon as it's empty (maybe sooner) Hikari Freeze Dried Blood Worms - The fish love this and will keep this in the rotation Hikari Vibra Bites - Not too crazy about the ingredients, but wanted to see what the hype was about. This will be replaced - I'm already feeding Krill Flakes, so nothing new here to see Hikari Crab Cuisine - got this for the shrimp and snails for some calcium, but will try something new (Xtreme Shrimp or Denerle)

My first question on this forum was about this same topic that you can see here to give you a little more information. I keep mine running and right now I am still floating water sprite that is doing INCREDIBLE. It was gone from what you see in the picture on that post to covering almost the entire tank. I put some pond snails in it to sort help keep it cycled and I'm going to add a couple of zebra danios back in it. It's sitting on a wire shelf in my storage room and I don't care what it looks like because it's out of the way and it's a QT. I just try to keep it very simple.

Thanks, I didn't remember how any of my java fern looked in the pot when I received them.

I just ordered a couple this morning. I have a question about the rock wool and rhizome plants. If the rhizome can't be buried in substrate, how does it survive in rock wool?

Exactly what Mick said above. I used it when I first got into the hobby. Once I added plants, I started to read more about it and how it is supposed to remove certain minerals that that plants need. Since I have removed it, all of my aquariums are still crystal clear and I have good plant growth. Plus it's one less thing I have to worry about maintaining. I don't have any personal scientific study to backup anything about carbon that I have done. I even removed Purigen from my filters and replaced it with a Fine Poly Pad and my water is still crystal clear with no smells and no ammonia spikes.

@Dean’s Fishroom would you say this is true for multies also? In about a month, I'll be setting up a 20 long with multies and was planning on getting 3. I didn't want to get too many so that I could plan for increasing numbers from fry. Would 5 be too many to start with in a 20 long?

What algae eaters (snails, ottos, plecos, shrimp) can put put with Multies in a 20 long? I haven't setup the tank yet and it's my first cichlid tank. Just trying to plan out what's going in the tank. Right now, I'm definitely getting a couple of the Easy Planters with dwarf sag and some Anubias that I'll put on some wood.

Thanks @Cory. @Candi is a rockstar and I completely forgot about contacting her. I have emailed her in the past and I always get a fast response, but I have gotten so used to posting questions in the forums.