[Quarantining]

Ah, if you already have hard water, it may definitely be a disease. If more mollies start to die, check out Cory's video on livebearer disease. I was able to get levamisole (and the handy dosing spoon) from selectaquatics.com and it was very effective.

 

[Maggie's 10 gallon betta project]

Best of luck to you! The research phase is part of the fun, isn't it? @Lizzie Block says her bettas love the long roots of dwarf water lettuce, so give it a shot. 🙂

 

[Thankful in Denver]

Yay, another Coloradoan! Glad you're having fun and learning a lot. 🙂

[Quarantining]

I usually restart the "quarantine clock" every time one of the fish gets sick or dies. When I had problems with new mollies before, it was because they were raised in brackish water at the fish farms and my GH or water hardness was too low. Once I increased it (using Wonder Shells or Seachem Equilibirum) to 20-30 dGH, they improved a lot.

Here is Cory's molly care video that helped me figure out the issue: 

 

[Has anyone else had this problem with the San Francisco Bay brine shrimp hatchery?]

Oh weird! That's never happened to me before. If you ordered it from Aquarium Co-Op, please email us at shipping@aquariumcoop.com with a picture and the order number so we can rectify that for you.

[Anubias Rot]

Here is an Aquarium Co-Op article on anubias rot if you're interested:

https://www.aquariumcoop.com/blogs/aquarium/anubias-rot

[What is the tan layer in my substrate ???]

And here's a blog article we wrote about mulm! 🙂

https://www.aquariumcoop.com/blogs/aquarium/mulm

["Powderized" Crushed Coral to Raise KH?]

Hmm, never tried it before. I believe crushed coral works "faster" when you put it in a hang-on-back or canister filter so that water was constantly traveling through it. When I just put the crushed coral in a media bag in the tank (because I didn't want to use it as substrate), the effect on KH was much more gradual.

[General Cure?]

Not sure if you meant to repost, but here's my reply:

 

[General Cure?]

Wikipedia has an interesting paragraph on how praziquantel (one of the active ingredients in General Cure/ParaCleanse) works. It says it paralyzes parasites such as flatworms, flukes, and tapeworms. Afterwards, the dying worm may get destroyed by the immune system, digested, or expelled.

In humans, the Mayo Clinic says, "Praziquantel works by causing severe spasms and paralysis of the worms' muscles. Some kinds of worms are then passed in the stool. However, you may not notice them since they are sometimes completely destroyed in the bowels."

The other active ingredient in General Cure/ParaCleanse is metronidazole. It apparently does kill (not just paralyze) bacteria and protozoans (see source).

P.S. For those of you who are new to General Cure/ParaCleanse, those medications do not kill worm eggs, so 2-3 weeks after the first treatment, re-dose the medication again to ensure that any newborn worms that hatched are also treated.

[Guppy laying on rocks]

Glad you enjoyed my video! In case you haven't seen Aquarium Co-Op's livebearer disease video, sick guppies can also be a result of low mineral content if your tap water is very soft. Here's Cory's version that talks about it:

 

[do i understand this?]

Correct, from what I understand. The reason why people often recommend low KH for soft water fish is because they often also like low pH, and low KH makes it easier to reach low PH. 

Here's a high level blog article from Aquarium Co-Op if you're interested in water chemistry: https://www.aquariumcoop.com/blogs/aquarium/ph-gh-kh

[Heater cover for P25 Fluval Nano Aquarium Heater (25watt)]

I believe the shell acts as a heater cover, but I can't be sure since I've never taken one apart before. That being said, I haven't had any problems with plants getting "burned" or damaged from touching my heater, even the glass ones. 

[Aquarium Co-op Magic]

Thank you so much! We're very proud of our warehouse and operations team. I found this video very interesting too; loved seeing how a plant or product I ordered is taken care of before it gets to my house.

[New to Planted Tanks? These are must watch videos...]

Thanks for sharing! I often reference the info in these videos a lot. So glad to hear someone explain it in more detail than just a simple nutrient deficiency chart.

[Long time watcher first time buyer. So excited!!]

@Candi Hmm, do you have any info about whether or not our fertilizers are safe for crayfish? I would assume yes, but I haven't tried it myself.

[Product request]

Very interesting! Never heard of it before, so thanks for the suggestion.

[Honey gourami fry]

So cute! The only thing I did to increase humidity was to seal all the edges of my aquarium lid with seran wrap. Opening the lid occasionally to feed them didn't seem to be a problem. Not sure when they develop their labyrinth organ, but one article suggested between 6 to 8 weeks old.

[Salt vs staghorn algae?!?]

Hmm, I've never worked with some of the API medications, but my guess would be the salt? Especially since you're using a decent amount of it. Kudos on getting rid of them, and hope your fish feel better soon.

[Fluval E series heaters, are they just for Europe?]

I heard from some of Cory's past live streams that Fluval is having some manufacturing/supply chain issues. Aquarium Co-Op continues to order them, but we haven't received any for quite a while. We did get some of the 25W Fluval nano heaters, but that's not big enough for most people.

[Frustrations with Plant Buying]

That's a good question! I'm not sure what tank height is used. I went on a random website with aquarium dimensions and here's how they categorized aquariums:

• Small tanks = 15 gallons or less, average height of 12 inches
• Medium tanks = 20-40 gallons, average height of 16 inches
• Large tanks = 50-225 gallons, average height of 23 inches

So my best guess is that the plant categories may be based on the tank height of 12-16 inches? Which means a background plant can reach 10 inches or taller and midground plants are 5-8 inches tall? The lighting also changes the height of certain plants where they grow shorter in bright light and much taller in low light.

[Best Food for Cherry Shrimp?]

8 hours ago, OceanTruth said:

She better reply Aquarium Co-Op Easy Fry Food. Lol. Just kidding. 😛

Lol, yes you can use that, as well as Hikari First Bites, Sera Micron, Repashy gel food powder, and of course the BacterAE that everyone else has been mentioning.

[Snail Treatment for Subwassertang]

Hmm, I'm actually not sure! I've never done repeated exposures before. What I did for my tests was to dip once and then leave the plants in a quarantine container for 2-4 weeks (depending on how cold the water is) and see if any snails hatch. If the snail eggs stayed light colored and never darkened into baby snails, then I knew they were safe. 👍

[Best Food for Cherry Shrimp?]

I like using Repashy Soilent Green and Community Plus, canned green beans and carrots, and sinking fish foods. If you are trying to raise lots of babies, I like adding catappa leaves and powdered fry foods.

[Snail Treatment for Subwassertang]

@theotheragentm So far, I have tried as low as 4 hours (for 1 Tbsp alum per gallon of water) and I was able to kill ramshorn snails and snail eggs. I'm in the process of testing this new recipe on other pest snails (waiting for them to produce eggs), but the sensitive plants did much better with only 4 hours of exposure.