Twigflinger

Hey guys. Ive got some rotalla I purchased over a month ago that isnt looking so hot. It came emersed but seemed like it converted pretty quickly and was doing well for a while. This bunch was cut and tops replanted and they just have not done much since. What do you think they are lacking? planted in pool filter sand. I have split and put a few chunks of seachem and api root tabs, dose potassium and phosphate and nitrates are around 20-40 (I have a hard time reading the test). Perhaps the root tabs are not close enough. leaves seem to have a little brown but cant tell if it is algae or the leaf itself. I am running Co2 at about 15 ppm. Thanks for help in advance!

Well I am finally done! Weather has warmed up and not so worried any more. I found that I needed a heater in the water supply trash can as it very quickly cooled down the cubicles when dripping. I fill it with hose and it takes about a day with an Aquarium Coop 100 watt heater to warm up to 82. Each tote has a heater as well with a small pump to circulate water between totes. Depending on the drip rate, trash can needs to be refilled about every other day. We will see if ammonia becomes an issue as they grow larger. Each cubicle has an overflow with the blue sponge and the tote on the right has an overflow which leads outside the garage. Bottom vid is my favorite out of the batch as its the only white one. Very happy with the outcome however a reservoir for water change water larger than 32 gallons would be nice.

Sorry I haven’t made a ton of progress but I am just about done building the cubicles. Wifey has agreed that moving them to the garage would be risky especially considering it’s supposed to get down to about 10 F on Friday. Hoping to get everything set up and running over holiday break. I ended up using this cheaper white corrugated plastic for the cubicles instead and of the clear because of cost. Trying to hot glue them all was tedious so I ended up tacking them with hot glue then running a bead of silicone 1 over the seams on the outside. I found this really awesome calculator for layout of all the little pieces. https://www.cutlistoptimizer.com/ It helped a ton with figuring out how to cut everything on the table saw and allowed me to change dimensions on the fly to make sure everything fit in 2 sheets of material. Also since we spoke previously I mixed up some DIY Repashy with half free dried brine shrimp, half frozen bloodworms diced up, a few drops of vitamins and some gelatin powder. I need to experiment in getting it to float more though.. I give them a square in the morning so they can pick at it for a while and keep them full longer before I get home from work then a couple more feedings of the new life flakes. Also trying to Increase water change amount but the airline tubing gets clogged with gunk growing in it and slows down over time. The little guys are growing though! Just can’t wait to get them in their new apartments!

Liking the features for the price. Couple questions though. Can rgb be adjusted to my liking individually. It’s says it has sunrise day and night settings, do those ramp up and down automatically or do I need to click a button to change the setting?

Thanks I will check it out. Really love the shadows it casts on that tank to the left. 🙂

Hey peeps! I am looking for a light for a tank around 5 gallons. Not exactly sure what it is. Someone gave it to me and I have not measured it yet. I have serene led lights on my other aquariums and really like the ability to dim and set each rgbw strength. Is there anything else out there in a small package? Also think I would like something that sits higher over the tank so I can grow plants out of the top.

What’s the TDS?

Think I found a solution 🙂 1/2” electrical male adapters going into 3/4 tubing. The male adapters will go inside the tub. If I can find some pro gs or gaskets I will use those inside as well. Otherwise I will cut my own from gasket material shown in the background. If water makes it back through the threads I will put Vaseline on them. Not super worried about a few drips. Will be pretty happy if this works. Bulkhead fittings are $16! Almost bought this thingy. Has everything needed and semi flexible but was too long for my liking. Only about $6.

Yea I am doing this in a stand alone garage with no heat. I think it was down to 40F the other night and maintained temp but that was without insulation. I have the other tub complete just need to figure out how to connect them. I am considering trying the No drill vacuume tube setup. The sides are angled so I can’t do bulkhead fittings straight between them. Here is link for the tote. https://www.homedepot.com/p/HDX-14-Gal-Tough-Storage-Tote-in-Black-with-Yellow-Lid-SW111/314468098?MERCH=REC-_-pip_alternatives-_-311021551-_-314468098-_-N&&mtc=SEM-BF-CDP-GGL-D59S-023_007_ORGANIZATION-NA-NA-NA-DSA-2998358-NA-NA-NA-NBR-NA-NA-NEW-NA&cm_mmc=SEM-BF-CDP-GGL-D59S-023_007_ORGANIZATION-NA-NA-NA-DSA-2998358-NA-NA-NA-NBR-NA-NA-NEW-NA-71700000101062026-58700008077109942-39700073445997544&gbraid=0AAAAADq61UeLjPtmHiTsTVpUI7S5hk1bl&gbraid=0AAAAADq61UeLjPtmHiTsTVpUI7S5hk1bl&gclid=CjwKCAiAs8acBhA1EiwAgRFdw1F8Is8FUXKuSQkG-gkGWAGBIPlgkeDXydXqNQGAXFz9UJg99PtC7xoCae4QAvD_BwE&gclsrc=aw.ds The insulation has been sitting in my garage for years. It is installed shiny side facing in.

1st tub insulated on bottom and sides! Workbench has been leveled and reinforced to support weight. Just need to drain the other tub and insulate that one.

I agree. It is laying flat on bottom and up against intake now.

Problem solved I think! All a matter of water flow. I swapped it to a bucket back inside and it was reading correctly. Took it back outside and placed it in the tote and watched it. temperature rose to 85 which is what it was set at then kept climbing. I moved it up against the filter intake and watched numbers fall back to 85. It seems I simply underestimated the amount of flow it needed to work properly? I am going to continue monitoring though. I dont understand how in a 14 gallon tote the water temp would not all equalize?

Dang.. So i put in one of my other heaters and it is reading 75 while the coop heater was reading 88. 75 corresponds exactly with the mercury thermometer.

Just did a count and I have 27. I do have some snails in the sump and can move in with them :). Having issues with the heater though so that has help up progress. Now that I know hoe many there are I can start mathing out how many cubicles I need to make.

I dealt with this a while back and found that Lowes and Home Depot’s glass was too thin to be comfortable with. Maybe you would have better luck. I also looked online and replacement tops were pretty pricy. I ended up going with clear corrugated plastic.

He may have been using vinegar to clean hard water deposits which can leave white crusty stuff on your glass usually at the water line at the top. I have not used vinegar personally inside an aquarium so don’t know if it would react with the silicon in any way. Maybe try scrubbing it with a toothbrush that has not been used for cleaning around the house then flush it out with clean water several times.

Good point. I will try putting my other heaters in and see what they read. I do intend to insulate around the tub as much as possible with foam board and maybe some of that thin shiny aluminum looking insulation stuff. This is certainly not the expected use case for an aquarium heater and I’m sure it will affect its lifespan.

Hey guys. I just ordered the 100 watt heater and am testing it in a cold garage in a 20 gallon tote to see if it will maintain temp. I have a small filter running for water circulation and a plastic lid. To help hold in heat. This morning the heater read 81 however a mercury thermometer I dropped in yesterday reads 70. I have not read anything yet about the heater being that far off in accuracy. Could the mercury thermometer be inaccurate? Should I just set the heater to 91 and see what happens. I am doing testing to see if I can maintain water temp as I need to move betta fry to the garage for more space. I do plan on adding a second heater as a backup in case 1 of them fails. What do?

Here is the ghetto setup I have them in currently. How much space should I give each of them when I cup them out? I decided to modify my original plan with the plastic grid in a plastic tub which would have been communal water. Now my plan is to cut up the clear corrugated plastic Corry uses for aquarium tops and hot glue pieces together to make little boxes. These will be grouped together in a larger tub that houses the heater. Water will be dripped in to each box from above using airline tubing from a larger manifold. This way each fish is in its own pristine water and no hormones from other fish. The larger tub will have bulkhead fitting or something similar which will drain water to the exterior. I am hoping to move this all out to the garage which is detached and will be cold. I’m hoping 2 aquarium coop 100 watt heaters will do the trick. Just set up a tub with 1 heater out there and will see how it does as temperatures drop this week. Not moving any fish out there until I am sure all parts of the tub will be temperature stable.

Growth inhibiting hormone. From the little I know it is a hormone released when betta fry are in close proximity. Too much of it will slow down their growth. I guess in the wild it would prevent them growing big to fast resulting in less food for all of them.

What is your water change routine when you move them to the 40 gallon?

Thank you itsfoxtail. I have much to think about now. I will update you with my progress 🙂

Another thought…. Do you use live plants? The tank setup they were in to start was heavily planted. The bucket they are in now does not have plants. With the continuous water changes it would be tough for me to keep up with nutrients and I figured dying plants would do more harm than good. Out of the tap my water is about 50 tds.

Not long winded at all itsfoxtail. This is exactly what I needed! So it sounds like 2 issues of them seeing too many of their brothers and sisters which may be slowing them down as well as not enough space per individual. This is a tough issue to rectify for me without a lot of room. I should have been more clear but they are not in a bathtub directly but the 5 gallon bucket and trash can are sitting in there. The trash can is just a reservoir that continually feeds water to the bucket so I only need to prime and refill the trash can about once a week. A while back I had the idea of using a large shallow plastic container of some sort divided up with a grid pattern of plastic. This would allow me to heat (should I raise temperature higher than 84?) and water change 1 container while having the effect of cupping. If they feel like they are alone will they stop or slow down releaseing GIH? Lemme know what you think about this. I have not been able to find frozen bbs in my area, is there something else I can feed? For about 6 weeks I was supplementing the flakes with Instant brine shrimp. However I still had about half a jar left when it expired so I didn’t get more. I just ordered some micro worms but they seem a lot smaller than I was hoping and may have to feed a ton of them to make any difference. The female is indeed beautiful! She is named Midnight and my wife named the male Papa FT(Fluffy Tails)😊

Morning guys. We are driving to relatives so finally had some time to get on here and look for help. I have some betta fry about 5 months old that are lengthwise about the size of a dime. Everything I find on YouTube suggests they should be fully grown by now. I believe I underestimated the effects of GIH greatly…. As newborns, I used deans technique with the tray on top of my sump with a continual drip from above to circulate water. I fed them mainly BBS and then started adding in crushed flake food. After a while I stopped feeding BBS and now just do crushed new life spectrum flake. After a while of slow growth, I moved them to their own 5 gallon bucket with with sponge filter. I have an airline dripping water 24/7 from from a 32 gal brute trash can. When I started this I was figuring about 5 gal drip rate per day. Last week I increased this quite a bit because I thought it may help flush out gih. Heat from original aquarium was 77. Their current setup is now 84 degrees. I feed them 2-3 times per day. I have them set up in an unused tub in our bathroom but my wife’s patience is beginning to wear thin (I have been putting off remodeling bathroom until the bettas are grown). Can GIH cause permanent stunting? Could it be that I crossed 2 bettas that have messed up genetics? Here is a pic of mom and dad. Unfortunately I did not get a pic of the babies before we left. Really appreciate any input I can get. Happy thanksgiving!