Grassypeak

I have had Furan 2 completely wipe out my plants before. The only thing it didn't kill was Java Moss.

I think this is a very tank by tank thing. With heavy stocking I don't think that the little or no water change thing works. Shrimp always benefit from small water changes though. Cheers, Chris

I assume your tank is at least 55 gallons, so your bio load is not very high but over time 1 gallon a week is probably going to leave you with some parameter getting out of wack. Why is your water change allotment so small? I sit pretty solidly in the opposite camp. In my planted 75, I do a 50 gallon water change almost every week. The tank is heavily stocked though.

I still think that there should be a better way to register the results than red VS. ever so slightly more red. These reds are both in the range where we really want to know the exact answer. I wonder if you can use a Hanna Checker with fresh water. Then again if the test strips are easy to read and reasonably accurate that would probably be even better. I'd really like to know what my EasyGreen dosing is doing to my nitrates and API is not helping me. I can't imagine that most people don't have the same problem. When we do the color vision test in my class I almost always beat all of my students. I can see the difference between the reds on the chart but comparing the liquid color to the chart color is really just a shot in the dark. The computer screen idea is a good one but the colors of the chart are very close and the color of the liquid has a different quality than the color block on the chart. They never match in my mind. Cheers, Chris

Very cool. I'd love to be able to keep a stone roller or two. Cheers, Chris

Very cool. My rainbow shiners never looked that good. I kept them at 78 degrees though.

In 45 years of fish keeping I don't think that I've ever seen a fish eat itself to death. The thing that I worry about with fish that look fat is something called bloat. This is usually caused by a bacterial infection that destroys the kidneys, causing the fish to fill up with water. Bloated fish don't typically eat at all so this in not your problem. Over eating will make your fish fat but you have to make sure that the CPDs get enough food. If that one fish is going to be a pig there isn't much that you can do aside from giving him his own tank.

Awesome tank, What temp do you run? Do you cold cycle? Cheers, Chris

Sounds like a super fun project! Best of luck. Cheers, Chris

Hi Finnegan, First of all, I would take a deep breath and relax. Constipated fish will not eat like pigs. Endler's are quick and aggressive feeders, so feeding other fish with a tank full of Endler's or even guppies can be a problem. For instance, I have noticed that Daisy's rice fish fry and Indian rice fish fry do not do well with guppy fry. This is because the guppie fry out compete the rice fish fry. I haven't tried raising anything with my Endlers. They never stop eating. It may be that the Endler's will not be good tank mates for your CPDs. Although I think they should be fine. I would start by feeding enough to allow the CPDs to eat what they need and not worry about the Endler's. You may eventually have to bring the Endlers back if they are too competitive. You may have to bring some of them back when they start having tons of babies anyway. It may just be the case that you need to try a different food. Repashy foods sink and offer the fish a bit of grazing time. They also offer ottos a good food source. By the way Ottos are not an easy fish to keep fed. I would guess that many more ottos die within the first few weeks than ever make it past the first two months. I think Repashy is definitely the way to go, once you get them. When you get your betta, I highly recommend Ocean Nutrition Betta Pellets. They will be a bit large for your Endler's and everything seems to like them. I use them for many of my killifish and killifish are notoriously finicky about dry food. You didn't tell us how big your tank is or how many CPDs and Endler's you have. That info is always helpful. Good luck with your adventure, Chris

This is a huge problem with the API tests. I have better than average color vision and I cannot compare a vile of red liquid to their color chart and come up with a reasonable guess as to what the nitrates are. How are the coop test strips with respect to readability? Cheers, Chris