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Mike

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Posts posted by Mike

  1. On 8/30/2022 at 4:15 PM, Seattle_Aquarist said:

    Hi @Mmiller2001

    The water is snow melt from the Cascade Mountain range.  It varies over the year but the average is 45 TDS but can be as low as 26 TDS and has high as 70 TDS on the 640 scale......so soft.
     -Roy

    I’m also in Seattle, I can attest this is true. I tested my tap recently and it was 37 TDS.

    On 8/29/2022 at 12:14 PM, JoeQ said:

    "Not that complicated"!  As I was reading that, the drool was rolling down my chin from my confused slack jawed expression!!! 🤣🤣 All I want to do is raise it by a few degrees so snail shells don't erode, I have no intrest in earning a masters in advanced aquatic eco system balancing with a Batchelor degree in chemistry!!! Thanks for the in depth response tho, hopefully one day I will look back and think 'ahhh now I see, it was soo simple'!

    Dosing calcium and magnesium sounds complicated but it’s really not hard once you do it a couple times. Reef aquarists do it regularly since corals consume it in high quantities compared to plants. You’ll feel a lot more confident once you do it. 

    • Like 3
  2. On 8/28/2022 at 6:43 AM, K McZongo said:

    Looks good was it just floating or planted in substrate?

    I initially planted it into a mixed substrate of random aqua soils, eco complete and seachem flourite (all leftover stuff). I don’t think much of it is rooted in the substrate anymore though since I have nearly 100% surface coverage with other plants and sunlight doesn’t reach most of the bottom

  3. Kanaplex should work since it’s a broad spectrum antibiotic. You don’t need repashy specifically, it’s just what I use because I find it easy to mix in. You may just need to make due with what you have for now. The goal is to make a paste like food that can easily hold the medication. I like to feed mine to the fish using a small one mil dropper (pipette). 

  4. Sorry about your betta! Having a sick pet can be emotionally taxing. FWIW I highly doubt letting the tank drop to 72 degrees had anything to do with their poor health. So I wouldn't let that thought run rampant.

    As for treatment, I recently treated a betta of mine for fin rot by making medicated food and feeding it to him directly via a small dropper. I find this to be far more effective than just dumping the antibiotics into the tank. As for making the medicated food, I use a Repashy gel to make up a couple tablespoons worth of food or so (it's a very small amount). I let it cool slightly, mix in a few pinches of erythromycin, and then set it in my fridge. I feed this to the fish daily for the next two weeks. This is how I deliver all internal fish medications, and my success rates for treatment have skyrocketed ever since starting to do it this way.

    Best of luck to you and your betta, I hope it works out!

    • Thanks 1
  5. On 8/26/2022 at 8:57 AM, JoeQ said:

    Absolutely in love! How do you think it will survive in a 2k gallon koi pond and where can I get some?

    Not sure since I’ve never kept koi. But any fish store that sells plants usually sells some variety of Ludwigia. 

    On 8/26/2022 at 9:18 AM, modified lung said:

    Is that what it looks like when grown above water? I'll have to try it.

    Yep, this is the emersed form. 

  6. On 8/25/2022 at 4:34 PM, Mattlikesfish36 said:

    @Mikethanks for the reply. I am injecting co2 through an in-line diffusor. When I lower the light intensity or shorten the timing it seems like the plants growth gets stunted so that’s where I’m stuck on what to do

    Ah, then your EI dosing is probably too heavy for the biomass in your tank. The 50% weekly change isn’t removing enough excess nutrients and the plants aren’t grown in enough to take up most of what you’re adding. If this was my tank, I’d probably try cutting my EI dosing by a third or half for a couple weeks and dose a bit of glutaraldehyde (liquid carbon) on water change days to see if that has any affect on the algae growth. In the meantime you’ll need to maintain some manual removal of it to keep it in check. 

    • Thanks 1
  7. On 8/24/2022 at 5:36 PM, Mattlikesfish36 said:

    @Kurt Bruttingi have a twinstar 600e running at 50% power for 7 hours a day on a timer. Dosing EI fry ferts from Green Leaf Aquatics by their directions for dosage. Nitrates never go above 20 and I am doing weekly 50% water changes. Thanks for your reply!

    That’s a powerful light, are you injecting co2? If not, you may need to lower the light’s power. I run a Twinstar 450e at 20% power for 10 hours on an ADA 45p with passive co2. Anything beyond that and I start getting excessive algae issues. 
     

    Also, summer temperatures tend to bring me more algae issues as well. In the summer, I schedule a couple hours of lights out during the peak time of the day just to reduce the energy going into the system. It seems to help with algae control. 

    • Like 1
  8. It's a bummer, but sometimes our pets just don't get along. As pet-keepers it's on us to work these situations out.

    I have a cherry barb that was a bully in a smaller tank. As a last ditch effort, I moved it to a 29 gallon with some gold white clouds and a black moor goldfish of all things. She's doing great in there. She shoals with the white clouds and eats when they eat. The black moor is so derpy and blind, I've never lost a fish to it. I practically have to hand-feed it for it to find the food. Plus there is plenty of vegetation and cover in the tank for the minnows. It's a weird setup, but it seems to be working.

    Every situation is going to be a bit unique in some way. It could be that the best choice is to take the minnow to a LFS.

  9. I have a flex 15 and the curve is actually quite fun for what I have stocked in it (nano stuff). I have ember tetras, pigmy corys, otocinclus, and cherry shrimp. They're all quite small, but the curve has a magnification effect on them when they swim through at the right viewing angle. Kind of fun. If you're into photography, the curve can make reflections particularly difficult, though.

  10. Agreed. I have a tank sitting in an east facing window and gets a couple hours of morning light every day. I love waking up in the morning to sit in front of it with my coffee for a bit. It gets some algae here and there, but nothing I'm uncomfortable with. And the vallisneria in the back grows like a weed with that sun every day.

  11. 1 hour ago, MaxM said:

    Interesting that you say that. I also thought that way, but Jason from Prime Time Aquatics claims the opposite. He claims that the Fine sponge holds more bacteria for biological filtering. 

    Listen to him at around the 2:50 min in this video. 

     

    I'm confused now. 😞

    Maybe a science experiment is in order? The claims are quite testable with an at home experiment involving a couple buckets, some ammonia drops, and an ammonia test kit.

    • Like 1
  12. Having aquariums indoors is fun and all, but I really enjoy being outside in my gardens. I want to have fish there too when I'm pruning, weeding, and planting. I have some spawn-happy white clouds and trapdoor snails that I eventually want to move to an outdoor tub. I'm thinking something like this Tuff Stuff 110 gallon for the tub:

    Tuff Stuff Heavy Duty Oval Stock Tank 110 Gal

    I already have a bunch of water lettuce, water hyacinth, and western waterweed I can toss in there. I'll also add some aeration with a sponge filter + airstone hooked up to a co-op USB pump powered by a solar cell + battery. I'll have it in a location where it will receive 3 hours or less of direct sunlight and I'll probably partially bury it or mound up some dirt on the sides to insulate it a bit and plant around it.

    Given all that, I have some questions:

    1. How do I prepare the tub for winter? (I live in Seattle. We have mild winters but do occasionally drop below freezing. Hardiness zone 8b)
    2. Are my light levels going to be an issue in the summer for heat?
    3. What are some good resources (YouTube, blogs, forums, books) for beginners on this topic?
    4. What have I not thought about?
    • Like 1
  13. All this discussion seems very academic 😛

    What are some good options for those of us running hang-on-back filters? I suppose I could get a powerhead and an inline UV unit and add it that way, but I already dislike the amount of gear hanging inside, off-of, and around my aquarium. I'd prefer to keep things more hidden and tidy if reasonably (read: affordably) possible.

    • Like 1
  14. 2 hours ago, Ryan W said:

    I’d also lean towards Bolbitus. Not many plants in our hobby are rhizomes and have that leaf structure. Did the new growth start kind of curled up then fan out?

    Yeah I have another one that seems to have a stem that’s slightly curled up like new growth on most terrestrial ferns. 

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