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Looks like a limpet to me! Even tiny pond snails and bladder snails tend to have the same shape as their larger counterparts.

The main issue that I have with it is that it's a HOB filter, notorious for sucking up shrimp, but also positioned so that it negatively impacts fish. The tank isn't the right size for a betta or most adult fish, but it's the right size for fry. Sure it's a good attempt but I was trying to point out room for improvement. A beginner may buy the tank, put shrimp in them, and get discouraged when the shrimp are hurt due to the lack of baffle on the filter.

Are they fish that you bought or fish that you bred? If they weren't like that before, it's very common for angels to get bent fins or other malformations due to mishandling while young or genetic factors.

The setup in the photo is from one of their kits. Unfortunately kits still have a ways to go in terms of filters/lights and the filter in this specific kit is actually a step backwards imo because it cuts into the tank's swimming space.

If you must remineralize for some reason, use a product formulated for freshwater. The only case for most freshwater keepers to use marine salt is for hatching brine shrimp. The trace amounts added into the system from feeding brine shrimp to the tank can be beneficial to plants but I will place emphasis on trace amounts. Seachem manufactures some decent mineral additives for freshwater and Equilibrium is fairly commonly used and widely available. Other popular additives are wonder shell and crushed coral. All of that said, remineralizing RO is almost never necessary for freshwater. The only time that I have ever kept a species that required it was my Caridina colony.

Thanks for the input and luckily I have some on-hand. I just had a quick look into it and apparently anabantoids are more prone to it. I guess you learn something new every day.

When I kept mine I had them on blanched veg/canned green beans and fed them some Shrimp King Mineral or soy hulls. They're pretty water cockroaches and take just about everything.

I separated my sparkling gouramis because the male turned into a tank boss and the female got skinny. She's already a been finicky so I'm looking for suggestions on what may bring her back ASAP since I'm not really comfortable with her current weight. Background- I've owned my sparklings for almost 2 years. They had some kind of cestode infestation (most likely tapeworm) that was treated within the first two months of my owning them. Until recently they shared my heavily planted 10g. I've attached a photo at the bottom and want to point out how slim her abdomen is. Her ovaries have completely shrunk to the point that they're no longer visible and she's been like this for over a month while I try to put weight back on her. The tank that I moved her into is my portrait with no tankmates and that happened this morning. The tank has seed shrimp, hydra, and other microfauna for her to pick at on the side. Parameters (origin tank, the portrait that she moved into is similar but is heated by the room and fluctuates 76-80F/24.5-27C) Ammonia and nitrogen compounds are zeroed and I dose the tank with Easy Green 2x/week for my stems. Temp is 78F/26C. GH/KH are 25-75/0-40 respectively. The GH/KH are the primary recent change as I live in Texas and have extremely hard water normally. I replaced my old water softener 2 months ago and have had much softer water since then. I have Equilibrium on standby but as I'm not one to chase parameters I wanted to wait and see, then have it ready just in case. General feeding routine- One 10mg scoop for each of them (so 20mg total) mixed with tank water and released into the water column. They also get 3mL of vinegar eels (ready to feed) or baby brine most days, whatever I have readily available. I don't designate frozen foods for this tank but tend to cut a slice off of cubes that go into other tanks and give them a little bit. These guys don't eat much at a time so I've had the most success keeping their water clean by giving them very small but more frequent feedings, usually 3-5x per day. The tank also has otocinclus (2) that get Soilent Green/spirulina tabs and wild type Neocaridinas that pick at whatever the fish don't get. Foods/other that I have tried in the main tank- Blood worms (frozen and freeze dried) - Neither of my sparklings will eat blood worms, even if I mince them. Easy Fry Food - She eats this but a great deal of it goes to waste. She hasn't gained much weight even if I give small amounts (one 10mg scoop) 3x in a day in addition to regular feedings. Daphnia (frozen and freeze dried) - She eats these but hasn't gained any weight on them. GarlicGuard - Doesn't entice her which is pretty unfortunate because my sparklings and plecos are the only fish that don't give a hoot about it and I would love to have an effective additive right now. Fluval Bug Bites - This is their current staple food. The granule size is mostly right for them. I give it by mixing one 10mg scoop per fish with tank water and releasing it to the water column as they eat the most quickly at mid water twice per day (a bit more on days that I'm home). Hikari Micro Pellets/Micro Wafers/Vibra Bites - Putting these together because some of the pieces are small enough for them but others aren't and get wasted. I stopped feeding both foods as a staple because of this. Repashy Community Plus (gelled and powdered) - Since the gel form sinks, neither eat it. I have given it to them powdered and they have eaten it which made me think that maybe I should try Spawn and Grow as a supplement to her diet? Tubifex worms (frozen) - This is how I initially got weight onto both of them shortly after I brought them home, but the place that I got them from no longer keeps them in stock and I haven't found another source. Xtreme Krill Flakes - Honestly my best commercial flake candidate. She eats it but hasn't gained much weight on it. Similar issue to Easy Fry Food. VitaChem - Not a food but I often soak my frozen foods in VitaChem because of the attractants in it. It helps to get my less aggressive eaters into the good stuff before it's gone. I also keep a few fin nippers so this has multiple purposes in my routine.

Picked up a new rack! I have a 29 and a 20L in storage + relocated my invert tank onto it. I'm not sure how I want to go about this whole setup thing but I'm really leaning toward making it into a breeding rack with planted tanks on top, breeding setups on the bottom, and growouts in the middle. I lost my female angel recently so this unfortunately won't be used for her, but I may look into finally raising sparkling gourami fry or breeding my GBRs.

I think you used the right word personally. Regardless of the size of the leak, the old silicone does need to be removed due to the nature of the material. Old silicone won't adhere to new and that serves to make our lives harder 🥲

The hex has 12" per face (~59cm at the widest point) and the cube is 39cm wide. The stand's surface is 114x61. Combining setups isn't an option for me because my GBRs are in the cube and I'd also rather not rescape it as it has a great deal of crypts (tropica, a ton of parva, and my pink flamingo). The flamingo has finally quit being a drama queen after MONTHS of having it in there. I'm planning to set up another rack within the next few months so I'm leaning toward leaving things as-is and maybe moving in some of my livebearers as dithers if he winds up harassing my rams too much. So far they've mostly kept to themselves.

Thanks! This hex was a learning curve for sure since the footprint is strange but I've definitely grown to like it. The main thing holding me back from transitioning them to my 29 immediately is space. My 15 cube is on the same stand and there wouldn't be much wiggle room in terms of space if I set up the 29 in the footprint of the hex.

Mine were actually great parents and took a few tries, but could raise their fry to free swimmers without any intervention. I never figured out how to raise the babies independently because I never needed to. The only potential predators in the tank were the parents and my Bolivian rams so it was fairly easy to get them to darts before the parents would start to pick on them. I enjoy my water fairly tannic so I had a media bag filled with topsoil to get the tannins started. For a tank this size it's impractical to use catappa or more conventional botanicals lol. The mopani is actually three different pieces held together by reef epoxy. It cost me about half as much as a piece that size would probably cost me where I bought it. Since the last time I posted a photo, it has significantly less tannin because I removed that media bag and replaced it with Purigen after a few water changes. This was because the soil was raising my nitrates and my attempts at growing plants have largely failed in the setup. I would consider re-adding it if I convert the tank into a paludarium, which is one of the options that I'm considering now that I'm down to one angel. The main thing that I've been enjoying in the hobby as of late would be plants (which extends to my other hobbies, this spring has been my most ambitious garden yet) so I've considered a setup with vallisneria or another line of sight breaking plant, epiphytes, and ideally splitting up one of my crypts and planting it in there. That said, getting into the tank is a huge pain in the butt so I may stick to epiphytes that I attach to the driftwood. I'm still in the fantasy stage of what to do and given the number of tanks that I have I'm also considering consolidating my threads into one post.

I used to paint my tanks but now I use insulating window film. Most of it is the static cling variety and easily removable/customizable. The roll that I purchased was also reusable.

Another quick update. Apparently we had a power outage overnight! I have multiple USB nano pumps and backup power with a space heater (safe for indoors of course) to heat the room that my tanks are in but those all have to be swapped over manually, which I obviously didn't do as I was asleep. I'm very fortunate to have only lost the one fish from the incident.

Welp it's been awhile. I've been spending more time enjoying the tank than updating and it's time to make a bit of a sad one. Got up this morning and found that my female angel had passed. She was from a janky bloodline (bent fins, wonky body shape) so I didn't expect her to have the same longevity as my male, but I went to bed with her behaving normally so it was a bit of a shock. The other fish are all behaving normally so we can probably chalk this up to one of those "we will probably never know" deaths as my parameters are still in-line with what's normal. I'm at a stage where I'm strongly considering retiring the tank and replacing it with a 29 gallon as I've always kept it low stock and had difficulty growing anything other than vallisneria in it. With the current stock I could easily downsize to 29g without having to relocate any of the inhabitants.

Here you go. This is my desktop setup. It's a mix of trailing houseplants with mint and sage. They're all in the little baskets that aquarium plants come in and have leca beads in the container. The plant that dislikes wet feet (the string of turtles) is propped up on a sponge. The other setup is still WIP and basically a bunch of stems tucked into tanks while they grow roots. I was planning to create a DIY thread about it when the project is complete and would rather not hijack the OP's thread.

Seconding the aromatics! I use most of my smaller tanks for aquaponics and edibles include mint, basil, thyme, rosemary, and strawberries. That would be far safer than adding fragrance directly to a tank, especially since fragrance oils are usually irritants.

It's super common to see this kind of growth on surfaces early in a tank's life. I added some driftwood to my invert tank and wound up with some myself. It's completely harmless but if you don't like to look at it you can gently remove it with a toothbrush. What were the resources that you looked at? It sounds like they were geared toward treating cyanobacteria which is unsightly and in some cases harmful, but that's completely different from what you have.

If this is what your livestock are used to, odds are you're fine. Buildup is possible over time but you'll mostly see that in the form of limescale. From a layman's perspective, high KH means that your fish are more likely to develop healthy bones and your invertebrates are more likely to have healthy shells/exoskeletons. This is especially critical for livebearers. Minerals dissolved in the water column don't evaporate (much like how aquarium salt has to be removed through water changes) so can accumulate over time. If you want to look at resources about how buildup ramps up I highly recommend looking into marine resources as this is something frequently looked at by marine aquarists. Unfortunately the solution is generally to use RO to top off. If you have any terrestrial plants I highly recommend trying to do "water changes" by using tank water in your garden. This is what I've done with my tanks and the plants definitely appreciate my fish water so I don't feel like anything is going to waste.

In that case he's referencing this one. To me it looks more like an aquatic slime mold than algae but that's pure speculation. This one shown at other points in the video is definitely staghorn though

He refers to it as staghorn algae at the 20s mark. His accent is a tad thick but I think you're referencing where he speaks on how it's one of the more difficult to treat types of algae. I'm not sure where he's located exactly but I met a lot of people with his speech pattern while I was living in Bristol.

Crinum are heavy root feeders and the bulb needs to be fed in order to maintain the health of the plant. The new leaves were likely being consumed in order to sustain the bulb and prevent it from melting. If you have any mesh pots or (one of my favorite materials on the planet) plastic gutter guard you can build a little shelter to tether the bulb in the substrate and cut it away once the roots are re-established and anchoring the plant. Some of the melt/root death may also be due to the change in tanks. Crinums are a lot like Crypts and don't like to be moved around.

I resealed my 50 hex and I personally removed the trim, although for different reasons. In my case it was because the trim was pretty badly degraded and needed to be replaced entirely. I had the tank on EVA foam while I was working to protect it and didn't brace anything while I was working on it. This shouldn't be an issue for a 40 breeder, but for taller tanks look into a respirator rated for fumes. Many of the ones used in resealing sink to the bottom and if you're leaning in, it can get pretty rough even for acetone. The important thing for sealing larger tanks is making sure that the bead of silicone is an appropriate size. The guideline that I used was the width of the glass plus a few mm extra on each side. Hope this helps.

Looks kind of like the beginnings of staghorn algae to me. Attached photos are all taken from Google as I've not personally treated it. George Farmer has a short video on treating it and there are a ton of other resources on YT.