AndEEss

Why would you buy corydoras for cleaning your tank?

I would do another, at least 50%.

I just bought 2x Kessil A360 Tuna Sun for my incoming WaterBox 6025.

Their Latin name gives away their substrate preference.

Look up HDPE geocell/pavers. They'd help keep substrate in place and anchor the plants.

Maybe it has to do with your tank likely re-cycling when you rinse off all of the BB? Because what you do is NOT what I would consider best practice for maintaining BB.

Looks like some pot scrubbers in there. Pretty normal amongst the DIY crowd. Better than most purpose-made media.

Every unit of ammonia produces 2.7 units of nitrite and 3.6 units of nitrate. You need to add ammonia to a (fishless) aquarium to feed the bacteria while cycling it.

Correct. Since you’re doing a “fish-in” cycle, the best thing to do is regular testing and water changes (with dechlorinated water).

You have to add an ammonia source for the bacteria to feed on, live and multiply. Example: I have an autodoser pumping 1mL of 5% ammonium chloride solution into my plant grow out tank every day. That works out to 2ppm ammonia. Right before it goes off, once or twice a week I’ll test the water. 0ppm ammonia and 0ppm nitrite, every time, because my filter is full of billions of hungry bacteria eating ammonia and nitrite, and they are fed daily. Plenty of other ways to do it, too. You can add a bit of organic compost and some fish food, for example.

Bacteria eat, breathe and make waste just like every other life form. They need food, they require oxygenated water and they make waste in the form of nitrite and then nitrate. I would suggest you read up on cycling an aquarium before buying any more animals.

In the nicest possible way: buying a clown loach as a solution to a snail problem is a terrible idea. Unless you’re prepared to give them a 150g+ tank, don’t do it. Fix your snail problem by not over feeding.

How did you cycle the tank? What did you feed the beneficial bacteria between setting it up and now? A cycled tank should be able to process 2ppm (or more) ammonia per day. The problem implied task there is to either continually add ammonia every day or to add animals when it is actually done cycling.

New reader of this thread. I run two 110s on my 75g. A couple of thoughts: 1) I bought and cut Poret foam to size/shape and have ~4” of foam in each filter. All 20ppi. 2) I used plastic mesh to make a grate that is U-shaped and sticks out 2.5”-3” into the water, horizontally, from the filters. 3) Drilled out the bottom of the baskets. 4) Added mesh to inside of the basket. Filled remaining volume of the baskets with K1. I have 2x airstones in one of the filters. There’s a discernible rotation of the K1 media, forming a poor man’s moving bed filter. 5) Like others, I want the water to come from the intake tube only. I’ve got a very large pre filter sponge on each but neither is jammed up at all. I may modify the intake tubes to try to get more flow through them, if possible. 6) When the surface skimmer on a 110 is blocked, it sounds like the world is about to end.

BB = beneficial bacteria. They consume calcium. When you have overstocked tanks, that means more BB, and more calcium consumption.

What ideas do you want? Yes, your fish will live. Will it be a planted tank?

What is your ammonia source? Meaning, what are you adding to the tank to provide ammonia? Example: I dose 2ppm ammonia, via ammonium chloride, when I’m cycling a tank/filter. I’ll also add some organic compost. https://aquariumscience.org/index.php/2-4-cycling-with-ammonia/

Part of the problem is your bio load. You’re way overstocked. BB consume calcium and that will drive down your KH and buffering capacity. Also, yoyo loaches in a 10g??? Really?

Hikari Micro Pellets, Vibra Bites and Algae Wafers.

Ostracods. Nothing to worry about.

Nothing is plug and play. My CO2 system: 5lb CO2 tank CO2Art Pro-SE Regulator. Controls flow, and timing of CO2 via smart plug. Porter Instrument Company B-1267 Rotometer. Used to monitor flow rate. Drop checker. Used to monitor pH drop. Cerges Reactor made from water filter canister. Achieves near complete dissolution of CO2. I'd suggest you read up on CO2. Lots of good articles here. https://www.2hraquarist.com/blogs/choosing-co2-why

What kind of regulator does it have? How many bubbles per second or minute were you running? How was it diffusing into the water?

The first thing you should do is turn off your CO2 and install a drop checker. And then, read up on CO2. I’m guess by you gassed out your fish.

That footprint is way too small to have fish at all, IMO. I'd get a couple of neocaridina shrimp, and that's it. Maybe a snail.

That's how I set up every new filter. I'll generally take some media from the old filter and put it at the bottom of the new media in the new filter and let the bacteria colonize from there.