Vexus

8/12/22 WOW it's been some time since I updated this.... I don't even know if anyone is even still interested in this post lol. So where to begin... a lot of stuff has happened in the past 5 months, not good stuff but that's its own thing. To sum things up, my wife and I moved, things happened and I have just not had any desire to poste due to family health issues and such. It's been a rough time. But this place is for fish talk so let me get to that. So, the move, it was a sudden decision and so we stayed with my in-laws for a week. Obviously, I couldn't set up a 40-gallon tank in my in-law's home for a week, that would be crazy. So I did the next best thing, went out and bought a 20-gallon tank and a bag of sand then set that up in their living room lol. As you can tell by the looks on their faces my fish were not happy with the downsize. After pulling out plants and reattaching them to rocks so they would fit in the new tank, I filled a tub of water and put my driftwood in it then left it in storage so the algae wouldn't die, and I wouldn't need to worry about it drying out too much. Another option I went with was floating my water sprite. Up to this point my sprite was showing little to no growth, every time I would plant it into the substrate the base would start to rot, and it would break and float up, so gave floating a try. Unfortunately, I forgot to take a picture of it at the end of the week but trust me when I tell you IT. BLEW. UP. Like seriously after a week half the tank was water sprite and yet all the time before that I'd be lucky to see an inch of growth. So our "fun" sleepover time with family sadly came to an end after a week. and it was time to set up my tank again. I got my driftwood plants and fish then started putting it all back together. Some plants didn't make it, namely half Anubias, and after sorting through the large mess that was my water sprite I took the best stalks I could find and replanted them into the substrate. I also added a little cholla wood for the loaches and snails. Overall, I think it looked good when I was done, granted thanks to my large wood (phrasing lol) I couldn't do much as far as changing the layout. It has been a couple months now and since then iv added a couple nerite snails (previously mentioned) and 2 more hillstream loaches. The snails were kind of just a random thing for no real reason but while at my LFS I noticed they had a different subspecies of hillstream and just couldn't help myself. My original 3 are doing well (as far as I can tell, they are good at hiding lol) and from what I can tell based on some research they are Sewellia lineolata loaches while the new ones are Borneo Suckers. I just wish I could see all 5 at once lol. Another change I made that is more subtle is the addition of calcium into the water. I wanted to be smart about it though, so I went with a technique I saw on YouTube where you add crushed eggshells to the water. After saving up a good number of shells and cleaning them up I threw them in a food processor to get them good and crushed then put them in a filter bag and added it to one of the chambers in my filter. Assuming the information I got online was correct the shells should slowly dissolve in the water spreading the calcium throughout the tank with the water flow. After all that my plants are doing well, my grape wood driftwood has finally stopped growing weird fuzz/mold but also developed a nice layer of algae for my loaches and snails to eat, the anubias that survived the move are slowly recovering and regrowing, the water sprite is growing like a weed to the point I need to trim it every week, and my Lotus and Lillys plants are going strong like always. Now it's time to move to the most exciting part of the post and the reason I was reinspired to start posting again. As some may remember (or you can go back a couple posts) some time ago I discovered eggs in my tank that I believed to have been from my corys. Those eggs were eaten/disappeared within a few days of discovering them and would occasionally reappear every now and then just to vanish shortly afterwards. A couple weeks ago was the same situation, I saw some eggs on the filter and they were gone soon after. But today while doing my weekly water check after doing my changeout the day before (I like to wait a day before getting the numbers, so it has time to settle) I noticed something small moving around on a rock. I assumed it was just plant waste that got stuck but then I noticed it was moving around. So I took a closer look and what do I find? A BABY CORY!!!!! I was so excited I ended up choking while breathing and calling out to my wife to come look. She thought I was hurt or something and wasn't amused I was yelling for her at 6 in the morning while she tried to get ready for work lol. I started looking around and was able to find a second one soon after. You can kind of see it on the rock, that's how it looked when I first noticed it. The quality is not the best, but you can see both of them in the center next to eachother. These are my first successfully bred fish even though it was purely by chance. I have had mollies breed before but by the time I found out about them the fry were nearly all eaten and the few left didn't last long enough for me to separate them. But these 2 little ones managed to survive all on their own long enough that they shouldn't need to worry about the other fish coming after them anymore. So I'm really happy about that because it means my fish are happy and my plants are sufficient enough to support a community. As for the breed, I only have 2 cory fish, an albino and bronze cory. I don't know which one is the mother but seeing as the albino is the larger of the 2, I think that one may be the female. But again, I'm no expert so who knows.

Neos are what I’m wanting to get, most people on YouTube normally give similar ranges on water conditions so I was under the impression that’s what I needed to aim for.

Planning on adding shrimp once my plants get a little “bushier” first and wanted to try and get the conditions close to what Iv been told it should be

I recently moved so the water was originally 15 gal RO 15 gallon cycled and the rest tap best estimate. And I never really thought to test the RO

So, I started testing my PH and KH and got some results that I'm unsure about. Using the API GH & KH liquid test kit, 1 drop = 17.9 ppm, my KH came out at a 4-5 (71.6-89.5 ppm) my goal is 2-5 so I'm good with that but my GH is what concerns me. My GH came out at 18-20 (322.2-358 ppm) WAY OFF from the 6-8 I want it at. I live in Las Vegas Nevada, so I understand the water here is super hard, but I do my water changes with RO water from my LFS. So, wouldn't the GH be lower? There are times ill use treated tap water when I need a couple more gallons when I run out of RO but not often and I assume not enough to make that big of a difference. I tested multiple times; the first GH test was 13 (232.7 ppm) and the tests after that came out to 18-20. If it helps here are my other tank details.... 36 Gal bowfront Planted pH 6.8-7.0 GH 18-20 KH 4-5 TDS N/A (don't currently have a monitor for this) Temp 74-76 F 3-4 squirts of easy green every 1-2 weeks And a few root tabs once a month at most My water changes are about 10 gallons give or take a few every 1-2 weeks Any help on what I can do to fix this is greatly appreciated.

36 gal rimless bowfront 30.7 in L x 15.7 in W x 22.2 in H

Whatever I have dosnt look like that stuff. It’s never been that white as far as I know. It always looks looks tan like that when it appears. But it hasn’t gotten any bigger than that so I’ll just keep an eye on it.

Here is a picture. It hasn't grown more than its current state, and I'm not seeing anything on the gravel and plants like it was before.

The community crave is a flake. Also I keep an eye on the wafers. If the remains arnt gone after a day or so I pull them out but with 6 bottom feeders I don’t have that issue very often.

I've got a molly, platy, 2 dwarf gurami, 3 long fin minora tetra, gold skirt tetra(???), 3 hillstream loach, 1 emerald - bronze - albino cory, and some kind of rainbow fish I think (got it a long time ago). As for food I give them xtreme community crave 2 times a day, tetra pro plecowafers once every other day and blood worms once a week or so. I am planning to change over to home made food recipe using veggies, shrimp and gelatin I saw on youtube that looked like a good option once my current supply gets low.

No. There are no weird odors or anything.

So I dosed the tank for about 2 weeks with meds and adjusted the food supply and the fungus or mold or whatever it is has stoped popping up. There is a thin layer of fungus or something on the grape wood but after asking around and doing research I found out that it’s normal for grape wood to develop a thin layer like this.

So after dosing the tank and monitoring it closely and dosing food I have gotten the mold issue I. The tank under control but whatever is on the fish has been reduced but not fully removed. I’ll keep trying things but unless I see any signs of health issues in the fish I won’t worry to much. thanks for everyone’s opinions and suggestions. With them I was able to solve the primary issue.

Then that means only med I can find that I can get ahold of is the Kanaplex and possiblyl Maracyn Two. I guess I will have to call my LFS and see if they have anything. I know they have Kanaplex, I just hope that will be enough to handle it on its own. Maybe add some salt as well. I'm just worried it'll hurt my plants. I forgot to mention I have another poste related to this one in the plants, algae and fertilizer section and after getting some info on that situation and this one I'm positive the fungus issues my tank has is causing the issue in my fish. So not only do I need to treat my fish I also need to take care of these fungus spores after I reclean my tank again. At this point I wonder if a combination of ich-X and Kanaplex would solve this issue, kinda like Colu suggested with dosing their food with Kanaplex but using ich-X instead of the jungle fungus seeing as I can't get ahold of it.

It looks like I’ll need to use aquabid cause nobody has anything in my area for almost a 10 mile radius. Every Walmart is out of stock. Did they take it away with the fish walls? You’d think petsmart or petco would carry this stuff…. I’ll figure something out, Iv never used aquabid so I’ll need to see how that’s done. Just so I can cover all the bases, does co-op carry a decent alternative to the jungle fizz tablets? Like that ich-x? I didn’t see nitrofurazone in the ”contains” list so I didn’t know if it will work or not, but it mentions fungal issues. I also bought a bottle of PIMAFIX, is it safe to assume that won't work? If not then I'll just return it seeing as I haven't opened it yet.

@Colu could I get some clarification on some of those items and were to get them? I normally get my supplies from Amazon cause my LFS overcharges anything that’s not a fish. Items I can’t find on Amazon are… Jungal fungus clear, focus and entice. I did find garlicguard and kanaplex so I guess I may not need the entice. Also I use flake food and frozen blood worms, so will I need a different food type or can this work with flakes?

I’ll see about gathering all the stuff to do that thanks.

3-31-22 It has been another eventful week for my fish tank, I'm not even sure where to start. So I’ll just begin with a full shot of the tank and go from there I guess lol. I don’t know why but my phone keeps making the pictures aid ease even tho I’m holding g it straight up when I take them lol. So let’s start with my after work surprise I found the other day. Eggs!! I was so excited when I found those. At first I thought they were from my hillstream loaches but after doing a little research it looks like one of my Cory’s may have made those. Having an albino, emerald and bronze I have no idea which one actually payed them, but my money is on the emerald cause its bigger than the other 2. Not that it matters at this point cause either the hillstreams, dwarf gourami, mollies, tetras or platty has been eating them off the walls. 😢 My new loaches are doing well so far, they had been hiding in the back corner behind the filter for the first few days of getting them so I moved the filter out of the corner and now they are learning to not be as skittish whenever someone gets near the tank. And Iv all but confirmed that the issue my platty has is a fungal infection so I’m in the process of taking care of that. Now a plant update. The large portion of water sprite seems to be growing, it’s slow but it’s growing, and my tiger lotus has sprouted a few new leafs. And then there was my Dwarf Lilly. Now according to my “Fish Tank Log Book” I planted the Lilly on march 19, it sprouted that little white nub 4 days later on the 23rd. Look at all that growth after a total of 12 days from planting. 🥳 That’s the end of the positives (not counting my platty issue 🤒) now for the downers. My anubias has become the victim of rhizome rot as of march 26 losing its 3 largest leafs. But the good folks at co-op have got my back and a new one is on its way. And as you can see from this recent picture. My plant is not ready to throw in the towel just yet. But I will be attempting to remove it from the wood and transferring it to a rock when the new one gets here so wish it luck on that operation. I also have determined with the helpful input of some fellow forum members that my tank is suffering from some kind of fungus outbreak. Which would explain the platty situation.It’s also latching onto several of the plants and I’m not sure if it’s preventing their growth or not. As you can see my Montecarlo is being smothered by it. I have ordered a treatment for the tank and got a special tool I can use the get large chunks of the fungus out of the tank hopefully without stirring it up to much. Thats pretty much it, new fish are doing well, issues with the ecosystem are going to be taken care of (hopefully), plants are being managed and my first batch of eggs didn’t last long lol. Once I take care of this fungus issue I may look into getting some Java moss and I’m seriously considering getting snails but no matter how much I look into that I have no idea what type of snail to get. Almost everyone says some are good and others not but then the next person says the good ones include some from the bad list and bad ones from the good list. It’s very confusing. Can anyone make a suggestion for a snail that can live in harmony with shrimp? (Shrimp are still my goal to work towards once I get the plants and everything under control) I’m ok with a snail type that breeds but I just don’t want to to over populate. Any suggestion is appreciated. I never thought I’d have so many updates in such a short period of time. Idk if that’s a good or bad thing lol.

So Iv been keeping an eye on the eggs and something I think to take note of. The hillstreams seem to be staying close to the eggs where as the Cory’s don’t have a care in the world about them. I also noticed a small group of eggs attached to the back of the filter itself and I have never seen my Cory’s go near that with the exception of the albino who sometimes likes to sit underneath it. Do hillstreams normally stay near the eggs or is that coincidence? Also do hillstream and Corey eggs have any major differences to tell them apart or is it all generally the same appearance? As far as genders go, I can’t really tell with the Cory’s because I only have one of each but if my guess is right, the emerald is female while the bronze and albino are male. But again I’m not totally sure. The hillstreams though I’m 80% sure I have one male and 2 female. But it’s hard to get them side by side for a good comparison.

No scratching or rubbing against anything. Honestly behavior wise there is no change at all. I tried api melafix when I first noticed it but no change so I’ll try a different med more suited for fungus infections instead of bacteria.

Thank you for the advice, I'll look into fungus treatments. Is there one you would suggest? Edit: LOL OMG sorry didn't relies you actually did suggest one. Thanks again

As you may be able to see from the picture I’m concerned about my platty. At first I thought it had a small injury from bumping into something like a rock but After treating the tank and waiting it hasn’t really gotten better. Infact it appears to have spread more on its side. Other than appearance there doesn’t seem to be anything wrong with my fish and none of the others show any signs of the same issue. Gills and fins all seem to be fine, eating habits are the same and it’s still active in swimming around and such or spending time in the shade from the driftwood. I don’t have any tests available at this time so I can’t give parameters for now. Here are a few more pictures. Any help is appreciated.

I guess technically that would count as sticky..... lol

Sticky I don't think so, but it is like cobwebs. It sticks to rough surfaces or latches onto the gravel and has to be physically removed; the vac won't pull it off. When I use the net to sift it the force of the movement causes it to "disintegrate" and the particles to float back into the tank just to reattach again.

Also, the only fertilizer in the tank is simple green, and I did use a few simple green root tabs when initially planting my Sprite and Montecarlo.