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braids

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Everything posted by braids

  1. I was only confused about the guidelines because they were written in a confusing way. Which is why I asked for clarification. Clearly I was not the only one who was confused. I repeatedly mentioned my desire to follow guidelines. I'm deducing, since not outright mentioned, that they have since been edited. I have spent plenty of money with Co-op myself - somewhere in the neighborhood of $400-$500 in the last 3 orders, and shared link upon link upon link to videos and Co-op products, and sung praises elsewhere. Like Hobbit mentioned, I too, was seeing other people posting links, and it made me question if this was okay or not. Which is why I asked. But as so often is the case, the messenger is shot. Cory's suggestion that I am not a good fit for this forum was not lost on me. It actually broke my heart a little. I hope that this will benefit future people that join this forum. There certainly are other communities and other businesses I can support. The revised guidelines: Care stands for Community Aquarists Respect Each Other. First and foremost, be kind and helpful to one another on the forum. Use language that is suitable for a young hobbyist. Profanity is prohibited. We don't discuss Race, Religion, or Politics. We don't discuss other aquarium related companies both positively or negatively. Don't self promote your Social media sites, brand or business. Links to competitors are prohibited. Amazon.com, Ebay.com, Aquabid.com, and Aquahuna.com are approved. No selling or giving away aquarium related supplies or animals. Don't "bump" a post to the top of the forum. Write meaningful replies, instead of writing "cool" or "lol" write something that contributes to the thread. You can always thank someone by giving them reputation. If you have a problem with an order from Aquarium Co-Op, contact customer service. The forum isn't the avenue for order help. Moderators will be forced to make judgement calls. Prior actions on the forum will be taken into account. This will allow someone to slip up and use profanity, without getting banned. However a pattern of slipping up while advertising, more than once is a track record that would result in a Ban.
  2. @Cory We need help Batman. We don't know what is allowable and what isn't. Following is kind of a summary of the questions people are posing: The guidelines are confusing. From the guidlines: "Links to competitors are not prohibited. Amazon, Ebay, and Aquabid are approved, as long as they aren't intentionally advertising." Is it supposed to say: Links to competitors are prohibited. ? As in links to competitors are prohibited except Amazon, eBay, and Aquabid. (Which I personally find confusing given the small business gobbling machine that Amazon is, and how contrary they are in their business practices to the values that AC represents) From your comment above: That's a direct conflict of what the guidelines say. The guidelines read "links to competitors are not prohibted". The reason I link to a specific product is so there is no confusion as to what product and features it has. I abhor having my time, and other peoples time wasted because of assumptions, misunderstandings, confusion or labeling differences. Similar to providing a citation. @Patrick M. Bodega Aquatics asked about things AC doesn't carry. At first I thought well that would be okay because its on eBay. But you'd have to site a specific seller because lots of people sell that product. But then I would site what you said previously about the heaters - because we don't know what you're working on in the Batcave - so to speak. So we could be unknowingly be referencing a product or resource in development. Keeping in mind we don't know what you have going on behind the scenes or because it gets mentioned in one social media form, does not mean we all know about it. I have the same question as @Hobbit about referencing educational works, documents, comments of other youtubers, vloggers, etc. For instance: I found a fantastic plant deficiencies chart - I can't remember if I ended up posting it or not. Because not crediting the source is like stealing. I post links to your videos all over the internet whenever I say "Cory from Aquarium Co-op says..." If we can't site data then anyone can say anything without having to or being able to back it up. If we can't reference other ideas, concepts, etc people have to operate in an echo chamber of sorts. And there will be debates and back and forths (which can be carried out in a respectful way), but people are certainly going to have a difference of opinion. I know raising questions like this is not comfortable for everyone, but neither is being unsure of what is allowed and not allowed. And conversely seeing people posting links to competitors and siting other vlogs and sites/data that may cause debate among folks is probably unpleasant as well. We need to flesh this out. We just need to know what the rules are so we can play by them. 🥚I feel like I'm typing on eggshells. This makes me sad.
  3. You are not. I can guarentee you that! Heaters are a major frustration and exactly why I went to thre Co-op site first. Because I trust Cory in product design and choice. Because he sciences! 😁 I begrudgingly looked elsewhere.
  4. @Cory I hope I can express this in a way to be understood as not trying to be argumentative because that is totally not my intention. I just don't know how you can have an open forum and not end up with discussions with a larger scope. This is a world wide platform. Unless you take back to only locals can join and it's private. Here's an example of a situation I am in - I do go first to Aqarium Coops site, but I can't always find what I need or what fits for my situation. I'm prepping setting up my 125. I check AC - no heaters available. I search forum - no discussion. I see the what's available on the afore mentioned sites. Not familiar with what's there, and not crazy about the selection I'm looking for some direction. So I come back here hoping to have conversation, share what I've seen, get feedback, learn what more experienced aquariusts experience has been - what they used, the draw backs, the success, the failures in a respectful environment (that's a huge caveat!). How do we do that without discussing products that are not in the scope of what AC carries? I'm trying to tread lightly here and do my best to explain - I don't want to get booted, because I have a HUGE appreciation for what Cory and Candi have built - and the WAY they've built the business, and the VALUES behind those decisions and choices. The healthcare benefit being provided for the employees+ is huge to me. That's the stuff that makes me choose to buy from a small, growing, independent owned shop and sing its praises every chance I get. I value the videos, the product testing, the educating, everything that embodies Aquarium Co-op. Thanks for reading my novel 🙂 *you could literally track my history and find that scenario. **I don't shop ⅔ of the approved links.
  5. Lol - I'm sure he would - just didn't want to tag him for my petty confusion! Busy man!
  6. I wish someone would make a heater that is more like a stock tank deicer - all metal - plastic encased if need be. And one that had a +/- of a couple degrees. Fish, like people, don't naturally live in a constant exact temp. That would avoid the constant on/off cycling. Cut our electric bills a little, ease off on the wear and tear of the heaters, and in my opinion provide a more natural temperature fluctuation. Cory spoke about a lot of this in a video about heaters. I 100% agree with what he was saying. Sounds like the preset heaters are dependent on an average room temp to maintain the preset? @Maggie what do you usually keep your space at?
  7. I find products at various places - usually Petco, Petsmart, and Chewy, and want to reference them in conversation specifically because of information contained within the listing, but I don't want to be in violation of the rules. Or in another case I found a website that provides information on native fish that also sells them for aquarists and pond stocking - can I post that kind of link? From the guidlines: "Links to competitors are not prohibited. Amazon, Ebay, and Aquabid are approved, as long as they aren't intentionally advertising." The way this is written leaves me a bit confused because it says they aren't prohibited and the following are approved. I'm confused by that. If links of competitors aren't prohibited why would those three be approved? It almost sounds that those are exclusively approved but others aren't. I think it's the usage of language that is confusing. This would clear it up [to me] if it is the intention: "Links to competitors are allowed including Amazon, eBay, and Aquabid as long as they aren't intentionally posted for the purpose of advertising." I would be interested in learning about other resources (of course I always shop the Co-op first lol!) that are perhaps a bit more obscure, geared to aquarists or regional. I hope an admin/mod type will respond to this post! Thanks in Advance! braids
  8. Thank you for posing this question. I was just searching through the forum for this same info as I am in the same boat - prepping for my 125. I've been looking at heaters and I was wondering about the preset 78 degree heaters. Wondering if they would be a better option? Specifically I was looking at the Aqueon preset - 200 watt for 75 gallon - 2 would only cost about $35 for the pair. BUT that would preclude you from being able to raise the temp for illness treatment. Unless you kept a 3rd on hand for the need. Has anyone tried these preset heaters?
  9. I've been seeing black and blue angels in my area - there's an active breeder not far from me - and I'm not usually and angel fish person either - but these have me seriously reconsidering it. But I'd kind of like to do an angel only tank - and find a tank just for that purpose. Not sure what would make them happiest.
  10. I've been wondering how people get clear shots. I'll give this a try. Would like to hear other tips!
  11. I have previously but your lid lifters look nicer than what I found. I'll search some more,
  12. Would you share your source for hinges and lid lifters? 🤞 its not AMZN as I can't Jeff Bazos. I won't feed his greed. But that's my thing and I don't expect others to be as bullheaded as I am.😆
  13. Have you water tested the slate bottom yet? I picked one up at a garage sale this year - but not a 55! What is the trim like? My tar like seal is in amazing condition and it had a bunch of rain water in the bottom. so I'm confident it will hold water at least in the lower part lol! haven't fully tested it yet. I might do a shrimp tank. not sure yet.
  14. Is it making your MTS seem less crazy or scaring him for what the future might bring? 😂🤣
  15. @TheDukeAnumber1 Our well is about 140 ft deep. @Coronal Mass Ejection Carl In a large town in my area they released an in-depth report about the cities water - and after filtration they found an IMMENSE amount of medications detected. So much medication is excreted in urine or flushed and that all goes into a cities water supply. And that is in your city supplied drinking water. And then there are places like Flint and a few hundred other towns with toxic water. On the flip side in the country you have holding ponds where the - and I hope you're sitting down for this - where the tanks filled from septic tank clean outs, and the waste from the dairy barns (where cows virtually stand in a stall all day long - no pasture time) are emptied into. Its a giant slurry of human and animal waste. Which is aged and then sucked out of the pond and put into giant tanks and hauled out to farms. The liquid is sprayed onto food crops and the sludge is flung about by a tow behind cart called a manure spreader. Water is a crap shoot in either local. Literally. @tolstoy21 I was curious if there was a way to regen the resin myself. Just hadn't gotten that far - would welcome tips if you want to share them. I did a pretty wide panel water test on my water pre order so I'll have that to go off of, which is minimal at best but is at least some sort of baseline. That was done outside at the nearest point to our well per test instructions. I'm not as familiar with understanding Kh Gh and pH and how it all intersects as I would like to be. But I saw there is a video put out by Fish Girl/AC that covers that chemistry that I'll take a look at - hopefully that will help me. I feel like there is a potassium issue too with high nitrates, but I don't have any proof of that. Just a suspicion based on what my plants are telling me. Like I don't have the right ratio or there's a usage problem or absorption problem. This chart I found at aquariumbreeder . com (providing this info as a source citation) helps me because of the graphing layout. I'm really hoping to see a little drop in my pH and and my nitrates drop to low levels. I'm not one that chases numbers. I prefer the stability and work on the long term fix. And definitely not messing with chemistry with additives. One of my reasons for going with a Nitrate WHF (Whole House Filter) VS RO is because I don't want to remineralize and such. My fish rely on me, and if I go down I need their care to be as easy as possible on the people in my home (I have a health condition) and simple to explain if there is trouble. I may finally be able to keep shrimp after this! Can't wait! And maybe I'll get babies! (FISH AND SHRIMP!)
  16. @StephenP2003 Water changes didn't work for obvious reasons, so then I switched to buying distilled water when I should have been buying drinking water. Lol wrong turns! I hated the amount of plastics I was using (I wasn't able to get refilled Water). So then I tried some resin in a bag and plants - lots of plants and a mesh like filter that was supposed to reduce nitrates. They are simply too high to be effective. I have 6 tanks (which were an outgrowth before I understood what was happening and that if wasn't something I was doing wrong). They range in size between 3 and 55. I have sworn off buying any more fish until I can provide them with proper water. The three houses two neon tetras and some snails and is a grow out quarantine plant tank. Unheated. I have a 10 that contains two fathead minnows, some pond plants, a few snails and a damselfly larvae. (They live in rainwater and drinking water. They were surprises I found remaining in my summer stock tank pond thing!) Plants brought it from the pond. Unheated A 20 L with a few White Cloud Mountain Minnows, a female fathead, and rainbow glow shark. Snails. Well water. Planted. 78° A 40 Long with a South American Puffer, upside down cat, a zamora cat 6 black neon tetras, two dwarf rainbows, and 2 dwarf cories. Well water, planted, snails. 80° A 55 gallon with a 9.5" female Chinese Alge Eater. This fish is adopted for a friend. I actually drive 20 miles one way to get water from their house to do water changes because I promised I wouldn't put any more new fish in my water until it was corrected. 78° But I felt bad for her being alone so i got some small, quick, upper tier fish to go with her but they are currently in quarantine and then they'll go in the 55. 78° I've lost dwarf gouramies, mollies, and tetras. I suspect due to the long term high nitrates. But I had an Otocinculos for years. Supposed to be sensitive to nitrates. And blue rams but those weren't totally my fault. I bought at an LFS and I feel like I had "SUCKER" written across my face (because I was trusting) . I asked specifically about this fish and my water parameters. Guy said no problem. GRams are fine in high nitrate. Yeah. Later research showed exactly the opposite. I was excited, able to go to a big shop been around for 50 years. I feel like I got sold. But I should have tempered my eagerness. My fish never breed. Exception - the dwarf gouramies did, but it was a small hatch. One fry survived. Got to 25 cent piece size and died . Java fern does not like my water. I'm hoping that will change. In general plants are slow to grow. Once established they seem to grow nicely. I grow algae like a boss. My fish I think live a shorter life span. I'm really looking forward to giving them good water and more plants. All of my tanks have sponge filters, various decent LED lights, a current generator, and snails. No CO2. Plants. And in the temp range These are just my opinions through observation and without science to support them.
  17. I've been doing battle with high nitrates for years now. It was a long while before I tested my source [well] water and realized it wasn't a tank issue, but a source water issue. I was seeing 160ppm straight out of the tap. Had it verified by my County Ag Dept because I thought maybe I was doing my testing wrong. They said my water is essentially 10% Nitrates (likely from agricultural run-off). We drink a ton of water here, obviously bath in it, cook, etc. So I knew we had to do something about it. I thought RO was the only option. Then I happened upon nitrate filters! You can indeed get under the sink nitrate filters, but you have to replace filters every few months*. We wanted to cover all of our needs. So we decided to go with the whole house filter. *The nitrate filter resin must be changed an estimated every 3-5 years at the cost of about $700. The place I ordered from even has a portable system that is geared for serving livestock. Which made me think of people that have set ups in rental units. They also have off-grid systems! I'm eyeing up the inline UV filter as my next upgrade - which would be beneficial to people and fishes. By the new year we will hopefully be done with nitrate saturated water and the fish and plants will be happy! There are some plants that are not happy with my excessive nitrates. Anyone have experience with a whole house (or industrial application) UV filter? Below are reasons for using it... Effective in killing off bacteria and viruses such as: Coliform Bacteria Leptospira Interrogans (Infectious Jaundice) Salmonella Typhosa (Typhoid Fever) Bacteriophage (E. coli) Hepatitis Virus Chlorella Vulgaris Influenza Virus Legionella Pneumophila (Legionnaires' Disease) UV Disinfection is suitable for Industrial & Commercial Agriculture, Dairy, Livestock, Irrigation Water Food & Beverage Industry Beer Breweries, Wineries Drinking Water Ice Companies Well Water Aquaculture Restaurants, Schools, Hospitals, Hotels
  18. @H.K.Luterman I did add a plastic suction cup holder thing to try to reign in some of the roots because they were blocking so much light. But there was no metal - just clear plastic and silicone. That should be inert. I have removed it though.
  19. @Paul Thank you for replying! Yes, my nitrates come out of the tap at that level. Fish keeping is actually how we discovered our well water is bad. We're in process of researching which whole house Nitrate filter to purchase. It's about a 2K investment. Nitrate levels like this are bad for everyone in my family (finned, 4 legged and 2 legged). And yep - nothing I do - no matter how many plants I have seem to drop it much - at most 80 ppm. Its been a couple months since I've cleaned my filter - I can do that and see what comes of it. My fish feed off it as well as the snails. It doesn't have gunk built up on the outside, but I'm sure it couldn't hurt. I do have a deep bed and there is waste in the gravel (below not on top), but the last time I did a deep clean it completely crashed my cycle and I'm afraid to mess with it. That was devastating. I rechecked my pH this morning and its the same as in the pic above which is my normal pH. I don't have Malaysian Trumpet Snails in this tank. I could maybe add those. Side note - is that a Cane Corso in your profile? Beautiful whatever breed!
  20. Almost 24 hours later fish are still alive and rapid breathing if anyone has any suggestions. Could really use some help. Thanks.
  21. I have no idea honestly. I've never experienced this problem. My video is too big and I've tried to trim the video but my computer says I don't have permission to edit the video.
  22. My water parameters : Ammonia 0ppm Nitrates 0ppm Nitrates 160 Ppm (from the tap) Ph 7.4? Kh 11° Gh 3 grains or 51.3ppm TDS 455 Temp 82°F My fish were behaving normally last night and this morning. Around 11:30 a.m. I noticed the smaller of the glowlight tetras laying on the floor of the aquarium. Removed it. Then the second tetra started behaving the same. Erratic swimming, floating to bottom. Removed fish. Tested water. Everything was normal except my Ph was extremely high. Did partial water change and they returned to normal which is that 7.4 range. See pics. Fish are still alive. Video will be attached in next post. What can I do?
  23. That's an interesting thought. Maybe its the type of red? Or maybe its a bunch of malarkey.
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