jwcarlson

That's extremely cool. I feel like I'm on a collision course with some creek dwelling natives at some point.

I think I paid $30 for 8 from Aqua Huna, but $13 for shipping too. One didn't make it alive, another had swim bladder problem and died a week or so later, and one was a furcata rainbow. So I ended up with five for $43... so basically what you're seeing. 🙂 They're pretty little fish, timid though. I ended up with 4 males and 1 female by the looks of it.

@Lennie Nope, not at all. That's interesting though. My rabbits aren't fully grown yet, though, I got them pretty small. Even still, I've never seen any weird snail behavior other than occasionally there will be clusters of young MTS floating around on the surface in groups of like 20 or 30. But as soon as the surface tension is broken they go scattering like you caught them doing something naughty. 🤣

MTS is Mylasian Trumpet Snail, not a mystery snail (just to be clear, they're pretty small, about an inch and some of the bigger ones might be a bit larger). 🙂 The MTS stay in the substrate mostly, occasionally there's a shrimp or snail riding around on the rabbits, but I don't think anyone seems to be battling.

I've got rabbit snails with MTS and bladder snails, kerri tetras, cardinal tetras, betta, shrimp, sterbai corys... I don't think there's much they wouldn't go with, honestly. As long as it's not some big fish or snail eater. I really really like my kerri tetras, they're very fun to watch and far more active than most other tetras that I've had (other than rummynose, maybe). But the kerris are aggressive eaters and really fun to watch. Personally, I'd find like 10-12 tetras you like and some shrimp.

If the sponge was cycled, I wouldn't be worried at all. Could have put them in with the sponge.

Any other stone in this one?

I haven't had them dig them up, but sometimes the gel cap swells up and gets to the top. All the fish seem to want to eat it. I haven't seen any of them die afterwards, so I think it's OK. They looked like something Gallagher would use in a comedy show. Maybe that's exactly what they were - props. But I didn't stop to ask, they looked like they weighed six pounds. haha

I got a bunch of java fern and buried it in substrate. I'm now about a year past doing that and I have dozens of baby java ferns all over the place because I stressed and killed their mother plants. 😄 Whoops. They do much better glued to wood or rock. Or the little ones seem to float around just fine. Did the same with the anubias and I think one or two of those didn't do well, but once I got them out the ones that remained seemed to take right off. Anubias is my kind of plant. If it's not happy (in my experience) it just sits there an *remains alive* and then like a day after you make a positive change you rewards you with a nice new leaf. 😄

Typically, I don't want them right away so I leave them in pots in a bucket or a QT tank of some sort. Dose some ferts and give them a few days. When I plant them, I take them out of the baskets and do a decent job or removing the rockwool. But I have been less aggressive with removing it of late in favor of avoiding root trauma. Sometimes the plants have a lot of roots and removing the basket is tough. I'll cut the basket up in that case. All that said, I think there's plenty of people who leave them in the baskets and plant that right in the substrate. It's possible that crypts are OK with that and stem plants aren't... or vice-versa (meaning that I do not know). I wouldn't leave epiphytes (java fern, anubias, etc) in the baskets for months and months, I don't think, but short term that's fine - those should be affixed to something like wood or rock long-term.

What's your pH, @KatieBunky?

I'd be interested in a monitoring device/devices. Possibly a controller, but I'm not doing anything fancy at all in any tanks. I think the biggest question I'd have is what the calibration procedure and frequency is...?

Just set this tank up like an hour ago. Added Stratum, gravel over that, and sand capped. Planted it quick and tossed the new 48" light on. Looks pretty good. Not the plants, the light.

This is going to sound wild. But I am going to try to keep my nitrates higher in 2023, because my plants seem to struggle. Also using more root tabs.

Looks nice, @Anjum I have a 48" one coming tomorrow for my 55.

It can be a moderate pain in the rump, but it's not like threading a rope through a needle. You'll be able to overcome it. I have been poking holes (just put a push pin in the jar with the root tabs), but I'm not sure if it helps much. I pre-poke the ones I'm putting in so I can place them back-to-back. In deeper tanks it's more difficult just because I don't have as much reach. I was at a fish swap yesterday and there was a guy selling like three feet long giant tweezers and I thought maybe they'd be good for the task. 😄

You mean to tell me I've thrown away (actually... fed to my chickens) perhaps thousands of dollars of duckweed?! 😨

Wherever you are in The Hobbit, one thing is for sure: you're not far removed from a song break.

I'm not commenting because I have the answer, but I would suspect that the thermal expansion of glass is quite different than the expansion of stainless steel and that may (or may not) cause a possible issue either at the joint or with the glass itself. Just something to consider.

Unless I'm mistaken or they aren't "standard" sizes... 10 gallon - 20" 40 gallon (breeder) - 36" 75 gallon - 48"

It just let me check out with a 48" one.

At the very least you need a 5-gallon bucket for plant cuttings/trimmings. 😉

I finished Gleanings by Neal Shusterman, it was a pretty decent set of short stories in the Arc of the Scythe world. On to Vinland Saga 6!

Looks nice, I don't think I would replace your light. But buy an AC light for your NEXT tank.

Yours take breaks from laying eggs long enough to do something else?!