[Moldy mini-pond]

I moved my 12ish gallon mini ricefish pond in from the outside deck to the inside the house about a week ago. I just noticed mold started growing on the base of the plants and substrate. Know idea why that is or what’s going on. Water clarity still seems fine. Realized I’m out of test strips otherwise I’d give water parameters as well 🙄

Any advice would be appreciated.

[Red Ramshorn Snails]

I’ve got a little tank of ramshorns to feed to my puffer. I don’t cull for color or anything since they’re all going to be food but I do get decent sized ones in every color, from red to grey-ish to more white-ish shells and feet. I’m thinking color is genetic and isn’t lost with age…I could be TOTALLY wrong though! Lol 

[Are my Yoyo loaches in love?]

I’ve got 3 yo-yo’s in my 75g. One has always been waaaaay chubbier than the other two for years. Doesn’t ever seem to drop eggs or anything or get smaller. I wouldn’t worry too much about it other than getting them in the 55 once you get it set up. They’re a really fun active fish to have. 

[New Fish for the Week 10/31-11/6]

That angelfish is beautiful, saw him in the Q-tank a few days ago. The Mrs. was definitely eyeing him 👀

[A friendly game of tag]

On 9/6/2022 at 5:53 PM, redfish said:

Soo, thanks for the tag!  Let’s see:

I’m trying my hand at the RR process on some wild caught floating plants.  

I first rinsed the plants with some rainwater from soaking driftwood.

 

then I moved the plants to a second container to further clean it and added seltzer.

 

then I used the first container to weigh the plants down for full submergence “hopefully”

 

and moved it to a dark place until tomorrow.  I’m sure it’s not perfect but it’s a start.  Drilling holes in the top container would be better and I will do that next time.

I plan to add the plants to some outdoor tubs.

 

Very basic start for now.  Compared to @Travis and @MattHasMTS who I’m tagging since their cool projects helped encourage me to try a mini pond.

Looks like a great start! Can’t wait to see it finished!!! 🙌

[New Fish for the Week 9/5-9/11]

On 9/2/2022 at 7:20 AM, Snjchris said:

Can confirm. The Fahaka puffer is incredibly cute!!

Seriously! I couldn’t believe how small it was.

[First mini pond]

I’m just north of Seattle, pretty close to the co op actually. The water has been crystal clear for several months after the initial bloom when I set up the pond. It’s in a shady corner of the deck so even with temps being in the 80’s the water seems to be hovering at 60-70 degrees. The rice fish seem super happy with it though. 
 

I’m thinking of maybe setting up another one next year in a place that gets more sun. I haven’t gotten any fry and I’m wondering if the fish just want to get be a little bit warmer to breed. The plants are thriving and I haven’t lost any fish, so I can’t really complain. We tend to have more mild winters than you guys out east. I’m planning on adding a small heater once the temps drop and cover the plants in frost cloth…and hope for the best 🤞

[Malaysian trumpet snail problem…]

Oh I bet!

[Malaysian trumpet snail problem…]

Thanks! The crazy thing is, I feel like I underfeed this tank the most since it’s my only tank that didn’t have live plants and I know there’s nothing to use those extra nutrients.

I’ve got two plecos in the tank and I can’t even put wafers in for them without the cichlids gobbling them up immediately 🫤

I’ll head to the co op and pick up a couple assassin snails. At least that next post will have a cooler sounding title! Haha

[Cure for MTS?]

I had a real problem…still do 😬 I ended up consolidating several small tanks to two 75g and then got myself a big 125g…I find I really enjoy the bigger tanks more and they’re a lot less work than the 20g and smaller ones….I still have a few of those but tending to the bigger ones really helped curb my itch!

[Malaysian trumpet snail problem…]

Soooooo I accidentally created a Malaysian trumpet snail sanctuary in one of my African Cichlid tanks. I noticed a few in my mbuna tank a while back after adding some new plants. I threw them in my 75g peacock tank figuring they’d do a good job churning up the sand. Now I month later there is like a billion of them…and that might be a low estimate. 

Is there anything I can do? Or do I just need to accept I screwed up and created a monster? I’ve got a couple pufferfish in other tanks but they don’t seem all that interested in eating them and I’m gun shy to add more than one at a time to see if they’ll eat them.

Any advice would be great!

[First mini pond]

On 8/13/2022 at 2:54 PM, PedroPete said:

Have you seen any medaka fry yet? I use java moss for spawning and find that if I don't remove the moss, the fry that are born don't last due to parental predation. On the flip side, most a bunch of java moss after a week into a spare tub, jar, critter keeper, whatever, results in a bunch of fry hatching, which I then move to a grow out tub 🙂 Hope you get some babies yet this summer!

That’s great to know! I haven’t seen any fry yet which is a bummer but the fish seem happy (probably from a protein packed fry diet 🙄) and the plants are exploding! 

There is a very slow “waterfall” in the pond and I’m wondering if that might be creating to much current? Most of the rice fish set ups I’ve seen are basically still so that could be contributing to the lack of fry? There is a TON of water lettuce and hyacinth covering basically the entire top of the water and I haven’t really moved it around and looked for fry, so I might have some and just not realize it…maybe I’ll go take a look now!

[New Fish for the Week 8/8-8/14]

Unboxing video!!!!! 🙌🙌🙌

[Bat Signal for "Feeder Snails"]

On 8/7/2022 at 1:07 PM, brandonnaturally said:

Hi local Edmonds, WA customers! If any of you have any ramshorn, bladder, or pond snails or have a tank and breed lots of them, let me know and shoot the store an email. We have had a drought of them lately and would like to have some to offer for our customers in the shop, but no one has brought any in recently. 

 

Again, if you have some to spare, please email me at the store email at store@aquariumcoop.com for drop offs 🙂

 

I wish, Bruno is such a chunk though I can barely keep up! 

[First mini pond]

On 7/16/2022 at 3:26 PM, Guppy Guy said:

Sorry I'm late to the game, but how is it going? Where I am, it averages 95, a little warm for guppies. I will be trying a pond anyway though, I will just make it shady and watch the temperature closely.

Mini pond is looking phenomenal! Everybody was right about the plants clearing up the water. I think I only did one or two big water changes early on and the water has been crystal clear ever since! 🙌 The plants are growing better than I ever could've imagined up top too, I thought for sure they’d all be dead in a week! I’ve been dosing it with easy green, not sure if I really need to but it doesn’t seem to be hurting anything.

Hoping your guppy pond works out! I’ve kept guppies in fairly high temps with GBR and it seemed to work. I think if you keep things shaded it’ll work out just fine!

 

[First mini pond]

On 6/5/2022 at 3:40 PM, brandonnaturally said:

Just do what I do and send it over the balcony/into the yard! 😂

Oh, I’m way ahead of you on that one! Haha 

[First mini pond]

On 6/5/2022 at 1:28 PM, brandonnaturally said:

Looks fantastic Matt! Yes, the plants should help with the water clarity, definitely. I think what will happen is eventually the floaters will start propagating and shade out the water a bit, competing for resources and shading the light out. I'd up the water changes a bit until the plants catch up and start covering the surface and it should get better overtime!

 

I'd say it's Brandon approved! 😉 

Thanks Brandon!!!! Little did I know I was going to add another tank to my water changing schedule! Lol

[First mini pond]

On 6/5/2022 at 11:33 AM, Patrick_G said:

I've found that the green water comes and goes in cycles, but keeping the pond shaded seems to keep the green to a minimum. 

Good to know! It’ll get just a few hours of morning sun but will be shaded by the house the majority of that day. Hopefully that’ll help it 🤞

[First mini pond]

On 6/4/2022 at 8:16 PM, Fish Folk said:

Fish love the green water. Not bad water quality. Just green-water algae. Amazing stuff for fry to eat. Keep going! Looks just fine.

Chose some of the same potted plant for one of my tubs yesterday. I'm all in on Guppies. 

I wish it was warm enough to do guppies outside here!

[First mini pond]

I set up my first mini pond today. I bought plants that I thought looked cool…without knowing anything about them 😬 the pond is a 10…ish gallon system between the main pond and the water it holds on top. I’ve currently got it stocked with a few rice fish in hopes they have some babies throughout the summer. Just going to see how it goes and see if the plants survive. The fish have been happily living in it without plants for about a month. I’m just north of Seattle by the co op.
 

I guess my biggest question for @brandonnaturallyand everyone else is will the plants help with water quality? It’s pretty green and murky and I can barely see the fish unless they come to the surface. I’ve even done water changes on the pond but it only seems to be getting worse, visually. 
 

p.s. the 5 gallon tank next to it was a plant holding/growing tank. 
 

thanks for everyone’s help!

 

Matt

[New Fish for the Week 5/23-29]

On 5/19/2022 at 9:33 AM, Zenzo said:

One day I will have a bichir!

I know you’ve got a ton of tanks Zenzo but oh man was my brief bichir keeping a doozy! Lol @brandonnaturally knows all about it... and warned me before I bought him as he was naughty at the store! He turned into a murder fish and ate almost every fish I tried to keep with him even though it was probably 6-7 inches max. He got rehomed and became the smallest fish in the next guys VERY large tank…and I got my 120g back! 😅

[New Fish for the Week 5/9-5/15]

Is Dean going to continue bringing in the platinum rice fish for the foreseeable future? My first attempt at a mini pond is NOT going as planned… 🫠

[Malaysian Trumpet Snails?]

I guess I should consider myself lucky then!

[Malaysian Trumpet Snails?]

On 4/12/2022 at 3:16 PM, Jack.of.all.aquariums said:

They are Malaysian trumpet snails. They are veeeery good at hiding. You can have hundreds without knowing it but as far as I'm concerned they are beneficial.

Plenty of people have spread the info that they will chip puffer teeth but I feed them to my schoutedeni puffer breeding group and have never had a problem. Mine will only chomp them if they are really hungry otherwise the just suck out the foot and leave the rest to rot. Sometimes they carry them around and it looks like they are stuck but they have always spit them out eventually.

That’s great to know! Next tank cleaning I’ll give him a few and see how he likes them. What else are you feeding your puffers? Mine seems to only want to eat ramshorn snails and the big freeze dried krill. Don’t really seem interested in frozen bloodworms or brineshrimp…

[Malaysian Trumpet Snails?]

I  was just gravel vacuuming my mbuna tank and just came across of a ton of these snails, all buried under the substrate. No idea how/when they got introduced. Tank has been running since November and I’ve somehow never seen these before…I guess two part question. What kind of snails are these? And would they be safe to feed to my Schoutedeni puffer? They’re pretty pointy/sharp on the end so I don’t want the puffer to cut himself.

Thanks from a new and confused inadvertent snail breeder 🥴