nabokovfan87

Potentially it was planted too deep.

CAE will get very big and will potentially go after everything in the tank. It's happened a lot, but not something I can state firsthand. We've also seen some members on the forum encounter issues with their CAE going after fish. Ultimately, CAE won't do anything for algae and despite the name itself, it isn't really going to go after algae. https://www.aquatic-gardeners.org/Articles/cyprinid/

It is porous, but it's difficult to say. There are products like cuprisorb and carbon that you can use, soak the wood for a long time and try to remove any contamination.

Very cool to see all the progress in the tanks. 🙂

Agreed. There is a ton of equipment used to make that project achievable for some. It's a huge learning curve as well, like you mention. Ultimately, I can understand exactly where that decision comes from and maybe one day you'll get there.

It can depend on if you are going to be mounting it above the tank or directly on the rim. Ultimately though, if the length of the tank is 48" I find that having the light the full length of that light does help when it comes to pushing plants that demand high light. All of this is related to the number and the power of the LEDs on the light. More LEDs of a certain type indicates more powerful light energy to the plants. This is also where something like spectrum comes into play and where that research into how plants use different wavelengths of light comes into play. This is also why people are familiar with that 6500K spectrum value. Is that the exact best value for the plants? Maybe. Is that going to fully distinguish what the light outputs? Very likely it will not because most lights have other color LEDs apart from white 6500K. There are a lot of scientific papers on the topic when it comes to plants. Finding some of those may help with what you're trying to research. Ultimately though, there are only certain lights available that are designed for aquariums. Some are designed to be above the tank and some are designed to be on the rim. Ultimately, considerations like that come into play and the "width" of the light can simply be altered by having more than one light. There's a few really good starting points. The ACO light is one of them because it works and it's straightforward. I have the fluval lights and I enjoy them. I would only recommend the planted version and not the aqua sky, but I understand that isn't an option for everyone. When it comes to simplicity, the goal is to get a light that just works. Something rated for IP67 is pretty important for me personally because your light will get splashed on or dropped on or wet in some capacity, eventually. You can add a smart outlet as a timer and get all the functionality in the world that you need when it comes to scheduling. Being able to adjust the intensity of the light is also useful. Considering it's a 75G tank, keep that depth of tank in mind. If you have a lower power light, then you'd opt for something grows well in those conditions. Nicrew, hugger, there's so many brands out there of lights. Unfortunately the big box stores just do not carry most or any of them. Aquarium stores, websites online, that is where a lot of us get our lights now. Plants really are the determining factor though. You can focus on plants that fit the light you select or you can choose the light that fights the plants you want to work with. That is where I would start and find something that fits the above criteria of being splash resistant and adjustable.

Yeah.... For certain. Maybe it's time for that aquascaping competition style of setup? something that detailed I mean. Check this out: This one was about little setup tricks. It was about the foundation for how to do something specific. Very interesting to see that side of things. There is also other videos that go into "how I made my...." Where some of the higher ranking tanks and winners talk about what they do. You can also push yourself out of your comfort zone and try something that you've never done before.... Something that isn't just about the challenge, but is about the learning process and exploring a different way of doing things. (and nooooooo I don't just mean no filter stuff! 😂) So a layered thing is out for you? I mean.... A cap on top of soil, is that an option for you or something you have currently? I've also seen the tier method. The visual stuff up front, rocks in tiers, and then soil in behind the rocks. Visually you don't see the soil, plants hide it, but it's there for helping the plants to grow.

😂 There's a million ways to do it. There is very fine gravel too. Is it the color or the issue of cleaning it a certain way and it always looks dirty?

Definitely weird. Maybe you can try contacting the manufacturer. Is there a warranty option?

Pretty much any input can have a prefilter. Even a tidal 35. 😂 I don't mind canisters at all. Stuff like the fluval x07 series has a section that is all foam filtration. Other canisters are doing this as well not. The problem with canisters is that people try to outdo one another and run them for years without cleaning. Pepere had a post this past week talking about his setup and how easy it was to manage. Ultimately, every filter works as well or as difficulty as you want it to. It took me years before I finally got fed up enough to fix the tidal issues for myself. Took me years before I found the video when someone else had the idea to do the same thing. I kept looking for a follow-up but never found one. Eventually you just stop procrastinating and get it done or replaced.

George Farmer just uses a dollar store strainer. There's always a way to get something that'll work for you! The only way I've found is to use a lid. You just route the wires as you need to. Some of them can go through the space in the lid and for other wires you can use a glass cutter (or have a shop make it for you) and put a 45 degree notch in the corner. Most of the time your lid is going to have some space somewhere for the sake of filtration.

Having two tanks side by side, my favorite thing I've seen is to treat them as one big tank. The constrast of blackwater in one sounds perfect to compliment the crystal clear nature of the 29 next to it. That's a unique setup.... My suggestion would be to start there. The blackwater. It might just be the way the piece of wood is placed or the general form of that tank. Once you get an idea of what that tank is, then try to compliment or continue that scape in the other tank. That's how I would start. As far as stocking, I assume sandy bottom for the corydoras. Epiphytes make a lot of sense. Is there some you've not tried but want to? Hygro pinnatifida has a very good "feel" as if it was taken right out of blackwater setups. That's the one I would start with and follow that up with other things. George Farmers rainbow fern/crypt tank is a pretty beautiful setup. Those plants could be a great focal, even if just in a small section to highlight. The contrast. A 29 g is a bit of a fickle beast. It's tall enough to demand a certain setup and deep enough to eliminate a few other species of plants that could easily struggle. My 29g with the shrimp is moss, dragon stone, anubias, and ferns. It's nowhere near where it should be with plant health, but the nice thing about that tank is that it just chuggs along without much fuss. It's a very easy one to maintain with all of the epiphytes.

I think it's a saltwater controller I saw back in the day where it had a feed button and everything shut off for 15 minutes. I do feed pretty heavy sometimes. I generally give the fish 10-20 minutes to eat. I turn the filters off because they just ingest the fold right away and then I let them eat. Sometimes the food is gone quicker than others. Like OD mentioned, the main thing is to avoid food sitting and rotting. I think zenzo and Irene have videos about fish size and how much to feed. I've heard to feed something the size of their eyeball, mentioned above as well. There's a lot of old tales too about what to feed and how. For me, I just try to keep it simple. Feed a reasonable amount. A few bites for each fish once a day. I give them time to find that food, check to make sure everyone is eating. ..... another thing to keep in mind is how easy a food is for the fish to eat. I've had fish go nuts for food, struggle to eat it, then they just ignore it.

No he's honestly better off in the tank with the plants then anything else. You would just keep doing daily 50% WCs until you see that ammonia go down. What is your nitrite? For ammonia 0.25-0.5 is "of concern" but when you get into 2.0ppm ammonia is when you really freak out about the ammonia source. For nitrite it's a similar range for ammonia that is of concern. Normal response to all of these would be to do a 30-50% water change. If you have it in the very high range, then it's often recommended to do a one time 80-90% water change and try to find the source of ammonia in the tank. It is also important, go ahead and test your tap water. Ammonia in the tap means you're probably dealing with chloramine in the water.

The shape is a bit wonky on them, but let me break it down for you.... Not having one, but I think I've helped modify 2-3 with others on the forum. The general workings of things is optimal for a specific situation. It has the readily available foams for internal use. I use one of these on a non-marineland filter, I really like them. The pore size is good enough, it's not going to choke out a pump and it just works. It's ridiculously long, so I ended up cutting mine in half. You have the very unfamiliar option of having the "dual prefilter" setup as you can see on the box below. What this does is two things.... 1. It gives you foam in a place that you're legitimately not going to use for anything else, it's a good quality mechanical filtration media. 2. Your biological media is now in the correct spot and it's extremely easy to simply add in more foam or more media because the shape of the basin on the marineland is very well designed for modding.... see more on this below. When you look into the chamber / basin where the cartridges are on the marineland, this is what you see: It is basically a rectangle. the foam goes on the right. water flows left, you leave some space in the back (or use the cartridge it comes with to create a wall) and then you stuff the front with media and you're done. Extremely easy to mod. The aqueon is exactly the same thing minus the flow control, but you have one minor mod issue when you try to add in your own media: That little holder for the cartridge is just in the way. The aqueon also tapers (they all do) as you go towards the floor, but the real issue is that little semi-circle. Unless you stuff that full of foam or fine pad or something, the water normally goes right through that circle and avoids your media. It's a place for bypass. Unfortunately. It's extremely minor in comparison to the bypass on the tidal!!! But, nonetheless it's a slight preference of ease of "buy this and install it and you're done" type of benefit. Marineland makes all the parts for the filter that you need and you're done. Simple. In terms of issues, BOTH share this issue. A. How is the pump attached to the filter, is it secure. B. How is the intake attached to the pump, is it secure. Aqueon uses this clip to attach the pump, that clip is reported to break over time. Mine didn't but I also didn't run it forever. For marineland the issue is similar, between the pump and this intake tube cover that fish may have an easy time knocking off. I cannot confirm this. Maybe @TeeJay can help us out with that one. I imagine, big fish, yeah, they can likely take off either one.

That's awesome! 🙂 KH could always be slightly higher, I mean mostly just 1 degree is the range I like to max out at for my water/ph, but it looks really solid for the tank and for the livestock.

Mark's shrimp tanks has one where he just literally went and added a lot of ceramic rings to the back corner of the tank. That would give the shrimp some hides and some biological media. Adding lava rocks as well works too. You can also just add another sponge filter. Ultimately, take everything you have and swap over to a 20L aquarium and then go ahead and add a second sponge filter. The problem is likely solved. You can change out more water, but you also have more volume to keep things stable in terms of buffers too! You can always upgrade to a HoB if need be. This is also a fun option too. ^^

I'ma have to book a flight one day to go find some. Beautiful fish.

I basically tore it down yesterday (last post in the thread). I would not recommend the tidal unless you're going to fully modify it and seal it off. For the time being, my only real recommendation is the aqueon or the marineland penguin pro which both have the exact same issue. The penguin pro is a little bit easier to modify, but both of them have reported issues with pump mounting issues. Aqueon has a little clip that can break over time and the marineland is a similar issue. The tidal slides into a channel and is really awesome for how the pump mounts. I do not have a penguin pro so I cannot say anything difinitive, but all of my research and my own personal history with everything I've used... That's the only one I'd buy right now. When I was a kid we had the standard penguin with cartridges and the wheel. Love the wheel too, but if it annoys you, just remove it. The warranty on the tidal is pretty epic and I love their customer support. That's what you pay for with that specific filter. I still think bre most pushed/liked is the aquaclear.

0 ammonia Nitrite is extremely high.

This sort of tells the tale as well for you in this scenario. The Nitrates went down (awesome!) The nitrites went down (awesome!) The ammonia went down (awesome!) the KH went down (expected, because it is something you're adding to your tap water to raise KH) More biological filtration helps to keep the ammonia, nitrites at 0, then having more water changes removes that high level of nitrates as a result of the biological filtration. Adjust the KH to the right point once you have things stable, then you have that longer term stability you're looking for. I try to think of issues like this in 3 main steps for myself. 1. Lower the stress: I know there's a water quality issue ---> Change water 2. Fix the issue: I know there's ammonia and nitrite that is lingering ---> Add biological support 3. Long term stable environment: Get things correct, and then stabilize your tank with GH and KH buffers as you need to.

I've had this issue happen when I had a tank over stocked. You're seeing nitrite and nitrate which means the cycle is there, but struggling. Ultimately in my case it was silly because In both cases it was clear for me what the issue was. Both of them with 10G tanks, which for me is the size of a 1G tank for someone else I would imagine. It's so difficult for me to work in and for me to maintain. Filtration size is also a concern. It's the type of thing where 3-5 fish seems to be "full" for the bioload. This situation... and I am sorry I missed this thread reply. (thanks for reminding me of it) I would ask what the filtration setup is on the tank. How much of a biological media source do you have for the load on the livestock. For me: Situation A: QT setup for the sake of moving fish from the floor to the tank and adding a heater. Ultimately it was clearly overstocked. I ran 2-3 filters on this tank and an airstone. I had a tidal filter and a sponge filter running. Constant nitrates were causing some issues and the majority of what I saw was the fish behavior that indicated to me there could be an issue. I increased my water changes so I could better clean off the excess waste (nitrates) and it worked out. Situation B: Swordtails and swordtail fry and one corydoras. It was not "overstocked" but as the fish grew it became a concern. The nano/small sponge filter just was not able to mechanically clean the tank, resulting in a lot of manual removal of waste. The solution to the problem was that I added a few large lava rocks. That was a nice solution and it went away almost immediately. Another lingering nitrite spike.

I found this and had to share... https://www.catfishstudygroup.org/pdf/journal/2014_2.pdf

I looked for it yesterday. The image in the OP was Filipes tank, ironically, the same one that originally inspired Tomas. That's really cool. So there's probably similar styles and likes between yourself and Tomas on GA. It's not something I would say to keep in there long term. Some people use types of foam for aquascaping as well. As someone with some background in the material side of things, yes.... It is very, very likely that it would release something. I keep contact time very low and I don't leave that in the tank. Fish are also shipped with Styrofoam tags as well from time to time. I use it in my neo shrimp tank without issues for many months now.

this is just.... Makes too much sense.