nabokovfan87

Yeah, showing the ammonia. Let's check/verify filtration. Show off what you have and how it's setup if you can.

KH/GH on the 10G is good and seems to be doing fine. The 5.5g the KH is slighly low, but it's within range. Water changes to maintain the KH, basically is how I would think you can handle that long term. Right now I would purely focus on cleaning filtration, siphoning the substrate, cleaning the glass, and weekly water changes. Keep the water clean, charge up the stratum substrate, and just make sure that things are able to develop and do their thing. It can take ~1 month for the substrate to really settle in and stop releasing things like ammonia or excess organics, and it would just speak to things like brown diatoms developing in either situation. Use a toothbrush where you need to clean rocks, then let things settle and do your siphon + water change. Manage things completely through manual removal right now. It's a bit of a pain, but it's just that stage you're at. George Farmer has some great videos on doing tank maintenance and it's a bit relaxing or therapeutic if you need something to help pass the time when cleaning. Now, the real crux of everything is how do we get the plants growing appropriately and are there any things that you can do to help manage the issues and boost up the plants. Pinholes, rotting leaves, deterioration is going to point to either planting issues, fert issues, or acclimation on the plants. So if we look at some of the plants we can get an idea of what might be going on in some cases compared to others. The swords often have some melting issues, but they do love light also. Big broad leaves usually means a low / medium light is best. The front plant on the left you can see it's shaded out and the front row of the tank is pretty dark / no light. This happens with the little black hinge on the lids cutting the light, so placement of plants matters here. I would avoid that front 1" of the substrate given everything you're seeing with just shadows and the light you have. If you can drop the light lower and against the lid, it might help resolve some of those sorts of issues. It's counter intuitive, but adding 2-3 root tabs (or just tabbing the tank where plants are wouldn't be a bad idea either. The substrate seems a little thin, I usually like 3" as a minimum, 2.5" as a bare minimum, but having 4-6" is about the norm sometimes. That alone could help the plants to root and get their nutrients flowing a little better. Just a note there as well. So for this tank, I would adjust placement on certain plants, try to tweak the light placement, and then just make sure that things like the substrate is good long term for you. I would say light at about 40% is good, then 60% or so as your peak for about 6 hours per day. 1.5 hour sunrise/sunset is good, if you can do that. Adjusting placement is going to help here, but the tank mentioned in your comments might not be as bright as you had initially thought. You'll make the adjustment, focus on cleaning things, and *hopefully* you see new growth happen asap. This tank, especially with that KH indication, just tells me that it's not charged up and the soil is leeching. Manual removal as mentioned and using a brust for all the little detail work that you need to do. Keep on top of it, water changes are your friend to keep the KH high and removing excess organics from the substrate. All of the chemical filtration you mentioned is helpful, but water changes are a lot more effective at this stage. Normally people recommend things like daily 50-80% water changes week 1, every other day week 2, to get the substrate setup long term. The thickness is a lot better here, so the plants can really root and start to thrive. Again, just try to keep that front 1" of the tank clear of plants and try to get the plants in the right spots for what sort of light they need. The middle, center of the light is going to be the most intense spot, brightest spot on the tank. Try to keep the floaters from blocking the light, especially having a lower power light on this tank. keep it to about 40-60% or less on the coverage of the water surface. Being able to turn off the blue channel here might be helpful, but I am unsure if it's possible. Check out some of the nicrew planted lights in future if you look to upgrade this one. There's a lot of options, so it just really depends on how things happen over time and what you're noticing. Stick to 30-50% water changes if you can. https://www.hamzasreef.com/Contents/Calculators/EffectiveWaterChange.php This is a good tool to give you an idea of how much water you're actually swapping out and things building up over time.

New fish additions courtesy of @SugarBassJoe and they are doing great. I am so relieved that Grace is still being calm and loving the tank with some more life in it.

Diving into things now and I think there is some techniques we can do to help. For future reading, I have an algae thread (years of struggles) and compiling all of that experience into a few posts. That being said, what is your lighting situation on each tank? What lights, intensity settings? For each tank, what is your GH and KH testing results?

Correct. There is also a "nano tank" version of easy green that uses drops instead of pumps. You could always use the easy measure, disperse 1 pump and then split it using a pipette between the two tanks! My nitrates stick around 20 ppm.

Given the water we have, you could use the more active rocks in a shrimp setup or with live bearers? You can acid wash it, very easy to do that, and then basically see what that pulls from the texture/surface of the rock. Cool finds. The tank looks good and we'll have to see how all of the plants do with adjusting to everything you have changed and moved. Looking forward to seeing your tanks back up to max awesomeness, you know... the usual for you!

Very well could be. Take a video of the UNS thing and then let's figure out why you're hearing some noise. It should be silent!!! If it's not, they do have pretty good support too. Essentially, it can be difficult for filters to pull in the junk, which is why knowing how to siphon well is a very useful skill!

You remove the carbon / chemical media from the filtration, not the actual mechanical or biological media. If you need clarity on this I can elaborate further. Whatever filter you're running and whatever you're been removing we can get things setup to stabilize the tank. So, the main thing right now is to have good water quality to give the fish the best chance to get through the treatment as well as recover. What are your water parameters right now? That would determine if you do another round or do another round in a week or so. I have always had to do multiple rounds of treatment for kanaplex, just as a talking point. I would expect that you do, but it's all depending on the fish in particular and what you're seeing.

I want to try some of the more unique eheim offerings. I have had the Jagers go crazy on me and boil a tank. I know..... get a heater controller. I switched to the e-series Fluval ones and haven't used anything else since that I enjoyed or worked as reliably for me.

Very sorry to everyone at Aquarium Co-op for all of what you're currently going through with Murphy. I think everyone here knows that it's always been a goal to give that guy the best life and the best care around and I think the team was very successful with that. For those that have never heard it or watched it, I'll post the video with Cory talking about Hank here below. Losing a friend is never, ever easy, and that pain is just Love that you're feeling. Cherish the good times and all the wonderful moments.

I would imagine that active substrate helps the fish in the tank a bit. Betta, hillstream, SAE, rasboras, all like the closer to 7.0 or below pH. It's not a hard and fast rule because a lot of fish are aquarium raised and have various conditions they've been adapted to. There are a lot of the fish that you have that are hillstream/river species or part of the cypranidae family of fish. Hopefully that helps a bit when you're looking for signs of stress or causes for issues. Generally speaking, cypranidae would like 7.0ish water (usually the high range I see is around 7.4 or 7.6). The general thing here I'm trying to get across though apart from PH is just the environment, stress, and things like temperature/pH playing a role. As temps go up, that means that stress increases. I understand that the temp is higher for the betta, but the other fish would likely do better cooler. It increases the oxygen in the water for them. Higher temps increases their metabolism and reduces their lifespan. Moving the betta to it's own tank might be helpful on the temp side of things and allow you to drop it below 78 degrees. Any sort of video or photos of the fish would help. Maybe someone else can gleam something from the setup notes, test results, and the photos. Fingers crossed things improve for you and the fish return to normal.

cc @Fish Folk (in case you didn't get the notification) As a sidenote, it might be a benefit to look back at some of Simply Betta's breeding videos.

I really would love to have one of these one day. Such an interesting puffer species!

https://www.seriouslyfish.com/species/pangio-semicincta/ Temp listed on their site is 21-26C. That would be 70-79 degrees F. Optimally I would shoot for the middle of that range, 74-75 degrees. As temp goes up, that means that oxygenation goes down, which can cause some gill issues and added stress. What that means is that if you can, adjust the temp down, but also be aware of adding an air stone as a benefit for the loaches in particular.

What fish? pH can cause flashing. A lot of loaches could flash when they get into higher pH like that. Is it loaches? Lastly, can you test gh, kh, and ph in the tank and your tap water? Maybe they just cleaned the pipes as well and that caused some issues?

I know someone who has their 29G / 20 Long on a stand like that. I believe it's ok. If you're at all concerned or the stand is a bit wonky, open the cabinet and take some photos. Most of the stands have some kind of support on the ends and the middle of the stand is just in place there. My 29G wood stand lasted about 5 or so years? My metal one will likely last for much longer. The floor where I'm at left it where the stand warped on itself and it's time to retire it. Just a note and I wanted to mention it. This is how rimmed tanks are designed to handle load, yes.

After treatment with peroxide you would have highly oxygenated water. It would be good to do the maintenance before, give the tank a little while, and then do the treatment as normal. If you haven't seen it, here's a video regarding the method. I would assume it's a type of fungus from the plants rotting or the organics (wood) and other things rotting. I'll drop another video and maybe it would give you some insight into how much "junk" can be there. You can see a lot of dark stuff in this substrate as well. The gravel makes it hard for the fish to get any food that drops down there and that leads to rot. Siphoning well, having really good circulation at the substrate level helps. The stuff you have is pretty chunky. Compared to "aquarium gravel" it has a lot larger gaps and doesn't compress as much. The compression is actually a good thing in some cases. Seachem pristine is a bacteria, I assume, similar to what they use for waste management facilities to break down waste. That is supposed to make it easier for the filter to then filter it out of the water. From their website: It provides bacteria that break down excess food, waste and detritus in freshwater and marine systems. It will also reduce excess nutrients (e.g. ammonia, nitrates, and nitrites) that may fuel the growth of nuisance and disease-causing organisms. The bacteria species in Pristine™ thrive in fresh or salt water and can utilize a wide range of organic compounds, including fats that can cause unsightly films. Unlike traditional nitrifying bacteria, this bacterial blend can adapt to harsh or low oxygen environments and continue to multiply and improve water conditions. Biopolymers produced by established bacterial colonies trap particulates and increase water clarity. Basically, whatever was on some of the surfaces, buried in the substrate, that got manipulated out and is just waiting to be siphoned out or cleaned out. It's bacteria at some level growing. If it is an algae, then whatever the bacteria did, fed that algae, which is really common with red algae (BBA) which tends to thrive on dying organics. I have had it migrate from wood to plants to glass, silicone, plastics, down to the substrate itself.

@xXInkedPhoenixX has some good shots of female egg barren females. If you opt to treat for parasites it's not uncommon and it's about a 4-6 dose treatment at minimum with two different meds. Expel-P and Paracleanse are the basic two for parasites. Ich-x can also be used for some parasites.

That old adage of measure twice cut once never met this silly thing called trying to fit a canister on a 75G aquarium. I get the filter shut off, make space on the floor by just pushing the table back against the wall. I want it forward enough so it's away from electrical, which probably needs to be moved again. That all being done then I had to try to remove the tubing that was installed and figure out the puzzle of which ones will fit for where I need. I had one piece of longer tubing if need be, but it was a one shot deal. I get the intake setup on the side, install the diffuser and that was like trying to tighten 3 things that rotate in different directions all at the same time. It was actually 5 things, but you get the idea, more of a hassle than it should be. On the 407 you have those red nuts at the base, you take those and then loosen them up, pop the pipe in, and tighten it down against the wall of the tubing. With the diffuser it's the exact same thing.. you attach the tube and the nut goes away from the diffuser pressing the tube against the fitting end. So you have to loosen the nut to clamp down the hose, then tighten the diffuser back down because it loosened up, then fix the opposite end because that loosened up, and hope that it all is "right". I emailed them and explained the directions are pretty bad the the "installation video isn't, but the replied back with a product catalog and a link to the blog section where the most recent post is bordering on 2 years old. It did leak a little bit and I'm not happy with the install right now, but it's there, it's in place, and it wasn't leaking the last 2-3x I checked. I would love to better understand the mechanics of this diffuser and how it works. I believe the outside fills with air, water in the middle of the stone, which diffuses into the water. It works much more efficiently than trying to push tiny bubbles all over the tank... as long as the water has good circulation. Despite all the struggle I am very happy about that. The "fun part" was that after all of that hassle I had to get the outlet pipe installed. I set it on the back of the tank, try to avoid the electrical and then I am trying to bend all of the tubing in place. I get it hot, try to reset the memory of the material and it's mostly good. It took me 2 tries at first because I had to twist it from pointing one way to pointing the other way and I just didn't realize it at first. Using suction cups to hold the pipes in place definitely has it's faults in this case. Get that situated, run the last tube and tighten down the nut on the 407 and let the tube settle into place. It pulls to the right, but it's "fine" until I can get the tubing to settle. The annoying part is that it pushed the inlet back and then it kept pulling the tube out of the suction cups, banging the steel into the rim and the glass. Fun. What was 2 cups holding the inlet pipe is now 4 suction cups holding the inlet pipe. That one is twisting slightly and just needs to be dialed in. It's all working, it's all installed, it's all "fine", but there's the explanation for the photo of what it really is to me! I'm happy its done with. I do not look forward to moving that lid and the filter in future.

Basically, you test your KH and then go from there. It could swing literally just from the KH being used up and then you have pH dropping as a result of any type of organics in the water. Robust filtration to remove those organics, high maintenance standards, and things like your buffers would give you that stability over time. Because the controsoil is in there, you'll just want to test/monitor KH over time and make sure that base value is there while the substrate charges (absorbs positive ions from the water) https://www.aquariumcoop.com/blogs/aquarium/ph-gh-kh KH measures the amount of carbonates and bicarbonates in water, which affects the buffering capacity of the water. This means that KH helps neutralize acids and prevents your pH from changing too rapidly, which is useful because sudden pH crashes can cause health issues in your fish. Low KH means your water has less buffering capacity and the pH swings easily. High KH means your water has more buffering capacity and the pH level is hard to change. Think of KH like a trash can. The higher the KH, the larger the trash can. If we overflow that trash can, then a pH crash occurs. Therefore, people with low KH in their tap water often use crushed coral to gradually raise the KH (or increase the size of their trash can) and prevent pH crashes.

I think you have one of my favorite plants! That buce is doing well for you it seems. I enjoy that specific shade and leaf shape. Looking forward to whenever I can get my hands on some. (Kedegang Japan, not round leaf)

yeah exactly.... Something is pulling air somehow and I don't know what it is, but it's a lot of air for that hose to be moving that way. Main points would be tube or pump or that maintenance port. Beyond that, hopefully they replace it for you if those don't fix it. (It's not a car and swapping stuff around shouldn't be the option here, especially with expensive parts) I feel for you. Wish it was an easy solution.

Notes added above for me. Try to get through ep1 if you haven't. I hope everyone is doing well and healthy. For next month, I'll keep things a bit light and easy with my pick. I do have one amazing one stored in the bag for the future, but let's just go ahead and save that one. Thank you again to everyone who has been participating and anyone is welcome to join in if they feel like it!

Intake and all that seems fine. I'm not sure what is leaking, but something is allowing a ton of air in there. If it's not the maintenance like then maybe the pump was just damaged somehow. There's a sponge under the output, right there, I don't think that's causing any issues. Let's say the pump had a gas bubble or something, turned on to push it out, then that led to the impeller getting damaged or something. The thing to do next would be to take it apart, verify the impeller and everything is clean/undamaged, then try to either replace the hose or inspect it. Beyond that, I don't see any issues.

Both of those are fun/great plants. Microsword is similar to the dwarf sag. If you can get something like Val for the back wall, you might end up loving the look of it. Not really an easy way to estimate it, but dropping means the plants are using it. So... you don't want to go to 0. but lower than 10 when you add more is fine/perfect. I have low nitrates, add in the ferts, then just test daily. Yep, time to add more. Find the rhythm and then set the schedule at that point. GH is "fine", but your KH is basically 0. It just means you're at a high risk of pH crashes and instability. I like to see ~4 as a minimum. I don't know what @Mmiller2001 min recommendation would be, but I just want to mention it for the sake of any issues you may run into. pH for Mmiller is fun because of the CO2 he's got dialed in and the PH drops he has. Now that you know how to battle the BBA, you're better moving forward managing it and it's just about dialing in all of the other parts that the plants need.