nabokovfan87

Either one of those would be non-standard and could produce some different genetic traits. Based on what I know about both of those lines, both should be pretty similar as far as difficulty. I think the first set with the dorsal might require more culling to keep it strong, while the second one would just be a bit more of a mix of genes and give you slightly more variation in patterns.

Here's a good channel to checkout for setups and some advice. You'll learn a lot if you wish to as well. He's got an aquarium channel, nature channel, farm channel. Very passionate person and just fun to learn alongside with.

First, THANK YOU for showing off some of the happenings and goings ons at the event. I know of a few of the speakers, was excited to see what gets recorded and what not. I tried to look up on the youtubes about if any of the talks would be up/streamed and all I saw was the KGT drama stuff and just checked out. Some of those aquascapes look amazing! (to be honest, all tanks look great compared to mine right now). I love the wood/dragon stone setups that were there. I'll be very interested to see how the rose moss looks and does for you. I haven't heard of that before! Thanks for sharing. Congrats on all the fun. 🙂

I recently found a research study that some lines that have melanoma issues, the parents can actually become sterile as a result of this after a certain time period. I can find the study if need be, but it was during a deep dive trying to identify what was going on with my own fish. Generally speaking though, yes.... add water, add cover, you will have fry. The main difference between these and something like guppies is purely style and size.

I think eheim has pretty much shut down a lot (nearly all) of their US Sales. There have been some who tried to get support for their products and were unable to as well. Very unfortunate.

This is one of the more difficult things here.... any algae eater needs to be able to support itself for the sake of eating algae on the surface. I don't think I've ever seen the otos on my hygro, especially smaller leaves, but the shrimp might. If the snails try to go up the leaf and it's can't support them, then they likely avoid it.

Pandas are probably the answer to those questions more often than not. For me I'm a bit partial to just about any and all of them. I would look into something like laser corydoras (orange or green or yellow) as well as trilineatus/false Julii for the activity side of things. Some can be more reclusive, but the majority of time this has to do with setup and with size of the group. Depending on if you just like the way they look then potentially check out duplicareus, panda, concolor, black schultzei, etc.

Somewhere around 23.5 for me. (Not including the forum post one)

It feels like it's been quite a while since I've sat and typed about the tank as opposed to my usual self-guided meditation on this tank. I just got done doing the most minor amount of work and I think it's time for a slightly vulnerable review of this tank and how it's been going. I think the most honest thing I can say here is that I'm seriously unhappy about this tank right now. There is a variety of reasons for this and there is a lot of good going on, but if I sit back and I look at the tank itself, each time I walk away I cannot help but think to myself, "I wish it was better." As a hobbyist I thing that is a very easy mindset for us all to get stuck in. I feel like each time we do get a moment to work on the tank, we push ourselves just a little bit to get the work done, but once it's done there is also this switch that goes off and I want to immediately go elsewhere to relax. The water is cloudy, the filter needs to work, and it's a hot mess. At other times, the tank might feel so neglected that you just don't want to be around it as often. I try to skew the line there and I put energy every day into focusing on the tank, finding something that makes me happy, and noticing things I need to work on. Let's discuss some of those thoughts. First, I do need more plants. I need to feel better about how the plants are doing and I need to feel a lot better about how I am handling the algae issues. I have spot treated a lot of areas on the tank. I've taken out the filter and dipped it. I've removed the plants and RR'd them. I've taking out equipment, hardscape, rocks, and glasswork and I've treated all of those surfaces in the past couple of weeks. I've tried to be more mindful of cleaning lids, scraping glass, and making sure I am paying attention to what the plants are doing. It brings me joy when I wake up and see the intense shades of bright green indicating new growth. What is the struggle here for me is that I really would've loved to see the S.Repens and all of the other plants at 2-4x the size they are now. I've had so many issues with algae, CO2, water parameters, and circulation that it feels like I have had to start over, or that my own failures to dial the knobs in well has led to those failures in plant growth. I do see new growth. I also know that I should've had more growth. All of the moss just died on me. It fell off. It's a tragic reminder of how fragile the balance of plants can be in some tanks. I miss having my epiphytes and my fast growing plants in one system. I have them separated in two tanks right now because of those constant struggles to dial in all of the parameters. Thankfully, I have learned a lot through all of those failures. Feeding the fish has been another major struggle. I sat today for a good 30-60 minutes and I watched the tank eat food. I saw Grace out and she was cruising for food along with the other corydoras. I've been trying new food, but I realize now I made poor food selections in the past when I moved away from certain ingredients. While the fish do enjoy the food I have, I also need to keep in mind and feed more of the proteins for the fish I keep. I need to understand what the fish need so that when I do run into issues... like no breeding... that I can go ahead and respond appropriately. Another major issue I have been having with the tank right now is my filtration. about two weeks ago I went to clean the prefilter sponge, pump intake, and that area of the filter and there was silicone debris from the mods that was floating all over the place. After I cleaned all of that up, I ended up having to use what resources I had on hand (super glue) and seal those gaps. Thankfully it worked, but I wish I didn't have to constantly plug holes for a filter that just doesn't work for my setup. This past week I went to pull out the media basket and the chunk of plastic I had glued to fill the holes fell apart on me. Here we go again with the superglue and I got that repaired. Ultimately I can't run two HoBs right now because I just don't have them. I absolutely would like to because I know that balances out the flow. If I run a single HoB on the tank it ends up being far too strong of a flow in one segment of the tank. This pushes me into that category again of wanting to figure out, go get a canister filter and get it working in this setup. I really need to think long and hard about figuring out that puzzle and make the best choice for the tank, long term. Finally... algae and plants. This isn't the same thing as above, but this is moreso about how I tried something and potentially that led to issues for me. I don't think I have ever heard of anyone else who has BBA growing on individual pieces of substrate. I looked at the tank this past week with the filtration off and it was pretty frustrating to see a lot BBA over the surface of the substrate. Not on plants, not on hardscape, just all over the ground like it's a pile of weeds. This past weekend I spent a day watching the tank while I dosed the tank with hydrogen peroxide to try and alleviate some of the issues. I will need to do this more and it's not as much of an issue as you'd think to do so, but it's just a new technique and a new process. We'll see if it helps, we'll see how it goes, and we will have to find out other methods if this one doesn't work out. In the long terms, my goals are: 1. Get the corydoras to actually be happy with the tank. 2. Get the mid and upper sections of the water filled out a little better. 3. Get enough hardscape to make the tank look the way I want. 4. Make maintenance a little easier, but improve the overall life support system on the tank with some redundancies like air stones. In the short term, my goals are: 1. I want to get a plant order in, add in some new stems. 2. I want to try to get a pleco in the tank to help clean the glass. 3. I want to try to add some sort of barbs if I can. 4. Get rid of the Tidal and fix circulation for good. Tonight, I went ahead and added some root tabs to the tank. I probably used ~25 or so of them and my hope is that helps perk up the plants and give them a nice push forward. I don't think the idea of adding the soil substrate alone is enough or can be used in place of root tabs. I think in the end you just need both. I'll keep an eye on the tank and see what I see, but for right now... for this moment... this is where things are for me. Thanks for reading! I appreciate it. I appreciate the second set of eyes, the advice, the encouragement, and the shared joy through all those moments in the hobby. It feels good to have that community even if I don't have things like a LFS or a local club.

First, congratulations on the new family member! It's a tragic story and very unfortunate about your losses that you encountered, especially with your NANFs. @Fish Folk just brought in some Elassoma from the outdoor tub and we've been admiring them. Perhaps that's a future resource for you to recover some of those when you are ready for them. I think there's probably a ton of us here so interested and enjoying discovering a lot of these Elassoma and other beautiful native fish! The project seems exciting, hoping for the best for you in the journey to recover everything back to prime condition.

Run 2 of the 36" lights? You can also do something where you have the main light suspended with 2 accent lights on the side on the top of the tank. Given depth on the tank, just consider that as well. It's sort of up to what you want! @Mmiller2001 can you by chance share with us your light setup on your tank just for discussion sake?

Just as a sidenote... Hygro Pinnatifida is a pretty slow growing plant, so you sort of want to treat it a little bit like anubias. (enough light to grow, but just keep an eye on algae taking hold of it and the plant struggling. Given that you have a smaller tank, intense light, hopefully you're able to adjust down the light or raise it up in some way.

Ain't this the truth! Sometimes you just don't know what you don't know. I was at the store, standing in the aisle, trying to remember what I needed.... 😂 . It was more of the stickies for all my hooks. I have them on the wall behind the tank hidden by the background and stuff.

I have a sheet, I'll see what the notes are on there for this particular algae. I think amanos do well to eat it though. Agreed. It can be so difficult to get a 75G to light properly. In my own tank I ran into issues where the light wasn't giving me the best refraction angle for some plants in certain spots. Because of that I actually ended up getting a mounting kit and raising the light. I turned up the intensity, but it helped to ease the refraction angles and give me a little better access to the light for some of the shallow height plants. It's all still a huge work in progress, but it's one where I would recommend looking into running two lights or running risers in some cases. From my own experience, I tend to get the green types of algae when there's too much light/fert and not enough plant growth or plant mass to use that energy. Something like... placement can be a big factor here. If I have my big anubias right under the light, then it's very likely to get green algae on the leaves. Let's track it, see what the numbers say, and go from there.

So a little bit of CC in the tank helps get you from 3 --> 4, which should be more stable. To get the tank up, it's just a sign of not enough Water changes. I expect it to drop a little. Sometimes you won't see that until you get a little bit of ammonia in the system and then it drops pretty quickly. Probably 6.8-7.2 range is where you'll see it land after 24 hours. A lot of people use a python or similar device for water changes, especially on bigger size tanks like that. the conditioner isn't going to foul anything or cause issues like that. It could be as simple as the KH and the bacteria you're using, bioload, etc., It might be a maintenance thing (frequency or amount of water change to remove nitrates) which is causing issues because the plants don't have what they need. That happens for an extended period and you go from the plants helping, to being severely struggling to stay alive. It's a tough situation because one side will argue that you have nitrates, so you have what you need. But if everything in the tank is nitrates.... then you have to consider how much nitrates and if you're getting any ferts in the tank for the plants to use. In a perfect world, you add in your nitrates from your fertilizer, through the week that is used up and then when it's water change time the tank has low nitrates and you add in more ferts. This is one way to ensure the plants have what they need from a fert perspective. Tabs is another method.... or an additional one. Based on your GH and KH, those seem to be in good spots. Based on everything else, it seems to be a really big question of what the plants need and what they aren't getting. Finally, the big question is about the ammonia vs. filtration and the amount of nitrates you're seeing week to week. Tough to say. We can try to track things then go through and determine what's going on with the levels on a week to week basis. Essentially, we want to test a few times and record those for comparing a trend on what the load in the tank is doing. Record the date of each of the following: 1. Test nitrate before you add ferts. 2. Test 24 hours after you add ferts. 3. Test before you do a water change. Note how much water you changed) 4. Test 24 hours after the water change. Assuming that you are going to be adding ferts after WC, but potentially not. If you don't that's better for this test. ----> Essentially, water change out the tank, in the morning following, run a test, get your value for "after cleaning" and then you add in your ferts and track if your nitrates skyrocket or not by the end of the week.

Those ones are... notoriously bad. Happy to report my e-series fluval ones are a gem and work so well. Maybe there is an aftermarket heater clip you can find?

I would think it's a paleatus. One of these guys: https://www.planetcatfish.com/common/species.php?species_id=271

If you're "doing fine" with that filter in a 20L then you're probably stocked pretty well. If you plan to add more fish, then I would jump up to the largest size sponge you can. Just add a ziss airstone on the tank, that helps a ton with movement in sponge/air setups.

The ziss stones you can adjust and you can adjust those so they don't splash nearly at all. You get the surface movement, but the actual splash is very minimal. If you can't do that with those stones, then you would add more drops (more stones) or you would get a slightly less powerful air pump. They also have "bleed valves" which may help the situation to exhaust excess air pressure if you don't want to have multiple pumps. I've seen some people do the same thing as below by using a gang valve and just bleeding off some of the air through an airstone (outside of the tank).

I tend to use the term "feisty" male. Others would term it as aggressive. Once you have a few of those in a tank, 5-7... they tend to spend all the time bother each other and calm down a bit on the rest of the group.

So.... I have had this happen. One reason as @Pepere mentioned could just be the stress of netting and damage from that process. This happens a lot with Otos. Another reason could be what you hinted as, poor stock, poor conditions, or other general issues. In my case, they just had way too many fish in a single bag and the bag was way too small. By the time I got to the parking lot, the shock from the temp swings, ammonia burn, and all the other factors of stress were just too much. Imagine a sandwich bag with 20+ nano fish. It was just a very poor experience all around and a very extreme example of poor care on the store employee's part. Because it's from the big box store, yes QT them if you can at all possible. Given that you have a pretty big tank, a 10-20G tote or small tank would be great for this and you can break it down/store it when not in use. I think what happened in your case is likely similar to what I experienced. The fish just were too stressed and ran out of oxygen. As soon as you open the bag you'll see that shift, but if the bag is too full, not enough air, etc.... then you end up with that ammonia exposure happening immediately. The ones that passed, take them back and explain to the store that you had them die on the way to the house so there was something really weird going on with how the fish was bagged or there's something going on in the tank/system on their end. Hopefully they work towards an improvement, but do your due diligence and just give those fish the best care. Anything from that store, same thing, because you know there's quality concerns.

It's a whole mess when you look into certain logistics like amazon returns (and what happens with all those items). It's been reported several times over the years that they just dump/trash a lot of things. The frustrating part is this new phenomenon about re-sellers on amazon and tanking the quality of what's available. At least up here... There's always "lost" expensive items for some reason. Really frustrating when that sort of things happens. I imagine that USPS warehouse is somewhere off the coast right near the Pacific garbage patch.... 😞 It sure isn't in the warehouse waiting to be on the truck, on the truck, or on the front porch!

I owe this journal a video and a few photos, but I just wanted to say that I did take the time to check-in on the tank and I have a good handful of very deep red near adult shrimp as well as a plethora of them that just look phenomenal to my eye. I was really uplifted when I checked into the tank. I tossed moss in a seaweed clip about a week and a half ago and the shrimp were playing in that as well as the other things stuck on the tank all over the place. I can't say it enough, I really do enjoy watching them and learning about them. Edit: I checked on them again tonight for a little bit. The big adult female should be molting anytime soon. One of the females that was "saddled" looked like she had fully formed eggs (I could see what seemed like an egg shape and distinct shapes) and she is either prepping to or was in the process of moving the eggs to her abdomen. I counted 4 berried females as well. I saw 2-3 generations of baby shrimp on the glass again. Males were looking good, colored up. Just a fun time when I sit and enjoy them.

I found the seachem one (no idea why it's SO HARD to find some products in big box stores....) and they have softer plastic inserts. They also do the same thing and take blades. I also have just a generic, "holder" from the hardware store I can utilize if need be. I am right there with you.... I want to find something where in a tall tank my hands can stay a little dry and avoid the risk of contamination with the shrimp. I've seen it as almost a very different mindset in the US vs EU where they all use the above style "blade holders" for scraping glass. Here in the US we use single use products or have the "fancy" mag scrapers and so on. For the sake of showing what I *was looking at* here's the seachem one. Here's the "fancy" ones I like the idea of using cards / softer materials than a sharp metal edge. One thing I do like about the magfloat blades is that it's not sharp, it's just robust enough to handle any algae scraping needs. If I get clumsy and poke some silicone, it'll be alright... generally speaking. I assume plastic handle. Is it pretty robust? I have this idea in the back of my head to actually get a shelf, drip tray, metal bar, and hang up my tools so I don't have to use the cup and keep knocking it over as much. The net I got for the shrimp... directly the exact wrong way for the little "loop" on the end to be to hang it. What a waste. 😞

USPS: It might show up, it'll usually be late, and it'll usually have useless tracking. Any sort of.... gated community, community mailbox, etc. It's almost impossible to reliable have boxes delivered. (for clarity, sometimes it's fine, but more often than it should be.... issues) DHL: It won't be on time, it'll be late, and it'll take about twice as long as normal. UPS: It'll get there, but it'll look like it got kicked the whole way. I've had to call the 1-800 number far too many times for my liking with the very typical... "it's say delivered, but it isn't" FEDEX: The "gold standard" for me. Tracking works, support is good, and they do things the right way when it comes to my own packages. A lot of times you see on the news about stuff being tossed, destroyed when delivered. Yeah. I've seen it to. I have never had an experience like that. For me, I prefer to only ship out via FEDEX if I can. Amazon: I'll put this here because it's a bit of a wonky situation. First, I don't have prime. Fun fact, you don't need prime. It's a cost I don't want to incur and I don't think it's "worth it" for most everybody. They place some pretty weird restraints on their system. I do have family in the house that has a prime account. The irony of different customer experiences is quite, hilariously, laughably tragic. I need a box to get here in a week? Order it on prime. (Prime has not been one day / overnight shipping in a LONG time around here). If you want the order to be placed, sit for ~3-5 days, and then be delivered at the same rate as a prime box, just order it regularly. Having random, unmarked cars show up at the house for people "delivering for amazon" is a really serious concern for me. They force people to use their own cars, don't have enough delivery workers, and I've had plenty of packages missing or damaged due to "random person" delivering an item. Because of all this, there is a lot of stuff I refuse to buy online. I also avoid certain stores/sellers because of things like expiration dates. It's a bit more work that it should be, or than it used to be, to simply "buy it off amazon" and they've definitely screwed up delivery of items more than just about anyone. In order of rating, top being the best: 1. Fedex 2. UPS 3. DHL 4. USPS 5. Amazon This is the absolute worst. Happens so often. I really hate that drivers don't have enough time to do their job properly.