nabokovfan87

pretty sure this is the same stand in question, just a different model. The latches for the doors look identical.

Acclimation issues definitely didn't help. Loaches being known shrimp eating fish is a major concern as well. Water, PH as mentioned above (lack of KH) is definitely not great for neocaridina shrimp. Too low and it will wear away the exoskeleton. It also explains why your caridina shrimp are doing well, it's designed for them with those parameters.

I don't think you need to go sponge filter at all A stone is a bit easier to hide. If you're feeling festive try a bubble wall even.

That's the thing.... rimless tanks you MUST support the entire base of the bottom glass. Bowing or lack of support is not great for rimless situations.

But warm laundry is the best for naps!

Yeah. Basically you have to keep an eye on certain types of airline tubing. It's so tempting to reuse it, but if you can't "grip" the nozzle it will be a bit easier to leak/fall off. If you have something that was on a check valve (normally big nozzles) and then you have it harden over time and you go to use that on an airstone, then you end up with an open end and a floating airstone. When you do use airline, cut off a good 3-5" minimum and and then consider if it is worth reusing. Thankfully the stuff is cheap. Hot tip though for anyone, especially @EVoyager31 I use 3-4 suction cups per airline drop in my setups. 1 at the top of the tank to hold thing in place when I move the airstone, one at the bottom of the tank to hold the airstone (same thing for sponge filters.... one where it enters the tank, and one along the tank where it routes cleanly) and then the trick is to ALSO do that on the outside of the glass. They work great to hold things in place and you likely will have less issues long term trying to reach behind a tank or something. It is very unfortunate about the whole situation. You can look into an impeller replacement (impeller + shaft on those) and potentially that resolves the dead filter. If it's within warranty, it might be worth calling then and seeing if they can help you out. HOPEFULLY everything is ok and you never have it happen again. On the bright side... tank is ok it seems like.

There's a ton of things you can use. Common ones for smaller setups are: Ceramic media: aquaclear biomax (also sold under fluval brand, same product) eheim substrat pro seachem matrix Sponge: -aquarium coop sells some -aquaclear foams There's more, but those are the two most common.

For these guys in particular, flake might be easier on them to chew / swallow right now. You're definitely doing the right things and sometimes it just happens. Unfortunately. Stress comes in many forms and that bit of stress can let immune symptoms pop up. Some things are also simply contagious and it's tough when you see a disease go from one fish to the next in your scenario. Hopefully the QT setup will work out and make things a little bit easier for you. The med listed for mouth fungus is going to be erythromycin (maracyn), as well as kanaplex or polyguard from seachem. Given what you tried previously, potentially one of the others on the list may have better luck in addition to the salt and catappa leaves.

It's a bit different in terms of the stress loading. It's hard to say what is "correct", but ultimately I personally wouldn't feel comfortable with a rimless tank on that stand. For whatever reason it doesn't seem to have the structure needed to fully support this type of tank. To give you an idea.... This is just a generic stand photo. This piece of wood seems to be missing from the above design. It's probably pretty critical to spread the loud out properly. (for either aquarium type, honestly, but especially rimless)

I am honestly not sure why some of your mther methods haven't worked. If you can I would move the tetras to a QT setup and that way you can keep a better eye on them. I almost think there's a few things going on, especially with issues on the mouth. There could be something where they have an internal issue in the mouth, but you're seeing an external symptom as a result. They tried to eat something and it caused a sore and the fungus, essentially. I would start with aquarium salt in that QT setup as well as catappa leaves to just see if you can ease them into a bit of recovery. I would also add in the malachite green (ich-x) again. There is a powdered med recommended for mouth fungus, but I will defer that question to @Colus so we are sure you have the correct recommendation Are you feeding primarily a flake food for the tetra?

No, you shouldn't need to start cycling over. There is bacteria on plenty of surfaces, mainly the filtration, as opposed to just the substrate.

The CPDs should be fine, but I wouldn't trust a loach in a shrimp tank. Something like a neo or caridina is just small enough for them to go to town and spend the day stressing the shrimp if not killing them. I would definitely encourage you to have a shrimp colony setup and then add fish after that colony is established. When something like that isn't an option, I would only ever start by adding cull shrimp to the tank to test how they do long term and see if they can establish themselves. As far as general shrimp care, there is a lot of great shrimp keepers on this forum and we're all very happy to help out. Acclimation is an easy one to fix right away and it's something that should be done. Mark's shrimp tanks on YouTube is a Wonder resource for care and it's a person I learned from myself when transitioning from keeping amano shrimp to more specialized neocaridina shrimp. He does have videos on acclimation, tank setup, as well as keeping shrimp with fish. Your KH being this low would lean me towards only suggesting caridina shrimp. On the photo of your test your PH is 6.0 or below from what I can tell. Something to consider moving forward. For neocaridina you'd want a bit of KH in the tank. Everything else looks ok though.

That's a bit nuts! The stand by default doesn't have any center support? I feel like this stand is missing parts or something.... At worst case talk with the stand manufacturer regarding the issue. You should not have to add your own supports to the stand. 1mm bow in the middle is pretty common and not too much of a concern, but the issue here is that's after you added your own brace. I don't see a brace across the back or the front to support the length of the tank. The stand may be intended for rimmed/framed aquariums and not for a rimless aquarium. The difference being that for a rimmed/framed aquarium it means you only really have to support the corners. When it comes to the rimless aquarium you support the entire base of the tank, bottom glass, and if you don't the tank can crack on you. If you can take the stand back to the store, explain it's defective for this setup, and potentially they have another option. Barring that, talk to the manufacturer and go from there. I wouldn't think the mat itself is doing that. Ultimately when you think about how a tank is loaded the glass bows outward (longest pane being the worst case) and that deflection has to go somewhere. Usually there is a downward arc of stress and an outward arc of stress. The mat would just compress as things are loaded. It's not really designed or intended to be a stress bearing part. It's meant to absorb any imperfections and spread, even out, the load. From the website, shows a rimmed/framed aquarium.

Found it.... (I'm sure there's another one) Impact of food types on shrimp growth https://repository.unri.ac.id/bitstream/handle/123456789/8168/I Wayan Subamia%2C Yogi Himawan.pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=y

Considering it's a new filter it could just be a matter of time. The fluval filters come with a blue dimpled foam that is pretty solid stuff. Ultimately that is the foam I would recommend over the aquaclear stuff. One thing you'd want to keep in mind is the porosity. Finer foams help to polish the water. Using the AC foam as a pre filter is probably fine and it gives you a course external mechanical filtration as well as the internal finer blue foam inside the canister. Following the canister you'd have something like the phosphate pad or a fine pad if need be as well. That alone should give the water all the clarification you need. Barring that, something is causing microbubbles which is then giving a cloudy appearance. Beyond that.... Video or photos would be helpful to identify the issue. Agreed. Video above is a great resource. Here is another.

You can always use a ring of airline nto corral the floating plants. There should be some surface movement.

I can't seem to find a good video. Essentially everything goes from left to right. Red = sponge Blue = ceramic media location You just get the sponge that would fit appropriately and not let the water overflow (taller than the water line, but shorter than the height of the back wall) and add in some ceramics to the right side. You've been adding bacteria, so ultimately you're still waiting. Try to find some foam and stuff to "mod" the filter and that way you have a more permanent media solution. Once you have that, especially the ceramic, then you can add in the bacteria directly to the media chamber.

Yeah, that's kind of the struggle of the cartridges. Unfortunately. One thing to consider is "modding" your filter with something more permanent like sponge and ceramic media. You can lift the LED out of the little chamber and just "ignore it" so to speak for the time being. Check the filter every day or every few days to see how the flow is going. It should be fine. The maintenance indicators are pretty fun, but sometimes they can be misleading. Just something to keep in mind. I will try to find a video or make a sketch about the specific filter you have (one of my favorites) and how to set it up.

There's a lot of videos on how to do it. As far as the snail, I'm really not sure.

This is their base food. They have an english website.

There's a seller on Etsy, might be your best bet. It all looked like high quality lexan type builds. Lexan >>>>> acrylic for lids. Pecktec just uses glass for his, when he takes the lid off the tank he slides it slowly and all the evaporation drips off the inside face of the glass. Pretty simple / elegant solution.

This one seemed pretty straightforward when I watched it. Hopefully someone else who has one setup and running can post their guide if they used (or have) one.

Blue is the original version that co-op was selling. Green is the updated version (different material on the felt washer). Apart from that they are the same. They absolutely do need to be cleaned in any use case scenario. "never clog" simply means that is can be cleaned, not that you can set it in the tank and it will never clog. All things in an aquarium, especially those with high flow, will build up some "stuff" over time. I clean mine every 2-4 weeks. Hold them under water, loosen the base so the washers can move, use your fingertips to rub off any stuck on grime and that's about it. The older full plastic ones are avilable in some locations I would imagine. They won't go as fine, but they would last a bit longer. I use 3 felt washers, 2 plastic ones on mine. Some have 2, but it's right around there.

very unfortunate. my condolences.

He looks like Humphrey! Congratulations on the new fish.