Greetings from Cleveland

[Drenon88]

Hello everyone, greetings from Cleveland!

 

I've been watching Cory on YouTube for about two years, though I didn't have any tanks at the time. I just found his content interesting and I like the way he presents information to his viewers. YouTube recommended other keeper’s channels and I became interested in planted aquariums.

 

Decided to try my hand at a planted 10-gallon late last year and in hindsight, it was laughable. It was a community tank filled with basic fish from retail stores. My aqua-scaping skills were non-existent. Most of the fish are still around today, but I somehow failed all 6 of the pygmy cories that I had. I had a bout of black hair algae which I successfully managed to combat.

 

I now have a 29 and two other 10-gallons that are doing well and look much better than my initial efforts. My original 10g is now a plant nursery!

 

I purchased a 90 gallon and stand, which I then sold before I ever used it because I decided that I wanted multiple smaller species-specific tanks. Yes, I have caught the MTS!

 

I built a stand from 2x3 lumber that holds four 10-gallon tanks because I was sure that that would be enough. That was only about 4 weeks ago. Today I just modified my Sketchup drawing to hold six 20g long tanks instead. I will probably start on that stand this weekend. Anyone looking for any lightly used 10g tanks?

 

I’ve been window shopping on Aquabid and Aquahuna trying to decide what to put in the 10g that I finished scaping but that is still cycling. I have a propensity for Tetras, Rasboras & Barbs so I see myself owning some Glass Bloodfin Tetras and Neon Green Rasbora soon.

 

Well just wanted to introduce myself and say hello to everyone!

 

-Dave

This tank is cycling, think I'll put some Neon Green Rasbora in! I have some E. Repens coming that I'll add to the foreground.

Edited October 15, 2020 by David Olszewski
Typo

[HereFishy]

Looks beautiful!!! Welcome to the forum 🌊

[Lizzie Block]

Welcome to the forum, your tank is lovely 🙂 Lots of great local fish stores around the Cleveland area! Hope you'll post an update on your aquascape when the fish are added and Repens gets planted in the foreground

[Bekah]

42 minutes ago, Lizzie Block said:

Welcome to the forum, your tank is lovely 🙂 Lots of great local fish stores around the Cleveland area! Hope you'll post an update on your aquascape when the fish are added and Repens gets planted in the foreground

im also in the Cleveland area and newer to the hobby, what fish stores do you recommend? 

[Lizzie Block]

Hey @Bekah! We're originally from the Akron area 🙂 welcome to the hobby! My favorite store in the area is called Agnoquatics in Broadview Heights. They're super nice people, good selection of fish and plants. There's Something Fishy on Broadview Rd in Cleveland. Good selection of hardscape at that store and decent fish as well. Our other go-to store is called RMS aquaculture also in Cleveland. You may have heard of that one. It's the biggest- more closely related to a big box store like petco, but with a really wide selection of tanks/heaters/lights etc. Their fish are often in questionable health though, so I personally haven't gotten fish from there. Just dry goods. Hopefully you can check these places out sometime! They're all quite unique to each other.

[Bekah]

19 minutes ago, Lizzie Block said:

Hey @Bekah! We're originally from the Akron area 🙂 welcome to the hobby! My favorite store in the area is called Agnoquatics in Broadview Heights. They're super nice people, good selection of fish and plants. There's Something Fishy on Broadview Rd in Cleveland. Good selection of hardscape at that store and decent fish as well. Our other go-to store is called RMS aquaculture also in Cleveland. You may have heard of that one. It's the biggest- more closely related to a big box store like petco, but with a really wide selection of tanks/heaters/lights etc. Their fish are often in questionable health though, so I personally haven't gotten fish from there. Just dry goods. Hopefully you can check these places out sometime! They're all quite unique to each other.

Thank you so much! I will definitely be checking these out soon! 

[Andy's Fish Den]

Hello from the other side of the state, I am over near Bowling Green, but I have family in the Cleveland area and visit that way quite often. If you haven't found it already, there is a great local fish club in the area, NEO-fish. They have a Facebook page as well as a website, I am a member of their club and make the drive to meetings several times a year. As @Lizzie Blockmentioned, you guys have some great LFS over that way, the go to ones I stop at whenever I am in the area is definitely Agnoquatics, Something Fishy, as well as one called Aquatica in Valley City. 

Good luck with your tanks!

[Bekah]

2 hours ago, Andy's Fish Den said:

Hello from the other side of the state, I am over near Bowling Green, but I have family in the Cleveland area and visit that way quite often. If you haven't found it already, there is a great local fish club in the area, NEO-fish. They have a Facebook page as well as a website, I am a member of their club and make the drive to meetings several times a year. As @Lizzie Blockmentioned, you guys have some great LFS over that way, the go to ones I stop at whenever I am in the area is definitely Agnoquatics, Something Fishy, as well as one called Aquatica in Valley City. 

Good luck with your tanks!

Oh that's awesome!!! we were looking for a fish club! I have visited Aquatica-- so awesome!! we got some neat endler guppies and cardinal tetras there! We visit Blue Fish in lyndhurst a lot, but love to visit other stores! thank you for your advice!! 

[FrostiesFishes]

20 long racks are great because if you build enough height into them you can switch them to 29’s 🤔

[KayDeeEmm]

Hello! I'm right next to Solon, OH!

NEO Fish is fantastic.

If you're willing to drive a little bit, there's another fish store called Aquarium Aquatica Gallery down by Medina - they are fantastic.

There's another local fish store in Middleburg called RMS Aquaculture - they have a large selection of tanks and such. Best to find out when they're getting a delivery - they sell out quickly!

Another recommendation for Agnoaquatics - very knowledgeable, and it's amazing how much stuff they fit into that tiny store!

[Randy]

@David OlszewskiHi and welcome to the forum!  Thank you for sharing your origin story and progression through the hobby so far.  The tank you shared a picture of looks good!

[Drenon88]

Thanks everyone that chimed in and welcomed me, I appreciate it.

 

My thoughts on Cleveland local stores.

 

Agnoquatics: Nice little store with a nice variety of freshwater fish. Very nice owners. They don't carry popular name brand hardware and I'm not terribly familiar with the brands they do carry. Nice live plant selection. Limited hardscaping materials.

 

Something Fishy: The place to go if you want to purchase cichlids - 95% of their fish are cichlids. They have some stones and driftwood for scaping.

 

RMS Aquaculture: Hit or miss - I've had spotty success with this place! They usually do have a nice variety of fish. They have a lot of tanks to choose from and they do carry brand name hardware. They have the largest selection of scaping stone and driftwood that I have seen personally.

 

Aquatica Aquarium Gallery: It's a nice place to visit once and is probably a good choice to shop at if you live close by. The store is jam-packed and I found it difficult to navigate. I almost tripped on a bag of gravel and fell into a display of tanks. There are sections of the store that are dimly lit and appear to be used for storage. I found their selection of freshwater fish a bit lacking.

 

Heading to Rift Lake Aquatics (close to RMS) to see what they are all about on my way home today.

[Maggie]

Hi David! Welcome! Your tank is lovely. I just bought my second tank. I decided to keep my new baby dwarf emerald rasboras (currently in quarantine in a 5-gal mini bow) in the 10 gal instead of the 45-gal as I'm afraid they'll disappear from view and have trouble finding the food because they're so tiny! Also going to get some dwarf shrimp. Not sure how many tanks I can handle as my water changing has to be done by hand right now. 

[Drenon88]

17 hours ago, Maggie said:

Hi David! Welcome! Your tank is lovely. I just bought my second tank. I decided to keep my new baby dwarf emerald rasboras (currently in quarantine in a 5-gal mini bow) in the 10 gal instead of the 45-gal as I'm afraid they'll disappear from view and have trouble finding the food because they're so tiny! Also going to get some dwarf shrimp. Not sure how many tanks I can handle as my water changing has to be done by hand right now. 

Thanks Maggie! I do my water changes by hand on three 10g and one 29g tanks because none of my faucets are suitable to connect a hose or Python to. My kitchen faucet is leaking like a sieve so I'll try to replace it with one that will work for water changes!

[twosheds1]

Hello, fellow Clevelander! I live in Parma. RMS is my go-to store, but I've always found their plants to really suck. They always seem near death. I do like their fish selection, though I never seem to have luck with their cories. I bought some panda cories from them a couple months ago and they died, one by one, over the course of two weeks. It wasn't a total loss, though, since I fed the corpses to my crayfish and they loved them.

 

Any relation to Cameron Olszewski? He's friends with my son.

[Bekah]

Our go to fish store in the Cleveland area is Blue Fish Aquariums on Mayfield Road near Lyndhurst! They have very friendly employees and a great fish selection in salt and freshwater. They have a good variety of supplies, decorations, and plants as well!

[Drenon88]

20 hours ago, twosheds1 said:

Hello, fellow Clevelander! I live in Parma. RMS is my go-to store, but I've always found their plants to really suck. They always seem near death. I do like their fish selection, though I never seem to have luck with their cories. I bought some panda cories from them a couple months ago and they died, one by one, over the course of two weeks. It wasn't a total loss, though, since I fed the corpses to my crayfish and they loved them.

 

Any relation to Cameron Olszewski? He's friends with my son.

Interesting, I haven't had much luck with pygmy corys either; I've lost all of them just as you've described. I tried twice and decided to give up on them. The only difference is that I bought mine from Agnoquatics. Pgymies are the only corys that I like so it's a shame I can't manage to keep them.

 

No Camerons in the family!