Corydora habrosus fry

[Lama]

15 gallon column tank with 7.2 pH, 0 ammonia and nitrites, 20 ppm nitrates, KH 3, GH 6.  Tank currently houses 5+Corydora, 9+cherry shrimp, and two Ottocinclus.  Hope to put some ember tetra and maybe our Betta fish in eventually.  We’ve been feeding small cubes of repashy (community and solient green) daily.  The tank is cloudy today.  I test the tank daily since it has the fry in it. Last water change was a week ago and that was due to higher nitrates.

We were in the process of moving fish in in stages, when the Corydora decided to start breeding.  Now we have some fry in the tank and they are about 1-2 weeks old.    I was wondering how I go about vacuuming in the tank…or do I just forgo that for the time being?  There is a definite layer of mulm and leaves breaking down on the bottom in addition to brown algae. It’s sort of killing me to not get in there but also don’t want to kill the fry.  Also, when might we be able to put other fish like the ember tetra in the tank (right now they are on week two of quarantine)?  At some point, I plan on thinning out the shrimp and Corydora to keep from overstocking.

[Patrick_G]

Your tank looks terrific! I’d hold off on the vacuuming while the fry grow.