Chris Posted May 19 Author Share Posted May 19 Alrighty, I drilled the 40 last night. Went pretty well, I think - hole is relatively clean. I just gotta finish getting it up on the rack and plumbing it, and we'll be ready for water. I added three more green corys to the 55 on Friday. My LFS is a bit weird with corys - they just mix them all together in one tank for the same price. So you can get Sterbais, Pandas, salt and pepper, Green, and Albino out of the same tank for like $4.50 a piece. Just gotta get lucky and hope they got the ones you want. 2 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chris Posted May 20 Author Share Posted May 20 Finally got around to securing the light to the rack. Ended up just using some zip ties - but yall, let me tell you, being able to get in and out of these tanks without worrying about that thing is a game changer! And, honestly, a 48" finnex stingray at 10" off the tanks is plenty for these 10 gallons. I bet I could grow just about anything low/medium light. Not bad! Also, my girlfriend decided she wanted a bearded dragon. We had a family member who had one, and bada bing bada boom... $75 later, we got an adult beardie, a 40 gallon enclosure, and all the fixings. Not really my thing, but of course I had to hold him. 1 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chris Posted May 20 Author Share Posted May 20 I've been basically 100% sure my blue neos have been a failed endeavor for quite a while... but I found a baby this morning! 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chris Posted May 22 Author Share Posted May 22 Getting pretty excited about all of these ricefish fry. This has been a pretty problem-free endeavor so far. Knock on wood! The oldest fry are about 12 days old, with the youngest being about a week or so old. All of them are eating BBS and powdered fry food now. The oldest ones are starting to look a little more like their parents in terms of body structure. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chris Posted May 22 Author Share Posted May 22 Every one of the corys in the 55 is sitting on the sponge filter. Anybody know why exactly they do this behavior? 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GoofyGarra Posted May 22 Share Posted May 22 On 5/22/2024 at 6:19 PM, Chris said: Anybody know why exactly they do this behavior? area of high flow maybe? My cories like to sit in the water flow. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chris Posted May 22 Author Share Posted May 22 On 5/22/2024 at 6:22 PM, GoofyGarra said: area of high flow maybe? My cories like to sit in the water flow. That might make sense. I was thinking maybe they were just digging into it for food, but they're just sitting there - not groveling around. This probably is the highest-flow surface in the tank. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chris Posted May 23 Author Share Posted May 23 Me and the girlfriend were standing in front of the 55, talking about the corys on the sponge filter and I just happened to spot a teeny tiny fry hiding in the 1/2" of water between the surface and the mag float. Looks like a swordtail. I fished him out, and set up a little 2 gallon tank I had laying around with an air pump. I'll grow him out a bit in there and then move him to a more proper grow out. Can only find the one in the tank - I'm shocked he survived long enough to make it to the surface of the tank, with all of the predators in here. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chris Posted May 23 Author Share Posted May 23 Got lots of little orange bellies around this morning... 1 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chris Posted May 26 Author Share Posted May 26 Shot a quick video showing all of the tanks in the fish room, starting with the blue platies and ending with the little swordtail fry I yoinked out of the 55. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chris Posted May 26 Author Share Posted May 26 Today is a big day! Kinda. I spawned my first fish outdoors! And it was ridiculously easy. The white clouds I put out in my tub have produced a lot of fry - I was able to catch 2 or 3 at a time with a tiny little net. The only food I've been feeding is a squirt of BBS once or twice a week, and maybe a chunk of bloodworms every few weeks. Everything else has just been what's fallen into the pond. And yet, babies! The golden white clouds that I have indoors, that get fed daily have yet to produce. 1 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chris Posted May 26 Author Share Posted May 26 Stopped by the LFS today. Picked up some goodies for my reef tank - a nassarius snail, a turbo snail, a green star polyp frag, and an orange rock flower anemone. FTS: Turbo: Nassarius: Rock Flower Anemone: Green star polyps: Top-Down: For the uninitiated, turbo snails are the lawnmowers of the snail world. They'll eat algae other snails won't touch (hair algae, some calcified algae, etc.) And grow extremely large. I've seen some that are golf ball sized. This guy is ping pong ball sized, and is too big for this tank - but he'll be a crazy good cleaner, and can be moved to one of my large saltwater tanks whenever he's polished off the algae in this one. Nassarius snails are scavengers - rarely will they eat algae, instead looking for leftover fish food and such in the substrate. This is a pretty large specimen, I mostly got him to help stir the sandbed. Green star polyps are an awesome coral that can get completely out of hand. They have a nice white center with some green tentacles, and a nice purple foot. They grow quickly and can become invasive in the tank if not managed. Rock Flower Anemones are some of the easiest anemones to care for. They're fine without regular feedings, living off of photosynthesis, stay fairly small, and are relatively non aggressive when compared to other common aquarium species. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guppysnail Posted May 27 Share Posted May 27 On 5/20/2024 at 9:24 AM, Chris said: Finally got around to securing the light to the rack. Ended up just using some zip ties - but yall, let me tell you, being able to get in and out of these tanks without worrying about that thing is a game changer! And, honestly, a 48" finnex stingray at 10" off the tanks is plenty for these 10 gallons. I bet I could grow just about anything low/medium light. Not bad! Also, my girlfriend decided she wanted a bearded dragon. We had a family member who had one, and bada bing bada boom... $75 later, we got an adult beardie, a 40 gallon enclosure, and all the fixings. Not really my thing, but of course I had to hold him. Oh my. He looks like my beardie 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chris Posted May 27 Author Share Posted May 27 On 5/27/2024 at 12:35 PM, Guppysnail said: Oh my. He looks like my beardie Have any pics of your beardie setup? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guppysnail Posted May 27 Share Posted May 27 On 5/27/2024 at 2:43 PM, Chris said: Have any pics of your beardie setup? He passed of a stomach tumor a few years ago. So I don’t have any of the full indoor setup but you can see bits of it here. The best substrate I found was indoor outdoor carpet. He was potty trained I took him out daily in summer and he had pads for winter so it stayed very clean. My one cat was his bestie so is I. Almost every photo. 🤪 HEADS UP!!!! Exotic vets are monster expensive. Make sure he gets baths a few times a week. They need the soak. Mine would swim in the tub over winter. Just don’t make it so deep he can’t get his head out of water 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chris Posted May 27 Author Share Posted May 27 Sorry to hear you lost him! He looked really well taken care of. I disassembled my 47 gallon rimless tank today. I've had it for years and only set it up once for a few months. Never really found the right stand and build for it. Hoping to use the glass for some smaller custom tanks. I broke one of the end pieces during disassembly - it was the first one I removed. As usual, that first panel is the toughest to get off in good shape. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chris Posted May 28 Author Share Posted May 28 (edited) Our new anemone friend took a walk underneath the rockwork today. Not surprising - the lights on this tank are brighter than the ones at the store, and these anemones are known to be rock-dwellers anyway. The green star polyps seem to be pretty happy. I turned the light down from 40% on all LEDs to 15% on whites and reds and 30% on blues. Hoping that'll help with algae and keep the corals a bit happier - the corals near the surface are "squinting" a bit because of the high light. Edited May 28 by Chris Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chris Posted May 29 Author Share Posted May 29 Loving the rosy barbs in the 55. They're definitely getting chunky, and their scales shine like crazy. The swordtails are thriving. They've really chilled out since being put with these more boisterous fish. They used to be little terrors - not anymore! The bristlenose has at least doubled in size the past month. And he's gotten so much thicker! Still lots of growing to do, though. This is my girlfriends favorite fish out of all of the tanks. And, finally, the centerpiece - the blue gourami. He's done some growing, and is generally one of my favorites in here. I love his color, and all the other fish are super quick and active while he just kinda calmly glides through the water. 2 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chris Posted May 31 Author Share Posted May 31 Chonk! 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chris Posted June 2 Author Share Posted June 2 Its funny how relaxing working on tanks can be, huh? I did a 50% water change on most of my tanks this morning. Started around 10, and am finishing up with the last one I have time for at 12. I got all of them done except for the reef tank, which will probably take all of 15 minutes this evening. I did the math - I changed about 120 gallons of water! Woof. Most of the tanks are freshwater. They get drained out into the yard, and refilled from the tap. I temp match with my finger (to get it close enough) and add Prime once the tank is filled. The saltwater tanks get drained into buckets, and then I mix up new water in those same buckets. Its been a while since I've done any maintenance on the clownfish tank, and even longer since I've checked the salinity. It was at 1.028 - whoops! 1.026 is considered natural sea water, so I was a bit high, especially for this fish only tank. I mixed the new water aiming for 1.020, and got about 1.018. It saves on salt cost to mix it a little lower, and fish don't mind the slightly lower salinity. It can actually help with some diseases and parasites, as on average the fish can handle the lower salinity better than the parasites can. Oh, and I moved the swordtail fry into the guppy tank. I got tired of daily water changes on that teeny tank, and I figured he'd do okay in here until he was big enough to put into the 55 with his parents. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chris Posted June 5 Author Share Posted June 5 Moved the ricefish fry into the 10 gallon with their parents. Cherry shrimp went into what was the ricefish fry tank. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chris Posted June 9 Author Share Posted June 9 I've lost a couple cherry shrimp since moving them. One was an older female, and the other was a juvenile. Everybody else looks good... thinking it was just stress from being moved. Pretty uneventful week otherwise - everybody is cruising along. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chris Posted June 14 Author Share Posted June 14 Looks like a couple of my platies have started to appear male - so far just two. They're growing pretty slowly, but the tank stays at 68-70, and only gets fed once or twice a day. I don't really want to put a heater in or heat the room, so they'll just have to grow slow! No more cherry shrimp losses, so I think it was just an acclimation issue. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chris Posted June 19 Author Share Posted June 19 I decided to pull some white clouds out of the pond, because I had a hunch I had quite a few and didn't want to overload the system. Boy, did I have a few! I did two swipes through the pond with a 6" net and came up with what's got to be around 100 White Clouds. Crazy! I moved them into a 40 I have set up in the fishroom and I think I'll raise these guys up and sell them off. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chris Posted June 30 Author Share Posted June 30 The supplier I've had my eye on for red eye puffers got some in, but only a group of 3. I've decided to pass for now - I'm really wanting a group of 6 or 8. All the tanks continue to do well. I did lose a swordtail in my 55 this week, but I think it was likely old age. They're a couple years old, and have been kept a tropical Temps since I've had them. She was fine one day and gone the next, and no other fish look ill. Such is life. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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