What's your dream aquarium product that doesn’t exist?

[JettsPapa]

On 1/25/2022 at 1:50 PM, Bill Smith said:

I love my yoyo loaches for snail cleanup as well!

Pea puffers will get the job done also.  They may not get all of them in a heavily planted tank, but they'll definitely keep them under control.

[Guppy Guy]

On 1/25/2022 at 4:44 AM, Anton said:

Would love a snail eliminator, got one pond infested by mistake and while they're not meant to eat plants being bladders they certainly do, dead fish, fish eggs, anything and everything. The guppy grass suddenly started getting lower and lower in the water, the snails have been eating it from the bottom up, soon there will just be tops then nothing. Chemicals cause a massive die off which is a problem. ideally i want them all to climb out and stay out. A certain number do that, which I can then just dust off the brick tank wall.....now if they all did that i would so happy.......thinking of something like a snail sound wave or predator pheromone that creeps them right out of there?

Make sure you aren’t over feeding. Your dream product might just be feeding less food. If there is excess food/nutrients in the water, snails will start popping up. I overfed a tank thinking that the fry would grow faster, but they grew the same speed with a normal amount of food then excess food. And the 🐌 showed up. 

Edited January 26, 2022 by Guppy Guy

[Anton]

On 1/26/2022 at 3:37 AM, Torrey said:

I believe that you are talking about needing an assassin snail😁

 

This baby just cleaned up 3 bladder snails. 

Could be 🤔 what do assasin snails eat when there aren't any bladders left, are they cannabalistic? That would be good.

[Anton]

On 1/26/2022 at 8:03 AM, Guppy Guy said:

Make sure you aren’t over feeding. Your dream product might just be feeding less food. If there is excess food/nutrients in the water, snails will start popping up. I overfed a tank thinking that the fry would grow faster, but they grew the same speed with a normal amount of food then excess food. And the 🐌 showed up. 

Yah, I get the balance thing. This is the dwarf sunset platy "tank". Outdoors. Platies do eat a lot and breed a lot. There weren't any snails in there before, they came with the guppy-grass from Thaiwan. The water perimeters have always been excellent and the water polished crystal clear, with vey little intervention. The guppy-grass took off as intended and my feeding carried on exactly the same, this was summer the rainy season. The snail population duly exploaded.

Cool season I feed less as the fish are less active however the snails then started eating the guppy-grass and are as numerous as ever. 

I'm peeved off as I like the guppy grass so do the little tubby dwarf platies. I had originaly thought..."little snails that will clean up fish waste, wonderfull" but they ate most of the mulm and beneficial bacteria keeping everything in balance, now they're eating the guppy grass, when I feed less. There's only about 15cm left of the grass and it was a big billowing cumulonimbus of it.

I still need to feed the fish, the cool season hasn't been very cool but still I reckon they've only been given about half the ammount in all.

Snail erradication 101.  I've changed my tune about snails after this, bladders will eat everything. Last thing I want is for them to spread to the other water bodies. 

After the grass is gone they may die back but never completely but I want guppy-grass. I have fresh guppy grass snailfree in other tanks to replace it with as not all the Thaiwan guppy grass was infected. Might have to just strip the whole thing and start again. Hundreds of fish will need a temp home sigh, it's a big muddy job, shovel and scrub. Im so angry I never quarantined the guppy grass loads I got in.

[Anton]

On 1/26/2022 at 5:35 AM, JettsPapa said:

Pea puffers will get the job done also.  They may not get all of them in a heavily planted tank, but they'll definitely keep them under control.

Too nippy I thought, the tank is a breeding tank for Dwarf platies. Platies are fast but I think this might be trouble. I like Pea puffers always loved them. Would like a set up just for them...

[Anton]

On 1/26/2022 at 3:50 AM, Bill Smith said:

I love my yoyo loaches for snail cleanup as well!

Hmmmm, Bill we have seven or so wild loach species in our mountain streams, stripey, longish like eels, tiger loach,butterfly all sorts. Wonder, as they are perfectly suited to our water conditions because that's where we get our water, if they wouldn't take. I don't use filters or aeration which could be a problem for loaches.

Think the Yoyo loach might be too sensitive.  

 

Edited January 26, 2022 by Anton

[Torrey]

On 1/25/2022 at 6:31 PM, Anton said:

Could be 🤔 what do assasin snails eat when there aren't any bladders left, are they cannabalistic? That would be good.

I have 13 tanks. I have been moving the assassin from tank to tank. Since I only bought one, and true whelks are not hermaphrodites, I didn't expect babies. Yesterday, while cleaning my bachelor tank, I discovered the baby assassin snail hunting bladder snails. *SURPRISE*

Due to how prolific bladder snails are, and due to the fact that I sell them to local pea puffer breeder, I have never run out of food for my assassin (now x2).

They will voraciously eat blackworms, as well. Basically anything that moves and makes the mistake of resting too close to an assassin snail. 

[AndEEss]

Mid-height (~16"), large footprint, low-iron rimless tanks.

Everything out there is either low (120S) or high (120U). I want something in between with the ~4ftx2ft footprint.

[Torrey]

On 1/25/2022 at 8:44 PM, Anton said:

Yah, I get the balance thing. This is the dwarf sunset platy "tank". Outdoors. Platies do eat a lot and breed a lot. There weren't any snails in there before, they came with the guppy-grass from Thaiwan. The water perimeters have always been excellent and the water polished crystal clear, with vey little intervention. The guppy-grass took off as intended and my feeding carried on exactly the same, this was summer the rainy season. The snail population duly exploaded.

Cool season I feed less as the fish are less active however the snails then started eating the guppy-grass and are as numerous as ever. 

I'm peeved off as I like the guppy grass so do the little tubby dwarf platies. I had originaly thought..."little snails that will clean up fish waste, wonderfull" but they ate most of the mulm and beneficial bacteria keeping everything in balance, now they're eating the guppy grass, when I feed less. There's only about 15cm left of the grass and it was a big billowing cumulonimbus of it.

I still need to feed the fish, the cool season hasn't been very cool but still I reckon they've only been given about half the ammount in all.

Snail erradication 101.  I've changed my tune about snails after this, bladders will eat everything. Last thing I want is for them to spread to the other water bodies. 

After the grass is gone they may die back but never completely but I want guppy-grass. I have fresh guppy grass snailfree in other tanks to replace it with as not all the Thaiwan guppy grass was infected. Might have to just strip the whole thing and start again. Hundreds of fish will need a temp home sigh, it's a big muddy job, shovel and scrub. Im so angry I never quarantined the guppy grass loads I got in.

@Anton this sounds like one of my breeder tanks for endlers. It's taken me a little longer than normal to find the right balance, and the assassin snail was the missing piece. A single assassin snail won't eradicate the snails, it will bring the snail population into balance. 

I feed my plants, via my fish. The more plants I have, the more I feed the tank. I determine 'balance' by testing water parameters. 

If plants are replicating and growing, and don't show signs of deficiency, and my ammonia & nitrites stay 0, and nitrates are under 20 ppm (and can stay there without water changes) I am balanced. 

If I hit 0/0/0, and plants don't show deficiencies and fish population is growing, I am balanced.

If plants start dying back/ getting eaten, I am underfeeding. If nitrates shoot up, I am overfeeding (or I don't have enough plants because I underfed and plants died back).

It sounds like underfeeding to control snails is negatively impacting your guppy grass.

If this were my tub, I would start increasing feeding and water testing to monitor nitrates, nitrites and ammonia. 

And I would look for things to complement the platies, that will help bring the snail population under control. 

I love endlers because they aggressively eat snail eggs (love their caviar). Endler males will generally leave fry alone, as long as the tub/tank is well fed (I feed similarly to Cory, it takes 7 to 10 minutes for all the food to disappear) and fry have hiding spots. They are great fish who easily adjust to a wide range of temperatures and need similar hardness and calcium levels as the platies.

If you can get some endlers, they won't cross with your platies, they eat snail eggs and young snails, and add an assassin snail for each 10 gallons of water, your guppy grass and water parameters will return to normal... and you will be able to feed enough to have a healthy balance without having to worry about a snail explosion generating too many nitrates.

[Anton]

On 1/27/2022 at 4:32 AM, Torrey said:

@Anton this sounds like one of my breeder tanks for endlers. It's taken me a little longer than normal to find the right balance, and the assassin snail was the missing piece. A single assassin snail won't eradicate the snails, it will bring the snail population into balance. 

..........feed enough to have a healthy balance without having to worry about a snail explosion generating too many nitrates.

Thanks for all those tips. However my "tanks" concrete tank in this case, are outdoors. This means I have seasons to contend with. Platies follow the temps in feeding activity in that they're one step behind the temp fluctuations in the cool season because the water delay in gaining shedding temps. So I cant keep pouring food in there when there is  cold spell, when they're semi dormant to appease the snails.

The snails don't seem to go dormant which is why the guppy grass is vanishing. 
I would be just feeding snails and possibly killing fish who don't have the metabolism to digest anything they ingest when its cold. 

One thing a platy cant resist is a nibble what ever the season, just wish it was escargot.

I'm reminded here about the cane-toads (amongst other imported assassins) formerly of Queensland Australia, but now spread into other territories. Foxes to kill the rabbits. Mosquito fish to kill mosquitoes.......all becoming serious pests themselves. I like Endlers but to eat this many eggs they would have to be very numerous. Gambusia are a nightmare and very easily become a pest species so do guppies and sadly I'm understandably cautious about endlers. They would also just add their load to the system in those numbers.

Life was balanced and harmonious before the bladders got in, the odd dead body was eaten by the fish and life went on for years and years. All I did was top up the water in dry spells with crudely filtered mountain stream water, harvest a few platies when I need them as lure fish for shy fish....

There must be a solution besides stripping and allowing to sun dry for a week or three but it hasn't been invented. Wonder if I bit the bullet and put in snail killer.......prolly kill the plants and fish....and need to strip the whole thing anyway.

[BettaHomesAndGardens]

I wish more lights came with stands that extended vertically or even extendable risers. I know there are plenty of easy DIY ways to do this but it just seems like an easy include especially for the more top end lighting fixtures. It would be nice to be able to lift the light up not only to adjust intensity but just to allow you to do things in the tank without having to constantly be moving the light.

[Guppy Guy]

On 1/26/2022 at 9:25 PM, BettaHomesAndGardens said:

I wish more lights came with stands that extended vertically or even extendable risers. I know there are plenty of easy DIY ways to do this but it just seems like an easy include especially for the more top end lighting fixtures. It would be nice to be able to lift the light up not only to adjust intensity but just to allow you to do things in the tank without having to constantly be moving the light.

That would be cool to implement into a tank as a pulley system. You pull a rope down, and the lights move up and over, and let it go, and they re-center. Of course there would be some kind of clip though.

Something like this albatross light rig would be cool.

[BettaHomesAndGardens]

On 1/26/2022 at 8:28 PM, Guppy Guy said:

That would be cool to implement into a tank as a pulley system. You pull a rope down, and the lights move up and over, and let it go, and they re-center. Of course there would be some kind of clip though.

Something like this albatross light rig would be cool.

I would buy all of these lol. That sounds so amazing.

[gjcarew]

laser forks, or some kind of laser-guided forks, would be cool

[Jeff]

For those of you not familiar with saltwater / reefs - the Vortech pumps are really popular, as the cords for them aren't in the tank. They're magnetized, so that the cord is attached to the magnet (backside of the pump) that goes on the outside of the tank.

I want this option for a heater. 

[Pinky]

I want easy electronic probes for all the water perameters I could ever want to test. These would just sit in the tank and give me live readings via a timed graph, that I can read trends as far back as a year. 
Ive got dexterity issues and my hands decide to yeet things into oblivion sometimes, and a probe would be a lot more robust than the API test tubes. I lose about one a week and it's really getting expensive. 😥

[Torrey]

On 2/1/2022 at 8:43 PM, Pinky said:

I want easy electronic probes for all the water perameters I could ever want to test. These would just sit in the tank and give me live readings via a timed graph, that I can read trends as far back as a year. 
Ive got dexterity issues and my hands decide to yeet things into oblivion sometimes, and a probe would be a lot more robust than the API test tubes. I lose about one a week and it's really getting expensive. 😥

So much this.

I can share my workaround, if you would like. I have thinning myelin, so nerves like to give muscles inaccurate directions. 

Plus, someone in here recommended a paint shaker with an adapter for the test tubes😁

@Pinky, ask @Streetwise about his Apex system. 

[Pinky]

On 2/1/2022 at 8:45 PM, Torrey said:

So much this.

I can share my workaround, if you would like. I have thinning myelin, so nerves like to give muscles inaccurate directions. 

Plus, someone in here recommended a paint shaker with an adapter for the test tubes😁

Oh yes please! I dont know what my problem is, i have one of those issues drs seem to think im either making up or its just not a big deal. 
I'll have to look into the paint shaker too, could be very helpful, thank you!

[Torrey]

On 2/1/2022 at 8:48 PM, Pinky said:

Oh yes please! I dont know what my problem is, i have one of those issues drs seem to think im either making up or its just not a big deal. 
I'll have to look into the paint shaker too, could be very helpful, thank you!

It took me a few decades to get answers, and if I hadn't gotten covid in 2020, I might still not have answers. 

It's frustrating. 😏

I test all my tanks at once, and use a commercial test tube rack. I place test tube that needs to be shaken in a hand towel, to prevent the yeet. Towel makes it large enough it can't slide out easily. My daughter made it even easier. 

She folded the edge of the handtowel over, and sewed to make 6 "pockets" for 6 test tubes. Now I can slide test tubes into slots, fold down the top edge, and roll the towel. 

Shake shake shake

I have only dropped this version twice, and I didn't have a vial break due to the cushioning.

I have not bought the paint shaker yet, saving up😁

[Odd Duck]

There are such things as vibrating test tube mixers.  I can’t remember their official name and they’re probably stupid cost, but you would only have to be able to hold the tubes down against it.  The slots in a towel is very clever!  I have a silverware roll for taking your silverware camping that would be a similar idea/shape.  I wonder if you could buy something like that pre-made?  My mom made mine.

Let me see if I can find something.  Here, it’s a Vortex mixer.

 

 

And you can buy the silverware rolls.

Edited February 4, 2022 by Odd Duck
Typo

[drewzero1]

On 2/2/2022 at 1:21 PM, Odd Duck said:

There are such things as vibrating test tube mixers.  I can’t remember their official name and they’re probably stupid cost, but you would only have to be able to hold the tubes down against it.  The slots in a towel is very clever!  I have a silverware roll for taking your silverware camping that would be a similar idea/shape.  I wonder if you could but something like that pre-made?  My mom made mine.

Let me see if I can find something.  Here, it’s a Vortex mixer.

 

 

And you can buy the silverware rolls.

There's a university surplus auction near me that I often watch for equipment for work. I'll keep an eye out for one of these 😜

[Guppy Guy]

On 2/2/2022 at 2:21 PM, Odd Duck said:

There are such things as vibrating test tube mixers.  I can’t remember their official name and they’re probably stupid cost, but you would only have to be able to hold the tubes down against it.  The slots in a towel is very clever!  I have a silverware roll for taking your silverware camping that would be a similar idea/shape.  I wonder if you could buy something like that pre-made?  My mom made mine.

 

They are really easy to make. I don’t use one, but if I ever need one, I will be making it out of an old drill motor with an uneven weight on the end, fastened to a small wood platform. Either a power adapter or a drill battery will provide power.

If you don’t have a old drill to use, harbor freight has one for $20 that isn’t half bad.

[Odd Duck]

On 2/4/2022 at 8:52 AM, Guppy Guy said:

They are really easy to make. I don’t use one, but if I ever need one, I will be making it out of an old drill motor with an uneven weight on the end, fastened to a small wood platform. Either a power adapter or a drill battery will provide power.

If you don’t have a old drill to use, harbor freight has one for $20 that isn’t half bad.

Very true for those that are mechanically inclined, but these don’t take 2 hands to turn on and run, are triggered by light, downward pressure, and take up far less space than a drill motor with significantly more safety features built in for the average user.

[Lizzyduff]

I'd like an android app where you could record the type of setup you have (i.e. nano blackwater), and the species you're keeping,  so that when you enter in your water parameters it can tell you if it's ok or not for that particular species. Preferably using color coding for those of us with dyslexic (dyscalcula) tendencies, for whom trying to figure this stuff out is simply migraine inducing.

[Torrey]

On 2/14/2022 at 10:38 PM, Lizzyduff said:

I'd like an android app where you could record the type of setup you have (i.e. nano blackwater), and the species you're keeping,  so that when you enter in your water parameters it can tell you if it's ok or not for that particular species. Preferably using color coding for those of us with dyslexic (dyscalcula) tendencies, for whom trying to figure this stuff out is simply migraine inducing.

I so support this!!!!

I am in the process of C&P all the information that I can find on plants and fish into a google sheet. A friend said they could help with the coding to use the input parameters, and identify which tank has the optimal parameters. 

What makes it hard, is the amount of 

1. Misinformation 

2. Being able to find out if fish are wild caught or tank bred.

3. If tank bred, the parameters of the breeding.

My LFS loves getting fish from me, because each bag of fish I identify which tank they came out of (plus parameters) and which line/generation the fish is.

I take 4 weeks acclimating my fish to the LFS parameters, so the fish will look good, and the shop is able to give people accurate information about the fish's acceptable parameters. 

I push fish to breed in our tap water (dechlorinated, obviously), and don't sell the first 3 generations for anything other than culls, because it takes 3 to 6 generations to confirm consistency, breeding true, and acclimation. 

I straight up refuse to chase water parameters any longer, so no more discus or neon tetras for me. I am probably going to post my Google doc in my signature, if my coding friend and I can get it to work. 

Of course the trick will still be to find out where the fish are sourced from, and *those* parameters.