Faran

First of all, the BEST way to buy discus is to get a batch of 6 smaller ones (4-6cm) from a breeder and grow them out to 4-5" in a bare bottom tank with daily water changes. You can do this in virtually any size aquarium and I used to grow out mine in a 2 footer to start with and move up with size. A 20% water change in a 54L aquarium is only 11 litres and that's the advantage right there. When you try and grow out smaller discus in a larger tank you end up changing hundreds of litres of water a week and it's painful to say the least. Water conditioner is fine and pre-mixing the cold water with a bit of hot to get the right temp is adequate. 1. what plants do i need to be in there? i know amazonian sword plant i will go for that one, but also i want to not be able to see the bottom of the tank and gravel so i want a plant carpet,what plants are good for that? Be careful which swords you buy as Amazon Swords will grow very very large and fill your little tank. Do some research and go with small to medium swords (leopard swords as an example) and I'd recommend Dwarf Sag as a ground cover over Glosso any day. Very very difficult to grow glosso like a carpet. 2. What does drift wood do to the water conditions? Stabilizes water conditions, adds tannins to the water which lowers pH and relaxes fish. 3. How do i keep the Ph down for fish and i know they like acidic water,how to i acomplish that? Unless you have a crazy pH over 7.5 I wouldn't worry about unless you're buying adult discus with the intent to breed. If you get your discus small they'll quickly adjust to your tap water and live and breed happily in it.

I adopted a Powelliphanta "Augustus" from Happy Valley but they were evicted and last I heard was living in a fridge in DOC Hokitika Does that count? Alan, I think they're the carnivorous ones you were talking about, remember seeing a model of one eating a giant worm at Te Papa.

That makes a lot of sense, you can skip the slow process of setting up a cycle with stress zyme by adding heaps of bacteria from another healthy filter by squeezing the media into the water. Just try and do it near the filter intake rather than in your fishes face

Converts to 89cm wide, 73.5cm deep and 51cm wide - 333L

I reckon they're the same as guppies and can handle an indoor unheated tank but would perish with frosts. They've just been put in the bathtub and now I'm questioning my judgment with Autumn looming

Or you can do a coldwater indoor aquarium with Leopardfish, WCMMs, guppies, many kinds of danios (including celestial pearl danios), bristlenoses, American flag killiefish and probably a lot more types of killies as well. Heaps of nice coldwater plants including Glosso which is a NZ native and a BEAUTIFUL plant highly sought over worldwide (google it).

Local, aye? :-? Legal and cute, too! Recently got leopardfish of my own (Thanks Skoll!) and they're happily living in a bathtub pond eating mozzies and pretty much anything else. Hoping to have heaps of them like my WCMM explosion this summer! By the way, does anyone know if they can happily survive the winter outdoors here?

First of all congrats on the new tanks and the gorgeous fighter. He really is lovely! Bugger on him getting sucked into the filter though. How'd that happen? I recommend replacing the power filter with an air-driven sponge filter for several reasons. 1) Safety.... self explanatory. 2) Babies. You may only have one tank now but your little starter will probably someday become a home for betta fry if you get him a girlfriend and have a place to put the parents when and if they spawn. 3) Turbulence - I've seen a lot of tiny aquariums lately which have overpowered internal filters that end up turning the whole thing into a washing machine. I wouldn't wanna be stuck in rapids all my life and definitely wouldn't want my fish to be - unless they like it, that is! I just re-read and saw you've already replaced the filter. Well, if you have problems in the future go the sponge route Oh, tip for cycling - when you have a mature cycled aquarium you can easily transfer the bacteria from the old filter to the new filter by squeezing your old filter media into the new aquarium and letting the bacteria culture get into the new filter.

As the tank is well aerated the most common problems indicated by heavy breathing symptoms are gill flukes and gill damage. Gill flukes are indicated by the gill covers extended and the discus breathing heavily at the top of the aquarium. This would be caused if the discus came from an environment free of flukes and was placed in an infected aquarium. I would attribute this particular case to the high ammonia levels in the aquarium and recent travel causing damage to the gills. If this is the case it's most likely permanent but may hardly be noticable when the water parameters are correct but the fish will start gasping any time a water change is needed. For the time being, have your friend work on getting those ammonia levels down to 0. Check the bacteria to make sure everything is cycled properly and look around for dead fish or left over food or wood rotting.

I did it on the cheap two year ago and got a polythene liner... been regretting it for the last 6 months now with a constant leak. The PVC you'll be able to repair but not Polythene so I'd recommend PVC for that alone, but all the builders I've spoken to recommend Butynol for lining a pond as it's pretty much indestructable and I plan on using that when I re-line my pond next month (waiting for the hundred or so baby WCMMs to grow out a little).

BUGGAH! Both the foot and the gold rams

Found it recommended on another site for a clown knife with columnaris - http://www.aquariacentral.com/forums/sh ... p?t=133423

Pop eye is usually caused by a bacterial infection behind the eye and responds well to Furan-2. Arowanas are an exception as it's caused by muscles.

A "blue" pH means that your pH is high (7.1-7.6+) and you need to add driftwood to the aquarium to acidify and neutralize it. This is a natural way to get your pH where you want it and the reason why you don't see driftwood in african cichlid tanks where a high pH is needed. "Personally I use peat and driftwood to lower pH and limestone to raise it." So high pH <7 would need wood and possibly peat to neutralize to 7 Low ph >7 would need limestone to neutralize to 7 Cuttlefish - That’s actually quite clever. It’s made out of Calcium Carbonate – same as Limestone. The only concern I would have is hardness. Cuttlebone is fresh and limestone is petrified CaCO3 and so they might behave differently underwater. Remember, you don't need it though!

Light from a window on any aquarium can cause unwanted algae growth and direct sunlight may cause the normally cold water aquarium to rise to temperatures unsuitable for the axolotl. I lost 5 large juvenile axies this way over the summer. But to answer your original questions - 1. Plants are very happy in sand provided they do not get uprooted and nitrogen pockets are avoided by aerating the substrate - this happens in any sand substrate planted or not. 2. No chemicals should be needed with cold water plants, as long as you have at least a simple sponge filter for bacterial filtration to break down waste into plant food. 3. Not really a question is it As Alan mentioned the plants will be fine planted this way as they'll basically be potted house plants with submerged roots and would grow very well IF they had enough light. So when it all comes down to it you really won't have enough light for the plant to thrive. Hardy plants like java moss are recommended as they don't need light, absorb nutrients from the water, and can also be used for spawning mops. Downside of java moss is that it can break up and the whole tank ends up difficult to clean as you don't want to accidentally throw away the moss. Aside from java moss, I ecommend plastic plants with axies all the way and I'm a live plant guy normally. I have a nice plastic twisted vallisenaria with a weighted base which the axies love and have used for spawning. The best part is that you can remove the whole plant with eggs attached to another container, just like java moss. Hope that helps!

Straight off caudata.

I'll be keen, put me down for some would you Paul?

The one and only time I've known him to import cockatoos they were direct from the Amazon and all looked like the wild parents shown on the auction. I know for a fact that he used to get double and triple red cockatoos from a local breeder here in Upper Hutt and there wasn't anything dodgy about them nor was there any "cockatoo cichlid virus" as I had many healthy ones from him in the past and enjoyed breeding them. I Googled it but I can't find a single report linking any specific virus to Apistogramma cacatuoides anywhere online. LMAO!!!

Excellent method but it won't work if you have an undergravel filter

Sounds like a bacterial infection behind the eye. Treat with a strong anti-bacterial medicine such as Furan-2 in an isolation tank.

Well tried calling her husbands workplace and he's still there but out and won't be available until the weekend.

If you have an airstone running in the bathtub for the daphnia it should prevent a portion of the top from freezing over unless it gets REALLY cold.

Snails are another option, but like BNs they can eat eggs and even wrigglers if you're not careful.

Yup, worms need to breathe like anything else

I agree completely with Ryan. BNs are handy when dealing with parents that care for eggs and young such as cichlids but definitely not suitable for egg scatterers/broadcasters.