alextret

Thank you very much for the advice. >none of the local stuff will last long in warm water. Indeed, this is an essential point. I did not realize that. What I have in mind at the moment is not a marine tank, but the possibility to stabilize a low to medium density artemia culture by using an algal scrubber instead of a filter (it looks like filters are difficult to operate with plankters present, because they would filter out artemia, or its food, or both). I got interested in this sort of thing once I found that spirulina powder is readily available. It looks like scrubber can be operated with almost any kind of algae, for as long as it is robust (e.g., blue-greens do just fine).

According to most textbook definitions, it is a pond (because it can be drained for maintenance). Again, according to various literature, the biggest issue with draining is where to get rid of all the water (which, if the pond was operating for a year or so, is probably not of very nice quality). Probably, 7000 liters is not that much, so it is not really an issue for a relatively small pond.

In case of fresh water, algae spores are distributed over air. Even 100% pure fresh water will develop an algae bloom if left standing in the sun for long enough. Does the same apply to brackish and salt water? Also, is there a way to get brackish and salt water plants for cheap (e.g., to collect them in the wild somehow)? I mean, legal ones, of course, like the legal oxyweed.

How do they drain the pond? Are they using an electrical pump? Where do they dispose of the water?

Where can I get some quality guppies? (Pure lines etc.) I am in Palmerston North, but I travel to Wellington from time to time.

I have four tanks working with a single filter, syphoned through. This set up worked more or less OK for almost half a year (actually, it was, first, two tanks, then three, now, four, you have the idea). The problem to watch for is partial loss of syphon during water changes (due to air bubbles entering the tube), and, rarely, for unknown reasons. Once syphon is lost, the difference in water height develops, and makes the filter pump ineffective, so nothing really drastic happens. In particular, it does not lead to dramatic loss of water.

In "Dynamic Aquaria" they recommend the use of the so-called algal scrubbers (basically, just to pump water through separate tanks with algae and a lot of light, with growing algae binding nitrogen). They recommend not using any filters at all, to allow plankton organisms to survive. They do present sufficient data to demonstrate that algal scrubbers are effective. But, I would not use an algal scrubber as it should be too expensive (high power bill). But of course, all biological filters would have a similar effect on CO2. The bigger the filter, the more CO2 it would (presumably) add. But perhaps, it would still be not much.

>'Will the bacteria in the filter produce CO2 like fish?" the answer is no. I see. I've been reading "Dynamic Aquaria" by Walter H. Adey and Karen Loveland in which they claim that external canister filters are bad because bacteria in them produce CO2, which brings the pH down. I thought that this CO2 could be a good thing for some purposes. They did not have any data on that, so I guess since nobody is using external filters for CO2, bacteria do not generate that much CO2, after all.

How effective an external filter would be in supplying CO2? I do not mean any special setup, just an external canister filter. Bacteria should be turning 02 into C02 as they breeze, as fishes do.

I actually like trumpet snails, and tried introducing them in my tank on purpose. Unfortunately, they are not doing very well. Some died out, some remain alive, but it appears that they do not breed. I see occasionally one or two of them climbing the glass, but they are all the big ones that I introduced in the first place. No small ones.

The difference in advice given by Wet Pets and by Animates is probably because Wet Pets sell water, and Animates sell water treatment products but do not sell water. So, both recommend what they sell.

Details of PN water supply system are described at http://www.pncc.govt.nz/Council/Service ... Supply.htm There is no mention of copper (it does mention chlorination & fluoridation). I am using tap water with no chemical additives, but let it stay for about 48 hours to get rid of chlorine. I'm not sure if the effect would be the same if I used water straight from the tap - I never tried. Fishes seem to be OK. So are snails. So if they do add copper, it should not be very often, it is supposed to be a potent snail poison, is not it?

>Get the biggest you can afford I wonder if electricity bills are an issue. Does the "biggest you can afford" refer to buying a filter, or to operating a filter.

I guess they'll have to stay in quarantine for a looong time (if they stay alive). I found leopards to be somewhat accident-prone (dying for no obvious reason, jumping out, etc.) I have an interest in fishes other than gold fish that can be held outside. I think my water quality is not good enough to keep natives, which leaves me with WCMM and leopards.

I had 4 leopard fishes in a tank outside, 2 males and 2 females. Last week, I found one of the males dead, and another one eating it. Could it be the case that they had a fight? Or is it something nastier (some sort of a disease etc.?) There are no plants in the tank, so there is nowhere to hide. So far, the remaining 3 leopards seemed to be OK. The tank is actually a large (semi-transparent) plastic box which I use as a quarantine tank. It is of an adequate size, and I change about 30% of the water daily. I have to keep the lid on to prevent leopards from jumping out, so I can not put any plants in, for I am not sure if the plants would get enough light.

I have WCMM outside in a situation similar to yours. I bought them a couple of months ago. They bred several times. I'm giving liquifry to the fry. I'm not sure if they are growing at a suitable rate, but there are many of them quite alive. But, odd enough, I never figured out what to feed to the parents - they refuse flakes (even exactly the same brand that they feed them at LFS). They look OK though, although I suspect that they did eat the fry recently. I can't tell for sure as I have three tanks syphoned through together, and fry more or less automatically gets syphoned away to a neighboring tank which they have to themselves (it is not by design, by I find the outcome quite entertaining). Also, odd enough, I'm quite confused about how to sex the adults. They are changing color all the time. I was quite certain to have 2 males (colored and cocky) and three females (less color). But once it became colder, they all turned to pitch black, and behave more or less equally cocky.

Are you going to be able to drain it?

I wonder, what do you think of The Original EcoSphere http://www.eco-sphere.com/home.htm They claim to keep scrimp with some algae in hermetically sealed containers for long periods of time. Is it a hoax?

I'm confused about WCMM that I have in a tank outside. They seem to be quite uninterested in flake food (which is all I have to offer). They do pick some flakes as they go down, but very half-heartily, and most of the flakes remain uneaten. They do not look particularly unhappy, though. In fact, they look as if they have some other source of food, which is better than flakes. I have no idea, what could it be (if it is the case). They were in the tank for about 3 weeks and bred once. Should I just leave them to their own devices, and not give them any food at all?

Talking of snails, I have a tank with WCMM, which breed (as WCMM do). I'm quite happy them breeding, as I have a pond where I could put the fry to grow up. I have some small snails in the tank they breed in. How diligent should I be in trying to move them elsewhere? Would they eat the eggs? The snails are around 2 millimeters large (I moved the larger ones, but the small ones are difficult to find).

I'm sort of having a similar dilemma. I have a 150 liter tank with 7 neons 3 harlequin rasboras 1 bronze cory 1 algae eater (hopefully, SAE) It has an undergravel filter powered by powerhead, well planted. I'm changing water little by little more or less continuously (using it to water house plants), I think it should come up to about 1/4 change per week. I'm using tap water aged for 2 days to get rid of chlorine. I do not clean gravel more than once per week, or sometimes once per 2 weeks. As water level is fluctuating, the actual water volume should be around 120 to 130 liters. I've been pondering about adding 4 more rasboras, and 2 more bronze corys. So I wonder, how likely is such an addition to make the whole thing unstable. In any case, the configuration I would have after the addition would be: 150 liter tank with 7 neons 7 harlequin rasboras 3 bronze corys 1 algae eater

>Cheap insurance at about $30.00 Where to they sell them?

My solution was just a separate tank with a standard bottom filter (driven by a powerhead) and a lot of gravel. Easy and cheap. Seems to work, but I have to objective measure as to how effective it is. Fancier set-ups are probably more powerful.

>Now I have it growing permanantly in the garden. Just curious, do you mean in a pond in the garden, or outside? What kind of oxygen weed would it be? There are many plants people call "oxygen weed".

I kept them for about 3 weeks with no heating inside the house. And, they were in an unheated tank at Wet Pets where I bought them. I kept them in a 12 liter bowl, which I just carried outside in the evening, when temperature outside was close to inside. I have three 100 liter tanks outside, which are syphoned through as a single system, with a powerhead pumping water through it. But leopards never got into the system, as they went down while in the bowl. I was changing water once or twice a day using water from the system, which kept them quite happy while in the house, so I do not think that water quality was an issue. But then, the weather was rather hot over that period, so perhaps it was a bad timing to move. At Wet Pets they told me there are people in Palmy who successfuly keep them outside all year round (and it was not a sails pitch, as I aked a couple of weeks after I bought them). I guess, I should have put them outside with a heater set to something like 15C, as a safety precaution. As to WCMM, they do eat flakes quite eagely when they see them falling. But, so far they did not figure out that they are supposed to pick them off the surface (if they don't do that, I fear that a lot of food remains uneaten). Can WCMM jump? I seem to have no luck with the outside tank system, as one of the WCMM mysteriously disappeared this morning. I'll try to search for it more thoroughly, though, I was a bit in a hurry.