alanmin4304

Check out the tanks imported from China, they are beautifully made, look realy good and use very little glue. I would hate to think what it would cost to get the edges polished here.

It is the sulphate in tablet form so should be ok. My book suggests quinine at 30mg/litre so it is 1/10 dosage.

When I make tanks I cut the ends the same height as the front and back and the same width as the base minus the thickness of the front and back. Don't leave a gap between the glass, push them up tight and tape them in place with insulation tape until it cures. RTV is an adhesive and not a filler so you don't leave a gap and use it as a filler. You only need a thin bead between the glass so the joint is all glue and no air bubbles. It will look neater if you only have a small bead on the inside ( it doesn't do much structually,just looks better and is easier to clean the tank) RTV cures using the moisture in the air and then forms a waterproof skin, so if you use too much the inside will not cure and leaves it weak. Thats my tuppence.

While cleaning out an old cupboard I found a bottle of mepacrine from way back. Many moons ago quinine was used to control white spot and vevet at about 30mg/litre (doesn't damage plants ) and mepacrine was used also in the control of malaria and other parasites in humans. Does anyone know what rate mepacrine should be used at?

fishboi, have you noticed that many plants close their leaves at night regardless of the lights being on or off. I have low wattage pilot lights that stay on all the time so the fish don't get such a fright when the main lights go on. I am sure the fish would prefer a time of twilight or night.

Sorry, I was not very clear. I meant to float them in a small container in the main tank. You would still need to get another tank later or give them away to someone who can raise them. I used to breed a lot of angels and the one in the picture looks to have good genes, if the partner is similar you would have no trouble selling the babies. Black angels sell well. If the only damage to the one in the picture is the hole at the base of the dorsal fin I think it would be best treated with an antibiotic like furan.

In a previous life I inspected a couple of water supplies and a couple of swimming pools

It is dacron and is available from fabric stores for stuffing pillows/cushions. You can sometimes buy off cuts of fabric from making jackets etc which have dacron between two layers of fabric.

You can remove the leaf and eggs, weight it with a little lead and float it in the tank with an airstone, then treat the adults. Check that it is hole in the head and not fin rot as a result of damage from exuberant mating (which should be treated with antibiotics rather than treatment for parasites)

I think you will find the breeders give a salt bath prior to breeding in order to reduce the external parasites which the adults can resist but the fry cannot. Many of the other meds which also do this can also cause temporary sterility. I think you should treat for internal parasites as previously suggested.

If you are going to pot heavy feeding plants like Echinodorus sp. you will need to feed them or they will not do very well. I bought some Cryptocoryne sp. plants off a local through Trade me. They were potted in clean gravel and in a bare discus tank. The three newest leaves on each plant were white. I have fed them a bit and they now look like what I suspected they were C. walkerii. Experimenting is the way to learn. Good luck.

I have never tried it as I thought the idea was to have a low nutrient tank. You could try plants like Ambulia,cabomba, H.polysperma,H. zosterifolia (stargrass),Java moss, Shinnersia,cardamine,Hydrocotyle. Just start with a little and see how it goes.

I find the best way to see velvet is to look at the fish in the dark with a good torch. It is a very smalldot like a sprinling of very fine salt.

In some countries water supplies are treated with chloramines rather than chlorine. To my knowledge chloramines are not used in NZ, but when used it is produced as you suggest. When you treat water in a swimming pool or water supply with chlorine you add it until you get free available chlorine, because it is a more effective disinfectant than chloramines. The amount used before the chlorine becomes free and available is called the chlorine demand. This is cause by things combining with the chlorine including amines. Proteins are chains of phosphates with various amino acids (amines) strung off them and virtually all organic contamination of water contains proteins, so the chlorine becomes various chloramines until they are all used up and you are left with about 1ppm free available chlorine and the chloramines created. If you treat water with chlorine and it contains organic matter it will contain chloramines. There endeth the lesson for today. Psalm 127

If you pot a plant it will need to be fed through the roots so you will need to put media with nutrient in the pot and this will defeat the purpose of the bare bottom tank. If you want plant you could anchor large Java fern to something or other plants that don't feed through the roots.

I would just rinse it out under the tap and set it running in a mature tank to start picking up the crud and bacteria you want. Replacing the media is the way the shops make their profit. All you need to do is make sure there are no bad creebies in the filter from it being unused for so long. I have filters I have not cleaned for over 6 months as they are still turning over a good volume.

I think the most common way chlorine spikes are caused is when repairs are made to the water supply system and chlorine is used to sanitise the systm. It is used in high concentrations and is difficult to completely flush from the reticulation. This can happen in a water supply which is not chlorinated.

I have used methylene blue and malachite green together OK but not with salt. You can also use acraflavine together also. The mixture controls some bacteria which can lead to fungal problems later.

The pressure on the filter will be the same if plumbed externally or through the bottom as the pressure only relates to the distance between the tank water leval and filter.

All chlorinated water supplies contain chloramines as the chlorine combines with the amines to form monochloramine then dichloramine then trichloramine. All proteins contain amines and all water contains proteins, other than unusually pure water. In many countries the drinking water has been through six people before it gets to the tap. Are we grateful we live in Christchurch?

I have been using it at the normal rate (7.5ml / 300litres daily) for about 3 weeks. It has gone completely from all plants but is still on the rocks.

I always plant the tank first as that helps with the cycling (uses the nitrate that gets produced) and it takes a while for the plants to get established, so they are getting established while the cycling is going on. The plants you have in the picture look like cuttings and will need to develop roots before the can play any real part in cycling.

Check that the hoses are not partly blacked with crud, often this is what is restricting the flow. Don't clean unless the flow is severly restricted as they only work properly when they contain enough crud.

don't forget they usually have a small surface area / capacity compared to a normal tank and therefore will not support as many fish.

I had a major problem with black beard algae and treated with alcahol and it was a bit of a disaster (caused a massive bacterial bloom) I did a 45% water change and treated with flourish excel at the normal rate. About 2 weeks later the water is a little cloudy sometimes, black beard has gone from plants but is still on rocks (but much less). I notice that light green algae grows a lot quicker on the glass and this usually indicates that the conditions are good for plant growth. I have left the lights as they were, and my E. martii has done the wild thing, and the other swords are looking pretty happy as well.