ryanjury

Awesome! That is starting to look really impressive, well done! I would love to have a tank that looked like that one day.. Mind you at the moment I would love to have a tank that plants actually grew in lol

Nice fish I agree those jewels are very nice too, yellows are nice and clean as well, they are getting hard to find that nice now

It is still running I just cannot seem to add any more air stones to it as it isn't grungy enough for any more, it can make most of the air stones boil, but obviously alot of the are sponge filters so they are just ticking away.

That would run over 100 airstones probably more like 200.. I have a 70lph one running 40 odd airstones and it has just run out of puff..

Sounds like you got a good buy, he looks like a nice fish Don't put tiger barbs with him as they are known for being fin nippers, they can be ok if you are going to stick a large group in there but still I wouldn't risk it with a fighter..

Yeah most solders are lead free these days it is industry standard, but from someone who has done many many hours of soldering and I do it almost daily at work the flux is pretty nasty stuff I wouldn't want it in my tanks..

TBH dems are pretty hard to strip, I have killed a female doing so and it is very stressful on them, it just gets harder as the fry get more developed too as they start swimming back into the mothers mouth. Generally the females will spit when they are ready just provide lots of hiding places for the females to chill out in and for babies to survive in after they are spat. Usually removing dems to spit themselves is a bad idea as introducing them back into the colony can be an issue. Breeding nets aren't very good as the fish in the tank try and eat the babies through the netting this ends up getting them sucked into the netting and killed anyway, the plastic guppy traps can be ok as they have less holes for the fish to try and suck the babies through. Have you considered thinning out males to make things easier on the girls?

Yeah I use them they are great, I have even had success with running them in bigger tanks with messy fish, obviously they don't pick up as much crud as a power filter or even box filter would but they do work well.. If you are a real cheap ass they are actually really easy to make too..

That is with energy online, the 20% prompt payment makes a huge difference

I wouldn't use it, alot of solders are lead based (although this is not so much anymore) but most of them have a resin based flux core which wouldn't be so good for fish I would imagine..

Our latest bill was $260 (after 20% prompt payment) that is with a heatpump running 24/7 the dryer running most the day and 45 tanks running in an insulated garage with heaps of big canisters, dehumidifier running all the time as well out there so pretty happy with that

Lumpheads come from fast flowing rivers so it should be fine.. The only issue would be the fry getting sucked up, I would say they will be at the greatest risk when young so would make sure the area around the filter was open space so they wont lay and have young wrigglers sitting right next to the filter. Apart from that you would just have to set it up and see what happens.

I would love to setup some tanks one day and do a comparison and see how much difference they actually do make. The bacteria will only build upto the bio load of the tank so it is not like adding 100kg of noodles will give you more bacteria and then therefore more room for error, it will just provide more area for the bacteria to grow but the same amount will grow as before. It is my belief that the filter wool can provide more than enough media for the good bacteria to grow on.. As it works really well for me even when things go wrong, but I am yet to prove this and do use noodles in my canister filters on bigger tanks. I think this is an interesting discussion, has anyone seen any scientific research that has been done on it (not backed by manufacturers)?

For sure they are a good thing to have But I have plenty of bare bottomed heavily stocked (and heavily fed) bare bottomed tanks filtered with air powered bubble filters with only fiilter wool with no issues at all, so I would definitely argue that they aren't needed at all..

Noodles aren't really needed at all, they provide good surface area for lots of good bacteria to grow but this good bacteria will still grow in the filter wool (ever wonder how sponge filters work with no noodles?) gravel etc.. I am yet to see anyone come up with a formula for how many good bacteria you actually need (they gradually grow anyway) or how many good bacteria various medias can actually hold, and it would be very hard to work out as it would depend on so many variables.. If you really wanted to get some just get them from where ever you can get them, if they are old and manky just boil them to make sure they are sterile.. Another option is to goto a garden centre (or lake taupo) and get small pieces of pumice and use that.

Yep I had an awesome stand that was made (or at least sold by) a descent store in Auckland it was supporting a 5 x 2 x 2ft tank with basically only a box of MDF not even sealed.. It is amazing how people can make stuff to go around water that can't handle getting wet as eventually it will end up getting wet. This is the reason I never use MDF in my fish room and always advise people not to..

Sounds like it was a good outcome in the end though, I mean all the fish are still alive and nothing major has happened (apart from the carpet which I am sure can be fixed).. Glad that you managed to get it sorted, good work from the people who came and helped you out, Sandra helped me out when I was overseas too rushed over to help out with tanks etc when things went wrong she is awesome. As much as these things happen they are just motivation to build things bigger and better..

Good work so it seems to be working for you, it will only be better when you have those little gaps and joins taped up and sealed I found it made a huge difference adding carpet and underlay to the floor.. Yeah its a pain because I am messy and always spill water, but with a fan dehumidifier and lifting it it actually dries really fast and to me the effort is worth the gains in warmth that I get.

What happened today Kash?

I would call the 10 degree increase in temp a good gain! That will save you heaps, it will be interesting to see what it stabilises at.. Do you have anything on the floor or just concrete?

You have to be careful that you are not confusing leopard fish for gambusia as they can be similar to the untrained eye and leopard fish are legal..

lol goes for all fancy goldfish Sunlight brings out colours more I have seen guppies raised outside in natural sunlight come in for winter that are absolutely stunning..

Might be ok for 1 sev but I would say they will eat neons, my advice to you if you wanted fish with character would be to go into the dwarfs until you have a big enough tank for the bigger guys. Something like bolivian rams are hardy easy to keep and easily available, even kribs etc are very colourful and nice..

Just get an FX5 it will still be more than enough for a 4 x 2 x 2 I have one on a 5 x 2 x 2 filled to the brim with africans..

I am pretty sure I have some old heating elements somewhere (from the "old days" when they had separate thermostats and elements) and also a few smoked heaters that have blown thermostats that I think (haven't done it so hard to know for sure) be very easy to remove and bypass.