sharn

oh man, thats so freakin awesome *dies* i LOVE arapaima, they get to like 15 feet easy not the greatest looking fish but the size makes them mega cool! good to see the man has taste and has pacu and GG in there too, no point putting piddly fish in there, youd never see em :lol: i like this BUDGET!!! geeze, ill bet most of us wish we had the cash to even start building something that size, let alone finish it! now all you guys that moan about this, think about having to put up with it for a year :lol: that guy rules, i wonder if hed like to have multiple wives? :lol:

:lol: sounds... exciting? :lol:

i personally never test for calcium, phosphate or iron, it isnt needed unless you are running into problems (phosphate is often a cause for algae). i find it useful to get a base test of your tap water done for kh to see what you are working with at your LFS, there is generally no need to test for it if you tap water is above 4DGH or so, therefore you dont really need to buy the kit if you dont have problems. gh isnt normally a problem unless you have picky species (africans, rams etc). a kh above 3 is classed as stable enough but i think you want it at least 5? if you are using co2. in te puke we have no buffering so our water is very prone to pH crashes so i have to put shell grit in all my filters to get the kh up. ammonia and nitrite i only ever used for cycling but it is helpful to the newer people to have these on hand just incase you have problems with sick fish as the water is the first thing you want to rule out problems with. i use my nitrate kit to tell me when i need to do water changes, i try to keep all my tanks under 30ppm, except the discus tank which is never allowed to get above 10ppm. once you work out how often you need to do water changes to eliminate high nitrates then you dont often need to use it unless you have sick fish. i beleive up to 80ppm is acceptable for short periods of time (like if you go on holiday for 2-3 weeks and cant do water changes) but anything under 40ppm is classed as 'in the safe and healthy range' from what ive read??? i prefer to keep it as simple as possible help newbies, if you tell them a million things they need to test for, a whole bunch of things they should be doing etc they are gonna start thinking its more hassle than its worth, you wana keep it simple and fun until they REALLY get hooked :lol:

jamie- the bell thing has been done by a few people, most people end up saying that the oscars get really annoying cause they always jump to ring the bells. this was when food was used as a reward though. i was going to attempt it and have no doubts Frank could do it but i really dont want a bell ringing 24/7 :lol: the hoop trick would probably be quite easy also, the jumping part might be a bit harder and probably not the best idea to teach them as they are jumpers anyway and often end up on the floors if their lids arent on and heavy i have seen my O get completley out of the water during a random spaz and it wasnt that great, especially when your next to the tank when he does it, talk about shower!!! :lol: im not sure what reward you could use other than food though?

clowns will often not tolerate each other as they get older so if you do keep two that arent babies its probably best to do it seperatly just in case. im not sure at what size they start to not get along though :-?

you can go ahead and get angels right away if you wish, theyre pretty hardy little guys. they will eat fish they can fit in their mouths like neons and other younger/smaller tetras but thats normally only once theyre adults. not all angels eat tetras though, only 1 out of 4 i had ate my neons (just bit their heads or tummies and left the body ). cardinals would be a better choice as they grow larger but they are more expensive (round 8-9 each!), rummies are also pretty. there are also larger tetras that grow to around 5-7cm, things like bleeding heart tetras etc. theres sooo many out there it can be difficult to choose :lol: and welcome aboard, i wish we were able to get snakes over here, i wouldnt mind a ball python or something like that!

baby ones i meant :lol: not sure how a little puffer would do taking on a almighty adult apple snail- probably very badly i would say :lol: 2fishy- have you got any ramshorns in the shop tanks? perhaps they would be ok? the younger ones shells are quite soft

raid your other tanks for apple snails :lol:

got mine too, cant wait to read it thanks caryl, you deserve a massive medal

alan- ill bet that if you upped your temp they would perk up heaps. ive read alot about discus at 25-27 or so and they do ok, theyre perfectly fine but when their owners up the temp to 29-30 or so they always see an improvement in perkiness, hungryness (due to increased metabolism) etc

perhaps make it clear or green to blend in with plants? or cause your backgrounds blue perhaps that colour to blend in? it probably wont be hard to make as long as you have the right diameter pipe

you might even need to end up upgrading for that RD, they can get to 12" easily and your standard 210L aint much wider :-? RD's are often very nasty fish to other fish and a little less to humans :lol: many people say that only a few scratches is a good day when your cleaning a RD tank :lol: people often reccomend placing them out of the traffic areas if you do have a grumpy one as its stressful on the fish to be trying to kill you everytime you walk past :lol: most people only have horror stories of tank mates for RD's, i have read a few stories of plecos working ok as long as they have many hiding spots (but really who cares if hes the only fish, theyre REALLY beautiful and well worth the extra tank for him). at 6" hes probably about to hit puberty so expect to see his attitude change slightly, i would keep a very close eye on him and your O, it only takes a few minutes for a RD to destroy an oscar if it wants (oscars are actually pretty woosy fish lol) and that wouldnt be nice at all your oscar will LOVE that 280L and you could probably add another medium fish if you liked (perhaps a FM/sev), its only around 70gal (can you tell i spend alot of time on american sites :lol: ) you could probably do an oscar/pleco combo too if you liked. good luck with your beasties, big fish RULE

nope, theyre not a must at all! i didnt get mine to clean up left overs, i got mine cause theyre cute. i make sure i over feed slightly so that enough gets down to the bottom for them. they pretty much eat what your other tropicals eat, they are omviourous (sp) i beleive meaning they eat a wide varity, mine get flakes, discus bits, shop bought frozen foods, bloodworms etc etc. they are gorgeous little fish to own, theyre always very enthusiastic and are out pretty much all the time, unlike some of the other bottom feeders

i think goldies are pretty notorious for chowing down plants :lol: perhaps java fern/moss might be worth looking into?

i know that males often get 'egg spots' on their gills when they want to breed. not sure if thats all species or what :-?

LOL, i wonder how many years it will take him to figure out you were right in the pronounciation? i personally thought it was said 'chich-lid' until i heard a few people it saying the proper way :lol:

i always hear people pronouncing cichlid 'chich-lid' instead of 'sick-lid' which makes me laugh, just cause its a funny sounding word :lol: if ya wana list some fish you have trouble with someone will be able to help you out. personally i aint got panaque right, i think its said 'pan-a-kay?' but i think it should be said 'pan-ak'

you cant really over filter but you can 'over current' :lol: if there is ALOT of current coming from your big filters, enough to upset your fish then that is too much. just turn the spray bars back facing the glass to diffuse it

sadly this isnt always the case and very few meds will mention if its unsafe for inverts, plecos, and other sensitive fish im sure many many people have lost sensitive fish due to the package not mentioning that these meds are ok for your general fish, but not for the delicate ones like rams, ghost knives, plecos, clowns etc.

if you recently added a fish you hadnt quarentined they could have bought it in. moving fish from tank to tank can bring it on from stress, chilling can bring it on etc. theres alot of things that can cause it. im not 100% but i think ich is always in the aquarium but is an oppertunistic thing and will just take hold when one of your fish isnt feeling right and because its in an enclosed enviroment you will get large infestations easily.

i have always gotten rid of ick with salt and heat cause i prefer natural methods but some people prefer to use meds. there is a product made by Wunder that is especially for whitespot, the tonic will do whitespot but is more of a broad all rounder i think. i am unsure if you have to half dose with that stuff cause of your pleco, generally half dose with all meds but i think i read that stuff is pretty gentle. if you dont mind risking the pleco just do a normal dose if you go the meds way, or you could start at the half dose and move it up as you moniter him. make sure you follow directions but do a weak dose for a week or so after just to make sure youve got rid of the lot. if you want to go the salt way (if its bad just use meds, its quicker) use 1tbsp per 40L. leave it in this dosage for a week and a half or so and replace the amount you take out with water changes as it doesnt evaporate, after that slowly start to weaken the dosage but keep some salt in there for a while (maybe 1bstp per 80L) as it often takes 2 weeks or so of treatment to completly rid the tank of it. up your temp to to around 28C as that will speed up the cycle so you can get rid of it quicker. gravel siphons and more water changes go a long way too so your on the right track there be persistent and keep the treatment up for a week or so after you see the last spots go just to make sure *posted same time as pawz* :lol:

i would remove all your decorations appart from easily removable ones like driftwood. they will stress even more if you remove their hiding spots which will make getting rid of that ich harder. perhaps buy some large terracotta pots and chuck them in there? theyre easy to remove and will be good temporary hiding spots. it would probably be ok if your fish werent 'hiding fish' ie the JD's which like to hide, plecos etc but because thats their security, and sometimes their territory moving all those spots out wont make em happy. good luck

i beleive the co2 eats away at rubber parts? i know it slowly eats away at something :lol: i have wondered if the co2 would suffocate bacteria also? those inline co2 diffusers like blue has are good, they hook up to your outlet which still gives you great diffusion without bothering the insides of your filter.

its not a sales ploy (would that be a first? :lol: ) if you dont have very good circulation near your heater and around your tank you can get 'dead spots' which do feel alot colder and that cant be good for the fish. i like to have two heaters in each tank if i can (im slowly replacing the singles with new doubles), not only does it heat more effectively you also have less chance of the heater sticking on and cooking your tank, with two lower wattage heaters its going to give you alot more time to realise whats happened and vice versa with it sticking off. in saying that though in my oscar tank i have one heater, but i have two internals at each end, heater in the middle. this heats the tank evenly as it has 3000lph flowing past it. if you have your outlets set up properly youll be totally fine with one heater, but you have more risk of cooking the tank

dont worry about his charging unless its causing him major damage (scales missing, stunning himself etc), most oscars do this. mine even has his moments at me where he doesnt like me in my own bedroom cause hes moody let alone seeing the dreaded twin :lol: perhaps tape some sort of paper to the sides to minimise reflection? the shark probably did set it off, oscars can be such drama queens :lol: but try some new foods and see if he perks up