whetu

Hi imsweet, what kind of bleach did you use? I assume you're talking about chlorine bleach: sodium hypochlorite. Did you make sure you got one with no added perfumes etc? If so, rinsing the tank repeatedly and leaving it in the sun will eventually get rid of the chlorine smell. Personally I prefer not to use chlorine bleach on aquarium gravel or other porous material. I prefer to put it in a big pot on the stove and boil it to sterilise it. Another type of bleach you can use is hydrogen peroxide. It is an "oxygen bleach" rather than a "chlorine bleach" and the residue is much less toxic. You can't smell the residue from it the way you can with chlorine bleach, so you just have to rinse until you think it's all gone. Hydrogen peroxide is the bleach hairdressers use to bleach hair - hence the saying "peroxide blonde."

Oooh you lucky thing! I wish people would lend me their fish stuff long term! What did you end up doing with the filter media? Personally I would have sterilised the old media by boiling it, then kept all the media. (The more media the merrier, I always say.) Then I would add the new filter to the tank in addition to the old one so you always have a filter running for emergencies like setting up a quarantine tank.

Yes, basically that is correct. In general I prefer two small heaters over one large one, so if one heater gets stuck 'on' or 'off' you have more time to react before too much harm is done. There are a few things to consider with heaters, for example if the room the tank is in gets particularly cold in winter (e.g. overnight) you're likely to need more total wattage. If the ambient temperature of the room is always warm (e.g. if you have some kind of central heating) then you can get away with less heating in the tank. Also of course it depends on what kind of fish you're keeping and their preferred temperature range. To keep a large tank in the high 20s is obviously going to need more wattage than keeping it in the low 20s. Make sure the heaters are positioned in an area with good water circulation so they keep the tank evenly heated. So yes, 2 x 200 watt heaters, one at each end of your tank, sounds good.

lol stella, does being a dental assistant totally put you off kissing?! If you actually start thinking about all the germs and stuff in people's mouths... eeeewww! I would rather not think about it!

A few years ago I worked at a touristy-type place and we used to sell sunshine in a can. It was surprisingly popular with overseas visitors - I suppose because it wasn't too heavy to carry back with them. I hope they weren't too disappointed when they opened the can though.

What is the standard aqua one lighting? I find fast-growing stem plants are always a good start. They tend to be low demand, easy to grow, cheap to buy, and easy to propagate just by snipping off the tops and re-planting. You don't tend to get a wide range of colour, but if your discus are going to be the centrepiece of the tank then they probably just need a fairly plain background - go for variation in foliage texture rather than colour. Try hygrophilla and ambulia for a start, then see what else your local aquarium store has.

Agreed David R - this is what always happens. But often the original poster doesn't know what info they should be giving or what questions they should be asking. So surely the first person to answer should be asking all the right questions instead of making recommendations. The pattern should go like this: 1) OP asks "What kind of fish can I get?" 2) Second poster says "Before this question can be answered, we need to know..." and goes on to ask all the relevant questions so subsequent posters have more info to base their recommendations on. Instead the pattern tends to go: 1) OP asks "What kind of fish can I get?" 2) "I like oscars. You should get them." 3) "I like killies. That's what you should get." 4) "You should get a school of clown loaches." IMO it's a bit harsh to blame the "failure" on the OP.

That video is a really good demonstration of how cardinal tetras swim about kind of randomly (unless they get a fright) and rummynoses tend to school a bit tighter. Beautiful setup! In the Baltimore aquarium in the US they have an amazing South American tank with about a billion cardinal tetras and a cayman (sp?) - a kind of alligator thing. As you can imagine, the tank is MASSIVE. It has a submerged tree with a really tangled root system and the cayman can get completely out of sight behind the tree. I was looking in the tank at the billion tetras then all of a sudden they all moved as a single cloud of little fish to the other side of the tank and this cayman loomed out of the darkness and came up to the glass and looked at me. Oh my goodness that was a spectacular sight!

I've never had danio fry survive in a tank with other fish - they just seem too little and yummy and everyone eats them. :roll: Even with plants like java moss to hide in, as soon as they swim out they seem to get gobbled up. Is there any way you can divide off part of your tank until the fry get big enough not to be eaten?

Thanks for sharing your experience - that's one mistake I don't have to make for myself

LOL! Don't be sorry about being pedantic! I think it's a very good sign that you have patience and attention to detail - both things that are useful to a fish-keeper. You're right about that. Three things about a tank that can be the hardest to correct if you get it wrong: The stand, the background and the substrate. A bit of time and effort put into getting those right can save a lot of aggravation later, in my experience.

Romeo are you a wallpaper hanger? Sounds like you did a very thorough and excellent job.

pics! :bounce: pics! :bounce: pics! :bounce: Sorry to hear about your algae problem - I thought you were just talking about your standard slimey stuff you get on the glass, but your description sounds like hair algae? I'm fortunate not to have encountered hair algae in my long algae-keeping career but it sounds like a real pest from what people say. Good luck with it. Hopefully once your tank has aged a bit you'll achieve some kind of 'balance' and the algae will just disappear of its own accord.

Oh Nicmack, that's terrible! I am very sorry to hear about your losses. I would suggest emptying the tank and giving it a general clean (just so it's not sitting there looking nasty). Then let some of the helpful people on this forum talk you through what might have gone wrong so you can decide if you want to have another go. Catastrophic losses do happen in this hobby, but they aren't common. Hopefully this will be the only time in your fish-keeping career that you will suffer something like this. If you choose to keep going, it's likely you will end up finding the experience as rewarding and enjoyable as most of us do.

Yeah, that's why I started too - to get extra barbs and just to see if I could do it. Next thing I knew I had swarms of the little blighters! :lol:

Yes, ottos definitely like their buddies around them. But even when I had six in a 3-foot tank they would hide all the time. I used to go for months wondering if there were still any ottos in there, and then one day they would all pop out the front for some reason and I would be amazed to see them! One of the nice surprises in a heavily planted tank! :lol: (Actually calling it "heavily planted" is a bit too flash... more like a neglected jungle but the fish seemed to like it ok)

I used to get huge batches of gold barbs without a lot of effort - but yeah keeping them fed and thriving is the hard bit. And you never really make much money off them by the time you take into account all the time, effort, equipment etc you put into it! But it's still great fun and if you're lucky you'll get your money back when you sell them.

Some people spread a thin layer of oil on it and press the oiled side against the back of the tank. Then push the bubbles out with a credit card or ruler or something. It gives a really nice finish. A similar result can be achieved with water, and the backing can be peeled off and used over again (it can't if you use oil. I have been known to attach the backing to heavy corrugated cardboard then put the cardboard against the glass. Or just blutak if you're not to bothered about how it looks! :lol:

Do the people where you buy your black stockings ever look at you funny? And do you think 'fishnets' would work? :lol:

My clown loaches hide when there are strangers in the room. Visitors look in the tank and see the schools of barbs & tetras and simply have no idea that there's a bunch of big fat stripy guys hiding in the pile of rocks & driftwood at the back. Even food won't tempt them out. As soon as the visitors have gone, the loaches are out digging around as usual. The exception was my partner's 4 year old niece. She came over the other day and was all over the tank (I still need to clean her fingerprints off the front glass) and the loaches came out and acted like she wasn't there! Unheard of! She was jabbing at the biggest loach with her finger shrieking, "look at that big greedy one, it's taking all the food!" Meanwhile he just ignored her. As soon as her parents came to look, there were just innocent-looking barbs & tetras again. :lol: *disclaimer: Niece knows not to tap on the glass or put her hands in the water. No fish were harmed in the making of the newest little fish-enthusiast :bounce:

Ooooh no! You wouldn't want your brass dezincified!

oooh those little fry are so cute! Well done chin168 and congratulations on another good spawn.

Awww poor little guy

Don't be too hard on yourself - I think we've all done something similar at least once! Actually you probably haven't done the good greeblies much harm. The fact that the temp was low when the filter was off probably just meant they went to sleep for a while in your filter but they should be fine. And the fish will probably be fine too given they live in the Winterless North :lol:

Thanks! And it looks like they school right along with the full-colour neons? Very pretty!