Matt

I asked at jansen's yesterday and they said to use a coke bottle and an airstone, but to use a straw over the airline tubing to hold the airstone at the bottom, which I thought was a very useful tip. I like your idea of the peanut butter container though Caryl as it sounds easier to harvest them than trying to get them out of the neck of a coke bottle . I am going to have a go tonight and see how much mess I can make, hopefully I should have a batch of A. Cacatuoides which should be free swimming tomorrow night. I haven't seen them yet though so the female might just be having me on :roll:

Just place some peat in one of your filter compartments inside a stocking or one of the fluval media bags. I am using a Fluval 404 on my tank and it is 40 inches long by 20 inches wide, your 204 should be fine on a 3 foot.

I have two pair in my 250 litre community tank, ph 6.6, temp 26C, which breed about every month but eat the eggs after a few days. I feed them a varied diet of blood worms, frozen brine shrimp, shrimp pellets, algae wafers, flake food etc. They need soft acid water to breed successfully i.e. peat filtered. See previous thread: http://www.fnzas.org.nz/fishroom/viewtopic.php?t=2984 Some more info here: http://apisto.bravepages.com/Ram%20article.htm I hope this helps. Good luck

I have read of horror stories on the internet about glass bottles exploding when used for co2 , I'm not sure how true they are however. I use a 2.25 litre coke bottle filled to the top of the label, with two cups of white sugar, half a teaspoon of yeast and a pinch of baking soda. I get about two weeks out of mine. At the start it runs at about one bubble a second dropping to one every three seconds at the end.

I have just set up a new tank 24-12-18 for breeding dwarf cichlids and am in the process of planting it out. I have quite a few excess plants in my main tank that I could use, but the only problem is that I am trying to get rid of green beard algae in that tank which just won't go away. If I was to transfer some of the excess plants into this new tank with no fish (no phosphates etc), and leave them to get established for at least two weeks, would the algae die off or would it just lie dormant? For the sake of $20 worth of plants (Ambulia, Java Moss etc) I would rather buy some new ones from the LFS than have stupid stubborn algae in two tanks! Cheers, Matt

Hi Susi, From my calculations (which are probably wrong ), that means your lights are on for 16 hours per day which is too much. Your lights should only be on for 10-12 hours per day, which is the length of a day in the tropics. Get a 24 hour timer from mitre 10/placemakers etc (about $9.00) so your lights will come on and go off at the same time each day - better for the fish and plants. Cheers, Matt

Welcome Natalie and Matt, Good luck with the discus, I am rather jealous . What size tank do you have them in? Cheers, Matt

Maybe scubaferret means platties or some other yellow/gold coloured fish rather than goldfish...

I've used Tonic before but found that it didn't completely get rid of the white spot after two doses. I did a water change and then got some White Spot Cure from Hollywood Fish Farm and that got rid of it, after a couple of doses. I was advised to keep dosing until the white spot was completely gone, even tough the bottle said to only dose a maximum of three times. Cheers, Matt

There are a couple of programs already out there that you might want to look at one is Aqualog http://www.joejaworski.com/aqualog/ . This is the program I use to remind me when to dose fertiliser, change water, Co2 etc, it says Windows 98 but I use it on XP and it works fine. There is another called Aquaguide?? I think, but I can't find it on the net at the moment. Cheers, Matt

You might want to try some Teenage Mutant Ninja Tetras, I've heard they are quite good at fending for themselves :lol: :lol:

In my tank I have Blue Rams and Keyhole Cichlids and in with them I have Rummy Nose and Black Phantom Tetras. I think they are also referred to as dither fish. My cichlids are definitely not shy and are out in the open most of the time, it also helps to have a lot of plants and rocks/wood for them to hide in if they want.

Hi Kim, I would like to come along if that is ok. I have been meaning to join a club for a couple of years now . Cheers, Matt

Hi Ballistic, The rams i have are Microgeophagus Ramirezi they are called Blue or German Rams. IMO they are smaller and prettier than the Bolivian Rams. I tried searching for webpages but couldn't find any with any decent info. My tank specs are 250l heavily planted, ph 5.5-6.0 (peat filtered), Temp 26C lit for 10 hours per day. I have been feeding frozen bloodworms twice a week and also frozen brine shrimp once a week to condition them, the rest of the time I feed flake and pellet food. I did nothing special to get them to breed, in fact I had just finished dosing for whitespot which both pairs were riddled with a couple of days before they layed eggs :-? I don't know why the pics come through on my machine and not on everyone else's??? Anyway, here are the links to the pics: http://www.geocities.com/i_lovebeer/Ram ... ngEggs.jpg http://www.geocities.com/i_lovebeer/Ram ... gEggs1.jpg http://www.geocities.com/i_lovebeer/Ram ... gEggs2.jpg I am hoping to get hold of another tank soon to set up as a breeding tank for them. I don't have any other tanks at the moment so I will have to see how they go in the community tank first. Goodluck Ballistic Cheers, Matt

I just thought I would post some pics of my Rams breeding in my community tank. I must have done something right because both pairs bred at once . I couldn't get any photos of the second pair as they were sneaky and bred on the back of a rock. I think they may have eaten their eggs now though as they aren't guarding the rock anymore. Fingers crossed for the second pair. Nothing can get within a square foot of their eggs, especially the Keyholes which get chased for three laps of the tank if they get too close . Cheers, Matt

Bristlenose are extremely efficient at making twisted val disappear

Just to add to to what Ira said, due to their long fins don't put one in with fish that nip fins i.e. Tiger Barbs. Cheers, Matt

Make sure his water is clean i.e. regular water changes. I know Melafix can be used as a wound treatment, but I have never used it for this purpose myself so I'm not sure how effective it is. I hope this helps, Cheers Matt

Hi Alan, Thanks for the reply, try right clicking on the pics and selecting show picture. The don't seem to come through everytime as they are hosted at geocities - free but slow. I think I will keep a close eye on how the parents cope, and if I have to I will move the black phantoms to my work tank for a while. There is heaps of cover for them, especially in the overgrown ambulia that I was going to trim, but I guess I will have to leave it for a while now . Thanks again for the info, Cheers, Matt

Yes it does, you don't need carbon with planted tanks as healthy plants with remove impurities from the water by themselves. From http://www.fnzas.org.nz/filtration-3.0.html Types of Media Activated Carbon The most familiar chemical adsorbent is activated carbon. Activated carbon should be a little larger than pinhead in size. When washed and dry, it should be dull and not shiny. When placed in water, it should hiss. It should also tend to float at first. Be careful of charcoal, however, because it is dull and floats, but does not hiss. Charcoal is usually very soft, crumbling easily between the fingers and is usually available only in pea-size. Good activated carbon is hard but fragile, feels hard and does not crumble, but fractures under finger pressure. Not all true activated carbons are equivalent. The most common available carbons are economical water purification grades, usually derived from wood or nutshells. These are not bad carbons, but you may wish to seek out some better grades. The best carbons are usually produced from bituminous coal and have high porosity and low density. They should also have low ash content to minimize impact on pH. Most activated carbons need to be thoroughly washed prior to use. Because it is soft it has a tendency to crush a little during shipping and is therefore covered it carbon dust. Rinse in clean befor use. All activated carbons release phosphate, despite claims to the contrary, and only those that release the least should be selected for reef aquaria. Activated carbon adsorbs a small quantity of ammonia, nitrite and nitrate, but the quantity is quite small. In most aquariums it would take a large bucket of activated carbon to remove enough nitrate to be effective. Its main use is to adsorb organic compounds. These compounds give the water its aged look (yellow). It adsorbs dissolved food, fat, and minute dirt particles. Advantages: Easy to use, Relatively Cheap, quickly polishes the aquarium water. Disadvantages: Must be cleaned before use, has a short life (approx. 1 month), many carbons tend to release the waste products back into the water once saturated, does not specifically target unwanted compounds (often removes fertilisers from planted tanks), releases phosphates into the tanks water when first introduced.

I got home last night to find my Keyhole Cichlids had laid about 100-120 eggs in a cave and were furiously defending them from anything that came within a 10cm radius, which made me feel rather proud . I didn't end up eating dinner till 10pm as I couldn't put myself away from watching them . Has anyone successfully raised keyhole babies in a community tank? I have been planning on getting a 3 foot tank to use for breeding my Rams, Keyholes and Discus (when I can afford them) but haven't got around to it yet so I have no where else to put them. The Keyhole's stand a good chance as they are twice the size of anything else in the tank - 2 rams, 8 black phantom tetras, 4 julii corudoras, 4 otocinclus & 2 baby siamese algae eaters. Any idea when the eggs will hatch? I'm guessing Saturday but I haven't researched it yet. Please excuse the crappy pics, I didn't have my digital camera at home so I had to use my phone. Thanks for any help, Matt

I got some of the wood from a river. Lights are on for 12 hours a day, total 120 watts. Tank is 100x50x50cm, 250litres. I kept forgetting to bring my flourish home from work so the tank wasn't fertilised for the first three weeks, now I am using both flourish and flourish excel. I removed the algae on Tuesday using a nylon brush, and at this stage it has stopped growing but is not dieing off yet. All my plants are growing well especially the Ambulia which has gone red at the top. I have two baby Siamese algae eaters and 4 Otocinclus in there. I have a Bristlenose at work which I was thinking of taking home to help out, but I'm too scared as she has a fondness for Twisted Val . I will take a new photo in the weekend as the tank is looking much better now When is the next North Shore meeting? Cheers, Matt

I'm not sure what type of algae I have, I think it is green beard algae. the reason I am using all three is because I needed to start fertilising anyway and the algaefix is to inhibit the algae growth as it seems to feed of what the plants feed off. I started injecting co2 last week and it started pearling and growing faster . The tank is only about 5 weeks old so I think part of my problem is due to cycling, there is still a slight film of protein on the top and it was still showing a small amount of ammonia last week.I have removed most of it manually and it seems to have stopped growing but hasn't started dieing yet, I just added a second dose of algaefix last night so I will wait and see what happens. Here is a before and after pic three weeks apart,

I just learnt that lesson the hard way, huge algae explosion , they hadn't seen algae like it at the Hollywood Fish Farm. I have started dosing with algaefix, Flourish and Flourish Excel and it is has stopped growing.

For the logo, how about a fish with a mullet, wearing black jeans and a leather jacket leaning on his MK1 Ford Cortina :lol: Just kidding, I will put some thought into it today, if I can do anything to help let me know. Cheers, Matt