pink_fish

Thanks

Hi all, Just a real quick question for ya (I am only just starting out with guppies) – how old do guppies have to be before their colours start to show? I've got a bunch of young'uns that are about 2mths old (the biggest of which is almost adult size now – 2cm-ish), but only their black colouration is showing and it is just becoming clear which are definitely males. Just wondered how much longer I have to wait before they start looking gorgeous, lol? Thanks in advance!

Thanks everybody - great advice. They're almost free-swimming now, so will be moving some out into my fry tank this evening.

Hi all, I have a beautiful pair of Bolivians that have spawned for the second time in my AR980 tank and are now watching over their wrigglers with pride. Last time, we waited until the fry were free swimming and then took some out of the tank and put them into another tank (8'x8'x19') to raise them up. The fry left in the main tank all disappeared a few days later (presumed consumed, lol), but the fry in our fry-raising tank all died just a few days after that... . I'm aware that they are sensitive to water conditions, and so I did a water change of around 50% every day/second day in the fry-raising tank. This first batch were unexpected, so I didn't have a cycled sponge filter for their tank, but figured that since there were only 20 or less, an un-cycled one, if nothing more than to provide water movement, would be ok. I fed them Liqufry initially, and then microworms after that. Basically, I would just really like some advice so that this time we can raise the fry up properly. I have prepared a cycled sponge filter and have microworms at the ready. What else can we do? Thanks for all your help in advance!

Any chance it could have been injured in some way – either by being attacked by other tank mates or on something in the tank (rock or something)? If your water is all good and nobody else is sick, then maybe that could be it.

I have used a medication called 'White Spot Cure' with great success - it's an anti-parasitic and cheap ($4 or so a bottle, if I recall) – I have Spike, my Siamese Fighter who 'came back from the dead', to prove its effectiveness. As others have said, you must continue to treat for awhile after you cease to see the spots – I treated for another week and kept him in his hospital tank for the following week, just to make sure. At the risk of causing confusion and being a bit controversial(!), on the subject of salt I have been doing my own reading lately and have been surprised to find out that a lot of people do not recommend it. I always used to use it, with no apparent problems, but have now stopped – although, as others above have said, it does work to cure ich. So you might want to read a few bits and pieces and make up your own mind before adding it to your tank. These are some of the articles I read which seem to make some valid points: http://www.algone.com/salt_in_fresh.php (from a aquarium pharmaceuticals company, so maybe biased, but interesting nonetheless) http://badmanstropicalfish.com/articles/article5.html http://www.aquariacentral.com/forums/sh ... hp?t=85698 (scroll down to the first post by liv2padl)

matto – how long ago did you buy him? *wonders if is from the same hatching as own* (edit: maybe my bloke is a sheila then??!! Ah well, I'll just leave it where it is with the blue rams in any case...) nycnlo – didn't realise that. I guess then there's still a small chance my guy is a girl – but 'it' spends all day sizing up to his reflection in the back of the tank and/or sizing up to the male blue ram, lol. Whatever 'it' is, its pretty bolshy! Still no sight of an egg spot, and I think that at the age it is the spot should be visible if indeed it is female. It also has a distinctly masculine mouth (I've noticed that my females' mouths look quite different to the mouths of my other males which both have bigger, more pug-like mouths). The long ventral fins that it has are what convince me the most though - very long and very bright; all the females I've ever had before have only had short/small pale ones.

He looks to be youngish – around 6–8 mths old I'd say, and he's blue/green with long red ventral fins – pretty much the same as this VT I found on the net: http://z.hubpages.com/u/102022_f520.jpg – but our guy has a bit more red in his anal fin. He is more wild-type, I think, than the fish in the pic though – when stressed, his 'female'-looking stripes show up and his colour is greyish around the head (like a female).

Well, he is definitely a 'he' – when I got home last night I found him having started a bubble nest. So now I've moved him in with my fiesty blue rams – they all seem to have come to an arrangement now (i.e. if he nips them, they nip him, lol) so I guess I'll keep him.

Thanks adodge – that's an idea, I'll give it a go this evening and will see what happens. I have had stroppy females before (and mine flare quite often) but they've all only been a bit wild to the other females in the tank, not to any of the other inhabitants, and given a day or so they all calmed down. Will report back later on after the bubble-nest test...

I just bought a 'female' fighter at my LFS who has turned out to be a very agro plakat male! I guess I should have taken a closer look at the pet shop, but I assumed she was just a very bright female! So I gets 'her' home, put her in a tank with my other females and assorted tetras and killies, and whammo – 'she' starts terrorising anything else that moves. I take a closer look and can't see an egg spot. So then I do the mirror test, and lo, 'she' is a 'he'. Sigh. :-? Just thought I'd give y'all a heads up about them being around again - either if anyone is looking for plakats or if anybody is looking for nice bright females and thinks they've found some! I think I read here somewhere a few weeks back about plakats being around and being sold as females. Both the LFS I visited this weekend have a bunch that look to be from the same brood – bright blue or red with very long red ventral fins – a bit grey looking too, with wild-type 'female' stripes – they do look like very good VT females. In any case, I'm going to see if the LFS I bought him from might take him back...

Thanks for the info, alanmin - that does make sense. I guess I have success because because I do always stock my tanks up very slowly (so I must actually be cycling them once the first couple of fish go in)! I must have read some flawed articles many years ago when I was getting into fish for the first time – I distinctly remember learning about cycling without using fish. I'll probably continue to set up tanks the way I always have as I find that the plants establish themselves better when there are no fish in there for a few weeks first, in any case. Jaide, good luck with your fish tank – keep us posted! I'm off to read more about this cycling business, lol.

I have found that there is enough waste material from the plants & results from water tests I've taken during the fishless month have showed the tanks going through their cycles happily. Once the month is up, I then build up my fish stock levels very slowly. Jaide, dimebag is probably right about just putting your 2 fish in straight away (since it's only 2 ) – just keep an eye on your ammonia and nitrates.

When everything is new, you have to cycle the hard way - ie, run the tank fishless for at least a month. You can add some friendly bacteria to help it along - Stresszyme for example. It _may_ be ready for fish sooner – use your nitrate & ammonia test kits to monitor what is going on. Some people do add a fish or two about two weeks in to provide some waste materials for the bacteria to work on (a guppy or danio etc.), but I've always gone the fishless way as I find it gives plants time to start growing properly.

Oh dear. :-? Did they improve when the heat went down then?

Well, all my tanks (ranging from 22l to 215l) read about 29C when I get home from work each day at the mo, but since the fish all look fine and dandy, I've left them alone. How hot would it get in their natural environments, anyway? Or, for example, in the big outdoor breeding ponds they use in Asia (Thailand for e.g.)? My feeling is that the fish can cope with some degree of variation. I do add cold water when I do my water changes though, although that doesn't really have all that much effect on the temperature! Has anyone actually had any stressed/sick fish as a result of this heat so far?

Hi Jaide, I'm sorry you've been having trouble with you wee fighter man (I just read your other post about him now having cotton-wool mouth disease). If you 'thoroughly' clean out a tank/filter you destroy most of the good bacteria required for biological filtration, as you know, so when you cleaned out your tank this is what happened. Your fish would have reacted differently depending on the health of each of them at the time. If your fighter was already a bit poorly he would have become more susceptible to increased ammonia etc. in your newly cleaned tank (fish can be stressed without appearing to be stressed - is is why 'suddenly' fish seem to get sick – their immune system is a bit weak, and so they get sick). A water change would have helped because if the biological filtration system in your tank is now not working, there will be an increase of nasty chemicals in your tank which will weaken and/or poison your fish. In terms of what you can do now that he is sick, you should firstly test your water to see what is going on. If you have too much ammonia or nitrite then you should do up a 50% water change straight away and then test your water daily, doing 10% water changes if necessary each day. Also important is to add friendly bacteria – 'Stresszyme' is one brand – these will help to kick start your filtration again. And remember not to totally clean your tank out again. For his cotton-wool, I have had success treating fungus diseases just with 'Tonic' (mainly methylene blue) – read the instructions and go from there. Move him to a nicely-cycled hospital tank if you have one available. I hope some of this info helps. Keep us posted on how he does.

Mine eat ANYTHING – staple are various flake and pelleted foods (BettaMin, NovoBel, NovoTab, Shrimp Pellets, SpectraMax), supplements are cooked peas, cucumber/courgette, spirulina tablets (all put in for the BN, but my fighters eat them all too). Once a week they get daphnia (currently mixed with mozzie larvae), and maybe once a fortnight, bloodworms; less often they get a few microworms. The only 'fussy' fighters I've had gave up being fussy after a few days after they discovered what the regime was at my place, lol.

Oh my – I'm so sorry for your losses! I'm afraid I don't know what's happening to your poor wee fishes, but I can commiserate. A mystery disease chomped through my collection of Black Widows early this year and I've got a mystery ulcer-y thing chewing up my favourite female fighter. I hope things come right for you soon. :-?

Luckily fighters are pretty resilient fish – he should be okay given time. Put in some 'Stress Coat' and some 'Tonic' (mostly contains methylene blue, so anything containing a bit of this will do) - follow the directions on the bottles. Keep him alone in a quiet (not too much water flow) tank. And keep us posted on how he does!

I'd be interested to know too. I didn't realise there were any in NZ - any FSs stocking them?

Can I ask how big the tank is? Size of tank & the number of occupants is often significant in situations like this.

Hi, Beautiful fish you have there! I agree with others that have said that you have a cycling issue – follow their advice & things should start to improve. Also, looking at the pic of your tank, I would suggest that you have too many fish in there – goldfish need a lot more surface area per fish than tropical fish do. If possible, halve your fish population _permanently_ – and when cycling, it is usually recommended to have even less fish ('cos there won't be enough bacteria to consume their waste). Good luck!

Hollywood has some of these, at least they did this past weekend. I didn't realise they were killies & I looked and looked at them and thought, 'gosh, they look like killies', rotl!

lmsmith - thx - its an 'ex'-state house - I just noted that it was one to give people an idea about what kind of house/structure we were dealing with. Current status is that my partner is going to strengthen the stand and add some bearers to the joists - yay for having a builder as a partner.