malevolentsparkle

Ive got an ehiem pickup 2012 internal. super quiet. I paid around $90 for it and you could probably go for the next size down. I cut the sponge down and have ceramic tubes in the top for increased biological filtration. going good so far.

I got sick of my geophagus digging up my plants so i got some smallish (2-3cm) decorative stones from hardware store and covered an area with them. so now about 20% of my tank floor is undiggable and has my smaller/shallow rooted plants. he dosnt seem to bother the bigger plants so the rest of the tank allows him to forage. if you find stones a similar colour to your gravel they won't stand out that much

no, behind the anostomus it looks like a chiclid of some kind.

wow i have never heard of them killing each other, they are teritorial but they hardly have the tools to kill! It seems unlikly that the other fish ate all of him, they are mostly boney plates. maybe he jumped out and a cat or something eat him? my tank was the same with the back corners cut out for cables, he got out, so beware!

I found a pic of my old 4ft tank that i had several years ago when i was still at home. I think the photo was taken in 2003: From memory: pearl gourami, anostomus, kribs, lots of loaches, flying fox, geophagus juripari. also one of these: I found the photo but don't remember what it is the big rock was found in a river near raetihi on the central platau. you can't see it in the photo but its full of fossilised seashells. I think i still have it somewhere...

he should be fine. the only thing i would worry about would be the shark but if hes nice to the bristlenoses that it should be sweet. nothing in your tank could eat him, he is heavily armoured and very camoflaged. let us know how he goes. I will warn you though, I had one recently that jumped out at night. apparently some do it sometimes for no obvious reason. make sure you lid has no gaps where he can sucker his way out of.

the cool thing about a whiptail is that you can always see them! they are camoflaged so their reaction to a perceived theat is to freeze rather than hide

you guys have got me interested now, ive got a box filter running peat, could i plug the co2 into the airline?

loaches will be your friend here. if you have small gravel/sand they will dig and are every entertaining! if you like catfish a whiptail might be a good idea, they get pretty long but are super slim and don't swim around much.

Just in case the idea of c02 and fertilizer is a bit daunting, I have a well planted tank (including amazon swords) with no soil or anything under the gravel (grey grit from HWFF) and no c02. I also have only 1x t8 tube on a 155L tank. The only special thing i do is chuck a bit of liquid mico-nutrient fertilizer every now and then. I have no problem getting decent growth and everything looks healthy, in fact my big sword is out growing the tank and reproducing like mad!

how does it compare difficulty wise to a tropical marine?

will give it a go at hollywood. if not ill pick up a cheap one. 100L/h will be enough for peat in a 155L tank right? or would i need something bigger?

president was a major brand, at least at HWFF, several years ago. but they seem to have closed up shop - can't find any info on them on the net.

Im planning on getting some soon, but the wild colour form. anyone had any problems with them?

wow this is amazing! where did you get everything from?

hay, I have an old president 6000 air pump lying around and thought Id use it in my aquarium to run a box filter with peat in it. But even though it makes all the right noises, etc i'm getting no air flow. anyone know if you can still get parts for these? I assume it's the diaphrams, maybe another brand will fit?

could it be that you all are getting multiple males? I thought rams liked male/female pairs. "Most fish can be kept as tank mates as long they are not extremely aggressive fish or fish that are big enough to eat them. Other male dwarf cichlids shouldn't be kept with them unless the tank exceeds [180L]. If the tank is less than [135L] it won't be a good idea to have more than one male ram as there may be territorial disputes." "Introduction to an established tank is essential as they are likely to die if the water is not 'old' enough." http://www.fishlore.com/aquariummagazine/dec07/blue-ram-cichlid.htm

for a natural looking piece i would say you would have better luck with a wholesaler. find out where slate is quarried in NZ and go from there

i meant hardness, pH etc.

what kind of water you got in there? I far from an expert on your fish but have you you thought about large torpedo barbs?

hay i got one of those years ago - sold as a kuli too. I think mine was more brown though. skinnier and longer than a kuli but otherwise pretty similar.

i have one of those filters, its great, it has 3 seperate, large inlets so the suction is not huge. have it set to the lowest setting (it's pretty variable) and leave space around the filter (ie dont put it right in the corner). and it should be fine. It also have a large output so you don't get a jet of high speed water like some filters i could mention...

with cuttings i dont really see any other option than lead. ive got about 10 lots of cuttings in my tank with lead on them. i'm planning to remove the lead soonish, at least on the fast growing plants. problem with aquatic plants is that unlike land plants they can grow leaves with no roots at all! oh how to tell when roots have grown.

i used to keep those things when i was a kid. apart from the illegal part they make great first fish. they are free, not fussy about food or water chemisty and are interesting to breed. just the problem of what to do with them when you want to move on!

sounds like the ole white spot to me. you should be able to pick up white spot cure from any pet store.