Ice222

I know it can be confusing, but it's like asking for a doctor's advice online, even thought there may be many good doctors answering you questions, it can be difficult to get the right answer when none have seen your problem directly and crossed off all the possible causes of the symptoms. Especially when they don't have the full background of the patient. In fish terms that would be things like: -How big is the tank? -What kind of filter? -How many fish? -What kind of fish? -How long has it been cycled/cycling? -How much do you normally water change and how often? -What do you feed them and how much? -Did anything differently lately? -Have you been you been using any meds or chems? -What are your Ammonia, Nitrite, and Nitrate levels? -What is your tank temperature at? And there's more! You can see, considering the large number of things that could be affecting the fish, you can see why it can be hard to find the cause of a problem and give the right treatment. This time it's just a case of 'too many cooks in the kitchen' if you know what i mean :roll:. I by no means claim to be a veteran, I've only kept tanks since April this year, but I haven't had a single fish die yet so I think I'm doing okay :lol:. Did come close once or twice though with some silly mistakes! Very nice to hear that someone has gone out to see your fish in person though, I hope they were helpful. EDIT: I better not have jinxed my fish just now... Somehow my betta looks a bit 'off'. Paler, not swimming as much and not swimming up to me when I go up to the glass. Maybe he's just pale since it's night, the lights are off, and he's sleeping so not swimming up to me, but I'm gonna keep a close eye on him anyway D:.

Omaria, yea it's hard starting up a tank when a lot of petstores give wrong information anyway. I'd recommend just getting a Ammonia and Nitrite test kit, as they are most likely what your fish are having problems with. It'll also help you tell when your tank is cycled, I think they usually take about a month to cycle if starting from scratch. Basically your fish poo/pee all add to Ammonia which burns their gills and makes it hard for them to breathe, you need to wait for a invisible bacteria to grow in your filter to turn Ammonia into Nitrite, Nitrite is still bad for fish so you wait for a second type to turn it into a Nitrate. Since you started with quite a few fish and you don't have the right bacteria, that's why your fish is unwell. Feeding less and changing small amounts of water often, will help get rid of the ammonia or nitrite (especially if you suck up any uneaten food in the process) until the good bacteria has formed. I think you have already heard that Chlorine is bad for fish, and you already add a chemical to get rid of it, but I'd recommend one particular one called Prime, because with that one, you only have to add a few drops (1 drop/2L) so a small bottle will last you a long time, and it also makes ammonia less harmful for awhile. To cycle you must leave your filter on all the time, having a heater also helps cycling. Plants aren't necessary, but if you don't have plants to absorb nutrients in the water you're probably more likely to have algae problems. Also It may sound mean, but I think that if your fish have babies at the moment, I think you should just let the parents eat them, otherwise if your tank water isn't stable yet, they'd most likely die anyway and add to the amount of waste in the tank. I hope you'll continue to enjoy fish keeping as you learn more it gets easier and easier to keep (until people then decide to go for harder challenges once they're hooked ).

Hey, skittles actually taste different if they are a different colour unlike m&ms . So mush misleading stuff about fish out there. 6 second memory my ass.

Oh yea there's also one thing I've always wondered. What fish, if any, would actually eat themselves to death? Since keeping fish, so far, I think it's just a myth, all of mine seem to get bored of their food pretty quickly if I feed too much. I supposed the risk is more in polluting their water?

It's always hard to buy snail free plants. Just gotta use your eyes I think, and if I remember right you can dip the plant in some salty water and rinse it 1st before you but it in the tank. That sounds like a fairly fish-safe way to rid the snails. Most snails aren't really a problem though, and I actually like the look of trumpet snails (plus they tend to hide in the sand). I hate the 'pond' ramhorn snails tho D:. I just don't like the look of them.

A lot of stores including my own work uses TM as a cheap form of advertising. Hell even if the fish sold at $1, I'd say it'd be worth it. Look at how much attention it got, the cost of 1 zebra plec to get that amount of advertising is a bargain imo, I wouldn't say it was a desperate move at all. Also I don't remember HFF saying that they are the only people who could get them, just that they're the only ones that actually had them for sale, and although I don't approve of the way they worded it, considering that there were ppl marauding choco zebras as zebra plecs to sell at the time, I can see why HFF wrote what they did in the auction.

Nah not all the time, only happens once every few days it seems. It's as though the 2 fish both decide to simultaneously chase each others tails or something. I think it's a display of some sort, but I'm just not sure whether it's are 'we're sorting out the heirachy here' kinda thing or more of a 'wanna spawn ?' kinda thing. Heck it many not even mean anything maybe that's how they play. CPDs just seem to enjoy chasing each other around all the time anyway, and it's not just boys chasing girls.

Right now I'm keeping a 30L tank with 7 CPDs, a Fighter and 2 Otos. I'm using my old AR380 as a quarantine tank, and I have a fishless cycle on my other 30L tank which would hopefully be for breeding the CPDs if I can manage it. I have 2 Sparkling Gouramis in the QT atm as I just got them, but they already look settled in and are enjoying chasing each other. Just a few observations I've noticed about my fish in general: -The oto cats (and my old GBA) don't touch the brown/red algae I have in my QT, but the Sparklings nibble on it. -Just got the new fishfood at HFF, all my fish love it, even the Otos, all EXCEPT for the Sparklings who spit them back out... Something must be wrong with their tastebubs ! -Double CDPs swim circles, all the way, around each other. Sometimes triple circles. It's so intense! What does it mean?! -Thought Oto cats like hiding places? Mine seem to be enjoying their home with my CPDs despite it being completely open + a light background (light is being repaired/replaced so the plants aren't growing atm ). And not about the fish per-say but I'm geting a clear case of MTS D:. Started with one, now I have 5, 2 I plan to sell, but then I'm thinking of buying 2 to replace the 2 I'd be selling... Thank god I'm only really a fan of tiny fish, keeps costs down, and I actually have space for them .

Wow that is cool. I've heard of ppl trying to get green water to promote infusoria for fry, but this about biofuel is even cooler .

Maybe they need root ferts? I had some with a crappy kitset light and it still grew 1-2 tiers a day. JBL plant balls work well.

Well done, it's looking really good . Is it better than the original?

I hear female fighters are better in odd numbers esp if you're not keeping very many? Helps them set up a heirachy apparently. I don't know how true that is though.

Your ambulia is so short. It's cute !

This thread makes Dennis's Pic to the left pretty appropriate. That aside, I don't know why ppl like straight val so much, imo twisted val looks awesome.

I don't trust most cycling products, but sounds like I might have to try JBL filter start. I've used Stability, which is neat, works quickly but since you're supposed to keep using it, I wouldn't want to rely on it. If your tank is heavily stocked and you stop using it you might risk your tank re-cycling. Most recently, I've been cycling I've been doing a fishless cycle with two new tanks using ammonia nitrate (got it off a mate who does chemistry at uni), and one cycled in less than a week. I only had one heater at the time though, and I must say it made a HUGE difference. the tank without the heater is still cycling, whereas I just moved my fish into the heated tank a few days ago.

That's the algae I've been having trouble with too D:. Been trying to get a pic of it for id, but i don't have a decent camera. I wouldn't say it's easy to remove though, it sorta slimes over everything in the tank, and the BN I had and my ottos I now won't touch it. It grows incredibly fast too. Also either I am getting 2 types of algae, or it goes a little greener when i increase the lighting period.

Yea I like her fighters, the plakat I got from her is lovely. Just moved him over to his new tank today (was cycling it fishless before). The same thing happened to me, one of her stunning fighters was for sale and I missed the bidding. Thankfully she had a similar one, brother of the one on auction, and I ended up getting him. He does have uneven ventral fins, most likely from fighting, but it's just a minor flaw to me really.

How long have you had fish in the tank before you got the ammonia reading though? And I don't know what OP bought, but I figure it's the type of stuff that would mess with ammonia readings, but as they got an ammonia reading BEFORE they put the stuff in, I don't think that was the problem. From what I know of Prime though, it doesn't remove ammonia, only detoxifies it, and doesn't mess with readings, most other ammonia locking/removing products do.

From how I read it, OP did a 25% water change, then checked the water and found high ammonia.. Then went to HFF, bought some sort of ammonia reducing stuff to put in the filter, and took out the filter media to fit in the new stuff and rinsed it all under tap water. How long has your tank been set up before the ammonia spike? Also how big is the tank and what do you have in it at the moment? As for PH, from what I hear it's generally best to just leave it alone. Better to have stable PH than to mess around with you PH with things like PH up or PH down. I'm not sure how Cichilid keepers get and maintain a steady high PH though. Prime is a water conditioner that removes chlorine in tapwater making it safe for fish, but it also detoxifies ammonia for some time. It doesn't remove ammonia, but it'll buy you some time to fix the root problem and the good thing is it won't mess up any test kit readings unlike many other products. How you should clean your tank really depends how long it's been running, how big your tank is and what kind of fish you have in it. Generally you shouldn't have to move out the tank decorations and/or the substrate though, and don't touch any part of the filter that are meant to store the good bacteria.

A fighter's level of aggressiveness really varies from one to the other. If you have currently a have one with your danios in the 25L and they aren't being bullied, then it'll probably fine with other fish provided that they aren't aggressive/nippy, colourful, or long finned. As for snails and smail eggs, it's probably best to just manually remove them from what I heard. Things that kill snails are generally not great for fish either, and most snails don't do much harm. I'd recommend getting against putting females with the male though, not so much for the fishie's sake, but I know if it were me I'd be tempted to breed them and further fuel this MTS (Multiple tank syndrome) that I've heard so much about .

I meant that I really have a preference for Bowfront tanks. Maybe it's cause I like tiny fish. I know bow fronts distorts the fish a bit, I find that it kinda magnifys them, so it makes my tiny fish a little easier to see. As for my budget, I don't really have one yet. Only just got a job so I'll just save for the moment and see what I can afford in a few weeks time. If I do decide to custom a tank, I'd probably be after a 60lx38wx40h bowfront and looking at spending a few hundred dollars on the tank alone. I'd only really need the front to be low iron, so just curious about what the availability/prices for the front panel might be like.

Wonder if you can get the low iron glass in curved for bowfront anywherei n NZ. Wish I didn't like bowfront tanks so much, then I could utilise my work and see if I can get low iron glass at a good price, I know we can't even get curved glass through my work though so definitely not low iron curved glass from them!

I suppose that could be it but moss shouldn't go brown that quickly just from lack of Nitrates? Didn't used to water change so often either, but since I have a n algae problem and I can't identify my algae, I just upped the water changes since most people seem to say algae is cause from some sort of excess nutrient and water changes are usually recommend it. Even without the frequent WC the moss was still dismal.

Hmm I do live in the same suburb as Adrienne so I could be something out of the tap. If I collect rainwater to use, is there any risks? I mean it's probably more gross to me than anything (eg. I know we certainly do get some mozzie larvae in any standing water around my house, it's probably more gross to me than to the fish really). Stopping the ferts, hopefully that'll help, cause that's definitely easier to fix than my tap water! Thinking I might just start over. Get an excuse to get some new tanks and sell my current ones .

I seem to have trouble getting moss to live let alone grow. Its kept in a 23C tank with CPDS +1 betta and gets a water change every 2-3 days (25%), tap water is treated with Prime, and I add a 3 drops of Tetra Florapride. Haven't done any tests lately Didin't used to add excel but I had a weird algae problem I couldn't find a solution to so tried dosing it to see if that's help. Tank is 35l x 26d x 26h with a sponge filter (+airpump) that's both overrated than for a tank this size. Light is an Aqua one AL-8 reflector unit. Considering that Java moss is a low light plant I'm pretty sure lighting isn't the problem. The stocking level shouldn't be a problem either as the moss was pretty dismal even before the addition of fish and my water changes are pretty frequent. There must be something fairly wrong with my water or the fert I'm using somehow, since it's not just this tank that can't grow moss.The Xmas moss I just bought and kept in a different unfiltered+unheated tank, was still emerald green after a week of being in post, but it's starting to turn brown after just 3 days here. It's not just posted plants either, the Java moss I got from HFF is the same, emerald green but goes brown in my tank after 3 days. I'm pretty sure they're not acclimatising, there's moss in here that's 3 months old, it hasn't grown, I've thrown out the worst of it but it's still mostly a brown clump.