Kinbote

Mine's made with 10mm and the distortion is pretty bad whenever you're looking at it on an angle; wondered how inevitable it was. A guy today told me that it 'looks like half the depth it really is'.

David, your tank's made with 12mm glass, right? How do you find the optical distortion?

Good article, thanks. Unfortunately the antibiotics he (and everyone else I've read) recommends are the same as I'm using with absolutely no effect, which is what makes me suspect that it may not be columnaris or that the columnaris may be secondary to something I haven't detected, eg. NTD. :dunno:

If you haven't actually seen any of the other fish harass him, it could be a columnaris infection which will make the fins disintegrate like they've been chewed off, cause red patches of dying skin that might look like burns, and can also make the fish separate off from the rest. It usually infects fish that are already weakened for some reason. If you've got a quarantine tank you'd do well to put him in there, which would also resolve the bullying if that's what it turns out to be. It's very variable in appearance, but check out some pictures: http://www.google.com/images?um=1&hl=en ... 80&bih=959

25% every four days as per the Furan-2 directions, and I've done an additional 50% in between treatments. So lots, in other words. And of course I'm dosing with StressCoat as well as StressZyme. The fish are all in my quarantine tank.

I'd said in the original post that that's what I'm assuming it is and what I'm treating for, but if it is columnaris it should be responding to the medication, and it shouldn't have suddenly started after bringing in some infected fish, since columnaris preys on already weakened fish is already present in most aquariums.

Another dead fish today, this time a rosy tetra, and a sick bleeding heart is steadily deteriorating. I've completed two cycles of Furan-2 and am starting a third, and it's had absolutely no perceivable effect with the fish steadily dying. I'm trying to keep the temperature down to 24C but with the ambient room temperature it's usually nearer 26. Ammonia and nitrite have consistently been reading 0. The fish aren't eating much and I'm not feeding them much, so I doubt decayed food is a factor, but I've removed most of the gravel in case that was harbouring anything. I've also added tonic salt since that's meant to inhibit columnaris's ability to attach to fish. But if it is columnaris or saprolegnia I'd have expected it to respond to Furan-2, and it wouldn't make sense that this all started after contact with some sick cardinal tetras. My last bleeding heart that died was a lot more symptomatic than the current ones, but I didn't get a picture unfortunately. It had the characteristic whitened saddle ring around its dorsal fin and some fuzzy white patches on its side. I don't see anything on the rosy other than some internal whitening around its stomach, which looks vaguely like NTD, which would fit my suspicion that they might have NTD and only have columnaris as a more obvious, but secondary, infection. The bleeding heart has a big patch of fuzz on its mouth and some more on its left pectoral fin and tail. And here's a pic of one of the sick cardinals that seemed to start it all about 2 weeks ago. Hope someone can suggest something. Pretty depressing so far. :dunno:

I took David R's advice and made up some concentrated blackwater in a bucket by soaking bagged peat moss and indian almond leaves in boiling water, added that and the tank's starting to look a lot better. It's not quite this dark in real life but it's getting a nice whiskey tone.

After looking at a lot of photos, I think the cardinal tetras I got from Bird Barn probably had neon tetra disease, and columnaris as a secondary infection. I'm treating my quarantine tank with Furan-2, halfway through the second complete treatment cycle now, but it's having no discernible effect and my bleeding heart tetras are still getting infected and dying one after another (although the rosy tetras in the same tank still seem fine). As I've read, columnaris is an opportunistic infection that targets weak fish, but my ammonia and nitrite are both reading 0, I'm doing regular water changes and the fish were all very healthy before I brought in the infected cardinals. If it were columnaris, I'd expect the treatment to work, but is it possible that the bleeding hearts might be infected with (more or less incurable) neon tetra disease but only showing symptoms of columnaris as a secondary infection? I'd been working on the assumption that once the treatment's complete and the fish are healthy, I can assume my (big, canister) filter is also safe to transfer back to my main tank. But if they're infected with incurable neon tetra disease, will I then have to replace all the filter media to be safe?

I don't know, but there's absolutely no visible algae growing on any of the surfaces so far, and when I had the 330 litre tank in the same place (without peat moss or indian almond leaves) it never got green like this.

I've got plenty of teatree. Might be an idea. I filled up the Hailea BT1000 with peat moss and emptied 11 teabags of crushed indian almond leaves into a media bag and hung it in front of the filter's outflow.

Thanks. I'm not using any fertiliser, and no food since there aren't any fish in it yet. I don't think the green is algal since it was crystal clear until I added the peat moss and indian almond leaves. Just would have preferred a browner tint.

It could be, but there's absolutely no visible algae on any surface so far. Too asian? I'm not totally happy with the look of it yet. I went for the bamboo because I noticed that most of my plants and driftwood were reaching about the same height halfway up the tank and creating an imaginary line there, which the bamboo is helping to break up. I'm trying to get a look something like these pics: http://www.amanotakashi.net/portfolio/a ... water.html, and trying to create interest without blocking the open spaces. Would look better with actual tree branches instead of bamboo, but it cost just $4.40 and came heat treated. Bamboo does grow in the Amazon, so it's not implausible.

Here's the latest view of the tank. I have to say it photographs extremely badly and looks a lot better in person. Tanning up pretty well; it's greener than I'd hoped though. I'm using peat moss and indian almond leaves, both of which look brown, so I'm not sure why it's ending up green. Anyone have any experience with that?

As I've said in other topics on here, I've had an outbreak of what seems to be columnaris contracted from some infected fish that I got from Bird Barn. I'm treating my quarantine tank with Furan-2, and have been running one of my Aqua One CF1200 filters which I planned to transfer to my 800 litre tank once it's ready. I'm wondering what I need to do to ensure that I'm not going to contaminate my big tank when I transfer the filter over. Can I assume that if the fish are healthy after the treatment, that the filter will be clean too? Or should I replace the filter media to be safe? It'd probably cost about $100, but that might be cheaper than treating the 800 litre tank if I had an outbreak there. And should I throw out the gravel and decor from the quarantine tank once it's been treated? What's the protocol?

Thanks for the reply, that's interesting to know. I'll write some more about my thoughts on BB after my current situation's cleared up.

Looks great to me. Liked it slightly more with just the wood, rock and moss.

Another rosy tetra's dead this morning, as is the injured bleeding heart, which is probably for the best. That makes three of my fish I've lost so far. I'd said in another thread (viewtopic.php?f=4&t=50615) that this all started when I got a batch of cardinal tetras selected by a visibly stoned employee from the Bird Barn Henderson, at least one of which was clearly in the advanced stages of disease on arrival. They'd previously said that they'd compensate me for the loss of any of my own fish from the same infection, but have since revoked that offer. Accidents happen, no doubt, and it's unfortunate for everyone, but it seems like there's some negligence involved here. The fish loss and medication have cost me about $60 so far. Will see how it progresses.

I'm dosing them with API Furan-2, hopefully they'll pull through. I suspect it's the same infection that's been spread from the cardinal tetras I got at Bird Barn, maybe columnaris.

One of my bleeding hearts in a quarantine tank with some others and some rosy tetras seems to have had its tail bitten off, and now there's an infection (white discolouration, white fuzz) around the area. Should I euthanise, or could some kind of medication help?

The amazon swords should get like that eventually.

Have you got a source for cabomba? Pygmy chain sword is another nice SA plant you might want to consider. Latest pics of my amazon tank are here if you're interested viewtopic.php?f=4&t=50055&start=45

Are you going to go for real cabomba? Ambulia is about $3.50 a bunch, reputedly easier to grow and indiscernible from cabomba to the casual observer.

Nice, the new Doctor Who actor.

Nice looking tank. You probably wasted some money buying all that hair grass, though; it spreads like crazy.