GrahamC

http://www.hagen.com/pdf/aquatic/GLO-Lighting-Guide.pdf Check out page 4

Green yellow light is apparently best for aquatic plants. Blue light is apparently best for photosynthesis but that gets taken out by dissolved organic compounds. Reds get absorbed by the water. So, aquatic plants use what's left.

I feel guilty too when I have moved a fish from one tank to another, and it quickly perishes! Lucikly I have only myself to blame. Human nature to put the blame on someone, and the vendor is a convenient target.

What happens when you buy a fish from a LFS and it dies the next day?

Murray Hallam of aquaponics fame claims that stocking levels can reach 30-40 kg of fish per 1000L of water, and still get good growth. Massive filtration going on though with all the plants. BTW, someone said they liked blue ray clarity of their water. But if you get up real close you see pixels at 1080p. I prefer to get up real close to the tank and it looks as though the fish are just floating in the air in front of you!

I take it that stocking levels for a tank are inappropriate everywhere though?

I doubt any fancy goldfish would be able to catch the WCMMs. I don't know which ones ate mine, but I presume it were the comets ... though when I observed them I never saw them being chased.

I'd estimate that it takes 6 months to get to the 10+ cm size from the tiny ones in a low lighting situation.

http://fishpix.s3.amazonaws.com/IMG_0293.JPG The plantlet shown in the middle is over 10 cm long from stem to leaf tip. I could have pulled it off but generally wait until they fall off when I'm doing tank maintenance. http://fishpix.s3.amazonaws.com/IMG_0294.JPG This free floating leaf has developed plantlets at the tip, a couple of cm from the tip, and one just above the pond snail. I was intending to pull the leaf out and chuck it ... but interesting that it has survived as is.

UV filter cleared my green tank. Wonder if you can borrow a mussel from the LFS to do the same

I noticed a few weeks back that I had a java fern leaf that had detached from the rhizome and was floating in the tank. It had patchy brown spots on it so presumably nutrient deficiency. Anyway I neglected to remove it, and it has remained in the tank floating near the surface. Step forward to today, and it's still there, still mostly green, and now some plantlets are growing from it. So, my question is, since stress causes the plantlets to appear, and since single leaves can appear to survive free floating, is it a reasonable method to encourage plantlets by cutting single leaves off a mature plant and let them float? The cut leaves will be stressed maybe, and then might sprout? And what do I do to the plantlets as they detach? Just let them float around or get them to attach to something? Does it make a difference? My tank has silica sand only, and I've feeding it some flourish with PWCs.

Eaten

Welcome. I know that some places say mountain minnows are compatible with goldfish but my mountain minnows gradually disappeared from my goldfish tank until I put them into their own tank ( actually they're in a tropical tank being shared with some angels separated by a Hamburg filter. ). It may be that only comets are fast enough to catch them, and they might actually be safe with your fantails.

You might want to think about ditching the bubbler as it loses CO2 from the tank

It does hurt when you lose a fish/eel for no apparent cause ... and then you wonder who's next. BTW, is this a low tech ( no CO2 injection ) tank?

How are you heating a house for $100 - $130/month?

I think you apply as much flourish as required by PWCs until the stuff is gone.

It means he didn't have an import license for the plants.

A cubic centimeter is known as a ml. There are by definition 1000 mls in a litre. So 243,148.422cm3 = 243,148.422 mls ~= 243 L. I'd suggest rounding it down to 240 instead of rounding up to 250L because you don't fill to the very top, and substrate etc take up volume.

Perhaps it's been mined and so is sharp, and not naturally water eroded and rounded particles.

In that case take the impeller out and see if it makes any noise.

I have a 104F, and when it's working it's not usually noisy. Sometimes the impeller gets unbalanced or something and it then makes a racket when I turn it on. I then turn it off, move the impeller with my finger and then try again.

Shouldn't a heavily planted tank provide enough biological filtration by itself so as to not need the Eheim?

Eeek. Mine is $400/month.

One would have thought that since introduced trout have decimated native freshwater species, that Maori would be entitled to exercise indigenous rights to fish instead for trout for personal consumption without the need to be specifically granted a license, but that appears not to be the case. http://www.bennion.co.nz/mlr/1998/may.html