misnoma

Okies... so by the end of the week I should have an empty tank (5ft 370L), and own a skimmer (Deltec MCE600 HOB). Looking to set up a FLOWR tank. Not about to jump the gun, I've read on here about books that are good to read etc, can't remember the threads however. Does anyone up here in Auckland have good books that I could borrow for a week or so to have a good read? It would be very much appreciated I'm also reading as much of reefcentral as poss.. and you can be sure there will be plenty of questions asked here, well before water touches the tank heh.

Saves getting water on the carpet carrying em in a net :lol:

When I moved to one of those type tanks I cheated a little. I pulled half the noodles/bioballs out of the cannister filter I had on the old tank, put em in the media containers on the AR tank (easy to get to etc) and hurled half the fish in. After a week I moved the media back, put the rest of the fish in, and stocked the old tank with some comm fish just to keep the filter going. Didn't get any ammonia spikes in either tank.

I don't have the aim to pee in the tank

Yup, all you're trying to do is dilute the ammonia enough to keep the fish comfy whilst the filter catches up. The water going cloudy could well be a bacteria bloom, keep up the waterchanges (i.e. don't let ammonia get any higher, it would be better lower than that) till things all balance out again. They will settle, just not overnight

The nitrites rising is a good thing right now (normally you would want 0), however it shows that bacteria are breaking down the ammonia. Keep up the 20% waterchanges to keep the fish happy and the ammonia low, stay away from the gravel though, and keep monitoring, you should see ammonia drop, nitrites climb a bit more, then start to drop off, leaving you with 0 ammonia and 0 nitrites, and only nitrates. Once you get to there, it's the weekly waterchanges that keep the nitrates down, the other two should sit solidly on zero

Driftwood is easy to test, take out of tank, put in bucket of water (so it stays sunk ).. do water change and wait three days, then you know for sure Will save spending money on carbon/salts etc etc

Sounds like the driftwood to me, how long has it been in there - maybe it's starting to break down?

Funny.. that's how we tested the floor for both my ~500L tanks :lol: :lol: Wooden floored apartment, so there's a bit of movement, but nothing insane hehe.

Urm... 4x2x2ft = 430L That's some serious weight sitting in one spot.

Actually I think he was just hassling you spelling as an extra bonus.. spelling badly will never prove your point. Edit: try writing your replies in a word processor, then pasting in here.. suddenly spelling = easy.

hahahahh yeah, fruit salad is about twice the price imo the Brightwater looks better for fish anyway, gf has a tank with a mixture of 80% brightwater, 20% fruit salad, still looks like fruit salad, just a heap cheaper

I got a large bag (that I struggled to carry) of brightwater for urm... $16 from memory, two of those covered my 4x2x2 tank quite happily.

Next time go to "Stone and water world" - it's _exactly_ the same stuff.. .and a heap cheaper EDIT: Well.. whichever place is closest to you, there will be somewhere forgive my instant assumption you lived in Auckland hehe, possibly a phonecall to the above place will tell you a local supplier.

I'm using (not for turtles, but for my tank with the baby bristlenose in it) one of those "laundry bags" the gf has for washing her delicates It was a fine(ish) black mesh, which when doubled over doesn't clog the intake, but won't let the babies in.

I'll agree.. get a corner or foam filter from the lfs (about $7-$10) and put it in one of your working tanks for a week or so. I found even after 3-4 days in the main tank when I hurled it in the 20L fry tank they were fine (was doing 50% waterchanges daily before, now do %10/weekly) Main thing is to get it seeded from a tank that's well settled

Given the initial post said a) running for 8 months b) started bubbling like crazy c) THEN cleaned it and still bubbling How do you explain b) ? This is what people are trying to explain... not out of box, not just cleaned, but doing it anyway.

*sigh* well today the gf and I made the decision to euthanise the other two clown loaches in the tank. They were the only fish left with any sign of whitespot (the others have looked fine for 3-4 days). The poor clowns were utterly coated in it - fins disappearing etc. Hopefully things will settle down, and sometime in the future we can get more clowns, they were so fun

okay.. so thing to remember with the Deltec hangons is if you clean them _too_ well they'll do the bubble thing for a few days over again?

You're missing the bit where he said it had been working fine for ages... the review only mentions insane bubbles when you first start it up.

I am guessing however have you tried opening the airtap more than just a little bit? wondering if perhaps it's only causing insane bubbles when the tap's barely open. Interested in the outcome of this since I'm considering finding one of these.

The url to your image is incorrect

Welcome to the fishroom The capslock key is on the left of the keyboard, between the shift and tab keys, pressing this will mean you don't have to shout at everyone (writing all in caps is generally taken as shouting, and is somewhat hard to read). In terms of keeping pH where it "should be", where is it now, and where are you trying to get it to, what fish do you have (it may be that where it is now is just fine and you're fighting a battle you don't have to)? Plants may be related to pH if it's miles off where it should be (with nz water I doubt that though), otherwise having enough lighting etc can be an important thing. More information about your tank will help here as well Cheers

He can survive without a filter if you do large daily waterchanges. Next time you're at a fish shop pick up a sponge filter (about 5-6NZ$) and keep it in the main tank somewhere hiddenish. That way you have a precycled filter to use in a bucket or whatever else which only needs an air pump to do it's job

Maybe the display lasts two weeks?