zeta

I never used to have problems with my fish's fins...but I used to kill a lot of fish. I haven't killed many fish lately, but they all seem to have some problem with their fins. An hour ago this angel's fins were okay (relatively).. and now this: What could be causing this??

I highly recommend pearl gouramis and kribensis

Thanks Pegasus, that seems very relevant. What treatment do you recommend?

Yes, I am a little worried. They don't seem at all like natural coloration, they change from day to day. But they certainly aren't holes. Pegasus, my gravel is very smooth, I'd be quite surprised if it was wearing their barbels down. What else can cause eroded barbels? The hoplo's barbels have been getting shorter too, probably about half as long as they should be.

Hello, can someone please tell me what this greying of my hoplo is due to:

aargh..where to begin. My bristlenosed plecostomus is missing about half his dorsal fin and a good deal of his tail because my angels keep nipping him! My LFS refuses to believe this is possible, but the angels arent exactly subtle about it.. they just sidle up to him and have a nip, I watch this happen daily. My hoplo catfish has quite a bit of finrot in his tail after being nipped relentlessly by a pakistani loach (I got rid of the loach the day after I worked this out).. it's taking a while to heal. He also has this odd silver coating on parts of him (at the base of his tail and dorsal fin).. he's had it before and gotten over it. Sorry about the quality of these photos, I still havent worked out how to take fish photos and my last batteries have just run out. My albino corys have very stumpy barbels. Apparently this would be because the pakistani loach ate them while they were asleep. The loach went about 2 weeks ago, how long would barbels take to grow back? My hoplo's barbels also seem to be shorter than they should be. I do have a couple of rosy barbs but I've never seen them nip anybody. I really don't blame all my troubles on fish nipping each other, I reckon there has to be something else making life difficult for me. I have killed 7 of the 20 fish I have owned. I'm certain overfeeding isn'y my problem, I fed only every second day for months, and I'm feeding daily these days (sometimes bloodworms, sometimes flake, occasionally zucchini, peas..) The tank has a few plants, a chunk of driftwood (extracted from a malaysian bog, bought from the LFS), no rocks. The gravel has a small amount of shell. pH is about 7.5 out of the tap and maybe 7.3 in the tank (I have to get them to test it at the LFS, my test kit is hopeless). Water gets changed about 1/3 every week, gravel vacuumed about every fortnight. Water is quite clear, although gets a bit murky when the fish get fed (they go nuts and stir it all up). So all I can think of is maybe there's something in the water. How would I find out for certain? Thanks for your time

Hello... my fish really aren't doing as well as I would like. Mild finrot, rampant fin-nipping.. and my angels seem to get these black spots Should I be alarmed? They seem pretty okay otherwise..well, not close to death, which is doing well by my standards.

How import is darkness to fish? I run my 15W tank light for 10 hours a day, until 9pm but the incandescent room light is often on until 1am. Is this cause for concern? Should I be draping something over the tank to block out the light at night?

The bottom of this page http://www.reefers.dk/html/hvad_er_ozon.htm explains it pretty well

I wish my fish wouldn't eat each other's poo and then spit it back out.

He's gorgeous... but he's got a cartoon eye!

Isnt the bristlenose just one of hundreds of plecostomi? People often refer to it as Ancistrus. Hope that helps, zeta

Hello, I thought it was about time to show my face. I've been lurking for a while. I'm studying Mechanical Engineering at the University of Canterbury, and I've been keeping fish since the start of March 2002. My tank is about 100L (30"x15"x15"). In it I have: 2x Pearl Gourami 2x Golden Angelfish 2x Albino Corys 2x Hoplo Catfish 2x Rosy Barbs 2x Kribensis 1x Bristlenosed Plecostomus 1x Clown Loach 1x Pakistani Loach 1x Kuhli Loach All the fish were juvenile when I bought them, so none should be much older than 4 months. I love all the fish, except for the Rosy Barbs, they get on my nerves somehow... There are photos of all the fish at http://homepages.paradise.net.nz/refrewst/fish.html I've been injecting CO2 using the yeast method, it works wonderfully. I've got a 3L juice bottle half-filled with water with a cup of sugar and a tsp of yeast, it's been steadily producing CO2 for at least 3 weeks, the plants are growing great and it keeps my usually high pH (~7.5) down to about 7. I consider Kritter Kingdom on Blenheim Road to be my home petshop, they've been great. My fish-keeping experience hasn't been entirely trouble-free so far, so I look forward to getting lots of help from you guys! Zeta