Aquarium Homies Thread

[Mother mopar 3318]

He's prolly stressed the heck out. As long as he's no "laying down" or side ways. Hell be alright hopefully.

 

 

[thunderlounge 7813]

The good news is that you can read of it happening to smaller fish frequently in the saltwater arena, where they take a ride in the overflow and end up in the sump just hanging out. 

It probably freaks them initially, but they seem to chill out pretty quickly with no long-term harm.

[El Diablo 4232]

I was finally able to inspect him a bit and took a picture. He got fucked up. His fins got hung up on something, there's a hose barb in the line that he went thru plus the bulb to prime the suction. Right now he's hiding out between the glass and the sponge filter. I guess that's a safe place for him to recover. The way he's in there I can look at his eyes and Dumbo "ears" and they look alright but his fins got ripped bad, like torn off in chunks.

 

[Mother mopar 3318]

My man figured it was easier to go with the current than to be broadside. In the middle of the night he's flipped his orientation 90 degrees.

Seems to be happier as his mantle is fully extended and not moving to much in the current. Had a few dwarf cerith snails crawling on him last night eating algae on his shell but he didn't mind.

[El Diablo 4232]

A little better picture of Colt, the new Betta. 

[El Diablo 4232]

So the little Endler fish seem to be pretty easy to breed and I found a pair of Japan Blue Endlers that I'm going to get. The pair is only $9 so not much of an investment to see what I can do with them. Thread has been pretty slow so here's a picture of my 55 as it looks today. I change things in it all the time, lol. Some plants get funky, I move things around during water changes etc... Anyway...

. 

[Mother mopar 3318]

Picked up and "new" used 45 gallon drilled reef tank with a sump on father's day. Got most of my stuff in from Bulk Reef Supply yesterday. Now I'm just waiting on my new skimmer and return pump and water test it and then start transferring stuff from my 29g nano tank to the new one this wknd.

Side note had to start dosing Kalkwasser this week in my nano tank as my corals were using more calcium then I could provide with water changes. Started slow with just a 1/2 tsp per gallon of water in a 1 gal jug and I'm dosing it by using a gravity dripper. Tested parameters last night and calicum went up from 390ppm to 430 over night. So I slowed the dripper down to 1 drop every 90 seconds. Ph bumped up from 8.0 to 8.15 too. This morning PH stated the same so I'll monitor over the new few days and go from there.

[El Diablo 4232]

On 6/1/2019 at 9:33 PM, El Diablo said:

I was finally able to inspect him a bit and took a picture. He got fucked up. His fins got hung up on something, there's a hose barb in the line that he went thru plus the bulb to prime the suction. Right now he's hiding out between the glass and the sponge filter. I guess that's a safe place for him to recover. The way he's in there I can look at his eyes and Dumbo "ears" and they look alright but his fins got ripped bad, like torn off in chunks.

 

This guy died on me over the weekend. His fins were healing and I didn't see any signs of infection on his outsides so I'm guessing there was some internal damage that he couldn't overcome. He'd been getting around just fine after his initial convalescent period. I found him at the bottom of the tank on Friday evening, he was alive but just barely and he made it until Sunday. RIP Runt.

[Mother mopar 3318]

The 45 gallon is up and running going on week 2. Had a small outbreak of diatoms which has cause the clam to be upset, as the water is a bit dirty. Reinforcements are on the way bigger clean up crew will be here Wednesday. With the huge upgrade in lighting I picked up some very nice SPS corals.

[thunderlounge 7813]

Niiiiice. 

[LonghornD 49]

My MIL got my 2.5 year old daughter a fish tank, so I've now entered the world of aquariums. First time checking out this thread. There are some god damn professionals on here. I'm impressed with y'alls tanks.

Also, the kid named our orange guppy "Bevo". #prouddad

[El Diablo 4232]

2 hours ago, LonghornD said:

My MIL got my 2.5 year old daughter a fish tank, so I've now entered the world of aquariums. First time checking out this thread. There are some god damn professionals on here. I'm impressed with y'alls tanks.

Also, the kid named our orange guppy "Bevo". #prouddad

How big is the tank?

[LonghornD 49]

54 minutes ago, El Diablo said:

How big is the tank?

Only 5 gallons. We have three guppies and a snail in there. I know that's probably pushing it on the fish to tank size ratio. But they seem to be doing okay so far (currently at four weeks of keeping them alive). I bought all the standard equipment: air pump, heater, water filter, and some live plants to help filter the water as well. I've also been doing 1-2 gallon water changes once a week and have been monitoring Ph and ammonium levels.

So what else do I need to be doing? I don't know what I don't know.

[El Diablo 4232]

Post a picture of the tank. It sounds like you've got a good grip on what you need to be doing.

[LonghornD 49]

Any advice/suggestions greatly appreciated.

[El Diablo 4232]

Is the filter one that uses cartridges or is it driven by the air pump and is basically a sponge material? 

[LonghornD 49]

Cartridges.

[El Diablo 4232]

3 hours ago, LonghornD said:

Cartridges.

Okay, here's the deal with cartridges: Don't buy them, it's just a racket. If you're doing little water changes every week just swish them around in the water you've taken out. The bacteria that you WANT in your fish tank live in the filter, gravel, etc... they live on any surface really but the filter has a lot of surface area and you don't want to mess with that. Clean them in old tank water before you throw the water out and then put them back into the filter. 

What sort of water test kit do you have?

[El Diablo 4232]

A couple of weeks ago I went back to the fish store and picked up 8 more of the "assorted" Endlers, they're cool little fish. Well, the batch I got was more "assorted" than I'd anticipated - it included a couple of very pregnant females. I hadn't looked closely at what they had bagged up and just dumped them in with the rest. 3 days later I've got fry. So I guess now I'm breeding mutt Endlers. Yay me?

[El Diablo 4232]

I bought a dozen Corydoras Trilineatus. I had 4 already but wanted to up the numbers. I thought I had bought 4 more just a couple weeks ago from some bimbo in VA but after I got the fish and looked at them really closely I realized they were similar but a different species, C. Leopardus. Guess I'm stuck with 'em now. Bitch sold 'em to me as C. Trilineatus though. Furk.

[thunderlounge 7813]

Sounds like a sternly worded letter is in her future. 

[Mother mopar 3318]

Picked up a dersa clam today, great price and compliments my squamosa nicely. Also had to start dosing calicum 2 weeks ago. Have a doser hooked up dosing 20ml a day, every other hour to keep me at 450ppm throughoutthe day.

 

 

[El Diablo 4232]

Sweet! Hope he does well in there.

[thunderlounge 7813]

Damn, I do love clams. Still waiting/excited to see how they do in your setup. 

[Mother mopar 3318]

I upgraded tanks and the squamosa was unhappy for a few weeks or so as he wouldn't expose his mantle fully. Combine that with trying to get my calcium up over time. He seems much happier now. Keeping my alkalinity at 9 calcium at 450 and magnesium at 1450.

 

I have bad to reduce my lighting intensity by 70% as I was bleaching a few corals. The new tank has a AI hydra 52, which I admit is overkill but I didn't want to keep buying lights, so i splurged on that. I have the lights set in acclimation mode for the next month and it will slowly ramp up to full power. In 6 months time I should be able to frag some nice corals and start to recoup some funds.

 

 

[thunderlounge 7813]

Tank upgrades are always a gamble and adjustment. Glad it’s starting to work out though. 

[thunderlounge 7813]

Damn.  This thread really needs jt and his egg-frying ass back in here. I miss seeing his reef. 

[Mother mopar 3318]

Did he Jt ever make the transition from shaggy to here, havent seen him in any threads.

[thunderlounge 7813]

I’m not sure. I thought someone mentioned a long while back that he was taking a break a d used the switch as a catalyst. Would be nice to have him back in here though. 

 

[El Diablo 4232]

6 hours ago, Mother mopar said:

I upgraded tanks and the squamosa was unhappy for a few weeks or so as he wouldn't expose his mantle fully. Combine that with trying to get my calcium up over time. He seems much happier now. Keeping my alkalinity at 9 calcium at 450 and magnesium at 1450.

 

I have bad to reduce my lighting intensity by 70% as I was bleaching a few corals. The new tank has a AI hydra 52, which I admit is overkill but I didn't want to keep buying lights, so i splurged on that. I have the lights set in acclimation mode for the next month and it will slowly ramp up to full power. In 6 months time I should be able to frag some nice corals and start to recoup some funds.

 

 

I really don't know much about lighting, I just bought one that I thought I would like, and I do. I ran across a review of it just the other day where they were measuring the PAR and fuck, this thing is up there for a FW light. I knew I was blasting my stuff and had cut way back on the time but I had no idea as to how much. A 70 PAR is pretty high for a FW lamp and yeah, I've been running it full blast. Oof.

[El Diablo 4232]

4 hours ago, Mother mopar said:

Did he Jt ever make the transition from shaggy to here, havent seen him in any threads.

What was said above, I think he said in the old thread that he took it all apart.

Funny thing, one of our posters here has an account on the site where I hang out the most, uses a very similar screen name there and I'll just leave it at that. Never seen him post on here or the old site under this topic, not sure why. He seems pretty knowledgeable about saltwater, and space and photoshop.  

[Mother mopar 3318]

They have PAR meters that measure the intensity and give you a read out. If you follow Bulk reef supply, they have videos and demonstrate this capability on the most common size tanks. My light 14" above the water line will give high 380s in PAR which is enough to grow anything even at a depth of 18+"s

I'm not familiar with lights on FW tanks but in the end I assume like most anything vegetation uses lights to grow and carbon dioxide is the fuel?

[thunderlounge 7813]

A good par meter will cost you an arm and a leg. Don’t be fooled by a cheap “lux” meter, as they only measure the human visible spectrum and not all the wavelengths that aid photosynthesis. 

If you ever want to check readings, see if a local reef club has one and ask if you can rent/borrow. Much easier/better than dropping $500+.

 

[El Diablo 4232]

19 hours ago, thunderlounge said:

A good par meter will cost you an arm and a leg. Don’t be fooled by a cheap “lux” meter, as they only measure the human visible spectrum and not all the wavelengths that aid photosynthesis. 

If you ever want to check readings, see if a local reef club has one and ask if you can rent/borrow. Much easier/better than dropping $500+.

 

The guy whose video I was watching is pretty well known and I feel confident that he was using a PAR meter, he certainly would know the difference. For plants 70 is more than enough. I had no idea what SW tanks would need, in the 300's is crazy talk to me.  His reading of 70 was for a 12" depth and I think he said that PAR drops by half for every 4" of depth. One of the guys I follow who's been in FW planted tanks for ~40 years aims for around a PAR of 30 on a low tech tank. 

In other news I found a fish in my canister filter just a little while ago. Was cleaning it out, it's probably been a month since the last time, and when I got to the very bottom of the canister I was scooping out some much with my fingers and felt something. Freaked me out. I don't even know what it was, lol. I just took the canister over to the tank and dumped it in. No telling how long it had been there and a bit surprised it was alive. I've got a coarse prefilter sponge on the intake so really have no idea how it got in there unless maybe I dipped some water out of the tank to prefill the filter last time and accidentally scooped a little fish up with the water. 

[Mother mopar 3318]

The new Radion XR30 can put out par north of 400 in the center. Light that strong burns/melts most corals. Light acclimation is key. I've melted a few corals accidentally.

 

 

[thunderlounge 7813]

Yikes. 

I’m reading all this and thinking, 70? 300? That’s it?

Then the light came on. Duh! Filtered/reduced by water. I’ve been working on setting up my indoor garden too long I guess. I’m trying to get at least a 700 reading, preferably 900.  Water, depth of corals, much less needed.  Oops. 

 

But hey, I remember Radion lights from previous tank research. So there’s that. 

[El Diablo 4232]

So I bought a temperature data logger, like something you'd put in with a shipment of food. I'm going to set it up and drop it into a tank of water on the patio for a week or so just to get some idea of the range that an outdoor tank might go thru and then proceed from there with that intel. 

[Mother mopar 3318]

So I bought a temperature data logger, like something you'd put in with a shipment of food. I'm going to set it up and drop it into a tank of water on the patio for a week or so just to get some idea of the range that an outdoor tank might go thru and then proceed from there with that intel. 

You thinking an outdoor tank, that's wicked. Temp swings aren't such a big deal if they are gradually achieved.

[El Diablo 4232]

12 minutes ago, Mother mopar said:

2 hours ago, El Diablo said:

So I bought a temperature data logger, like something you'd put in with a shipment of food. I'm going to set it up and drop it into a tank of water on the patio for a week or so just to get some idea of the range that an outdoor tank might go thru and then proceed from there with that intel. 

You thinking an outdoor tank, that's wicked. Temp swings aren't such a big deal if they are gradually achieved.

Yeah, being an above ground small tank it might have more and larger sudden changes but there's got to be some small fish that can tolerate such conditions and it just seems like it'd be cool to have some outdoors fish during the warmer months. Seems particularly doable here in Central Texas. Lots of folks use White Cloud Mountain Minnows, they're pretty durable and can take winter weather too. I'm just not sure what their upper limit is. A simple tank with just an airstone should do okay I think.

The little logger was $25, I figure I'll find some other use for it once I've used it for this experiment.

[El Diablo 4232]

The little shit wasn't exactly intuitive and the instructions were lacking for a moron like myself but I think I've got it set up. Should only take a couple of days to get some idea of what is going on temperature-wise if I actually got the thing to do what I want. Fingers crossed!  It's an EliTech RC-5+ for whatever that's worth. Had to download software to program the thing. Grrr...I'm getting too old for this shit.

[El Diablo 4232]

Welp, so much for that idea, or at least that location. I pulled the data logger and the LOW temps recorded in the mornings were right at 81. That would be tolerable to a lot of fish. Unfortunately the HIGH temps were right at 101 every day. I might try a different location but the way that patio is configured it's going to be tough to find a spot that meets the criteria Oof. Oh well, better to be out $25 than some fish i guess.

[Mother mopar 3318]

Wow, talk about one heck of a temp swing.

[El Diablo 4232]

10 hours ago, Mother mopar said:

Wow, talk about one heck of a temp swing.

Well, it pretty much tracks with what our normal temp range is for this time of year, about 20 degrees. I may try to find another location and run it again. I did this with the cover on the tank so maybe a different location with no hood and an airstone might give me a better result. I might get a little evap cooling that way. idk.

[thunderlounge 7813]

It won’t hold up, and you’ll lose too much to evap as well. 

Outside is a tough game. Gotta hold a lot of water, and may need a chiller. 

[El Diablo 4232]

49 minutes ago, thunderlounge said:

It won’t hold up, and you’ll lose too much to evap as well. 

Outside is a tough game. Gotta hold a lot of water, and may need a chiller. 

Pretty much what I decided. A shady spot in the yard with an in ground pond would probably work, hell I know it would, but I'm not making that kind of a project out of this.

[thunderlounge 7813]

Right. A tank just can’t hold enough, and it fluctuates way too much. 

[El Diablo 4232]

16 minutes ago, thunderlounge said:

Right. A tank just can’t hold enough, and it fluctuates way too much. 

Kinda makes me jealous of folks up north who can keep container aquariums outside during the summer.  I may try doing something in the fall and winter. White Cloud Mountain Minnows can tolerate a LOT of cold, down into the high 30's I believe. 

In other news I started up the spare 20 gallon tank I had sitting here. Just water, bacteria in a bottle and ammonium chloride. I think I started it on Wednesday or Thursday of last week and just yesterday I started to get some nitrite and today it's up to between .5 and 1.0 ppm. The instructins are to dose the tank to 2ppm ammonium but I went full steam ahead and dosed it to a little over twice that.

When I started into this hobby a year or so ago I read a research paper on reactivating nitrosomonas and nitrobacter that had gone dormant and they found that using really high doses of ammonia had a much higher yield so I figured what the fuck, might as well. I'll keep an eye on my ammonia every few days until it starts to get down around that 2ppm level and then decide when and how much to dose the next round.

I can't remember off the top of my head how much nitrate X amount of ammonia will convert to. It's either 1 to 1 or there is some funky scale based on molecular weight of nitrogen or some shit. Whatever, not gonna kill any fish, just cycling it out of boredom. Filtration is just 2 double sponge filters running off of an air pump.

[thunderlounge 7813]

Maybe one of those half-barrel deals in a shaded/semi-shaded area?

I’ve thought about one of those for my deck. Morning and evening sun, a lotus or lilly plus a few minor fish. 

 

[El Diablo 4232]

18 hours ago, thunderlounge said:

Maybe one of those half-barrel deals in a shaded/semi-shaded area?

I’ve thought about one of those for my deck. Morning and evening sun, a lotus or lilly plus a few minor fish. 

 

The more I think about it the more I'm thinking I may do this. I was going to pretty much give the little data logger away but I think now I'll keep it and run a little test later this year. Should be no problem once we get into October or so.

[thunderlounge 7813]

There is a reason I haven’t done mine yet. So far I’m up to 2 half barrels, thinking about a third tier. Same reason I don’t have a tank set up right now, or have a koi pond. I keep planning, and a nice idea ends up massive.