Syll

Hi everyone.

Couple of questions. I have a newly established saltwater. 120 gallon. The rock is cured and levels are stable. No corals yet, just FWLRO right now. I'm not ruling out corals later, but right now I just want to get it up and running.

I know fish pretty well. I'm working on that stocking list right now as the two quarantine tanks I set up finish cycling. What I don't know very well are invertebrates... I know I need a good clean up crew, and could use suggestions.

Now, availability is limited here... so instead of listing species of snails/shrimp/what ever, it would be more helpful if you could detail function and quantities... like how many critters to clean the live rock (150 lbs), how many to clean the sand.... etc... including any jobs I may have missed.

Second part is would you recommend quarantining the clean up crew? I'm not sure if they could really carry anything in.... so insight into that would be helpful.

Thanks for your time!

I have a 24 gallon bow front. It's currently stocked with Endler's livebearers... if you don't know what they are, they're like guppies.. but smaller. http://www.seriouslyfish.com/profile.php?genus=Poe...

Well, like guppies, they are breeding... except they don't seem interested in eating their fry. As a result, my tank will be horribly overcrowded soon. I've tried giving them away... no luck. Local pet stores don't want or don't have room for them. No friends can take any.. well none I trust to give them a good home.

The last option is to add a fish that will eat the fry. I'm a bit stumped as to what fish to add. Since space is at a premium in there, I only want to add one fish, so schoolers are out. I also don't want it to pick on any of the adults. The adult males are fairly small... anywhere from 3/4 inch to 1 inch. I'd love to hear some ideas on what I can add to help keep my tank healthy. I have a QT tank ready to go.

Also, I've tried craig's list.. no one wants the fry.. they only want the adults.

I have a 55 gallon planted aquarium. For a while now, I've been having some issues.

There are three plants. Anubias nana, a micro sword (new addition) and a "aqua fern" The nana is the oldest plant in there... I got it a year or so ago... I think. It's been a while. The micro sword and fern are new additions. The micro sword is spreading like crazy and doing good, the fern looks to be on it's way out. It was one of the plants in a tube from petco... Didn't think it had much of a chance but I figured I'd try.

I've switched off of using liquid fertilizer and have gone to a root tab when the problems started. Figured I was over fertilizing. No luck with that. The plants seem to like it though.

I've tried running low CO2... around 5 ppm. Plants suffered a bit and didn't help with the algae. I've tried running higher CO2 ~15 ppm to see if I can jump start the plants metabolism and out compete the algae... no luck with that.

I'm getting a few types of algae. Hair algae. I have a couple mollies in the tank that help out with that. Snails pick off the short stuff. Getting bush algae, which the snails mostly take care of. Ottos help out with keeping the plant leafs clean of algae... the stuff that's bugging me is the stuff suspended in the water.

It's not making the water a bright green... when the light is on, it's more of a whitish color. When the light is off, it's more of a murky green. Leaving the light off for a few days does help with the water clarity.

The aquarium is well established... The water tests at 0 ammonia, 0 nitrite, 10 nitrate at the end of the week before water change. I did test the phosphate levels right after water changes today and it tested at 1.0 mg/l

Could the phosphates be responsible for my algae issues? And if so, I do have phosphate reducing pad that I can stick in my filter to help remove them.. I originally got it for my salt water aquarium, but the package says safe for fresh water.. I don't know if it's plant safe though. I'm rather attached to my anubias nana.. It started out as a little 5 leaf plant and has now spread to take up at least 1/3 of my 55 gallon's bottom. My fish love it too.

Obviously, I run CO2, root tab for fertilizer, and 216 watts of 6500k T5HO lighting.

The story is we were looking through craig's list posts and came across one where a guy was looking to rehome his green cheek conure. His work kept him away for too long and he couldn't devote enough time for him. We offered to give him a good home. A few weeks later, he said ok. We already have parrots (a green cheek conure and an african grey)

We make arrangements and when we meet him we find out it's not a green cheek conure at all. It's a blue cap conure. Quite a bit larger than we expected and the cage we had prepared for him simply wouldn't do. He's much larger than our green cheek.. which is close to what we were expecting. Ok, we scrambled a bit and got a suitable one with enough space for toys and wing stretching.

We get him home, let him out of the carrier. I expected lots of screaming. He obliged =D I expected some nipping.. and he did nip at us. But what's strange is he'll climb up on your shoulder and not bite ears or anything. He'll walk up to you and play with your shoelace. He'll step up onto a wooden perch you're holding. He'll gently take food from your hand. But if you offer him your hand or finger, he'll try to bite.

I know I have some trust to build with the bird, and I plan on taking it one day at a time. I expect a long hard road ahead with the use of many ear plugs.... but the fear of hands but not people worries me.

I'm planning on taking him into an avian vet for a check up ASAP. Haven't had a chance to weigh him yet but her looks a little malnourished and he keeps chewing on the leg his band is on so I want to get that cut off. (the band, not the foot)

I've tamed a parent raised budgie before... but I've never tried to earn the trust of a bird that has a real reason to mistrust humans... and I'm wondering if that's the case here. Advise from more experienced bird people would be welcome. I fully understand it could very well be a long, hard road ahead of me, but I want to do right by the little guy. He deserves that much at least. No quick fixes.

I recently got a Green Spotted Puffer about 3 months ago. His diet is mainly snails, shrim, fish, and algae. He was about an inch when I got him.. now he's between 1.5 and 2 inches. So he's doing good. Nice colors, active, all the signs of a health fish. Even comes up to the glass when I'm near it and chases around the siphon during water changes. He's in a 34 gallon bow front with really pretty sand substrate.

The problem started when I slowly raised the gravity of the tank. Over the course of a week, I raised him up to 1.010 SG. I use instant ocean marine salt mix. He's getting bigger and since he was in fresh water, it was time to get a bit of salt in there. He took the adaption very well. The problem isn't with him... but rather his food.

As soon as I drop the snails in, they almost instantly die. I use snails I fish out of my fresh water planted tetra tank. He doesn't seem to show a lot of interest in dead snails.. before he would gobble them right up. Without these snails, I worry his beak may become over grown and will cause problems down the road.

Could use some ideas on how to deal with this situation... I've considered going to full marine because I have a salt water tank with nothing that eats snails so I could get some marine snails breeding,.. worried it's a bit early for him to go full marine though.

Currently setting up a 125 gallon It's currently cycling. Fishless cycling. Adding ammonia. Nitrites started showing up today so the cycling is going is moving along great.

We're planning on african cichlids. Mainly Yellow Labs. My questions are:

What would be the optimal temp for these guys? (got new fancy heaters with a digital thermometer so I can dial in pretty well)

What numbers would be a good stocking? (don't tell me one inch of fish per gallon. The bottom of the tank is covered in large rocks all piled up to provide lots of caves and hiding places)

What fish food would you recommend? We usually feed our fish tetramin but it runs fairly high in protein.. even the special cichlid food has 45-47% protein. Don't want to cause them problems due to too much protein.

Currently setting up a 125 gallon It's currently cycling. Fishless cycling. Adding ammonia. Nitrites started showing up today so the cycling is going is moving along great.

We're planning on african cichlids. Mainly Yellow Labs. My questions are:

What would be the optimal temp for these guys? (got new fancy heaters with a digital thermometer so I can dial in pretty well)

What numbers would be a good stocking? (don't tell me one inch of fish per gallon. The bottom of the tank is covered in large rocks all piled up to provide lots of caves and hiding places)

What fish food would you recommend? We usually feed our fish tetramin but it runs fairly high in protein.. even the special cichlid food has 45-47% protein. Don't want to cause them problems due to too much protein.

It's a 29 gallon. It has a school of harlequin rasboras, a school of long fin danios, a school of lemon tetras, and a school of black skirt tetras.

I've been keeping an eye on the nitrate production, and it can hold a betta in terms of bio load, but I'm worried the betta may get his fins nipped. What's your opinion? If I were to get a betta, it would probably be male.. but I wouldn't rule out female.

I just got everything set up today. Added the live rock and sand.. tested everything to make sure it was all good. No fish in there yet. The live rock should be cured as I got it at a local store and it was in the tank.

The pH was looking a bit low so I tested the KH and it was 7. Everything else tested fine.. think my salt's a bit weak on the buffering? Should I pick some up .tomorrow? Opinions would be greatly appreciated since this is my first marine aquarium

Getting one soon. I've done enough basic research to determine that I can provide a good home for one, but would like some good, in depth, information. Yes, the breeder has been talking my ear off about the bird, but I like to cover all bases.. just in case the breeder is forgetting something.

Any good website links would be very much appreciated. Thanks! =)

With income tax return time coming up, I've been planning on putting together a saltwater aquarium. I thought about going with a reef tank... but I'm not sure if the set up I'm going with will be right for corals and fish both. I would appreciate answers to the following questions that I could use some clarification on.

1) The tank size I've chosen is 44 us gallons. After doing some research, I'm of the opinion that with fish, it would be too small for corals. Do you agree?

2) Lighting.. With coral I've read you want at least 4 watts per gallon.. but that's it. So this is somewhat of a two part question

a) If I had corals, how much lighting and what spectrum or combination of spectrums would you recommend.

b) If I had no corals, how much lighting and what spectrum would you recommend?

3) I've heard that if you have live rock, no filter is needed. True or false? (Yes, I read to have powerheads focused on the live rock.

4) This is the big question I had, and I would appreciate as detailed an answer as you can provide, even if it's 20 pages long. What the heck is live rock anyway!? And how does it help break down waste?

Title says it all. In your opinion, which fish is the most adaptable any why?

My vote would have to go to the Molly (I will freely admit, mollies are one of my favorite fish, so I'm not 100% objective here) The reason is because they can survive where so many fish can't. They can live in stagnant fresh water ditches, brackish coastal pools, full marine conditions.. and even water that contains toxic amounts of hydrogen sulfide. Seriously... how many fish can live in water so corrosive it will destroy your clothing? Mollies are truly amazing fish!

What get's your vote?

About a month ago, I got a budgie. He was very timid, so we named him Timmy. He was not hand fed. I figured getting him tamed would be a challenge, but since I know of 0 local breeders, and no Mom and Pop pet stores left in the area, it was pretty much my only option. There used to be a lot many years ago, now it's only Petco and Petsmart, with two local fish stores.

Well, I let him acclimate to his new home the first week. Spending time with him, talking to him.. but he never moved.. the only time he would move is when he went to get food or water. I figured he was still freaked out about the move.

Well, it didn't help. He still rarely moved 3 weeks later, and panics every time I open the door to his cage. Any and all attempts at training have failed. Disappointing, but not unexpected... being a "bin o' budgies" bird, my expectations weren't that high.

Well, since he refuses to interact with me, any of his toys, and just sits immobile all day every day, I figure he must be lonely. Maybe if I get a girl, it will liven him up and give him some kind of interaction. Maybe they'd mate and I can hand feed the babies and get a tame budgie.. pipe dream, but none the less, I worry about the little guy just being immobile all day.

Well, I got a bigger cage, another budgie, a couple more toys and a nest box (yeah I know, overly optimistic). Within the hour, Timmy perked up quite a bit. They were chirping back and forth, he'd follow the other one around, the new one groomed him a bit. It was all cute and adorable.

Then the oddest thing... The new one regurgitated seed and fed it to Timmy, who ate it. Is this normal for budgies? The only time I've seen this is when the parents feed their young...

I've been trying to switch my Green Cheek Conure (Dizzy) over to pellet food.. However, I'm stuck at step one!

I started by mixing just a little bit into his seed.. however, when he's eating, I'll watch him pick up and spit out the pellets whenever he finds one and continue eating the seed.

I'm thinking of trying a different brand of pellet food to see if there's any improvements, but I would appreciate any tips or insights some of the more experienced bird keepers may have. Dizzy is about 6 months old.

I got a parakeet today. I've wanted one for a while, so I said "why not?" I've had one in the past, so I'm not totally clueless as to what it will entail, and I currently have 10 finches, so keeping birds isn't new to me. Yes, I realize finches and parakeets are different and will involve different practices.

I got a cage, it's 18x18x28. I have two perches.. they go from thin, to thick and are rough to help keep nails worn down. I have a wooden ladder to climb and chew on, another soft wood chew/climbing toy, a miirror, yet a third climbing toy, and one more toy that is like an abacus with little things that slide and spin. Oh and a mirror and swing.

I also have a food dish, water dish, grit cup, bath, and an extra cup for treats.. fruit, veggies, etc. I got a vitamin supplement called Avian Plus made by Zoo Med's (yes, I know the apostrophe shouldn't be there, but that's what it says on the bottle!) I use it for my finches, so I figure I'll use it for my parakeet too. Sprinkles on the food 2-3 times per week. The food I have is Encore Premium Parakeet food. It's a mix of seed and pellets. I eventually intend to switch over to a largely pellet diet.

Well, being ever cautious, After I get the guy home and in his new cage, I did a quick search to see if I was missing anything, or if what I thought I knew was wrong... that's where I had problems.

Some places said to not give parakeets grit, others said to. Some places said don't use rough perches, other said to. Some places said you can give peanuts to them, other said not to. And don't even get me started on the minimum cage size! Some say 16x16 other say 39x20!

So.. am I doing anything wrong? I'm going to be running around tomorrow and can easily replace anything that's not right or pick up something I missed.

I see a lot of people commenting (often incorrectly) on water chemistry. This quiz is to see how much you really know. Best answer goes to the first person to get them all correct.

1: True or False. Aquarium Salt will raise your pH.

2: What does pH stand for?

3: GH is the measurement of what?

4: KH is the measurement of what?

5: NH3 is also known as?

6: Assuming no chemicals have been added to alter your pH, water that has a pH of 7 and a KH of 8 has an assumed CO2 content of? (margin of error +-5)

7: What exactly is SG and what does it measure?

8: What is a pH buffer?

9: How do you buffer water to a neutral pH?

10: What happens when your water has no pH buffer at all?

From what I've seen, and I'll admit that it's not a whole lot, all this health care reform stuff is going to do is mandate that everyone have health insurance... Wouldn't that make the cost of insurance go up? The main rule of the free market is to sell a product at what the market will bare. If it's required to have it, that price can be huge, and people will have to pay it. Not to mention that you'll have more people pulling out of the pool insurance creates causing over all costs to rise.

The "public option", or government issued insurance kinda counters this, however, as with everything else, when the government pay for something, the price is always inflated. $1200 dollar toilet seats on naval ships for example. If the insurance companies can't gouge you, what's to stop the hospitals from doing it? Let's face facts. Health care in the United States is a business. And like all businesses, they are out to make as much money as they can.

I'm just really worried that this whole thing is going to turn into a massive expense that I really can't afford. As it is now, I struggle paycheck to paycheck. I really don't want to be forced into government assistance to live my life.

I have a 120 gallon Molly tank. Population never used to be an issue because they would eat their fry. However, they've stopped doing that. I've cut back on their food, hoping that would make them start viewing the fry as tasty snacks again, but no luck. I have examined other options, but see no solutions. Local fish stores won't take them (we only have two in town, one's worse than walmart, the other has no room)

When these fry grow up, the tank will be horribly overstocked. For the overall health of the aquarium, something needs to be done. I've started looking into adding one or two fish that will eat the fry, but not harm the adults.

It's a hard water tank, with a bit of salt. We add one tablespoon per 5 gallons of marine salt to help keep our mollies healthy, but I wouldn't call it brackish. The SG of the water is 1.004 so I would still consider it to be fresh water. pH is 7.8 with a GH of 14. We keep the temp around 80f.

With that water, I was thinking a small cichlid would be perfect, however, I worry about them becoming too aggressive. I'm open to ideas from people who know more various types of fish.

I know it may sound a bit cruel picking out a fish to eat babies, but a lot of the fry are inbred and we've already have had some developmental issues with them (crooked spines and such). It really is for the overall health of the community.

They like apples, and not only is it good for them, I hear many people say it fresh fruit should be a regular part of their diet. Because I want my cute little finches to be as health and happy as can be, I'm going to start feeding them apples regularly.

One question... what method should I use to allow them to eat it easily? I've tried cutting off a little piece and feeding them that, but they seem to have a hard time getting at it. I have also used a slicer to give them thin slices, but it usually ends up falling through the bars on the bottom of the cage... I was thinking of cutting a wedge out and attaching it to the side of the cage near a perch. Any advice or tips would be appreciated :)

Here's what happened.

My 55 gallon tetra tank is planted. I have a good light and a CO2 diffuser. The diffuser creates a pocket of CO2 and has a power head attached that creates a jet of water spraying into it. It's pretty efficient and does a wonderful job of supplying CO2 to all my plants while not putting in too much CO2 to kill my fish.

Well, it was time to do some pruning.. mainly the red ludwigs. They get too big, branch across the top and start to block light for the other plants. So every now and then I trim them down and replant them. Who ever tells you their max length is 20 inches is a liar! =)

Anyway, while doing this, my female betta Micky decided to swim into the diffuser. I don't know how long she was in there as this process takes about 3 hours... I saw her in there kinda floating... I got her out as quickly as possible... When she was out, she was doing the "death float" Gills not moving, pectoral fins straight out to the side. I gave her a gentle poke and she kicked her fin a bit and went back to the float.

I quickly scooped her up in my hand, held her at the surface of the water near the filter output, and every 15 seconds or so lifted her head above the water. Her gills started moving again after about 30 seconds. She started to lift her own head above the water after about a minute. She finally swam off after about 2 minutes and hid in a corner. She's doing a lot better now.

I need ideas to keep her out of the diffuser. I don't want her going back in there and I'm afraid she will. The only idea I have is cutting up a net, putting that over the bottom of the diffuser and keeping it in place with a rubber band.. but I don't know if a rubber band will leach any harmful chemicals in the water...