Hi and Question

[voice1970]

Hi All. My Name is Tom. Thinking about getting back into hobby again after a 9 year break. I used to have a reef tank and a freshwater tank, so know may way around a little. Still have lots to learn though.

Questions I was hoping to get some help with.

1) I now have some cats. I did not have them previously when I had my tanks. Curious on what any of you may have done to help cat proof tanks. Do the wooden canopies help? Mine are bengals, very active and very very curious, so is a concern. Want to straighten this out before I dive in.

2) Thinking about getting a 75 G tank/stand this time. I am just going to do a straight forward freshwater community tank. Curious on any recommendations on best place to get one of these. Any used sites, or sites that generally have good prices for these. Or places in my area (Massachusetts). My apologies in advance if it is not appropriate to ask this here.

3) Are there any new products out there that will help me initially cycle my tank. If not, recommendations for best kind of fish to use for this. Would like to avoid stressing fish if possible, I know that may not be avoidable though. FYI, I will want to get mainly fish that will not nip other fish's fins for my community tank.

Thanks in advance for any advice any of you can give. Happy fishing.

 

[fluttermoth]

Welcome to the forums, Tom, good to have you here

Cats aren't a big problem. I, along with my mum and my best friend, have kept cats and fish for many, many years without any problems. You just need to make sure whatever tank you choose has a good quality, well fitting, lid; my current cat insists on using the top of my goldfish tank to get to the top of the living room door, so you need to make sure it won't collapse! If you've got Bengals, I'm sure all the usual "make sure all electrical cables are hidden" type tips are very familiar to you already!

I'm not much help on buying set ups; apart from being in the UK, I tend to pick mine up second hand when I see one going cheap; any second hand selling site is worth watching.

We never recommend fish-in cycles nowadays. Best way is a fishless cycle using household ammonia. If you have a look in our 'Cycle Your Tank' sub forum, there's a lot of great information to get you started

You'll need to find out the hardness and pH of your water before we can recommend good species for your final set up (one of the advantages of fishless cycles is that you can stock with the fish you actually want, right from the start). You can find that information on your supplier's website; it will be there somewhere!

 

[voice1970]

TYVM for your response. Household ammonia. I remember I asked about this on a forum a long time ago and people were unsure. It made sense to me, but no one tried it themselves, so did not give the go-ahead. Good to know this will work.

PH of my water is pretty high here. 7.4 or so area. At least it was when I last did this. I had a good community tank a while back and was able to have a bunch of different kinds live in there and had pretty good success. Just kept up the the maintenance and water changes. I am going to get a test kit soon (ammonia, nitrite, nitrate, PH), but curious if there are any newer one's out there that are more accurate than the one's from 10 years ago.

I am more than happy for people to provide recommendations. Just no tail nippers as they stress the other community fish out. I also want to get a school going in there also. I had one of neons last time, but a black ghost I had started eating them, so did not keep it going. I knew it was a risk and was good for about a year, but he eventually did what I was afraid of.

One question. Can you recommend a good brand of lid. I know most are made of thin plastic. One of my cats is over 20 lbs and he will jump on top of it and jump off of it pretty hard at times. I just want to make sure all are safe. wireS, yes, will keep them away from the cats. Have a plan for that, tks for mentioning.

 

[fluttermoth]

A lot of people have done a lot of work on how to do a good fishless cycle in the last few years, it's really come leaps and bounds, and we've helped a lot of people through doing one It's definitely the right way to go.

As long as you get liquid or tablet based tests, not the paper strip kind, they're all accurate enough for our needs.

Most of my tanks have wooden lids that a friend knocked together for me; I'll admit they don't look pretty, but I'm not a very houseproud sort of person! I've never had to deal with a cat of that size, tbh; all of mine have been Abyssinian or Siamese types! But I'm sure there are decent lids out there.

 

[Elainec]

Hi All. My Name is Tom. Thinking about getting back into hobby again after a 9 year break. I used to have a reef tank and a freshwater tank, so know may way around a little. Still have lots to learn though.

Questions I was hoping to get some help with.

1) I now have some cats. I did not have them previously when I had my tanks. Curious on what any of you may have done to help cat proof tanks. Do the wooden canopies help? Mine are bengals, very active and very very curious, so is a concern. Want to straighten this out before I dive in.

2) Thinking about getting a 75 G tank/stand this time. I am just going to do a straight forward freshwater community tank. Curious on any recommendations on best place to get one of these. Any used sites, or sites that generally have good prices for these. Or places in my area (Massachusetts). My apologies in advance if it is not appropriate to ask this here.

3) Are there any new products out there that will help me initially cycle my tank. If not, recommendations for best kind of fish to use for this. Would like to avoid stressing fish if possible, I know that may not be avoidable though. FYI, I will want to get mainly fish that will not nip other fish's fins for my community tank.

Thanks in advance for any advice any of you can give. Happy fishing.

Are you sure you want to set up again? I had 2X 4ft tanks many years ago and have just set up a 40ltr tank again. Begining to wish I hadn't due to things being far more expensive this time round and I don't remember it being so much trouble.