Recent content by b3cca

Cycle can take weeks to complete, Without donor media/bacteria it will not be cycled within a week. Changing water will not slow cycle, the bacteria do not free swim in the water. In fact I found it cycled faster with regular partial water changes. Changing water during cycling is absolutely...

What may be easy in one area or Country may be hard in another - I believe in getting fish that suit your natural water supply rather than trying to match your water to your fish.   A GBR for example should be a fairly easy fish to keep if you live in area with very soft acidic water but would...

Why buy and add salt when you can simply do a few large partial water changes to lower the Nitrites naturally? Even if it is a false reading a large water change will not harm anything

I'm with Flutter on this. Sounds like your tank is not cycled or somehow has crashed which is causing the problem. In those small nano type tanks conditions can go from perfect to fatal fairly quickly. If you have no test kit then I would certainly be doing a partial water change just in case  ...

If it is 260 ppm then it's not ideal for blackwater fish   For a detailed list from your area Just stick you postcode in here : - https://my.thameswater.co.uk/dynamic/cps/rde/xchg/corp/hs.xsl/899.htm

No I don't want him to mate or anything But I don't want to stress them out either if they can't act naturally.   I can pretty easily change the flow level but i always like surface movement to keep good oxygenation in there, so as long not being able to build doesn't stress them I'll leave it...

I have a male and female Paradise fish in my tank but as I keep surface movement it means he cannot build a bubble nest with the filter on.   When feeding I switch off the filter for 15 mins or so while they all eat and during this time he always starts building a bubble nest. I then feel guilty...

Never once seen any of my 5 nerite snails anywhere near my moss balls.   Java fern will  pretty much grow on anything it's attached to as long as it alive, has roots and the rhizome is not buried

Yeah maybe the paradise fish flowing fins would be nipped by tigers ,, maybe the paradise will chase the barbs lol I Should have stuck to a placid community.   I have 4 caves/hides and it's fairly heavily planted in there so hopefully they'll all have their own space and places to hide if needed...

Well I have the RTS and the 2 Paradise fish in there but it obviously looks fairly bare.   Do you think maybe 10-12 Tiger Barbs would be good to add ?

There are lots of fakes out there sold as moss balls which are usually just scrunched balls of fern.   You need to make sure you get actual real authentic Marimo which are 100%  algae. Real genuine ones should live longer than you provided you don't put it through any extreme temps or direct...

Aww thanx Byron. Yeah seems everything I research is not good or ideal for a RTS , but it's ok I will be happy just having a single RTS and a pair of Paradise fish and  maybe get some bigger type snails that are big enough not to become lunch

Yes add some of your established media as long as you keep enough in your 110 litre to keep it stable.   I just did it with my Juwel 300. I simply moved my established cirax and some sponges over from my other tank and dosed the ammonia up to 1 ppm and it was gone within 12 hours hours, re dosed...

I recently got a new (for me) 300 litre Juwel tank it's 121 cm long and 66 cms high and 51 cms deep. My water is soft and acidic -- around 6 PH usually   I am definitely going to get one single Red tail black shark and a pair (m&f) of paradise fish and just need something else to put in there...

Hard to see on your pix but just make sure the rhizone on your plants are not buried/planted under the substrate as they will die