Recent content by Jim Sinclair

Is there any difference between red and black lava rock for biological filtration? All the videos I've seen recommending lava rock show red lava rock. At my local Lowe's a 6-pound bag of red lava rock costs $7.98, while a 16-pound bag of black lava rock costs $8.98--just one dollar more for 10...

If water flows "down through the sponge and back into the pond," does that mean the bucket is above the pond? How do you place it?

Yeah, I don't know how I could get anything off the bottom of these things. If a sick or dead fish was lying on the bottom of the tank, I don't know how I'd get it out. Where do you get nets with long enough handles? I was thinking in terms of building a filter that would be outside the tank...

Thanks for the reply. Where did you put your gravel filter trays?

I'm not sure which section this should go in. If I'm putting it in the wrong place, moderators please move it to where it belongs. I have purchased two used IBC tanks (this kind: https://www.uline.com/BL_173/IBC-Tanks), made of food grade plastic and previously used to house feeder fish and...

The gas company has told me they need to remove the old gas meter from my basement and install a new one. I have an indoor goldfish pond in my basement, as well as several tanks upstairs in the living room. Does gas meter replacement involve any industrial chemicals, tools vibrating at harmful...

The methylene blue bottle didn't have instructions for how long to keep fish in a separate tank, only instructions for how much to use and removing carbon from the filter, warning that it would stain things, etc. In the absence of any responses here until days later, I ended up putting them...

This: The all white one is the one that was mobile but lethargic, and appeared to have ragged fins last night. The white and orange one is the one that was lying on the floor struggling to breathe. Obviously they are doing much, much better now. They are not happy in the hospital tank. It's...

This has been an utterly hellacious week. Multiple nights in a row of sleeping only 1 to 4 hours, on the road hundreds of miles, and on Monday my sweetest, lovingest, cuddliest, most caring and nurturing cat died suddenly. So I've been reeling emotionally from that, and it took about a day and...

I've heard of elephants getting drunk by deliberately eating fermented plant material.

I googled "blind cherry barbs" and found several references, some of them suggesting that there are varieties of cherry barbs that are naturally blind. Here's a thread I found about one that was blind plus seemed to have a number of other issues...

Wow, that must be overwhelming! :-( I wouldn't give up on them yet. Acquired disabilities take time to adjust to, in fish as well as in humans. When I first pulled my mangled goldfish out of the pond where the bigger fish were eating them alive, I was advised to euthanize the one that had lost...

Isn't blindness one of the risks for humans of drinking wood alcohol, assuming the person survives at all? How can you tell the fish is blind in that eye? Is it bumping into things? I have a goldfish that is completely blind. I know this because it doesn't have any eyes. When it was a baby...

Okay, I am working at the polls today. As before, there are plastic spray bottles, one labeled "hand sanitizer" and one labeled "disinfectant." When the person from the Board of Elections came by to check on this station, I asked her what brands of products were in those bottles. She didn't know.

Soap residue would definitely be bad for fish. But so would residue from other things that soap is designed to remove from your hands--like motor oil, insect repellent, any kind of lotion, hand sanitizer even! Soap is very effective at getting all manner of crud off your skin. You should...