Finally tearing down ugly 57g, building new 36g to replace it!

[AdoraBelle Dearheart]

Wishing I'd spent longer hunting for a tank now rather than getting this one. To be fair, the seller gave me the wrong measurements and I calculated it as a 37g when I agreed to buy it based on those measurements, then measured it myself when I got it and found out it was 34g. But there is room on the cabinet, I could have got a 40-50g, and probably would have been wiser with the amount of cories I have.

 

[Colin_T]

Most of the heater cords I have encountered are too short, agree...

I live in Australia, we don't need heaters for the most part

 

[Rocky998]

Marina, I think? Good question! I'm not sure, lol. But it's hard to get any of the to reach, when I prefer a heater to be almost horizontal lower down in the tank so it's safe during a water change.

One reason I don't like to unplug equipment during water changes is that I don't trust my memory - I worry I'll forget to turn everything back on again after the water change.

Hm... Must be a UK brand... Oh wait... maybe I have heard of it? Idk...
I've tried putting mine down horizontally but it takes up space lower to the floor of the tank that I need lol...

I can see where that would take up a lot of cordage then

 

[AdoraBelle Dearheart]

@Colin_T - when I cleaned out the canister filter after this spike, there was more muck than I expected, particularly mush all on the filter floss, I'm suspecting maybe from dying plan leaves since it's a new set up. It had only been set up for three weeks but is an established filter - but the flow improved a lot once I'd cleaned it. Could the filter being really mucky and slowing flow have helped to cause the issue? With over-feeding being the main thing of course, but even when I fasted and did large water changes, I was still getting low level ammonia/nitrite readings.

 

[Colin_T]

Fish live in a soup of microscopic organisms including bacteria, fungus, viruses, protozoans, worms, flukes and various other things that make your skin crawl.

A dirty filter means all the aquarium water is passing through fish poop and picking up all sorts of nasty microscopic organisms

Dirty gravel is another haven for harmful disease organisms.

You can do as many water changes as you like, but if the filter is dirty and the gravel has lots of gunk in it, then the water will be contaminated very quickly by all the nasty things in the filter and gravel.

That's why the first thing I tell people to do if their fish is sick, is clean the glass to remove the biofilm, clean the filter to get rid of the gunk, and clean the gravel to remove the crap in that. Then a big water change to dilute any disease organisms in the water.

 

[Lajos_Detari]

Fish live in a soup of microscopic organisms including bacteria, fungus, viruses, protozoans, worms, flukes and various other things that make your skin crawl.

A dirty filter means all the aquarium water is passing through fish poop and picking up all sorts of nasty microscopic organisms

Dirty gravel is another haven for harmful disease organisms.

You can do as many water changes as you like, but if the filter is dirty and the gravel has lots of gunk in it, then the water will be contaminated very quickly by all the nasty things in the filter and gravel.

That's why the first thing I tell people to do if there fish is sick, is clean the glass to remove the biofilm, clean the filter to get rid of the gunk, and clean the gravel to remove the crap in that. Then a big water change to dilute any disease organisms in the water.

This is very good reminder for me especially when I'm too busy to clean the filters.
Thanks for the useful information.

 

[Lajos_Detari]

@Colin_T - when I cleaned out the canister filter after this spike, there was more muck than I expected, particularly mush all on the filter floss, I'm suspecting maybe from dying plan leaves since it's a new set up. It had only been set up for three weeks but is an established filter - but the flow improved a lot once I'd cleaned it. Could the filter being really mucky and slowing flow have helped to cause the issue? With over-feeding being the main thing of course, but even when I fasted and did large water changes, I was still getting low level ammonia/nitrite readings.

Were there a lot of dust or small particles from your new sand that might had been sucked into your canister filter?

I rinsed my sand many times until the water became clear and I put them in a fine laundry net to rinse them.
It was easier to rinse them when I put the sand in a laundry net.

 

[AdoraBelle Dearheart]

Were there a lot of dust or small particles from your new sand that might had been sucked into your canister filter?

I rinsed my sand many times until the water became clear and I put them in a fine laundry net to rinse them.
It was easier to rinse them when I put the sand in a laundry net.

Thanks, and nice to see you here and posting!
Not the sand for me in this case, I used Unpac Limpopo black sand, which is remarkably clean and doesn't need that much rinsing before the water runs clear. Some of the sand I used was from a smaller tank, but taken out and cleaned, and the new stuff rinsed, and it didn't cloud the water much at all when I added it and mucked about with the hardscape before planting.


In my case I think it's because I've over-fed, and the plants have been struggling - some of them have lost a lot of leaves that go soft, shrimp eat etc, things like an amazon sword converting to submersed form, and some plants just didn't make it. So despite my trying to maintain, too many organics bunging up the filter and slowing the flow.

 

[AdoraBelle Dearheart]

Fish live in a soup of microscopic organisms including bacteria, fungus, viruses, protozoans, worms, flukes and various other things that make your skin crawl.

A dirty filter means all the aquarium water is passing through fish poop and picking up all sorts of nasty microscopic organisms

Dirty gravel is another haven for harmful disease organisms.

You can do as many water changes as you like, but if the filter is dirty and the gravel has lots of gunk in it, then the water will be contaminated very quickly by all the nasty things in the filter and gravel.

That's why the first thing I tell people to do if their fish is sick, is clean the glass to remove the biofilm, clean the filter to get rid of the gunk, and clean the gravel to remove the crap in that. Then a big water change to dilute any disease organisms in the water.

Thank you, that does all make complete sense!

What I meant though is that could the slow flow from the filter, help cause an ammonia/nitrite build up? Like, the water not flowing through the BB enough to process the usual bioload? I feel a bit silly asking this question!

 

[AdoraBelle Dearheart]

Water is testing perfectly again, 0/0/10-20ppm, but I've only fed very lightly.

I've definitely made up my mind to replace this tank with a larger one - seems silly now that I put all that stress and effort into setting this one up, only to decide it'll be coming down a month later! I was short-sighted, and didn't do enough research into the size tank my plecos would need. It's hard to get reliable info about L181's for some reason. Sorry @Wills ! After all your help as well, I'll be tearing it down as soon as I can! Hope you'll still be willing to help advise me when it's time to scape the new set ups!


I really need to sell off smaller empty tanks, bronze cory babies and the 57g before I can replace this one. Once all that is done, can set up the 30-40g in the living room and move half the cories, possibly temp house the fish in this set up in there while I set up a 50-60g for them in here. That's gonna take some time, but the plecos are at least still really small, and the cories seem pretty happy in this set up for now. Spotted some pre-spawning behaviour earlier, and told them off - I have no space or time for more baby fish right now! I'm committed to keeping the water quality up in the meantime. I hope that that's okay... I've considered rehoming the plecs, but I'm really attached and would prefer not to... unless it would be better for them? I would rather rehome them than stunt them.

Placed an order for some more fast growing live plants, for all of the tanks. Aimed just for fast growing, so new plant order is;
* Water sprite
*Murdannia keisak
*Limnophila heterophylla
*Limnophila hippuridoides
*Elodea densa
*Nymphoides hydrophylla Taiwan
*Hygrophila polysperma Rosenervig

Hopefully all of those will help keep the water quality good while I look to improve things!

 

[AdoraBelle Dearheart]

Oh dear... the cories have moved from pre-spawning behaviour to actually spawning... Not gonna rescue the eggs this time I'm afraid, just no room to raise even more when 70 odd are still growing out. Will have to see if any eggs make it and babies raise themselves in the tank. Has happened before!

ETA: I may have spoken too soon. The bronzes spawning seems to have excited the sterbai, and those guys haven't spawned for me before... I'd be tempted to save their eggs if they lay any. I have six sterbai but I don't know the sexes, it's harder to tell with them since they're much more stockily built. @DoubleDutch any tips for sexing sterbai cories? There's a good chance that in a group of six there's some mix of sexes there, but not always. My bronze cory group is now 1:8 male/female after all.

 

[AdoraBelle Dearheart]

Oh dear... the cories have moved from pre-spawning behaviour to actually spawning... Not gonna rescue the eggs this time I'm afraid, just no room to raise even more when 70 odd are still growing out. Will have to see if any eggs make it and babies raise themselves in the tank. Has happened before!

ETA: I may have spoken too soon. The bronzes spawning seems to have excited the sterbai, and those guys haven't spawned for me before... I'd be tempted to save their eggs if they lay any. I have six sterbai but I don't know the sexes, it's harder to tell with them since they're much more stockily built. @DoubleDutch any tips for sexing sterbai cories? There's a good chance that in a group of six there's some mix of sexes there, but not always. My bronze cory group is now 1:8 male/female after all.

lol @Rocky998 just curious, which bit made you leave the wow react?

 

[Rocky998]

lol @Rocky998 just curious, which bit made you leave the wow react?

Your sterbai cories that have never spawned could finally be spawning spawning and I really really like sterbais!
And your bronzes are going at it again! Really cool is all

 

[AdoraBelle Dearheart]

Your sterbai cories that have never spawned could finally be spawning spawning and I really really like sterbais!
And your bronzes are going at it again! Really cool is all

Aaaww, thanks! Would definitely be excited if the sterbai's spawned! And being in the same water as other cories that are/have been spawning in is a known trigger to try to encourage other cories to spawn... something to do with the hormones. So maybe!

Tank light is off now, will have to see if there are any eggs in the morning

 

[Rocky998]

Aaaww, thanks! Would definitely be excited if the sterbai's spawned! And being in the same water as other cories that are/have been spawning in is a known trigger to try to encourage other cories to spawn... something to do with the hormones. So maybe!

Tank light is off now, will have to see if there are any eggs in the morning

The "mood" is contagious... Great

Maybe you can sell them though!