Hi all
New to this forum, have been a beginner enthusiast for several years, started with 3 African dwarf frogs, the oldest of whom lived for about 7 years. When I only had one ADF left I bought 3 cory catfish who are still going about 2 years later. I also buy nerite snails from time to time.
Last year I had a problem with blue-green algae which I got under control. In about January I got 3 new ADFs after I lost my 7 year old one, they have never seemed to be completely comfortable. They spend all their time hiding and haven't grown much. I have also had problems keeping any plant alive. I have always bought elodea densa and never had an issue with it - in fact I've usually had to trim it and throw some away as it's thrived a bit too much! But since I got the baby ADFs I can't keep any plant alive for more than a week. They just turn brown and die. My filter was also getting really clogged with brown muck. The snails have all gradually died as well.
I bought a new filter about a month ago which seemed to help things, but in the last week I found one of my ADFs dead and half-eaten, and all my plants have died again. Just now I went to clear out all the dead plant material and clean the filter, and I can only find one ADF, there's no sign of the second one anywhere so am assuming it also has died and been eaten. The corys seem absolutely fine, no sign of illness or anything, but the ADF gets very stressed when I clean anything in the tank. They have plenty of hiding places but obviously plant cover is currently an issue. I keep buying new plants to replace the dead ones but they then die in turn.
Since having the above problems I've regularly tested my water with an API test kits and found no problems with my parameters (am on the train right now so can't check and post current parameters). I would usually do a water change once a week but increased that to twice or three times when I started having issues. I kept the lights off completely to tackle the blue-green algae, and have also tried to generally have the lights on less in case that's causing my plants to die (I aim for 9/10 hours of light a day).
I've been using plant fertiliser as wasn't sure if my plants weren't getting enough nutrients but it's made no difference. I'm worried that there's something fundamentally wrong with my setup that I can't seem to fix. My corys seem to be coping but am worried I'll lose my last remaining ADF soon and then maybe even my corys if I can't figure out what the problem is.
The tank is 15 litre capacity, although I would say its probably filled to about 12 litres at the moment to allow the ADF to come up to the surface more easily as I'm worried about how stressed he seems.
Does anyone have any suggestions?
New to this forum, have been a beginner enthusiast for several years, started with 3 African dwarf frogs, the oldest of whom lived for about 7 years. When I only had one ADF left I bought 3 cory catfish who are still going about 2 years later. I also buy nerite snails from time to time.
Last year I had a problem with blue-green algae which I got under control. In about January I got 3 new ADFs after I lost my 7 year old one, they have never seemed to be completely comfortable. They spend all their time hiding and haven't grown much. I have also had problems keeping any plant alive. I have always bought elodea densa and never had an issue with it - in fact I've usually had to trim it and throw some away as it's thrived a bit too much! But since I got the baby ADFs I can't keep any plant alive for more than a week. They just turn brown and die. My filter was also getting really clogged with brown muck. The snails have all gradually died as well.
I bought a new filter about a month ago which seemed to help things, but in the last week I found one of my ADFs dead and half-eaten, and all my plants have died again. Just now I went to clear out all the dead plant material and clean the filter, and I can only find one ADF, there's no sign of the second one anywhere so am assuming it also has died and been eaten. The corys seem absolutely fine, no sign of illness or anything, but the ADF gets very stressed when I clean anything in the tank. They have plenty of hiding places but obviously plant cover is currently an issue. I keep buying new plants to replace the dead ones but they then die in turn.
Since having the above problems I've regularly tested my water with an API test kits and found no problems with my parameters (am on the train right now so can't check and post current parameters). I would usually do a water change once a week but increased that to twice or three times when I started having issues. I kept the lights off completely to tackle the blue-green algae, and have also tried to generally have the lights on less in case that's causing my plants to die (I aim for 9/10 hours of light a day).
I've been using plant fertiliser as wasn't sure if my plants weren't getting enough nutrients but it's made no difference. I'm worried that there's something fundamentally wrong with my setup that I can't seem to fix. My corys seem to be coping but am worried I'll lose my last remaining ADF soon and then maybe even my corys if I can't figure out what the problem is.
The tank is 15 litre capacity, although I would say its probably filled to about 12 litres at the moment to allow the ADF to come up to the surface more easily as I'm worried about how stressed he seems.
Does anyone have any suggestions?
