Small Tank For Fry Etc.

[doresy]

Ok, so I have never cycled a tank before. I now know about the physics of cycling. When I started fish keeping (4 years ago) I just filled the tank with dechlorinated water, added a couple of Platy (still have them!) 2 weeks later. After about 6 trips to the LFS in as many weeks for water testing they gave me the all clear to increase my stock.
Those of you that may remember my arrival to this forum may recall my 'I don't need to do anything, I have been successful with monthly water changes....blah blah blah'.......What a p***k!

Anyway, that's all in the past.......My weekly water changed established tank with Ammonia at 0. Nitrite also at 0. Nitrate at 40 PH at 7.0

At the moment I managed to contain guppy fry in a floating breeding trap. Also I found other fry in main tank which I netted and also put in trap. This has led me into wanting to get an Aquaone 320 (28ltr I think) to house fry as it arrives.

This is my thinking......

Fill with water from my main tank. Also use substrate taken from main tank. I have had a piece of coarse foam media in the water return chamber of my Aquaone 850 for several months. I was thinking of putting it in the little Fuval that comes with the Aquaone 320 along with a bit of sludge from the main filter.

QUESTIONS;
1) Doing the above do you think it will be ok to transfer the fry straight away?

2) I would quite like to divide the little tank in half. Using one side for heavily pregnant fish and the other side for fry. Any ideas on what to use for the divider and how to attatch it. It must allow water to pass through it and it must be easy to remove once fish has given birth and returned to main tank.

3) After testing the water and later on I would like to add a couple of small bottom feeders that will not bother the fry. I know corys need to be in bigger shoals so is there anything else that would be ok in a pair?

 

[iairj84]

Well first of all the water itself doesn't house much if any beneficial bacteria, the gravel and sponge you mentioned though do. I would use fresh dechlorinated water and not worry about using your tanks water. It will actually be more of a bother since you will already have nitrates in that water. The sponge is a great thing to transfer and will work great. The gravel is also a really good idea. I dont use really any substrate at all in my fry tank only some marbles to give smaller fry a place to hide. You could always put the gravel or sand in a sock and put it in the tank to keep the cycle short.

One of the great things about fry is when they're small I find that their bio load is relatively low which gives you even longer to build up that good bacteria from your mature media.

As far as the divider goes I've heard that you should get a fine embroidery mesh and use the plastic pieces that come with sheet protectors to stick it to the glass. I haven't used this method myself but would assume it would work pretty well. You could also get a piece of plexiglass and drill really small holes all throughout the piece... holes big enough to let a good amount of water through but not the fry (which would be kind of hard to do with some small fry) But generally unless you have more than one female getting pregnant the fry will be too big to enter into the place with the smaller and with the mom. I would personally use the later idea while using aquarium silicon to glue it in.

 

[Jozlyn]

I am in the process of making a divider for my grow out tank so that I can seperate the boys and girls. I bought some plastic mesh from a large craft shop, the type that people who do cross stitch use. I then got some plastic spines from the Newsagent, the type you use to keep a bunch of papers together neatly. Using aquarium safe silicone, glue the spines to the sides of the tank. Measure up the mesh and cut it to size, then slide it into the slot in the spines where the paper would normaly go, bingo instant divider!

I've done mine slightly differently as I want to be able to take it out or move it depending on how many boys and girls I have, obviously I'm not going to be so lucky as to have 16 of each, so having it in the middle of the tank might not be practical. So instead of glueing the spines to the tank I've measured very carefully and glued the mesh into the spines, my tank has a lip at the top which will hold the divider firmly in place at the top and it will be burried in abut 10cm's of gravel at the bottom which will hold it in place there.

 

[doresy]

Thank you both......all comments and suggestions helpful and taken on board.

All as expected with the exception of the water so will now use new (de-chlorinated)

Will experiment with the divider before setting up......meanwhile fry can stay where they are.

Simple thing like going to a hobby shop for the materials suggested is useful.(I think fish stuff so just go to LFS.....wrong!)

again

 

[iairj84]

I would definately check around with hobby type stores and craft stores. I buy as much as I can from those places to help reduce costs for me. It's silly to buy a bag of polyester fiber for $7.99 at a fish store when the same thing is $1.50 elsewhere. I support my LFS as much as is needed but certain things can be ridiculous!

 

[stargirly1208]

i agree with them. just don't buy that divider they sell in the petstore... very unuseful. the fry swim on the sides of it and get to the other side no matter how much u push it against the tank wall. but i had a problem of having the filter on one side and the side with the fry not filtering well enough. i was pretty successful in only putting in the mother who was ready to have fry in the tank and removing her as quickly as possible. as long as you have lots of plants and gravel, the fry usually are okay to hide from the mom. i've never had any problems with my fry getting stuck anywhere. so if you wanted to use gravel i'd say go ahead. i once had so many great hiding places i had all the female and male guppies in the tank with an overload of fry! it was insane. best of luck!

 

[Jozlyn]

I forgot to add that I will be having one small filter either side of the divider and I'll put the heater right beside it, that way both sides will be filtered and the heat will transfer through the mesh and keep the whole tank warm.