Smurf
New Member
Uf! Three dead cardinal tetras within a week....
Have been a bit lax with the water changes lately (moved house a couple of months ago and it will have been the water that went in on day one) and on testing (after the first death) the nitrates were high (around 80) and the PH was 8-8.5 (natural tap water is 7 (I checked) but it is Thames Valley so is about as hard as you can get). Also changed the caked up filter floss (ahem...)
I've done a couple of 40%+ water changes over the last 2-3 days and replaced my heater that seemed to be on the blink as I was getting widely varying temperatures from barely registering on the gauge up to 28! Its been settled around the 24-26 degrees for a week now so I think I've fixed that wee problem!
The tank is just under 40l and I'm looking to re-stock but with what? Dyson (the BN plec) seems absolutely fine, as does FQP (fish of questionable parentage; think it might be a platy: the only survivor from the 20-odd surprise fry....).
The cardinals had been doing fine and I'd like to replace them but not sure if the tap water in the new house is OK as a starting point? I suspect the build up of nitrates raised the PH but seems quite rapid - would more frequent water changes resolve the rise? Or do I go for neons that might tolerate the higher PH? Or something else? Open to ideas... would ilke a bit of movement and colour. Dyson's great (and bright yellow) but does tend to lurk under the boxwood most of the time! FQP is murky brown and really not very interesting at all but don't tell him I said that
Merry Belated Christmas!
Daisy
Have been a bit lax with the water changes lately (moved house a couple of months ago and it will have been the water that went in on day one) and on testing (after the first death) the nitrates were high (around 80) and the PH was 8-8.5 (natural tap water is 7 (I checked) but it is Thames Valley so is about as hard as you can get). Also changed the caked up filter floss (ahem...)
I've done a couple of 40%+ water changes over the last 2-3 days and replaced my heater that seemed to be on the blink as I was getting widely varying temperatures from barely registering on the gauge up to 28! Its been settled around the 24-26 degrees for a week now so I think I've fixed that wee problem!
The tank is just under 40l and I'm looking to re-stock but with what? Dyson (the BN plec) seems absolutely fine, as does FQP (fish of questionable parentage; think it might be a platy: the only survivor from the 20-odd surprise fry....).
The cardinals had been doing fine and I'd like to replace them but not sure if the tap water in the new house is OK as a starting point? I suspect the build up of nitrates raised the PH but seems quite rapid - would more frequent water changes resolve the rise? Or do I go for neons that might tolerate the higher PH? Or something else? Open to ideas... would ilke a bit of movement and colour. Dyson's great (and bright yellow) but does tend to lurk under the boxwood most of the time! FQP is murky brown and really not very interesting at all but don't tell him I said that
Merry Belated Christmas!
Daisy