A Few Minor Problems...

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Danny.

Aquarium Advice Regular
Joined
Oct 6, 2010
Messages
57
Location
Sheffield
Hi there,
I have just become a member of this forum so i could get a little advice about a few problems in and with my fish tank.
This may take awhile to get through so bare with me.

Firstly I Have a 240l (52 (UK) Gallon) tank with a fluval 305 ext. filter, Fluval M Class 300w Heater, Tetratec APS300 airpump.
I have been doing twice daily tests for the pH, NH4, NO3 and NO2 and so far there have been no problems, ammonia has not risen above 0, nitrate as hovered around 0.1 and nitrite around 0.1, pH has been stable at 6.8-7.0.
The tank has been setup 9 days now and has the region of around 16 fish. (I know this is too many fish for the tank not to have cycled properly but my other half is quite impatient, The fish however seem to be doing fine with one death of a female guppy that wasnt right from the off when we put her in the tank (probable stress from transport) and as previously mentioned i have seen no change in ammonia levels doing twice daily checks there has been no spikes at all)
In the filter i am using activated carbon, fluval Zeo-Carb (ammonia remover and activated carbon bags) and the Biomax.

The First of my problems is a technical issue, last night while trying to sleep i noticed when the heater turned on and after being on for about 30 seconds it would begin to make a fizzing sound accompanied by a slight clicking (like there was a piece of gravel being repeatedly tapped against the side) every 3-5 seconds.
I confirmed this when the heater turned off and the clicking noise remained for about 15 seconds after then stopped.
Obviously I have turned the heater off and removed it, replacing it with a small 25watt :( one from my quarantine tank. It seems to be helping the tempreture stay stable but i know it will not be able to heat the tank effeciently. What i would like to know is is this heater truely shagged and needs replacing?

Secondly we have an over aggresive silver male mollie. When we got our first fish we introduced a F&M Silver Molly Pair, F&M Black Molly Pair and 2 female platys. For the first 2 days they were all fine together, but after the second day the silver male would chase the silver female quite frequently, he then had a fight with the black male mollie and after we broke this apart the silver one went and hid under the bogwood all night, we thought this had sorted him out and put him in his place but next day he was chasing the silver female and black male again.
We decided to introduce another 2 females to the tank one black and one orange and black (there were no silver ones left in the store) when they were in the tank as soon as the light came back on the silver male was pestering the new black female as i watch hom niw he is chasing her all around the tank practically ignoring the female silver he was chasing 2 days ago and also sometimes chasing the black male off if he cant find the black female.
I wondered if there was anyway to calm this mollie down as i dont want to comprise the other fish, ive tried to catch him and quarentine but hes too fast and clever plus the heater for the quarentine tank is being used in the main tank.
Another problem i have encoutered is one of my very nice looking male guppys which we bought yesterday has a huge (nearly half) of his tail and top fin missing. I have caught him and isolated him in a breeding trap with some small tiger shrimp but he doesnt seem happy in there.
I have a number of suspicions as to who the culprite is but a number of other factors led me to ask on here.
Firstly we have a male fighting fish this i assumed to be the problem, after doing some research i found that keeping them together is not a good idea. However i do have another male guppy (not as colourful as the other) that is absolutly fine, he has no fins missing and seems to be happy.
I was also thinking it may have been the male silver mollie as sometimes he does nip at other fish very rarely.

My final question is regarding 3 bumblebee shrimp that i have. When we saw them online we thought they would be much bigger (1inch) but when they arrived they were tiny no bigger than 8mm for the biggest.
Currently i have them in the breeding trap with the male guppy, i was wondering if they would be ok inside the breeding trap to grow abit. I have dropped a pleco wafer in and they seem to be feeding just fine.

Thanks
 
Forgot To Add

I am also having afew problems with selective plants in the aquarium, two of them seem to be dying and withering just above the ceramic pot when the start of the stems are and keep coming off and floating around the tank. The others seem fine and growing well but these ones are just dying.
Any ideas?
 
Welcome to AA!

I see you're aware of your cycling needs. Good job.

I wouldn't trust any suspect heater. It's cheap insurance to replace it.

Adding a few more females is a good thing. It divides the male's attention. He may calm down after some time.

Guppies and mollies will eat little shrimp. Those would make expensive snacks.

What kind of plants do you have and what lighting do you have? Some stores sell "aquatic" plants which are really swamp plants and will die if they're completely under water. If that's not the case, insufficient lighting is the next biggest plant killer.
 
I have rang up the company that sold me the fish tank and they are sending a new heater asap, should arrive on tomorrow.
What do would your opinion be on the male guppy with a half eaten tail. Betta fish to blame, if so why has he not gone for the other male guppy?
At the moment the shrimp don't seem too bothered by the male guppy in their breeding trap it seems hes more scared of them than the other way round, darting away if they go near him.
The lighting setup is 2x 42w T8 tubes. One is Fluvals Aqua glow and the other is tropical sunshine. All the other plants in the aquarium are doing fine except these two (not sure on names).
Pictures to follow.

Nipped Male Guppy
img_1163617_0_060b21cb1553536f48a6aae919d56b98.jpg


Dying Plant (unknown species) (red one)
img_1163617_1_0261844b5094a91814b79acf03280a6b.jpg


Full Tank Setup
img_1163617_2_7027cf5179bc3ffccc4441d8b33cd19f.jpg
 
I'd let the guppy out in the tank. Keeping him in the breeder trap will only stress him out.

Red plants usually need pretty strong light. Try moving the plant directly under the strongest light.
 
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