NeverEnoughFish
Aquarium Advice Apprentice
Hello all,
I am an aquarium enthusiast from Madison, WI who has recently gotten back into the aquarium hobby after a 15 year break from it. My wife and I decided to purchase a Tetra brand aquarium kit from Petsmart (sadly Madison doesn't have an amazing LFS, at least not that I know of). Before completing the set up, I decided to look online for good advice and setting up aquariums and came across this forum. I must have spent hours reading threads on setting up aquariums, the best fish to get, the best filters to get, etc. So I want to first thank everyone here for posting such helpful information in regards to aquarium setups. Thanks to the advice I found here, I ended up doing a fishless cycle and had my tank completely cycled in less than 1 month.
A few weeks later, I decided to upgrade my filter. The tank kit came with a Tetra EX20 with the cartridges. Unfortunately before we knew we could actually customize filters, my wife bought a cartridge refill for the EX20. But soon after I set out to get a better performing filter and decided on the AquaClear 50. I decided then to run both filters at the same time and to customize their media. Another long thread reading ensued and this time I was prepared to get some great filter media before setting up the AquaClear. I can thank this forum for introducing me to Drs Foster and Smith as they are now my go to for anything aquarium related (goodbye Petsmart and good riddance!) I ordered a lot of their custom filter media and a huge sheet of the 50 micron water polishing pads. My water looks amazing and the filter media is working great in both filters (I'll actually start a new thread in the equipment area talking about how I was able to customize the Tetra EX20).
I also customized the lighting for my aquarium. The tank kit came with a full hood but incandescent lights. They made my water look really yellowish. So I went to another pet store in my area and found that they sold compact fluorescent bulbs that fit great in my hood so right now I currently have two Coralife Colormax bulbs and they make the colors on my fish absolutely incredible!
As for the fish themselves, nothing too special at the moment. You can see the fish I have in my signature.
In the future I'd like to upgrade to a larger tank and create another freshwater tank and also maybe have a smaller saltwater setup (like one of those Bio Cube tanks).
In closing, I'd like to share a few pictures of my tank taken last month:
I am an aquarium enthusiast from Madison, WI who has recently gotten back into the aquarium hobby after a 15 year break from it. My wife and I decided to purchase a Tetra brand aquarium kit from Petsmart (sadly Madison doesn't have an amazing LFS, at least not that I know of). Before completing the set up, I decided to look online for good advice and setting up aquariums and came across this forum. I must have spent hours reading threads on setting up aquariums, the best fish to get, the best filters to get, etc. So I want to first thank everyone here for posting such helpful information in regards to aquarium setups. Thanks to the advice I found here, I ended up doing a fishless cycle and had my tank completely cycled in less than 1 month.
A few weeks later, I decided to upgrade my filter. The tank kit came with a Tetra EX20 with the cartridges. Unfortunately before we knew we could actually customize filters, my wife bought a cartridge refill for the EX20. But soon after I set out to get a better performing filter and decided on the AquaClear 50. I decided then to run both filters at the same time and to customize their media. Another long thread reading ensued and this time I was prepared to get some great filter media before setting up the AquaClear. I can thank this forum for introducing me to Drs Foster and Smith as they are now my go to for anything aquarium related (goodbye Petsmart and good riddance!) I ordered a lot of their custom filter media and a huge sheet of the 50 micron water polishing pads. My water looks amazing and the filter media is working great in both filters (I'll actually start a new thread in the equipment area talking about how I was able to customize the Tetra EX20).
I also customized the lighting for my aquarium. The tank kit came with a full hood but incandescent lights. They made my water look really yellowish. So I went to another pet store in my area and found that they sold compact fluorescent bulbs that fit great in my hood so right now I currently have two Coralife Colormax bulbs and they make the colors on my fish absolutely incredible!
As for the fish themselves, nothing too special at the moment. You can see the fish I have in my signature.
In the future I'd like to upgrade to a larger tank and create another freshwater tank and also maybe have a smaller saltwater setup (like one of those Bio Cube tanks).
In closing, I'd like to share a few pictures of my tank taken last month:
The only thing I would suggest, is that if you have room, or if you eventually upgrade, to make sure your schooling fish all have at least 6 or more members. They will be much happier, and I've found one big group of schooling fish can look so much nicer than several little groups. Hope to see you around and again welcome to the forum!
