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I would look into a sponge filter as an option, it does not really increase flow and will act as a great place to add some biological filtration, as well as oxygen. The only downside is its appearance in tank.

are you sure its not algae? types of algae certainly can feel slimy, it could also be fungus introduced from driftwood, what color is it? Does it grow on anything? Do you keep the light on all the time?

do you have any tanks up and cycled already that your going to steal the filter media from? I find cycling tends to take different amounts of time depending on the methods used, so it depends what your plan is.

sounds like a good plan, I bet it will be alot of fun, I just set up a breeding tank for a mated pair of gold superveil angels, very similar except that I will simply pull them from the community tank, have them lay the eggs, raise the fry for a bit, then return them to the community tank while...

I second the purigen, I run it in all my planted setups with large amounts of driftwood and it works great, it lasts for a few months and you can regenerate it as well, works much better than carbon in my opinion. After time the wood will stain the water less and less, so you could always wait...

the blue rams could be electric blue rams, although they are probably your standard german blues as the electric blues are quite rare and expensive (around my part anyways) electric blue rams are really cool though in my opinion, they also have a long finned variety of the german gold rams which...

Personally I love the crystal red shrimp, I recently set up a breeding tank with tiger ottocinclus, and seeing the tiny little baby shrimp is really cool, and being able to get $5 a pop for the new ones cannot hurt either :D. They are the most beautiful of all the shrimp species in my opinion...

is the API brand you purchased still in strip form? strips are known for being inacurate, but not that inacurate I would think, very strange. Is it possible to perhaps get a liquid test to be sure? They are much more reliable, or perhaps take a water sample to a nearby pet store? You could...

Yeah thats what I find strange, nitrite starts becoming toxic at .1ppm although most would tolerate that level fine, but 5, you should be seeing them dropping in my opinion, they should at the very least be showing signs of discomfort, they are not gulping for air? or exibiting strange behavoir...

Tough fish! anyways do you test the nitrite after a water change, have you seen it dip below 5? It could be that its so far off the charts your cycle is stalled, although unlikely because 5 should be enough to kill in itself.

Yes it should, thats why I was asking about filter maintenance, as it seems stuck on step 1. I also had a situation one time doing a fishless cycle where I forgot to dose ammonia, and it killed off the ammonia eating bacteria, yet the nitrite bacteria that was developing at the time survived...

Does your aquarium have fish in it? I don't see if you mentioned it or not :) I am guessing no? After you do a water change do you test the nitrites? are they still at 5? I find sometimes after dosing the ammonia in a fishless cycle, the nitrites can build to massive levels, too much for the...

do you know what kind of fish you have? Some don't produce much waste like some of the smaller tetras. Just so I understand correctly, you are now seeing ammonia levels rise to 1ppm correct? Its the nitrate your now worried about? Do you clean your filters at all? If you clean out the filters...

I have often heard that rams were very sensitive as well, its a big reason why I shyed away from them for as long as I did, but I picked up 6 german gold long fin rams for my 69 gallon, and 6 electric blue rams for my 40 gallon, QT them for a few months and threw them in with my angels and...

By no means an expert, but I did extensive research on then earlier this year before deciding they were not for my lifestyle. The wilds are definetly more sensitive to water conditions, I would stay away from them to start off, and go with a good quality known breeder, as half the time the...

You should look into rams, german blue rams, electric blue rams and yellow rams (my favorites) beautiful fish, and will be lower in the water column giving you action on all levels. If you want your shrimp to breed however you will need some moss or something for the shrimplets to hide in or...

Looks great to me, good job on the stocking. Mountain minnows are cold water, the corys are warm, but you can go in between and make it work for both from my understanding, a temp of about 72 would be great. You even have some space left in your tank for a bit more if you wanted, with the filter...

Just peel some skin off, and blanch it a bit, or you can feed it raw, and remove after 24 hours so it does not foul the tank, you will have to weight it down with something though. They make something called a screwcumber that works great for this, you can pull it up on a web search. :)

You can give them treats from your own veggie drawer in your fridge as well, pleacos love sweet potato, zuchinni, kale, peeled/mashed peas, mushrooms etc as well, sweet potato seems to be the favorite, give it a try, I would bet they will devour ths stuff, and may like it even better than what...

I don't have too much experience with mbunas personally, hopefully someone more experienced can come along for this, but from what I have read there is a few variables for keeping mbunas, such as types of mbunas, how many hiding places there is in the tank, and whether its an all male tank or if...

You can get a submersible one? AA Internal 24 Watt Low Voltage UV Sterilizer - Pets & Ponds I believe the coralife turbo twist would need a powerhead, but I believe you can hang it on the back as well, and not have to run it in-line, however it will run in-line if you ever get that canister.

I have always really liked the german gold rams or electric blue rams, perhaps you could get a trio.

Sounds like its pretty much done to me, but you might want to do a water change to get those nitrates down first before adding the fish, you should see the nitrates rise from 40 after dosing the ammonia last night. The ammonia test in API does take 5 minutes to show color as well. Now comes the...

strange, something must have killed off some of that ammonia eating bacteria, did you forget to dose ammonia at all? Dose too much? do anything that might have killed them off? In any event if memory serves me correct ammonia eating bacteria is the quicker forming ones, should replenish pretty...

Glad to see those nitrites finally broke for you, usually you don't want to do a water change but I think in your case it was different because you had such a high concentration of them causing the nitrites to stall out. Ammonia could also be slightly slower to reduce because you removed the...