Recent content by jsoong

Red streaks in the tail is usually some kind of infection. The most likely reason for this is water quality issues. 50l is a small tank for goldfish. It is just barely able to cope with 2 fantails. <A 20 or 30 gal = 80-100l is much easier to manage.> The key to managing goldfish in small...

It takes a while for the nitrates to build up. Depending on your bioload, it might even be weeks. And since the test kit has a threshold to turn positive (typically 2-5), you won't see any nitrates registering until it hits the threshold.

I would guess that your tank is not cycled. <Unless you have a daily ammonia log that showed NH3 & NO2 spikes in the 3 weeks that the tank was setup.> You had a pretty low bioload, so it is going to take a while for NH3 to build & start cycling. At this point, with the added bioload, I would...

6 weeks in, you should be getting nitrites. Seeding the tank is certainly a good idea, but in the meantime, I would agree lots of pwc's are needed. During a fishy cycle, daily water changes are the norm. Ammonia binders are really just stop gaps. They do break down so you have to keep adding it...

And inverts also need Ca & other minerals in the water for maintenance of their shell. They do better in moderate hard water (say pH of high 7's). Depending on what your tap water is like, you might be better off using tap, or a mix of distilled & tap. Another alternative is to add a...

0.25 ammonia is not necessarily anything, as long as it is not rising. The typical kit (Nessler) cannot tell bound from unbound ammonia, so if you just did a pwc (or set up the tank from scratch), the bound ammonia from the chloramines in the water will show up as a weak positive ammonia in...

One thing you can do is to ask the lfs what water they use. If they use plain tap water (very likely, esp. in chain stores), you should be fine with your tap as well (as long as you are not in a different town.) Your acclimatization is pretty good, although it is a bit brief if the water...

Since sword tails are central American, you might have better luck searching for ideas for a central or south American biotrope to put the swordtails in. <Swordtails being such common community fish that I doubt too many people are thinking about a biotrope for them.> As for plants, you need to...

Prob. just a mini-cycle. The presence of nitrites is suspect ... maybe you stirred up some muck during the transfer. I would just keep an eye on it, and a few pwc as needed should do the trick.

Hi & welcome to AA! It takes a lot of expertise & understanding to doctor water. Just testing the pH & adding chemicals is NOT the way to do it! Before doing anything, we need to know what your water parameters are: pH, Ammonia, Nitrites, nitrates ... and if you are going to doctor your water...

I have not seen any double tank stand plans, but this is not too different from someone building a large tank with a large sump underneath. Although in your case, that bottom tank is going to be much heavier than any sump. The main problem I see is how you can support the top tank without a...

I don't think the fish cares much about noise or light. <As long as there is some quiet & dark time for the fish to sleep.> However, a tank too close to TV & stuff might be dangerous ... If you are like me, I spill water whenever I do pwc or cleaning .... Having the tank too close to your...

What I did was pressure wash the wood (no soap of course), then put the wood in the bathtub, and pour boiling water over the wood. If the wood had not been water-logged, you can also put it under hot sun for a few days or weeks. (Totally drying out the wood kills most water borne bugs. But it...

You are at ~ 4 weeks of metro now. That should be a long enough course of treatment. I would stop & see what happens next. In general, when using anti-biotics, you want to use a good dose (hence oral or injectable) for enough time (for usual bacterial infection, it is 2 weeks - 3 weeks). Using...

You must have been feeding the metro for weeks now? Are you at the end of the treatment course? <You normally only use antibiotics for 2 weeks - 3 at most.>