All change...

[2cvbloke]

Well, as I was saying in my other thread, I've moved the snails into my small tank, to make way for, erm, something else in my slightly bigger tank...

I tried my best to clean out the tank of the algae and any other bugs (there were loads of cool little things swimming about in the dirty filter water!!!), but upon refilling the tank I noticed there were still some patches of algae, so I'm heating up the tank and hopefully killing it off (assuming the very hot water I cleaned it out with didn't kill it first)...

Plus I moved my tank to somewhere where I can see them a bit better...

Anyway, piccies!!!:

 

[theotheragentm]

Tanks look much cleaner. Nice job.

 

[2cvbloke]

Tanks look much cleaner. Nice job.

Thanks, I damaged the filter's outlet tubing though as I decided to boil that too as it was caked in algae, and it seems to have shrunk, and the squirter, with a row of holes in it, has bent!!! 8O

Just need to go back to the drawing board regarding who is going to live in there...

 

[DepotFish]

Looks like a 10 gallon? Easier to let everything sit in bleach and then rinse like crazy. No chance of ruining too much stuff. Must re-cycle either way.

 

[2cvbloke]

Looks like a 10 gallon? Easier to let everything sit in bleach and then rinse like crazy. No chance of ruining too much stuff. Must re-cycle either way.

7.5 I think, I didn't use bleach as I haven't actually got any in at the moment (poor toilet!!! ), but very hot water is just as effective and more environmentally friendly....

And yes, it will be re-cycled, I would like to try BioSpira, but I can't find it here in the UK at the moment, the nearest thing I can find is made by Tetra...

 

[theotheragentm]

Just remember that products that contain bacteria to eliminate a cycle should be refrigerated. Shelf products may help reduce the harmfulness of the bioload, but only products that are refrigerated like BioSpira contain the necessary bacteria to handle the bioload.

 

[2cvbloke]

Just remember that products that contain bacteria to eliminate a cycle should be refrigerated. Shelf products may help reduce the harmfulness of the bioload, but only products that are refrigerated like BioSpira contain the necessary bacteria to handle the bioload.

I just found something about Tetra's SafeStart, which apparently, like BioSpira, is based on Nitrospira cultures, could be an effective solution for me, thing is that they claim that it can be kept at room temperature for up to 12 months and remain effective... :?

 

[theotheragentm]

Just remember that products that contain bacteria to eliminate a cycle should be refrigerated. Shelf products may help reduce the harmfulness of the bioload, but only products that are refrigerated like BioSpira contain the necessary bacteria to handle the bioload.

I just found something about Tetra's SafeStart, which apparently, like BioSpira, is based on Nitrospira cultures, could be an effective solution for me, thing is that they claim that it can be kept at room temperature for up to 12 months and remain effective... :?

Well, just measure your levels while you're using it to be safe. Good luck.

 

[2cvbloke]

Well, as a stereotypical old southern-state american would say, dagnabit!!! The Algae managed to survive the hot water cleaning and even though I haven't put any food or anything in the tank, just dechlorinator, it's turning green!!!

I'm going to put a sleeping bag over it tonight and keep the heater on full, so hopefully the nasty green stuff will die off, I hope permenantly, I hate that algae, it's the hairy/stringy type too (the snails live off it happily though in t'other tank)...

But a loooooong way back down the line, it was actually my fault that the algae got in my mum's first tank, taking a sort-of wild pond snail (a well grown hitch hiker on one of my mum's deceased pond plants), which had a "fur coat" of the stuff, and plopping it in the tank, and from then on in each tank since then the bloomin' green stuff's grown in them!!! :x

EDIT: Oh, I made up some blue LED nightlights for the snail tank too, cos I was bored the other night...

I made them using a dieing set of LED christmas tree lights, some of the LEDs were burning out at about a rate of 2 a day, so probably a dodgy PSU!!! It's not exactly neat & tidy, but it's not the lid you're supposed to look at!!!

I would upload some pics, but I seem to have reached my 2mb quota...

 

[An t-iasg]

2cvbloke,
Click on the profile button at the bottom of one of your posts. You'll see a bar graph labeled "Upload Quota". Click beneath that where it says "User Attachment Control Panel" and you'll see a list of all the pictures you've uploaded in the various threads. Click the checkbox to delete the old pictures to make room for new pictures.

 

[2cvbloke]

2cvbloke,
Click on the profile button at the bottom of one of your posts. You'll see a bar graph labeled "Upload Quota". Click beneath that where it says "User Attachment Control Panel" and you'll see a list of all the pictures you've uploaded in the various threads. Click the checkbox to delete the old pictures to make room for new pictures.

Ah, I wondered where the Profile button was lurking!!!

Thankyou!!!

EDIT:
Added the snailtank nightlight pics...

They're not as bright as they look in the pic, as always, it was the camera's Low-Light mode that makes them bright...

The lights run off the 15v PSU the main light uses, but they are directly connected to the PSU line so they aren't affected by the light switch. They're wired in two series lines, connected together in parallel, but I may take out one LED from each line or alter the setup so there's 3 Series lines so the LEDs are visibly brighter....

 

[2cvbloke]

Another slight adaptation, I changed the wiring, so now that in each series is just 4 LEDs and added an extra 2 on the front to accomodate this, so there are now 3 series lines, all connected in parallel for equal voltage, I had 1 burnout, but that was probably a faulty LED like all the others from the original christmas light string...

EDIT:
Oh, and the strange shape in the background is one of my sleeping bags over t'other tank to clear up the evil algae....

 

[7Enigma]

Easiest way to kill off the algae is to dump a NEW bottle of hydrogen peroxide in the tank. Turn the lights off, run it overnight, next day EVERYTHING will be dead. And unlike bleach, there is no cleanup. I'd do a water change to get the ammonia levels down from the dead algae, but the oxygen dissipates in the water and everything will be good to go. Looks really cool btw with the LED's. Did you make that or buy them (and if bought what brand are they?).

Also use the small tanks filter to speed up the cycle in the larger tank. Once the larger tank is ready for bacteria (ie after you've dealt with the algae and done a water change), take the filter media and squish it all over in the larger tank. That should seed it quite nicely.

HTH

 

[2cvbloke]

Easiest way to kill off the algae is to dump a NEW bottle of hydrogen peroxide in the tank. Turn the lights off, run it overnight, next day EVERYTHING will be dead. And unlike bleach, there is no cleanup. I'd do a water change to get the ammonia levels down from the dead algae, but the oxygen dissipates in the water and everything will be good to go. Looks really cool btw with the LED's. Did you make that or buy them (and bought what brand are they?).

Also use the small tanks filter to speed up the cycle in the larger tank. Once the larger tank is ready for bacteria (ie after you've dealt with the algae and done a water change), take the filter media and squish it all over in the larger tank. That should seed it quite nicely.

HTH

With all the terror things going on Hydrogen Peroxide isn't easy to buy now round here as that's been used in the making of bombs (and there was a guy in the news recently who was stockpiling food and potential bomb materials here in my town), so I'd rather take the longer & less suspicion-raising option...

As for seeding the other tank, I'm going to try out TetraAqua's SafeStart, once I find it, which is like BioSpira, thus hopefully avoiding having to cycle or seed the tank, plus I'm not too sure which is doing the work in the snail tank, the plants or the filter...

I'm just going by the idea that heating a tank reduces oxygen levels (taken from the Ich heat treatment advice), which in turn starves the algae, then it dies off, leaves a little ammonia, then a water change, pop in some safestart and add a couple of fish (I'm thinking Guppies now as I haven't seen Endlers anywhere... ), maybe a couple of cherry shrimp too...

The LEDs, well, they all came off some dodgy christmas lights, some of the LEDs were utter crap and burnt out quickly, so they got chucked in a box for two years, and I just recently stripped the whole lot off and have been using them for allsorts (the main reason is to use them for a large model of the USS Enterprise I have), and having the LEDs in the little holders makes wiring them up easy, after I figure out which wire is which of course!!!

 

[7Enigma]

I brush my teeth with hydrogen peroxide......what a world we live in.... Watch out! Flour is also a potential bomb making material, no more bread/pizza/pastries...etc.

I am just guessing but anything not kept refrigerated probably doesn't contain living bacteria. I know some of this nitrifying bacteria can form spores and last through bad conditions, but the ammonia level required to come back from that state is VERY high, not something you would naturally find in the aquarium.

The Ich treatment has nothing to do with oxygen levels. The purpose of the heat is to speed up the life-cycle of the parasite in the free-swimming stage. This gives less time for the parasite to find a host, hopefully short enough that it doesn't find your fish. I really don't think the heat is going to do anything beneficial, more likely it will make things worse.

Honestly if you cannot find peroxide, I would go the bleach route. It is a guaranteed quick kill.

 

[2cvbloke]

I brush my teeth with hydrogen peroxide......what a world we live in....

I am just guessing but anything not kept refrigerated probably doesn't contain living bacteria. I know some of this nitrifying bacteria can form spores and last through bad conditions, but the ammonia level required to come back from that state is VERY high, not something you would naturally find in the aquarium.

The Ich treatment has nothing to do with oxygen levels. The purpose of the heat is to speed up the life-cycle of the parasite in the free-swimming stage. This gives less time for the parasite to find a host, hopefully short enough that it doesn't find your fish. I really don't think the heat is going to do anything beneficial, more likely it will make things worse.

Honestly if you cannot find peroxide, I would go the bleach route. It is a guaranteed quick kill.

Personally I just use toothpaste myself...

As for the SafeStart, I really don't know whether it works or not, and as far as I'm aware it's pretty much the only solution that contains Nitrospira that I can buy, I could be wrong though...

As for the Ich treatment thing, well, I read that oxygen isn't absorbed by water when it is warmer, and people treating fish should reduce the water level to keep oxygen levels at a safe point, but, going from memory, if a plant is kept in the dark, it requires oxygen to process it's stored food (whereas during the day it is the opposite, creating food and releasing oxygen), so warm water means lack of oxygen and complete darkness should help speed up the algae killing process...

If push comes to shove though, is Citrus scented bleach ok?

EDIT:
I just googled Nitrospira and have found something called Nite-Out II, whoch supposedly contains the bacteria needed for each stage of the breakdown of toxins in the tank (Ammonia, NitrIte & NitrAte)...

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=300108436889

 

[7Enigma]

Just plain bleach, no scents or surfactants (detergents). The last thing I/you would want is to kill the algae and then have to trash the substrate because it has other chemicals absorbed into it.

 

[2cvbloke]

Just plain bleach, no scents or surfactants (detergents). The last thing I/you would want is to kill the algae and then have to trash the substrate because it has other chemicals absorbed into it.

I guess it's the kind that you get at a DIY place rather than the store bought stuff? :?

 

[7Enigma]

Just plain bleach, no scents or surfactants (detergents). The last thing I/you would want is to kill the algae and then have to trash the substrate because it has other chemicals absorbed into it.

I guess it's the kind that you get at a DIY place rather than the store bought stuff? :?

I dunno, over on this side of the pond we have cheap crap that is just plain bleach. Do you have a chain brand of stores that sells their own stuff? Normally if its labeled bleach and REALLY cheap its just bleach. But you have to check the label.

 

[2cvbloke]

I dunno, over on this side of the pond we have cheap crap that is just plain bleach. Do you have a chain brand of stores that sells their own stuff? Normally if its labeled bleach and REALLY cheap its just bleach. But you have to check the label.

Most bleaches here have "non-Ionic surfacants" listed in the ingredients (makes good reading when I'm "busy"... ), but next time I'm in asda (basically a reduced Wal*Mart) I'll look at their SmartPrice stuff to see if it's literally just bleach...