Anyway, I am newish here, but have lurked, and maybe was active before. I don't recall...
I do have one question: my tap water, which I age and condition, has a pH of about 7.8. My tanks are all in the upper 6 ranges, like 6.6, or 6.8. I put shell bits in to add some minerals to the water. Q: Where is the acid coming from??
I have several small aquariums that exist for the fishy survivors of biology classes attempts at eco-system modeling. Don't scold me, I was against it too. I used the keeping of the aquariums as an example of an ethical way to respond to what I thought was an ill-conceived enterprise.
I have a pleco, guppies, guppies, and goldies.
The goldies get a new tank this weekend--almost 40 gallons. That will be ten gallons per fish, so that should be a treat for them. It will be, as are all of my aquariums, heavily planted and well lit.
All of my tanks are stable, with no ammonia, and some nitrates. The smaller guppy tank--5 gallons & 7 guppies--has no nitrate either, so I add some water from a larger tank to sustain the plants in the smaller.
I use Aquaclear HOB filters with sponge, bio-media, and Purigen, and I have more than adequate filtration throughput, and the tops are mostly open.
I vacuum the bottom once a week and at the same time do about a 25% PWC and clean the filters by rinsing out junk and changing my prefilter.
I feed once a day usually, and only as much as they can eat in about a minute or so.
The Goldies get flakes, Topfin.
The Guppies get a variety of foods, Hikari powdery foods like daphnia or spirulina.
The Pleco gets Hikari veggie-tabs of some sort, and some zucchini once or twice a week.
I do have one question: my tap water, which I age and condition, has a pH of about 7.8. My tanks are all in the upper 6 ranges, like 6.6, or 6.8. I put shell bits in to add some minerals to the water. Q: Where is the acid coming from??
I have several small aquariums that exist for the fishy survivors of biology classes attempts at eco-system modeling. Don't scold me, I was against it too. I used the keeping of the aquariums as an example of an ethical way to respond to what I thought was an ill-conceived enterprise.
I have a pleco, guppies, guppies, and goldies.
The goldies get a new tank this weekend--almost 40 gallons. That will be ten gallons per fish, so that should be a treat for them. It will be, as are all of my aquariums, heavily planted and well lit.
All of my tanks are stable, with no ammonia, and some nitrates. The smaller guppy tank--5 gallons & 7 guppies--has no nitrate either, so I add some water from a larger tank to sustain the plants in the smaller.
I use Aquaclear HOB filters with sponge, bio-media, and Purigen, and I have more than adequate filtration throughput, and the tops are mostly open.
I vacuum the bottom once a week and at the same time do about a 25% PWC and clean the filters by rinsing out junk and changing my prefilter.
I feed once a day usually, and only as much as they can eat in about a minute or so.
The Goldies get flakes, Topfin.
The Guppies get a variety of foods, Hikari powdery foods like daphnia or spirulina.
The Pleco gets Hikari veggie-tabs of some sort, and some zucchini once or twice a week.
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