Mud-club
Chat & Social => The Bar - General Chat => Topic started by: tenpolequint on May 27, 2006, 15:34:13
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My wifes new fad is an aquarium which she wanted, went on about, and in the end I got her one. I got a tank with everything including fish for £100. Now to see how long I can keep the fish alive for.
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We got a tank a few years ago and with all the best intentions, we had a nightmare with numerous fish going belly up. Then we had a nightmare with algae (green and brown), we ended up spending a fortune on all the water treatments. I later found out that if you go tropical there are options of fish that will clean the tank out for you (to a degree), and thus they are much easier to maintain...........................
They give a better variety of fish too.
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There are two minature plecos which eat the algae.
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Now you need to set up a webcam, so we can all enjoy your fish. :lol:
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If you're that way inclined get yourself that fish tank screensaver (complete with water sounds)!
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If you're that way inclined get yourself that fish tank screensaver (complete with water sounds)!
Thats what I told the wife todo, but now I have the tank I am happy to have it.
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i had a 100gallon marine tank, so if you want any tips PM me.
the main reason any fish go belly up in an aquarium is excessive NITRITE level. the NITRITE level raises to fast due to the fish being stocked to quickly. idealy stock a couple of hardy fish, and wait for 2 weeks, put another couple in and wait, and so on . this allows the filter to grow the bacteria that 'eats' the the fish waist. also when its time to clean the tank, wash the filter element or gravel in the water you have drained from the tank (not fresh water), and dont empty more then 40% of the water from the tank, as this will also kill the filters bacteria and the fish will suffer from chemical shock.
anyway ill shut up now.
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Get your self the best external filter you can afford and make sure it is full of media and carbon...this will reduce to build up of green.
Or if you go the other way get a Sump filter with meadia and filter gauze..
I have a 6 foot x 24"X24"...aprox 340 gallons with Malowie Ciclids in it..i love to sit and watch em .. :wink:
The misses keeps threatning to fry one one up for Supper :twisted:
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Its only a 25 gallon tank. I did not know until I got it but this is the minimum size you should start as a beginner. apparently the bigger the tank the easier it is to maintain the stable environment for the fish.
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Happy Wife
(http://img139.imageshack.us/img139/7464/p52701025wc.jpg) (http://imageshack.us)
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Get your self the best external filter you can afford and make sure it is full of media and carbon...this will reduce to build up of green.
Or if you go the other way get a Sump filter with meadia and filter gauze..
I have a 6 foot x 24"X24"...aprox 340 gallons with Malowie Ciclids in it..i love to sit and watch em .. :wink:
The misses keeps threatning to fry one one up for Supper :twisted:
good advice, but remeber carbon has a finite life and cant be washed and reused.
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tank looks great.
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seems a bit well populated for a tank so new, ive had discus , marine , chiclids you name it, at some point it will all go belly up, and in a marine tank it makes you cry and your bank manager
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Bit late now, but you should not put fish into a 'new' tank for a couple of weeks until the filter medium has matured some good bacteria to cope with breaking down waste in a process termed the nitrogen cycle.
Get yourself a couple of good books and read up on the subject.
Fish only die when something is wrong.
I have a cold water tank(as opposed to a Tropical tank) and I have a number of goldfish about 6 years old and younger and the largest is about 8-9 inches long by about 2 1/2 inches deep (I need to find someone with a pond and move some of them on to be honest as they are too much for the size of the tank).
You will need to take out and replenish a certain amount of water every week to help keep the amonia/nitrite/nitrate levels down.
Get as much info as possible. Enjoy.
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Get fish tank, throw fish in toilet buy reptiles :) (just me then)
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The tank was not brand new but an existing set up. But already I have made loads of mistakes but I have joined a fish forum (also as tenpolequint) to point me in the right direction. I have been told about changing the water for a while until the nitrate levels stabilize.
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http://www.bristol-aquarists.org.uk/goldfish/info/info.htm
some info that might help.
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seems a bit well populated for a tank so new, ive had discus , marine , chiclids you name it, at some point it will all go belly up, and in a marine tank it makes you cry and your bank manager
i never had any fish in my marine set up die because of bad water, just had a tang that was bullied to death for teritorial reasons, and my puffer ate all the smaller ones :cry:
another piece of advice they dont tell you in the books, the fish can become unwell due to the stress of you constantly trying to make the water quality better. my fish seem to thrive after i stopped messing about so much.
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another piece of advice they dont tell you in the books, the fish can become unwell due to the stress of you constantly trying to make the water quality better. my fish seem to thrive after i stopped messing about so much.
This does seem sound advice as the fish are fine today no deaths. I do think the deaths were due to the stress of being moved about. I will not untake a regime of partial cleaning using the syphon tube to just take 25% of the water from the open area and leaving the fish undisturbed.
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you wont undertake and partial water change??
if you dont the fish will eventually die, but you dont have to do it as often as the books says, in a tropical tank i would do 30% every month or so.
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I dont know how the "not" got there. Will this cleaning help with the smell of the tank?
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i have had people tell me a properly running tank will small like mud or earth, not sure if i subscribe to that wholy myself, i assume thats would be the smell of decomposing waste. but your tank is to new to have a smell like that.
what does it smell of?
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Will this cleaning help with the smell of the tank?
Ill fish will make the tank stink.
Keep a lookout for obvious fish that are ill and take them out as soon as possible.
If you had one or two fish die because of moving them then they could have been a major factor in having smelly water.
If this is the case then doing a small partial water change (couple of gallons only) every couple of days for a week will help as will cutting down on feeding them. Remember to adjust the temperature of the 'new' water to match tank conditions before you put it in. Fish will live for 2 weeks without food if they have to.
How often you should do a partial water change when everything is fine will depend on how many fish you have in the tank, how much you feed them, the condition of your filters etc.
ps. If you have a tropical tank the water may have 'chilled' when you moved it and caused some stress.
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my m8 who i go 4x4ing with has the same tank and he has 3 filters in his
under gravel an external and a internal and has to still part chang the water ever couple of weeks even with the algi eaters but he also has logs in the tank which tend to discolour the water