• Re: New fishkeeper, advic

    From David Gordon@1:278/230 to All on Fri Oct 17 21:35:00 2003
    I forgot to also ask:

    Ultimately I'd like the tank to contain some shoaling fish, and if possible another betta. The shoaling fish are more important and I've heard that fast shoalers can damage bettas' fins - is this true?

    Thanks,

    David
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  • From Marksfish@1:278/230 to All on Sat Oct 18 08:50:00 2003
    The fish shop in question sold me a betta, pleco and small (approx 10
    litre)
    tank three weeks ago. I went in believing that a betta was a delicate tropical species and came out having been told it was a hardy 'all
    weather'
    species which could breathe air and was used to a natural habitat of mud ponds- dark and murky. Lies, I now know, but not in time to save my poor betta who succombed to a fungal infection the day before we were due to
    move
    him to a new home - a heated, lit and filtered 50 litre tank.

    Not really. Wild bettas do in fact live in little more than puddles in their natural habitat. They have developed the ability to breathe atmospheric air because of the lack of oxygen in these small patches of water. Also, because the body of water is so small, there are quite considerable fluctuations in temperature throughout the day.

    That said, it is no excuse for not looking after them properly in captivity.

    So now the pleco is in the tank with two plants, mod cons, shelter and a piece of cucumber which he is ignoring. I want to cycle the tank fully
    before introducing any new fish and I'm aware that plecos aren't an ideal species for this (ideally I'd be doing a fishless cycle but it's a bit
    late
    for that). The question is, is a 2" pleco going to be ok in an uncycled 11 gallon tank while the bacteria get their act together?

    The fish you have in there will be safe enough so long as you don't overload the filter with waste products.i found the best way to feed a plec was to
    cur a 2" circle of cucumber and put a plant weight through the rind. Put it
    in the tank just before light's out and in the morning you should have a perfect circle cut out and the rind intact.

    The tank has had AquaSafe chlorine treatment, "Stress Zyme" bacterial supplement (though I've recently read that such supplements are pretty useless) and a dose of anti-fungus, in case the pleco is at risk from the infection that killed the betta. The funcicide is phenoxyethanol based and claims to be "harmless to filters and all species of fish and plants".

    I have used StressZyme on a regular basis over the past 10 years. Not sure
    if it actually does a lot though. You may be better off getting hold of Waterlife's Bacterlife instead. It is a little more expensive but has a different conncentration of bacteria. Again, not sure how long they live
    once put in a bottle, but....

    A small amount of water from the old tank will have made its way into the
    new tank while transferring the pleco, though I think the problem was
    water
    quality rather than any virus or unusual pathogen. I still have the old
    tank, in case I find out that I can speed things up by recycling the
    gravel
    (after a good rinse) - perhaps I could test it out with a dose of ammonia
    in
    some fresh (dechlorinated) water?

    This is one of the best ways to seed a new tank. Your gravel will have
    bacteria in it from your old aquarium. If it still had water in it, I would
    say to rinse the gravel thoroughly in the old tank's water before
    transferring it over to the new one. You don't want to run it under tap
    water otherwise what little bacteria you have will die. That said, you will need to clean it under the tap if the gravel has been sat in the tank and
    gone stagnant.

    PS. Can anyone recommend a good fish shop in London?

    I'm in Leeds so that doesn't help. But if you say whereabouts in London, you may get a better response.

    Regards

    Mark
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  • From Simon@1:278/230 to All on Fri Oct 24 22:33:00 2003
    I started keeping fish in August and one of the best advice sites I found
    was http://faq.thekrib.com/begin.html

    I feed my pleco Hikari's Sinking Wafers - he loves them - one most evenings
    and he has almost doubled in size in 2 months!!!

    Good luck

    Simon


    "Marksfish" <mark@nospam.marksfish.f9.co.uk> wrote in message news:fn6kb.11949$kA.3045829@wards.force9.net...
    The fish shop in question sold me a betta, pleco and small (approx 10
    litre)
    tank three weeks ago. I went in believing that a betta was a delicate tropical species and came out having been told it was a hardy 'all
    weather'
    species which could breathe air and was used to a natural habitat of mud ponds- dark and murky. Lies, I now know, but not in time to save my poor betta who succombed to a fungal infection the day before we were due to
    move
    him to a new home - a heated, lit and filtered 50 litre tank.

    Not really. Wild bettas do in fact live in little more than puddles in
    their
    natural habitat. They have developed the ability to breathe atmospheric
    air
    because of the lack of oxygen in these small patches of water. Also,
    because
    the body of water is so small, there are quite considerable fluctuations
    in
    temperature throughout the day.

    That said, it is no excuse for not looking after them properly in
    captivity.

    So now the pleco is in the tank with two plants, mod cons, shelter and a piece of cucumber which he is ignoring. I want to cycle the tank fully before introducing any new fish and I'm aware that plecos aren't an
    ideal
    species for this (ideally I'd be doing a fishless cycle but it's a bit
    late
    for that). The question is, is a 2" pleco going to be ok in an uncycled
    11
    gallon tank while the bacteria get their act together?

    The fish you have in there will be safe enough so long as you don't
    overload
    the filter with waste products.i found the best way to feed a plec was to
    cur a 2" circle of cucumber and put a plant weight through the rind. Put
    it
    in the tank just before light's out and in the morning you should have a perfect circle cut out and the rind intact.

    The tank has had AquaSafe chlorine treatment, "Stress Zyme" bacterial supplement (though I've recently read that such supplements are pretty useless) and a dose of anti-fungus, in case the pleco is at risk from
    the
    infection that killed the betta. The funcicide is phenoxyethanol based
    and
    claims to be "harmless to filters and all species of fish and plants".

    I have used StressZyme on a regular basis over the past 10 years. Not sure
    if it actually does a lot though. You may be better off getting hold of Waterlife's Bacterlife instead. It is a little more expensive but has a different conncentration of bacteria. Again, not sure how long they live
    once put in a bottle, but....

    A small amount of water from the old tank will have made its way into
    the
    new tank while transferring the pleco, though I think the problem was
    water
    quality rather than any virus or unusual pathogen. I still have the old tank, in case I find out that I can speed things up by recycling the
    gravel
    (after a good rinse) - perhaps I could test it out with a dose of
    ammonia
    in
    some fresh (dechlorinated) water?

    This is one of the best ways to seed a new tank. Your gravel will have bacteria in it from your old aquarium. If it still had water in it, I
    would
    say to rinse the gravel thoroughly in the old tank's water before transferring it over to the new one. You don't want to run it under tap
    water otherwise what little bacteria you have will die. That said, you
    will
    need to clean it under the tap if the gravel has been sat in the tank and gone stagnant.

    PS. Can anyone recommend a good fish shop in London?

    I'm in Leeds so that doesn't help. But if you say whereabouts in London,
    you
    may get a better response.

    Regards

    Mark


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