Aquariums

[TNHawke]

This topic is for discussing aquariums, aka "fish tanks", in general, and in depth.
Please note, that because this topic is in the Hall of Speakers, posts simply stating what kinds of fish you have are NOT appropriate.
This topic is seperate from the general 'pets' thread because it will focus solely on aquatic life and habitats
So, what WOULD we like to see in this discussion?

Your personal, and other experiences with pet fish husbandry. Feel free to include what kinds experiences and questions you may have about keeping pet fish.

Need some ideas? Tell or ask us about
Setups: bowls? tanks? ponds? Size? Decorations? Substrate? How many gallons? What kind of filtration and lighting systems you prefer? What do you do for and about water quality?
What kinds of fish you have kept : cold water? Tropical? Marine?
How about other aquatic friends: snails, aquatic frogs, crabs, corals, clams, etc
Don't forget the plants: Do you have live plants? What kinds? What do you do to keep them alive? Or do you have no luck with them?
What kinds of fish are, and are not compatible in your experience?
Fish Health: What illness you have faced? Treatment methods?
Why : Why do you have an aquatic habitat?
Post pictures!

Other topics to consider for discussion-
Wild caught or captive bred
Genetic manipulation
Dying and tattooing
Releasing into the wild
Breeding
Anything else you can think of regarding these aquatic life forms

Please don't feel like you have to ask or answer all of those to post, they're just ideas to kick things off.

[Cassowary]

I know little to nothing about keeping fish and tanks, but I've always been interested. It's just always seemed rather... intimidating. With a land animal, you can stick it in a cage with bedding, feed it pellets, give it a water bottle, change it every week or so, and bam. Pet. With fish/tanks, you've got all these things about pH and salinity and water temperature... I just don't know where to start.

For someone interested in a fish, what sort of fish would you recommend?

In regards to past experience, I once kept a triop. It required a change of water... I don't recall, it was fairly frequently though. And required fresh spring water That was rather costly. My mom eventually flushed it down the toilet while I was on vacation. And one time, I kept a container full of water plants and snails for a bit. Other than that, nada.

And on the subject of releasing into the wild... it's dumb. It's why we've got problems like the snakeheads and Asian carp. I don't see why people do it

[TNHawke]

Awww, poor little Triop! I've tried to keep those before, but I just have no luck with them after they hatch. I did have some Sea Monkeys that lasted for months until their bowl got knocked over one day. It was sad.

For starter fish, the first thing you want to consider is space. How much room for a tank do you have?

My favorite tank size is actually 30 gallon (or 29 gal as they are often sold as). I like the 30 because it is large enough to set up its own biosystem, which then requires less cleaning. Smaller tanks are great, but require more cleaning. Larger tanks require less cleaning, but can be a bear to clean just because of the size. Another advantage to the 30 gal size is that you can fit quite a few fish in it with out overcrowding your tank. 10 gallons are extremely easy to overcrowd which then stresses your fish and that can lead to disease and death.

Next to consider is what kind of fish do you like? I do NOT recommend diving right into marine (salt water) tanks. I, personally, really enjoy goldfish, both comets and the more fancy breeds such as ryukins and shubunkins. Goldfish can be very hardy and long lived if cared for correctly. In the proper size of tank, they are also extremely easy to take care of. For tropical fish, danios and white clouds are the perfect starters. They are hardy and will help set up the brand new tank, as well as get you the experience you need to get into more delicate fish.

As far as pH goes, in most areas, for most fish, it is a non-issue. Trying to change the pH can actually result in huge fluctuations, and the change is what can be deadly. If you are on city water, and the pet store is on city water, the fish are already going to be acclimated to that water and they'll be fine.
You do want to make sure to use a tap water conditioner. You might even want to bring in a sample to the pet store to have tested before you buy any fish, just to make sure of the condition and to make sure the chemicals you buy will make the water safe. Bottled water for fish tanks is usually unnecessary.
My personal favorite conditioner is a product called Prime. It's a little bit more expensive to purchase, but WAY cheaper in the long run, because while all the other products want you to use X amount of teaspoons, Prime only uses drops. It smells a little sulfury, but it doesn't make the fish tank smell funny.

Once you know what size and type of fish you want, you can purchase a tank and everything to set it up. Honestly? Check Craigslist, or other local classified ads. People are always looking to get rid of tanks and equipment cheap, and often all they need is a clean up with some vinegar to get some old hard water stains off it. Or, hit a discount store like Walmart and pick up a kit. Save money where you can.

Filters- if your tank comes with an undergravel filter, just throw that filter out. They work in theory, but not so great in practice. The piggy-back types are decent. The biowheel ones are decent, but the best seem to be the cannister type filters- although those will usually be overkill in anything smaller than 50 gallons. The cartridges you can buy work... sort of. They're fine for beginners, but I prefer to fill my own, because often the prefilled, sealed ones don't have enough carbon in them to do your fish much good.
For small tanks, my preferred brand of filter is the Aquaclear piggyback style. They work great, aren't the most expensive, and the filter media components are easy to change, and do a great job.

Rather than me continue to expound on feeshies, go ahead and ask any particular questions you may have.

[Synchronized]

The biowheel ones are decent, but the best seem to be the cannister type filters- although those will usually be overkill in anything smaller than 50 gallons.

They do make smaller canisters-- on my 32 gallon tank I have a Eheim ecco pro rated for 35 gallon paired with an AquaClear 50. I'd only gotten it because it was on clearance for $50 at my store and that's super cheap for a good canister, haha. I'm going to upgrade to something like 60-80 gallon canister eventually because I have having two running at once. "Overkill" isn't bad in a tank-- the more extra filtration you have the better, and if the intake is a little too strong it's only a matter of putting something over it(pantyhose or prefilter, maybe) to prevent fish getting stuck. Is the water pouring out is too strong, you just baffle it. The water from a canister's tube generally comes out in a very thin stream depending on the make so current from the water usually isn't too much of a problem for most tropical fish(and some like strong currents, regardless).

Anyway, on to my stuff:

Setups:
32 Gallon Bowfront
- Tropical community, slowly crossing over to Tropical semi-aggressive

5.5 Gallon
- Guppy breeding and ghost shrimp currently, switching to dwarf shrimp in the near future

I have four tanks in sizes .5 gal, .9 gal, 1 gal, 1.5 gal all housing bettas. The .5 will be upgraded soon.

What kinds of fish you have kept : Tropical freshwater. I have some brackish fish too so there's a tiny bit of salinity in the two bigger tanks.
How about other aquatic friends: I have billions of snails. This infestation sucks. I also keep freshwater shrimp and may get clams in the future.
Don't forget the plants:
32 Gallon Will be changing soon, I'm in the middle of revamping my tank.
- 2 large Anubias
- 8 or so small Wisteria
- 2 Aponogeton
- 5 or so small Amazon Swords
- 2-3 clumps of Dwarf Saggitarius
- 1 Crypt, unsure of species
- a few clumps of hair grass here and there
- 2-3 small Java Ferns
- Duckweed
- 2 Marimo, one of which is flattened out and used as a house by my kuhliis.
- 1 Water Ivy

5.5 gal
- 1 Crypt parva
- 1 Marimo
- JAVA MOSS AND CHRISTMAS MOSS EVERYWHERE OH MY GOD

3 of the betta tanks have small Anubias in them, and the 1 gallon has small Java Ferns and Christmas/Java Moss.

I dose all of my tanks with Seachem Flourish and API C02 Booster, occasionally push in Seachem Flourish tabs/API Root tabs into the gravel for the rooted plants. Soon to get Seachem Excel because I have a breakout of black beard algae that needs treating, and I can't find siamese algae eaters or american flagfish in my area.

What kinds of fish are, and are not compatible in your experience? For the safety of smaller fish please don't attempt housing bettas in communities. And keep them far away from gouramis.
Also beware housing different species of gouramis together.

Fish Health: The only thing I could catch in time to treat was fin rot for my oldest betta. I just used erithromycin.

Why : it's pretty :V

Anyway, here's pictures:
32 gal

Spoiler

5.5 gal

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The bettas + other random fish pictures: most of these are from before I started revamping/before i moved some bettas around

Spoiler

bumblebee catfish

variatus platy with albino cory in the background

some harlequin rasboras and danios

kuhlii, another cory in background

trilineatus corys, kuhlii loach, mystery and zebra nerite snail

powder blue dwarf gourami

Spoiler

Halfmoon, Tager.

Dragonscale, Hui

Marble veiltale, Cho

Veiltail, Columbus AND HIS STUPID FISH FACE.

[Cassowary]

Long post of longness.

So much for not being intimidated... ;_;

Thanks for all the tips. I don't really know where to go from here on. Rather a lot to consider. I'll take a look at the fish species you suggested. All this is really just for future consideration, when I have my own place, as my mum doesn't like fish. Something about their soulless little eyes that are as black as the void.

And yes, triops can be rather troublesome. They tend to eat each other, which is why it's rare to end up with more than one or two in a tank, unless you grow them in separate tanks and then put them in the same tank. And even then, they might try to eat each other

Oh, right, what's a biosystem? And do tanks need heaters?

[DracoSpectrum]

After reading TNHawke's comments there is very little I can say that wouldn't be repeating what he said, so just a few comments from me:

Filters - Bio-wheel's are good, I use one on my smaller tank along with an internal canister filter. The main advantage to bio-wheel's is that they hang on the side of the tank, this makes maintenance on them easy as all you need to do is unplug it and then fill it with water before you plug it back in.

pH - So long as you tank water isn't too far into the alkaline or acid (that is too high or too low) most fish will adapt to it providing it is steady.

Tap water conditioner - Personally I do not feel that tap water conditioner is necessary and sometimes it is even unsafe, however this is just my opinion and you should research it for yourself. One alternative is to age the water for 24 hours before putting it in the tank.

And the fun part... The fish! - If a tropical tank is for you then I would recommend Guppy's and swordtails, these are what I started with over ten years ago.


And as for my tanks I have two both tropical freshwater, the larger is a community tank and the other is a specimen tank. For now I'm only going to talk about my community tank, I'll talk about the other one later on.

The community tank:
Water volume - just over 510 liters, 130 gallons.
Filter - I use an external canister filter with an output of 1400 liters per hour and a 9 watt UV light.
Lighting - At the moment I just use normal fluorescent tubes but I hope to swap too or add plant grow lights soon.
Fish - This tank has mostly peaceful catfish, the main population is Corydoras there are 21 of them in this tank and five different types. the other catfish include two bristlenose catfish, four port hoplo catfish and four upside-down catfish. There are also some non catfish they are my four silver sharks and three siamese flying fox. The tanks largest and oldest inhabitant is a one and a half foot long Plecostomus, I have had this fish for seven or eight years now, when I got him he was small enough to fit in the palm of my hand.
Plants - All living plants and mostly broadleaved plants with strong root systems, unfortunately having a Plecostomus is not positive for plant growth as they tend to rip them out. The plants I have include Amazon sword, rose sword, anubias nana and Java fern (lots of Java fern!). I intend to add more types of swords and anubias, I am also going to try to get some Cryptocoryne too.
Set-up - For the gravel I used a combination of a medium grade and a large grade at a ratio of one part large too two parts medium, the only reason for doing it this way is that I think it looks good. I have used rocks and driftwood, the rocks are in two piles/stacks with caves in the sides and a planted area in the middle. Smaller bits of driftwood with Java fern growing off it and larger plants fill in the spaces between the rocks. At the far end from the filter outlet there are two long driftwood branches positioned at an angle from the tank bottom to water surface.

[Synchronized]

Tap water conditioner - Personally I do not feel that tap water conditioner is necessary and sometimes it is even unsafe, however this is just my opinion and you should research it for yourself. One alternative is to age the water for 24 hours before putting it in the tank.

A quick addendum to this: If you have a small tank or your town/county/whatever uses chloramines instead of just chlorine in the tap water, you MUST use some kind of conditioner/dechlorinator. Chloramines can take days to weeks to come out of water on its own, and in a small tank even a small water change will put too much chlorine into the tank for most fish to survive it. It's also heavily dependent on the type of fish you have-- things like discus, loaches, and invertebrates are often far too sensitive to risk it.

A few months ago I wouldn't mind tossing a few cups of plain tap water into my 32 gallon tank because it was big enough for it to not matter. By around next week, I believe, they're switching our tap water over to chloramines, so. Seachem Prime dosing will begin shortly.

[MistyoC]

I have a 29 gallon tank and two 10 gallon tanks. They are currently uninhabited as no stores in town carry fish and I haven't been able to get to the nearest place that does. It's far enough away that I will take a cooler with me to transport the fish so they don't suffer from a temperature change on the way home. The 29 gallon tank is usually a community tank and the 10 gallons are used for quarantine (I always quarantine new fish for a few weeks before adding them to the main tank.), breeding, or bettas. I also have some 1 and 2 gallon bowls I use for bettas at times. I adore bettas and tried to breed some as a teen without success. I will try again in the future when I can get together the setup I want for it. My community tanks are most often fancy guppies and neon tetras with a few female bettas.
I'm not much for aquascaping. I don't have much luck with plants except java moss and even that got choked out by hair algae some years back. I use plain gravel for substrate and I prefer natural colours.

Our city does not use chloramine yet, so I tend to age tank water rather than use chemicals. After an incident where a certain small child fed the fish an entire jar of food, I keep enough aged water on hand to fill my largest tank! lol I store it in gallon jugs from juice, not milk, milk jugs break down more easily and may leak. This water doubles as emergency rations should a major storm (or construction crews! lol that has happened) make the tap water undrinkable. If I need to add chemicals or medications to my tank water, I mix them into a separate glass jar before adding to the tank. This helps prevent accidental overdose and makes portioning tablets much easier.
I keep 2 separate buckets for changing tank water. One bucket is used for untreated dirty water and may get used to transfer water from an established tank to a quarantine tank to jump start the cycle. The other bucket is used for medicated water or water from a quarantine tank. I also keep a set of measuring cups and spoons just for fish use as well. They are metal for ease of sterilizing.

[TNHawke]

Wow, Synchronized, you have amazing luck with the plants. I can usually keep a few going for a while, but then they all die off. I did realize, a few years ago, that one of my biggest problems was that I was covering the base of the plant with gravel, causing them to rot off at the stems. I've been much more careful since then and had better luck. I've also found that live plants tend to do a lot better in well established tanks over new ones. Maybe because there's more... fertilizer... in the gravel?
Currently, along with hair moss/ algae and a dying java fern on a log, I've got a potted whoknowswhat from Walmart that has been going so strong for nearly two years, that every 4 to 6 months I actually have to thin the sucker out or it tries to fill the entire tank!

With Bettas, the only thing I ever had a betta go after was fan tail guppies. I've had females go after other females and males, but mostly, I've had excellent luck with bettas in community tanks. Once, I even had 2 males living together in a 50 gal. It started when one jumped out of a side clinging tank into the main tank, fought with the one in the main tank, lost, and then the two peacefully coexisted- the loser got the side of the tank with the water outlet, the winner got the calmer side of the tank. I figure the tank was large enough, and had enough fake plants that the two didn't HAVE to look at each other and could hide if needed, so they never fought again. I also kept a male and 4 females together in a 5 gal tank successfully. The only problem I had was that the male chewed off his own fins so that the current wasn't constantly blowing him around.

Gouramis, I've never had luck with even two of the same kind. One always died, but I never saw them fighting. I just assumed that they did.

I don't recommend guppies as a starter fish. At least in Idaho, they have been so specially bred for color and fins, and then inbred by the main suppliers for the pet stores that they are extremely delicate. In my 20 years or so of fish keeping, I am only just now having any luck with Guppies, and I only got them initially because I needed live bearers to make baby fish to feed to my water dragon. Over the course of 3 months, I bought a total of about 25. I currently have 7 of those originals. But, I have lots of babies, some of whom are now growing up enough that they can breed more. I also tried some mollies, but one by one those have died out. They also lasted longer than usual. Normally, when I get mollies, they have one litter and both parents die, but the babies do great. No idea why that happens, they're not salmon who spawn and croak! This time, what killed them all was a case of droopsy. Nasty disease. Not sure how it got into the tank unless something I bought had it and wasn't showing signs.
I'll admit, I don't usually quarantine, but I do give a light medication to the tank the first week after adding new fish. I also don't add more than a few at a time.

Oh, right, what's a biosystem? And do tanks need heaters?

The biosystem is the cycle of beneficial bacteria keeping up on the amount of waste the fish produce to keep the water a healthy environment for the fish. With smaller tanks, this system can and will crash, frequently. The usual cause is that people buy a tank, and fish at the same time, and they buy too many fish. The filter alone can't handle it. Using things like Stresszyme (a fluid full of those beneficial bacteria) or water from an already established tank, can help. If at all possible, use gravel, or get some water from an established tank. I have been told that it's good to set up a tank and let it run with out fish for a week. Honestly? I have no idea what this is supposed to do. Maybe it just ages the water. Our state uses chloramine in everything, so if I'm on city water, I always have to use the tap water conditioner. (the one exception was when we lived over an artesian well in Eagle, ID. The water was so pure I could put it strait from the tap into the tank and never had healthier fish. It also tasted excellent!)
Anyways- start with just a few, hardy fish. I've had good luck with 1 per 5 gallons (another reason to start with a larger tank. Lone fish are often stressed fish, but it's also a good reason to start with a betta if it's a small tank). Then, over the next weeks and months, you can stock the tank, adding a few at a time. This gives those bacteria a chance to build up their numbers to combat the added waste from the fish.

As for heaters, it depends on the kind of fish. Goldfish are cold water fish, they would prefer a cooling system over a heater! Most of your tropical and marine fish need a heater, not so much to keep the temperature warm, as to keep it from fluctuating. If you live in a warm area, or always keep the house at the same temp, you may not need one if it's always at least 75 degrees Fahrenheit. With bettas, they do ok as low as 73. When I was a teen, my bedroom often got down to 65 in winter, and as low as 53 at night. I would always lose my bettas in the fall when it started getting too cold for them in their bowls. Once I started keeping them in heated tanks, I stopped having them die. The goldfish LOVED living in that bedroom, and thrived even more in winter than in summer when they got sluggish and lazy in the 'heat'.

[Synchronized]

Wow, Synchronized, you have amazing luck with the plants. I can usually keep a few going for a while, but then they all die off. I did realize, a few years ago, that one of my biggest problems was that I was covering the base of the plant with gravel, causing them to rot off at the stems. I've been much more careful since then and had better luck. I've also found that live plants tend to do a lot better in well established tanks over new ones. Maybe because there's more... fertilizer... in the gravel?
Currently, along with hair moss/ algae and a dying java fern on a log, I've got a potted whoknowswhat from Walmart that has been going so strong for nearly two years, that every 4 to 6 months I actually have to thin the sucker out or it tries to fill the entire tank!

I've been doing a lot of research since I started my tank back in August(the 5.5 started in January) especially on plant types/necessary lights/fertilizers/etc. All of the plants in my tank are low- to mid-light plants(with the exception of hair grass and maybe this lace sword I've gotten-- unsure about Mystery Red Plant) which does well for the 30-40-something watts of light I've got going into the tank. I use liquid and root tab fertilizers as well as the fact that I'm kind of overstocked(no worries, I do my water changes and I overfilter so my water quality's pretty good) help with raising plants-- I have my air stone turn on at night to supply more oxygen when the plants' photosynthesizing reverses(and it makes my kuhlii loaches healthier as well, they like high-oxygen water). Some plants can be super picky about fertilizers/light so it's worth researching each plant individually if you can. Many plants sold in pet stores aren't fully aquatic either and die off after being submerged for a couple weeks/months.

Anyway, I redid my tank a little-- still need to add some finishing touches later on when I have more money/find the driftwood and rocks I want.

Spoiler

I finally got rid of my black beard algae, for the most part. Dose the tank daily with Seachem Excel, and toss in a capful of Seachem Flourish once a week.