BettaFishMommy

with oscars, even java fern won't survive very well. trust me, i know! lol.

although i know this thread is in jest (i hope!), i always shake my head when i see things like this. making any creature fight against another is a big bowlful of wrong. i'll get off my soapbox now.

lol! mine would breed and lay like crazy too while being spoiled with 'snello'. there was a clutch per day for a while there. you may want to consider culling some of the clutches, since each clutch can have upwards of 200 baby snails hatch out. it may look like '50' or '100' eggs, but it's safe to say the number of eggs could be double that, since you only see part of the clutch after it's laid. there are many eggs in the middle of it too! it's easy to cull them, just scrape/scoop the egg clutch off the tank with a spoon, put it in a ziploc, freeze it to ensure the clutch is no longer viable, then toss it in the garbage. or you could just use your fingers to pry the clutch off the tank, but i learned the yucky way to always use a spoon! lol. went to remove a clutch and i guess it was pretty freshly laid....... a goopy mess all over my fingers, yuck!

to be honest, i don't even use carbon after medicating a tank. i just do a couple huge water changes, one one day, one the next, and then my next scheduled water change is a couple/few days earlier than normal. fish are fine and i don't have to mess with carbon, yay!

can't say i know eheims at all. the only canisters i have experience with are the rena xp's and one old fluval 302 i had to fight with on a friend's tank once. nearly tossed that ol' fluval out the window! lol.

it looks magenta to me, which is 'purple' in the diffusa world, lol. the shrimp will enjoy the snail jello too, and your mts will be budging in line behind your big snails for it, i can guarantee it!

the snail you have there is considered either a 'light striped purple' or a 'striped purple'. because computer monitors vary and may not show the absolute true colour of something, i can't pinpoint the exact purple shade, but it is one of those two. and it is definitely a pomecea diffusa, aka mystery snail. you'll want to feed a high calcium diet for your snails, to promote healthy shell growth. if you search our forum for 'snail jello' you'll find a place or two where i've explained how to make it.

i never once provided a 'leafy diet' to any of my many diffusa. they never once nibbled my plants. i made them 'snail jello' and they also ate fish food, algae wafers, and shrimp pellets. at one point i had over 30 'shellkids', lol, in my nicely planted 55 gallon.

i have seen german blue rams with small tetras before and the setup worked well. gbr's are considered very placid in the cichlid world and do well with smaller fish. just ensure you have enough plant cover and hiding spots for all your fish, so they have somewhere to retreat to and feel safe. i'd pass on the mollies for sure. they are absolute pigs when it comes to feeding time, and your other small fish would have too much competition when it comes to getting enough food. if you are having algae issues, then what is best is to find out why you are having algae and fix the problem instead of buying fish to eat the algae. how long are you leaving your lights on for? does the tank get direct sunlight on it? what are you dosing for fertilizer for your live plants? how often do you do water changes? answers to those questions can help us determine why you are getting algae, and help you to fix it.

from my knowledge, the two apple snails that are most commonly available in the aquarium trade that lay eggs above the water line are pomecea diffusa (also referred to as pomecea bridgesii, although incorrectly) and pomecea canaliculata. both look very much alike, but the cana snail will grow larger and is a voracious plant eater, whereas the diffusa does not eat plants and stays smaller. cana's also are commonly brown with faint stripes and diffusa come in a range of colours, including pale cream/ivory with red eyes. another great indicator is the colour of the eggs, cana eggs will be a bright pink or orange, whereas diffusa eggs will be more peachy pale pink when laid. there are also nerite snails that are part of the apple snail family, but i have never seen an 'albino' one. nerites lay their eggs individually and not in clusters/clutches, underwater. the photo will be a great help in determining which snail you have. edit - does your snail look like this, but with a different coloured shell and white body (the soft part)?

bahahahahahaha!!!!!! too funny! Val, now i know what you are talking about (the holes). yeah, Rena missed the ball on that lil design flaw! lol.

pm sent to you Sierra!

you mean that little triangle shaped hole? i'm pretty sure part of the hose assembly (underside of the lever) goes into the triangle hole when you push the lever down. i used to get a bit of a water 'gush' when i pulled the hose assembly off too. i learned to give the hose assembly (after i'd pulled the lever up) a very slow and gentle nudge side to side, until it raised out a bit, and that seems to avoid the little water gush that happens.

with mystery/apple snails, you just leave the egg clutches alone and in about 2 weeks the babies will break out of the little clusters and fall into the water. if you have any medium size fish you might see them eating the babies, but that's ok! because each egg clutch can potentially yield 200 baby snails. i raised 7 generations of apple snails and never once bothered to mist clutches, nor move them, or do anything special. i had TONS of apple snails at one point, lol. on a side note - i don't think there is an 'albino red shelled' mystery snail. could you post a photo of your snail, i may be able to help identify the proper colour name for it. you can also check in at www.applesnail.net for some great information.

i didn't fix it at all, just crammed the xp2 media into the xp4 canister (already with media) and put the xp2 motor and hoses on and am running it that way for now. i know it's not a long term solution, but i can't afford to get a new xp4 motor housing right now and i'm downsizing tanks anyway, so some filter shuffling will happen soon. makes me a lil paranoid to only run one filter on the big boys' tank for now, but alas, it's what i have to do. take a good look at the little blue ridges beside/in where the hose assembly goes into the motor housing. do you see any wear or edges that look like they are damaged? that was an issue with mine, and i think it was the reason the lever would go down but water wouldn't flow through to prime the filter. the hose assembly was seated perfectly in the space, but the valve wasn't opening. not sure if it was the reason for the water leaking into the motor housing though, as the 'housing filling with water' problem was there for a long time before that. i also had the teensiest drip coming from the hose assembly when it was off the canister, had to put the hose assembly in a bin during filter maintenance. been that way since i got the xp4. never did determine exactly where the leak was on the hose assembly yet, and i'm paranoid to take the assembly apart to see, in case i don't get it back together right and it leaks worse! lol. the little leak may be part of the motor filling with water problem, but considering the motor would fill full up with water within a half hour of the filter running, i don't see that little (one drop per few minutes approx) leak letting that much water through in such a short time. i've read a few accounts of the motor housing filling with water on xp's, in addition to mine and yours. must be a common problem with this canister. my xp2 that i bought brand new has never had any issues at all (i'll knock on wood now!). the xp4 i bought used. have you tried lifting one of the clamps while the lever is down and the canister has water in it, with that little gap at the top? then close the lever once the water level is where you want it. this could create a better vacuum seal and the water may not drop down after. another thing too is if you have too much media in there, the motor might be working too hard to push water through it, and the air gap happens? try removing a bit of media maybe? last thing i can think of is the little black plug on the side of the motor housing (the part that goes inside the canister). i have them pushed all the way in on my canisters and never have an air gap problem.

i wanted to say septicemia for a moment there, but it doesn't look like there is any red streaking into the pectoral fin at all, and if it was septicemia i don't think the fish would be growing or last a month after noticing the redness. i would quarantine, and do daily large volume water changes for a week, to see if good clean water can resolve the redness. you don't want to throw medications at a problem when you don't know exactly what the problem is.

i think because the fins on a betta are so thin, air can be trapped between the cell layers really easily. i've never had an air bubble in any of my bettas fins (9 bettas total over the past few years), but that's not to say it can't happen. as long as it doesn't seem to be affecting the betta, and he is still acting normal, then i would say just keep an eye on him.

one problem i had with my xp4 motor housing/hose assembly was a leak that caused the motor housing to fill with water. it wasn't due to the o rings, they are in perfect shape. i think it was something not connecting properly when i pushed the lever down on the hose assembly, and after taking a look, that area is really worn where everything lines up when the lever is pushed down. that might be an area where air is being introduced to the system on your xp?

Jayba, i have six aussie rainbows (exact species unknown, they came from petsmart) in the 20 long now, and there's room for a few more fish in there, but i'm torn on keeping the rainbows and adding a few favourites from the planted 55, or selling the rainbows so i can fit more of mine and my kiddo's favourites in the 20. decisions decisions! lol.

i have an xp2 and xp4 and sometimes when i prime them after filter maintenance they have a bit of an air gap at the top too. what i do is lift one of the 4 clamps with the filter turned off but with the lever on the hoses down, until the water level rises in the canister. you have to be on the ball about this though, lol, or else water will start to trickle right out if you keep that one clamp open too long!

sorry to hear about the tank! but i think a bigger tank AND a trip to Cuba makes up for it, lol. i'm running a 20 long with a 50/50 saltwater light (65 watt) that has half the bulb actinic. my plants are doing great! i've got java ferns on the driftwood and amazon swords planted in the sand. i haven't given this tank any ferts in over a month, and there are no root tabs in the sand at all. new leaf growth happens on a regular basis. i do have some algae, but nothing a clipped leaf here or a quick wipe there doesn't fix. there is a good bit of fuzzy brown algae (not diatoms) on the wood (mopani) but i attribute that to the wood never being underwater before this tank, and the fish pick at it, so i leave it be been running this tank with this light and same plants since just a few days before Christmas.

nice shots! a betta sorority is easy if you know what you're doing. it can even be done in a 20 gallon if your girls get along well. Cate, that blue betta in the first pic, that's a male, not a female, right?

@55gallon, Nature's Corner from downtown via bus is so easy! just hop the #8 at the telus tower, come down to 51 ave (just before millgate), and walk a few blocks west. or if you're coming from downtown during peak hours, just about any of the millwoods buses at telus tower will bring you to 51st ave. big al's is farther away, lol. wonderful post Jayba! i've recently started keeping rainbows too, and in my decision to downsize my tanks it's difficult to decide if the rainbows go or stay!

bahahahahahaha!!!!!!! too funny!

inverts in a quarantine tank isn't a good idea IMO, because there may be times where you have to treat your quarantined fish with a copper based med or any other med considered dangerous to inverts. best quarantine tank is bare bottom, plastic plants and plastic decor, and easy to disinfect if necessary. i wouldn't keep it set up all the time, but instead have your sponges in your filter on your main tank cut into pieces so that when you do get new fish you can set up the qt tank, move a sponge piece or two over to the qt tank filter, and have a pretty much instant cycled tank for your new fish to enjoy. and then just cut new pieces of sponge to fit in the vacated spaces in the main tank filter (your main tank filter shouldn't take too much of a bacterial loss and will catch up quickly). that's what i do whenever i need to set up a temporary tank - my Aquaclear 110 on my planted 55 has the sponges cut into about 8 smaller pieces, and i remove one or two depending on the bioload of the fish going in the temporary tank. after quarantine is done and your now 'not so new' fish, lol, are ready to go in the main tank, just toss the sponges from your quarantine tank filter in the trash or use them for something else. i've used old filter sponge for starting houseplants (roots love sponge!), cleaning bathrooms (i cleaned and bleached the sponge first), getting marks off walls, cleaning window tracks...... the list goes on and on! lol.