Linsay

Mine is cool not skiddish 7" or so good times to watch eat. hahaha

Really? I'm at 2.4 WPG. What do you suggest? Yes to the paintball canister. The reactor is a part of the Red Sea kit, looks kinda like a power head. I'm beginning to agree. I'm getting a bit of an algae problem. green and brown (hair algae maybe? - looks like 'old mans beard' lichen or spider webs). I put my son's BN in there just now in hopes he'll help a bit, I'll be taking him out tomorrow morning. I'm not at all concerned about poor water conditions (It's just that I had to undergo some pretty intense negotiations with my 4 year old to get him to let me borrow his BN :tongue: ), I've been testing it every couple of days and I'm still sitting at 0 NO2, 0 NH3, and about 5 NO3, pH 7.1 . I also tested the PO4 and Fe and both were 0. I added some NPK and trace ferts last night. If the pleco doesn't work out I'm going back to the store for some Rosy barbs. Any suggestions experts? With new plants

Thank you SO much for the great advice.

Super. I already have some of your wysteria actually - I'm Kraken's wife :ph43r: They're in the bottom photo. But if I need to have a bunch more plants to make this work then I would love some more if you're willing to part with it. Thank you

:bow: Thank you!...this is what I wanted to know. How much is "WAY MORE"? 2x, 3x, 10x as much as I have? Also, I think I have decided to keep the calvus and gold comps out of the planted tank. I think I'll do blue rams, zebra loach, and Apistogramma agassizii. cool? I have 3 rams (about 1") and 9 zebra loach (about 1 1/2"). I don't have the Apisto's yet. I'm thinking about getting 3-ish. :shifty: Anyone in Calgary have some free/cheap plants and or Apisto's?

Thank you. I'm really excited to see how it turns out. :rofl:

I HAVE done research on the calvus, lots of it actually...and admittedly the rams were more of an impulse buy. The pH is at 8.0 - just standard Calgary water. The calvus and the blue rams are doing perfectly fine together. I realize this grouping might not be long term, as the calvus will get much bigger than the rams, but the calvus grow VERY slowly and should continue to be fine with the rams for some time. Calvus are very peaceful - in fact, in my tank the rams are more boisterous than the calvus, not at all aggressive, just that when the food is out they're THERE. I did find out that the blue rams do better in softer water and are actually built for a completely different part of the world than calvus, but hey, it's working for me. They're eating and playing and doing just fine. Thank you for your input. I've always wanted to give fishless cylcing a try, so maybe I'll do that.

I've been preparing and looking forward to this for a long time. My first planted tank. It's a 45g with Eheim 2215 canister and Red Sea CO2 (don't know [CO2] yet, I'm at about 1 bubble per second right now though). Temp @ 80. Powder ferts under the sand and caps in the sand next to the root systems of the bigger plants. Lighting will be T5HO 2x54W. I have the lights, but my husband isn't finished the canopy yet, so I'm making do for today. I'll be putting calvus (black and white?) , gold comps, zebra loach, and blue rams in it eventually. Q#1 - Should I put the blue rams in now (there are 3 of them) to keep the ammonia going? I've read that the plants will suck up alot of the ammonia and nitrite if/when there's a spike. I'm using a filter that has been running in a heavily stocked tank for about a week and I've used the sand from the heavily stocked tank (cichlids). I think the tank will cycle fairly quickly, but my calvus are my babies and they're used to pristine water (0 NH3, 0 NO2, 5 NO3) (30-50% W/C weekly). Q#2 - With the fertilizers I have (Ocean Nutrition 'Giovanni's Starter' and 'Giovanni's Fertil Caps'), do I need to add fertilizers to the water too? also,I'm going to pick up some trace ferts soon too, what do you recomend? Q#3 - What's the best way to keep the pH up (for the calvus) when adding CO2? I think I read somewhere that baking soda works, is this true? BTW: when doing some research I found this article that was very helpful (It's on fish ponds in the southern US, but I found the basic info very helpful. It's on the relationships between pH, CO2, alkalinity, and hardness). http://www.govdocs.aquake.org/cgi/reprint/2003/725/7250100 (click on the link on the top right corner named 'abstract', then on 'full text' - again in the top right corner) Here's some pictures :thumbs:

In my (brief) experience saulosi's can be a real bugger. I have one that will beat the hell out of fish twice his size. If it's excitment you're looking for I wouldn't discourage you, but if you're looking for a blue somewhat peaceful fish maybe an electric blue (S. fryeri or ahli ...whatever...)? If it's the body shape you're after, maybe a rusty (I. sprengerae)?

:shock: OMG I never even thought of that. LOL. THANK YOU! all this time I was like "stupid uneven floor...grumble grumble..." haha

:smokey: That's awsome. Great pics guys

That's great to know that sponges will do the trick, I was worried it wouldn't be enough. Thanks guys. :bow: I love this site :thumbs:

Hey, what do you guys use for filtration for your fish rooms? I was thinking maybe a big sump / pond filter / canister with octopus like tubes coming off and into the tanks. There's going to be about a dozen tanks in a U shaped corner in the basement. The tanks are around 20 gallons each. I'm not breeding for profit or setting up a store or anything, just need to keep the predators fed :smokey: Any suggestions would be very much appreciated. Thank you

My favorite LFS in Calgary are Elite, Pisces, Riverfront, and Franco's. Pisces and Riverfront have the best selection, Elite has THE best advice/service. Riverfront is close to the zoo (just go west on Memorial then there's some funky downtown stuff, check out the Riverfront website for a map), and it's HUGE. My mom always told me "if you don't have anything nice to say don't say anything at all" ...so I wont say anything about golds. Just my opinion. :shifty:

That makes sense. Although I'll likely end up with a low survival rate anyway because once they're free swimming they'll be meals on whells - err..fins - Oh well, I didn't really need 199 Salvini anyway. :P Thank you