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Crystal

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  1. This might be an old trick in the book, but since I only just stumbled across it after so many years, I figured I'd post it here. Take a needle-less syringe. Pull the plunger out. Put pellets in (max 1/3 full) Put plunger back in, and suck water into the syringe. Turn plunger face up and evict air. (ensure there is enough water to cover pellets and then some) Put finger over plunger tip and pull plunger. Hold for 10-20 seconds. The vacuum will pull air bubbles out of the pellets. Once plunger is released, the vacuum ceases and the pellets sink. The best part is that syringes are usually less than a dollar for a 10ml, or a couple of dollars for a 100ml. A cheap solution to avoid buying those expensive sinking pellets. Perfect for those fish that don't like going to the surface to eat.
  2. Plants: Greenery: Parrots feather Coleus Moneywort Creeping Jenny german ivy Spider plants baby's tears devil's tongue various succulents pothos vine mare's tail (native) horsetail (native) water wisteria pennywort Flowering: mosaic plant waterpoppy pickerel weed Marsh marigold (native) Geraniums begonias Herbs: mints rosemary basil sage Very large: (probably better off in a pot in the water as they can get top heavy) cana lilly cattail reeds taro sweet flag Feel free to post or PM suggestions of plants that don't mind their roots submerged for an extended period and I will update this list.
  3. This year, many of my submerged pond plants weren't doing well, so I decided to try more emerged plants. My raised pond lacks shallow spots to set the baskets. So, I needed a floating plant basket. A quick check at the online prices made my eyes go wide, so I decided to make what I needed. Here we go: Materials: (Can all be found at a dollar store or craft section) Styrofoam (preferably a circle, but you can cut one up from packing scraps if need be.) I got two small ones or one larger one for $2 at the dollar store Sponges (the cheap type with no chemicals, the 8 for $2 kind) (This gives us a light medium for the roots to grow in). Plant cuttings. I also have a list of good plants at the bottom. Depending on the size you are making, you may need these: plastic drink cup Craft mesh (the white grid-like stuff in the craft section) wood skewer (or a stick, or cut-up popsicle stick). I made three different sizes: Super small, Medium, Large (There were larger rings at the store, but this shows a few options...) You can spray paint them if the brilliant white annoys you as much as it annoys me. Krylon Fusion was my favorite, but seems to have disappeared. I have used Rustoleum painters touch paint+primer with no problems. Spray thin coats and it barely damages the styrofoam (most spray paints eat styrofoam like candy...). I only spray the top and sides, leaving the bottom untouched. Super small: Excellent if you just want to try out floating plants and only have $5 I got a 4 pack of small 3 inch rings for $1.50 and a pack of 8 sponges for $2. Just cut the sponge in half and slide it into the ring. You can always pierce the foam with a skewer to ensure it can't fall through the ring (optional. I never did it.) Use one of the blades on the scissors or a knife to cut little slots for your plant stems. Holds 2-3 little plants nicely. Squeeze the sponge beneath water since a dry sponge is somewhat water-repellent. Insert the plant stems and set to floating. If the cuttings are fresh, try to keep them semi-shaded for a day or so until they start to get rootlets. For $3 and twenty some cents, I got 4 little floating planters. Ideal plants are small ones: coleus, trailers (such as parrots feather), various stem plants common in aquariums (like moneywort or creeping jenny), or ivys. Medium: I like this size in my smaller pond. Not too tiny, but not too overbearing either. I picked up a two-pack of 5.5" sytrofoam rings for $2. Still had sponges from the above project. I had some plastic solo cups that fit into the ring almost perfectly. I cut the bottom off one and inserted it. Then I cut up the styrofoam and put it inside. I had to wedge two side by side so they would stay put. Insert plant stems. This size of styrofoam is pretty buoyant, and with the deeper bottom, can handle larger plants like dwarf rushes or standing stem plants like geraniums. For under $4, I got two nice floaters. Ideal plants are pretty much anything that doesn't grow too tall (or it may overturn in a large wind). Coleus, geraniums, trailers, stem plants, tomatoes, or any houseplant that takes cuttings well. Large: This has a lot of potential. Large and extremely bouyant, it is tough to submerge and nearly impossible for the wind or fish to flip over. A nine inch ring cost me $3. I needed craft mesh (usually white, but I found it in black). If you could find a large plastic pot the right size, that is another option if you want taller plants (I am not touching on that here though). Take the ring and cut the mesh to size. Use fishing line to secure it (string and thread will rot). Cut foam to fit inside. Make slots for the plants and insert them. A circle of this size makes for a stunning mat of mixed plants. Creeping jenny, parrots feather, coleus, and several taller plants like geraniums or small rushes/sedges. For $5, I got a large floater that I plan to completely cover in different colored coleuses with a central geranium. I will post pictures once I get the cuttings and let them grow a bit. Good plants: This list was a bit of challenge for me to make since I am still trying out plants in a pond that receives a lot of harsh reflected sun glare - and it is far from complete. I will keep updating this list as I find things that work long-term. In general, try to pick plants that have no problem with their roots in the water long-term. Many plants will take cuttings in water, but suffer after 2-3 months if not put into dirt. Many trailing annuals in the garden centers will live quite happily in water (Creeping Jenny & geraniums, for example). Or you can go hiking to a nearby pond/lake for some natives (Like marsh marigold, sedges, or mare's tail) Many aquarium plants will also adapt to emerged pond life. Moneywort and parrots feather are a couple of examples. Many tropical plants that take cuttings will work as well. (Ivys, begonias, baby's tears, spider plants, devil's tongue, various succulents, etc) Quite a few herbs also do nicely (mints, rosemary, basil, and sage) I even heard several people tell me that tomatoes do well like this. (I will have to try it this year...) I prefer fast-growing plants since they are the ones that really keep my water clean. Although you can experiment as well (ever try growing an avocado plant from seed? Dozens of tutorials on Google say you just need water and a seed). My personal favorites: Parrots feather (hard to find lately, but my top favorite. Fast growing and doesn't care if its leaves are above or below water.) Coleus (Comes in 50+ color varieties from reds to greens to blues and more. These things are weeds... I kept one in a vase of water for 3 years on a windowsill and it was completely happy...) Moneywort/creeping jenny (The aquarium variety does seem quite different from the garden ones, even though they are - supposedly - the same plant. I have both types and they are thriving. The garden creeping jenny is more heat tolerant than the aquarium moneywort.) Geraniums (nothing like a blooming plant to make people do a double take) german ivy (doesn't like its leaves underwater, but if you use several rings to support them, this is an insanely fast and aggressive grower that is commonly found in garden centers). Spider plants (easy to source for free, tolerate high heat, and easy to rehome come autumn) I will update this post later this year with more pictures to show how well things do.
  4. The 20g swordtail tank has 1.5" of black sand. I just need to figure out a way to get rid of the duckweed, considering it has a 3D background that the stuff always hides in. The Goldfish tank has 3" of sand behind the retaining wall where the rooted plants are, but only 1/2" of gravel in front so it is easier to vacuum the waste from the goldfish. I actually had 6500K ATI lights for a month, but all of my plants were dieing. I upgraded to 10,000K ATI and now they are growing, the low light ones are thriving. It might be because the light is 8" above the water, and the water is pretty deep. Many of my medium light plants are barely growing. I think my java moss needs a haircut... :rofl: Goldfish are an odd choice I know, but I only wanted a few fish that would be larger. I heavily considered a pair of red jewels or even a pair of gold occies. But I always loved ponds, goldfish, and koi. But Koi need 500 gallons a piece at 3 years... The goldfish should be able to stay in that tank for a couple of years. Maybe I will be able to talk my way into a small indoor pond by that time.
  5. Figured I would share these. 37 gallon planted tank with 4 goldfish. The java moss really likes it, although there are a lot of plants in the unseen retaining wall behind it. 18" 10,000K light, open tank. I have large almond sized stones between my rooted plants so the goldfish can't get to the roots. Works quite well. 20 gallon planted tank with blood red swordtails, 3 BN plecos, and 3 guppies. Two 24" lights, 10,000K and ATI Aquablue Special. The plants grow like weeds. Somehow got one flake of duckweed in there at some point and it is like a plague now.
  6. I found my black sand at Big Al's. Although they are often sold out of the big bags in the store, they can be bought online.
  7. Looking forward to this. Travel in April is almost always better than in March.
  8. By import, are you referring to the LFS bringing in fish from elsewhere in the world, or importing directly from a supplier such as Fairdeal? I have found that fish bred locally seem to live longer than those shipped long distances to the LFS. For example, I often breed guppies and other livebearers and regularly add new blood to the breeding pool. The original juveniles from the local fish store saw maybe 6-8 months, yet their offspring in the same tank lived for 2-3 years. I am not sure which factors affect it, it could be shipping stress, chemicals used to control disease and/or promote color, or water conditions. Lately I have found a number of livebearer fish I have bought from the LFS to be sterile, or having issues with fertility (notably swordtails, but some guppies too). Yet any offspring they managed to produce had no issues in that department. Given a choice, I would purchase fish from a local hobbyist. Less chance of disease and the fish are more likely used to the local water conditions. But I have also imported fish with no issues. I found Fairdeal's fish to be excellent with few or no issues.
  9. Here are a few of my tanks from over the years. All of these 3 are now gone, my last tank needs a serious overhaul before I post it. 14g Lamprologus multifasciatus tank 55g community tank - tetras, guppies, and a pair of keyhole cichilds 90g planted tank. Breeding group of blood red swordtails (all hiding), 5 albino BN plecos (1M, 4 F), and Bolivian rams. The lighting and C02 made it tough to keep the plants in check, I frequently re-aquascaped the tank.
  10. Really depends on your exact location and the bylaws. Phone your town office and ask. Where I am, if I raised the edge of the pond up 24"+ then there was no need for a fence no matter how deep the pond was.
  11. Now I see the black gills, it looks like something is wrong with his gills and infection, or swelling, is spreading to his eyes. I believe the blue and pink skirt are injected with dye, maybe this guy has an ongoing reaction to the dye? Or some non-contagious pathogen snuck in while his immune system was down at one point? If none of the other fish have caught it after 2 years, I doubt it is contagious. It could possibly be a birth defect. The fungus medication I was talking about was called Kanaplex, I got it from Gobstock.com, although I think Big Al's may carry it. Although I don't think it will help your blue skirt at this point... Did the other fish lose the white stuff on their fins? It may help with that.
  12. Sorry, it has me stumped. I never had any luck with the painted skirt tetras - they didn't like my hard water. They never lived longer than 8 months in my tanks, I gave up after the 3rd attempt. My guppies bred like rabbits, and I could never keep the painted skirt tetras alive (although the natural black skirt tetras lived over 2 years). I used to have a medication that worked wonders on popeye and fungus, I will have to see if I can find the bottle...
  13. If you look at other photos of Blue or Pink skirt Tetras, they all have that pale area above the eye. Have the old symptoms disappeared?
  14. There are different sized CFLs. I did manage to find one type that was much smaller than normal and fit into my hood that that the other CFLs wouldn't. I will have to see if I can find the box. It came from Canadian tire, I *think* it was one those world eco bulbs, it was a 4 pack. We just opened boxes until we found the smallest type of bulbs. It grew lots in my 10g, the crypts loved it. You could always look into endlers, you would even have babies to sell eventually.
  15. Crystal

    Hello!

    Welcome. Isn't it amazing how those 4 legged fur balls seem to reduce the number of tanks in a household? I had 9 tanks at one point, got a puppy two years ago and now I am down to 3 and considering taking one more down. Nice pic of the dog, mine puts on a 'guilty' expression whenever the camera comes out...
  16. My fish and plants don't mind a pinch of salt on a constant basis (keep evaporation in mind when adding salt). I do keep the salinity lower unless I quarantine fish. But if I add new fish, I add 1tsp of salt per 5 g, especially if they came from a pet store. I slowly lower it with water changes so when the fish are ready to move, the tank water matches my other tanks. I notice that my BNs tend to spawn when I start lowering the salinity with water changes. Maybe they think the rainy season came? I know it isn't necessary to add extra salt on a constant basis, I just do it so that when I increase the salinity, it isn't such a shock to the resident fish.
  17. Actively breeding: Albino BN plecos daphnia (feeders) Trying to breed: L. multifasciatus red swordtails African butterfly cichlid
  18. I tend to put fish in my 20g planted tank as a quarantine. It isn't a strict quarantine, it has a pair of breeder BN plecos and endlers in it, but it is much easier to treat disease in a small tank if a pathogen did happen to hitchhike - and I see ich in most stores, so I add salt to the tank even before I add the fish. This method did prevent callamus worms from entering my 90g, which would have been tougher to treat. I let them cool their heels in there for about 2 weeks, ensuring their good health while letting them get used to my tap water and food without having to worry about other fish. Then I dump them into the tank I want them in. Often, if I bought a group of 6-8 cichlid juvies hoping to get a pair, I quite often get my pair before the 2 weeks are up.
  19. Ouch. I have not yet overdosed with excel or metricide (ok, half of the time I forget to dose it - they really need an automatic liquid doser that doses 2-20ml for planted aquariums...) As for those child proof caps and locks, I am sure you can guess who the parents hand the lock/container to when the parents can't open the lid/lock, right? My parents could never got those things open, they would always hand them to us to open, even when we were 5 we managed the caps. Well, good thing about a 10g, it is easy to do water changes. You could probably do one massive water change, removing as much water the first time around as possible, which would save time.
  20. I don't really think it is a disease, it seems like something in the tank is altering/contaminating any water added to it. But it will probably still affect any fish in that tank - try moving one or two over as a test and watch closely for a week. I had a tank like that once - the cycle never really established itself - I kept vacuuming the gravel and cleaning the filter trying to clear it up, but it wasn't until I kind of gave up and only siphoned & did water changes once a month that it improved. Plants help it, but to stop moving/disturbing things helped more.
  21. I have no experience with the fish you are wondering about, but at this point in time, I think something small and fast would survive. Quick tetras, danios, or mountain cloud minnows perhaps? I have no experience with the ghost knife's nocturnal hunting abilities to know for sure, perhaps someone with more experience can chime in...
  22. I normally dose 2x prime as well. I find that even if my liquid test kits show 0 ammonia, there is still enough in the water to kill my daphnia cultures if I am not careful. As for plants, my hygro and limnophila think they are weeds, and I have a huge patch of chain swords I want to get rid of, as well as some giant vals. Currently floating are two big chunks of hydrocotyle sp japan that refuse to stay rooted, but don't seem to mind floating, more hygro, limnophila, some giant duckweed and a few other rouge cuttings. I could probably spare some java moss, a nice size chunk fell off my my tank wall recently - did you know that java moss will grow out of water, up the tank, and attempt to escape if left unsupervised long enough?
  23. If you are after plants, swing by Athabasca on your way south one day. I can't give all my cuttings away, they end up in the compost (and I have several sandwich bags worth currently floating in my tank- and they are beginning to annoy me). PS, looking at the picture, it looks really clean (good job). I am unfamiliar with Fort Mac's water, but I know Athabasca adds more chemicals to our water this time of year. Try doubling the Prime dose on water changes and adding some (3-5ml?) to the tank per day for 5 days just to keep any stray ammonia in check.
  24. Possibly cyclops, they have a 'tadpole-like' stage before they get bigger. Possibly 2-4 other common tank critters. I know I have 3 different kinds in my one tank, considering that I have seen 3, there are probably many more that are just too small for me to spot.
  25. umm.. I don't see anything? Is this just me, or can anyone else see the picture?
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