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I know that Princess Auto usually has long tweezers. I have a pair that's about 18" long.

Turns out that Tuan doesn't have any cultures right now. Any other suggestions?

I'm slowly getting more interested in growing some live food for my fish. I'm thinking Daphnia would be the better choice of food due to their size and the size of the fish in my tank (celestial pearl danios are the smallest). This being for my 10 gal, I don't expect that I would need to grow a large batch at all. Does anyone have their own cultures going? Do you use yeast / soy flour mix for the daphnia? Any and all tips, suggestions or experiences would be greatly appreciated! Thanks, Hugh

I picked up a half dozen CPDs from TNT. They're pretty pale right now (and still in the bag acclimating since this morning) and I sure can't wait to get them into the tank and hiding in the plants...

A week later, nearly all of the GSA has been removed from my tank. Where large patches were, now only flecks exist. There are some spots the snail can't get at, but that's the extent of it. Eggs shmeggs. I don't care. This guy is a god-send.

This sounds like your typical Wood/Bamboo/Fan/Flower Shrimp. They're filter feeders, eating suspended plant material from the water. Will not eat any fauna from your tank.

I had a single shrimp that eventually died, turning pink as you've found. If your parameters are low, I can't imagine what would've killed it? 73-82 degrees is apparently the range to keep them at as well.

Marimo moss balls are a type of algae that grows in the shape of a ball. PJs has them from time to time at $10 a ball or so. Some people have talked about the cladophora algae spreading to their tank (I'm not sure if they are in fact cladophora, but I do know they're algae), but I haven't seen any spreading in my tank. They do best where there is some current to toss them around so light gets to all sides. You can also shake them out from time to time when doing water changes to remove any detritus that may accumulate on top of it. I've had one for a couple months now and it's a fantastic centre piece in my 10 gallon. Relatively low light (1.4wpg), diy CO2 and it seems happy enough. They grow slowly: ~1cm a year I've been told.

I hit up Nature's Corner and grabbed a nerite. Very similar to this, however a much, much darker shell color. It seems to have found my GSA (as if it were hard, even for the nearly blind) so we'll see what comes of this, eggs and all. Update: He's put a significant dent in the algae corner I've been rearing for months. I think I'm in love.

I've had an apple snail (one of the variants) and yes, I can second the downtime. It seemed that the snail would be active for a few hours, then sleep for the rest of the day. I'm only looking at getting a single nerite; I don't think I'd go crazy and get a bunch. I have a chunk of driftwood that is almost entirely covered with christmas moss. Maybe it'd find a way to lay them in there... Worst case, I get one and the eggs drive me insane. I'm sure I can find a home for him.

I'm considering the route of "buying a critter to fix a problem", which I don't normally like to do. I've got GSA spots growing in the corners of my tank, some on the centre of the glass and down along the substrate and as far as I can tell, it's due to the always bright office lighting. Because it's an office tank, I'm not always here to do tons of water changes to keep my nutrients down, so my nitrates sit around 20ppm and my phosphate around 1.0ppm. I have a decent amount of plants (vals, limnophilia, hygro and other slower growers) but it's not enough to reduce the nutrients to zero and require extra dosing of NO3. The tank is exposed to the light on all four sides (my cube is behind it) so blacking out three of the four sides isn't much of an option. Figured these guys might help fight off the GSA, but the eggs are a concern...

I'm considering getting a zebra nerite but I'm hesitant about their egg laying. From what I've read, people talk of the little white rice coccoons that appear on the glass and on any wood they may have in the tank. Some talk of them being very hard to remove while others say they leave them in their tank and they eventually go away. My tank is only 10 gallons so it being infested with eggs is not all that appealing. I'm sure there are some snail keepers that deal with this regularily. Thanks! Hugh

Gah. At least I'm not looking for 20 of them...

I've got a few red cherry shrimp and a few kuhli loaches already, so I don't think I want anymore bottom feeders. Has anyone ever kept celestial pearl danios? Anyone know if they're at all hardy? I think I've seen some of them at Big Al's for only $5 a fish or something stupid... TNT says they'll have them "soon" as well.

Afternoon everyone, I'm looking to get a group of small community to fit my 7.6 pH 10 gallon tank. Does anyone have any suggestions? I looked at some cherry barbs, but at a max size of 2" they'll probably be too large. I'd also like them to be fairly flashy. I saw a few pics of the celestial pearl danios; they look pretty nice. Let me know your opinions Thanks! Hugh

I'm just looking forward to seeing the finished product!

I have MTS and for awhile there, it seemed like there were more and more every day. After I started limiting the amount of food fed each day for my fish (overfeeding is an easy habit to have I've learned), I've noticed empty shells at the bottom of the tank. I had read that when you control the food input, you control the snail population and my tank is proof. It's no longer overrun. I've also heard that clown loaches will eat smaller snails but the large shells are too much for them. I got mine from Big Al's and I said I didn't care what size I was getting, so the guy gave me about 30-50 of them for less than $2.

A buddy of mine was looking to get a moss ball. So it's true that they're mostly algae? What level of light is required?

I second the "low light is less maintenance" mantra. Everything happens much slower, which is nice when you don't have time to prune. I've got eleven different types of plants (not even counting my algae!) and I know there's probably hundreds of others that I could grow under my measley 1.4 wpg. I stumbled across this link (http://www.sudeepmandal.com/hobbies/planted-aquarium/low-tech-planted-tank-guide/) which made me more confident in my low-tech tank.

This is turning into a journal (btw, how do I get one of those?)... Because I'm lucky enough to work nine hours a day about two feet from my tank, I can watch what happens as it happens. The O2 bubbles produced after doing the water change must have been a direct result of the plants consuming the CO2 from the water change, not necessarily from the light-glass scrub. A day afterward, the oxygen bubbles have dropped off completely. Back to considering CO2 with my 1.4 wpg...

While doing a glass scrub, 20-30% water change and replanting some cuttings from growing plants, I had the lid off my tank and decided on a whim to scrub the glass plate separating my light from my tank with a little vinegar I had sitting around. Not 30 minutes after having everything back together do I notice tons of air bubbles under the leaves of my sword, hygro and even my xmas moss. I'll post in a little while if this seemingly obvious part of tank maintenance does anything...

Thx for the suggestions Edge.

My only concern with swords was that I thought most of them were mid to high light. However, I do have one that seems to be putting out new leaves relatively frequently, thought they are kinda reddish (I'm leaning toward it being an Echinodorus ozelot). I do want to replace the glass in my hood since it's a bit old, etched and stained. Cleaning it has done nothing to help. I figure that I can probably spend $10 at crystal glass and they'll be able to do it for me.

I kid you not, when I planted my one and only val, my crypt seemed to spread out and shade it. Then when I moved it, the crypt grew even more. It was like it became sentient! By the time I got aggressive and removed half of the crypt, the val had entirely died off. Maybe I could get a bigger one.

Yeah, that's my other option. I keep waiting for them to grow and "get more" that way. I should probably just get some more. The ground is about 60% covered but it's only about half height in the tank, so I'd have to say that my tank is 25-30% full of plants. Any other easy, fast grower suggestions than what I've already got? I've some hygro, crypt, moneywort, xmas moss, a tiny java fern sprout, some type of broad leaf sword, and a floating chunk of what i think is a limnophila sessiliflora. I REALLY don't want to try another hornwort since my last one made a hell of a mess.