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midgetwaiter

Calgary & Area Member
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Everything posted by midgetwaiter

  1. The canister isn't going to do you much good if you are looking to do corals. You won't get much flow out of it in SW and it will end up being something you need to clean constantly in order to avoid excess nitrate problems from all the junk it traps. You'll never find somebody with a sump that says "I should have done a canister instead". In addition to the ability to move more water around you have more space to add equipment and various filter media. There is additional cost to getting a sump and having an overflow of some kind installed of course but one place that this is offset is the cost and efficiency of your skimmer. You will get much more out of a comparatively priced in sump skimmer that you will a hang on. A lit refugium chamber that can grow macro algae is also a HUGE help in most systems. Without a sump I still wouldn't use the canister your rock and sand will do most of your bio filtration, you'll just need to add water flow and a skimmer. A pair of Sieo 1100s would work and or Hydor Korallias are nice too. This system can't handle a big fish load well so no triggers or such but many people have been successful with it. You'll never find consensus between different web sites or reef keepers and different thing work for different people so YMMV. Some time ago I had a dual canister system and sump system side by side and I probably spent twice as much time messing with the casiters alone than I did with the other system all together.
  2. Give it some time, probably the best indication is if it keeps eating or not. I injured my male a while ago by dropping a glass top and had to watch him waste away, sucked big time.
  3. The fact that you have a small ammonia reading jumps right out. Did you clean your filter pads when you did your water change? If so, how?
  4. There is a bunch of things to consider here. Most importantly the 1000 gph pump is probably going to supply more water flow at 4' or so of head than the 2 500s would. I mucked around with the same call recently and decided to stay with one larger pump, I didn't see any gain in switching the two smaller ones. The amount of flow generated by the returns is tiny compared to what I get from the SEIO in there which I rely on for most of the work. It's tough to get the returns pointed in a way that you get any decent momentum to the flow. I'd suggest planning on an absolute max of 10x turnover with the sump and plan to get most of your flow from a wide output power head in the display.
  5. Does it or did it struggle like it doesn't want to be at the surface? If not it might just be acting funny. If it seems like it can't control it's depth I have no idea what to suggest, the lack swim bladder rules out anything I've had experience with. You'd need to find somebody that has significant experience with sharks and rays, they're unique in this aspect.
  6. This is a myth, regular old table salt is just fine.
  7. It changed colour because it's a male and the other one is a female. You never, ever try and keep pairs of livebearer species, the females will always get harassed to death. You need a minimum 1:2 ratio.
  8. Keep in mind that when one says they have 1" PVC they mean 1" ID which is interior diameter. Easiest route: take one of your fittings to home depot and stick stuff in in until you find the right one.
  9. I'm looking for a list of fish that are brackish, but that can tolerate FULL salt. Thanks. Take the list of fish from the FAQ and knock off the ones that say low brackish.... Aside from kribs, chromides, ropefish, some awaous gobies, rainbows and glassfish you should be just fine. You're welcome.
  10. Nothing anybody has mentioned is really a freshwater fish. Most of the livebearers and gobies come from estuary areas that end up mixing with ocean water to various degrees. The monos, scats, archers and some puffers breed in FW rivers like salmon and move out into the ocean as adults. What you are looking for is a list of brackish water fish, try looking for the Brackish FAQ by Neale Monks.
  11. Talk to a company that does warehouse shelving. The goos stuff can handle the weight and by the time you get around to getting everything you need to build it you're pretty close on the price. I did a 2 shelf 48X18 for around $100.
  12. While I agree that this would be the ideal solution one has to consider that the political climate in Myanmar is what created the situation. In a different country that would have happened first and more importantly there would be an answer to the "do these fish really only exist in this swamp" question. So much of Myanmar is off limits that the world at large has no idea what interesting fauna might be hiding out there.
  13. I'd guess about 2 weeks on average, newly hatched cat sharks are usually difficult to get eating.
  14. After a while we ended up getting a second rabbit for him to hang out with as we weren't able to play with him enough. She said I could name it so I chose Hasenfeffer, then her dad told her what that means. I got in trouble.
  15. A boa on the loose is what "fixed" her hamster and lead directly to me not being able to say no to the "look at the pretty bunny" discussion.
  16. The g/f's rabbit ripped up the cord on one of my "good" heaters and I'm trying to think of a way to fix it. I'm thinking of liquid electrical tape and wondering if anyone else has tried it. If so how long did it last? Under normal circumstances the repair wouldn't be submerged but can anyone think of a reason the product would cause problems in the water if properly cured first?
  17. Bubble tips don't always bubble, nobody knows why. It could have picked that spot for any number of reasons, light, flow or it just found a nice place to wedge it's foot in. More intense lights would certainly be better but you have to mess around a little to get them into a happy place some times. Try modifying your flow pattern a bit.
  18. We had them at Riverfront a while ago. We didn't order them, we ordered something that a customer wanted by common name (not jellybean) and these were what we got. The dye was fading out pretty fast though and they looked really bad after a while, yellow with a hint of whatever colour they were dyed.
  19. Once you're done this start making some diet changes, you should never have to trim teeth on a GSP.
  20. try keeping them somewhere cooler, sometimes they will grow the wings back if the temp gets over 75 or so.
  21. The goldfish isn't losing scales due to stress, the pleco it doing it. Sometimes when they don't get enough to eat or just feel like being a pita they will attack other large bodied fish that way for the slime coat.
  22. To hook it up just cut the end off an extension cord and wire it into the box. I don't know about safer, I'm still looking for 4+ slot outdoor style boxes. The things that got me looking at this were that 8+ outlet power strips are really expensive and that I liked the idea of having at least one set of plugs I could shut off for my return pumps. I never went quite whole hog like that with the switches. The other thing that got me thinking was the way my apartment is wired. It works out that I have 3 tanks all on one circuit, nice that I only need 1 GFCI but not so nice that if something in one tank goes then all 3 shut down. I was planning on putting a GFCI in the boxes with each tank, then I got to thinking that it would be nice to have 2 GFCIs in each so I could have say the return pump and a power head separate to maintain some flow if something went. Then add a delay timer for feeding maybe and you've got a $60 power strip While that would be nice it's a bit much. I also found 12 outlet power strips at Rona for $12 today. I haven't really decided what I'm going to do, any input would be appreciated.
  23. Malawi Bloat isn't something that it caused by a bacteria or parasite, it is a condition when the natural gut bacterias of the fish can't handle what they are eating and the food starts to rot in the gut. There is some debate about this though, IMO anything else with similar symptoms is often just called bloat.. What you are describing sounds like any one of a number of infectious intestinal problems. These can be present for a long period without obvious harm then for whatever reason overwhelm the fish. The most effective treatment for this is going to be an antibiotic like metronidazole administered orally. Soaking the food in it is a good way to treat if you can get the fish to eat, a little garlic added can help with that. Seachem makes a pretty good metro product.
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