FunkSolid

Thank you for the beautiful fish ;-)

I finally caught one of my males lighting up like a lightbulb on video and I had to share it.

So I was on Amazon.ca today, and I noticed they have the full line of NLS food, and its all Prime eligible. I'm not a NLS fanboy, but with the amazon Prime availability its a wicked deal, and I dont have to wait for weeks for some crappy free shipping. New Life Spectrum Cichlid Formula 1mm Sinking Freshwater Pet Food, 250gmAmazon.ca $16.55 (with Prime you get free 48h shipping) Big Als online $25.99 (probably same price in store) Woah thats a pretty huge difference! Just a heads up for the next time you need food. Andrew

I saw these guys @ Big Als and their phenotype made me say "WOW!". Then I saw the price and I said "$H!T". The dude at Big Als told me "There is one place in Thailand that breeds these and thats why they are so expensive". I have used the search function and The Google on these guys, and people are mostly saying that due to the genetic abnormality of this phenotype, and the horrific inbreeding to achieve it, their immune systems reflect their terrible gene pool. Most of those threads are a few years old (some are 7+ years old) does anyone know if that reality still exists? Thanks :-)

I assume your trying to avoid building a 2x8 bearing wall in your basement because it will cut down on your usable square footage, which is completely understandable. First some key nomenclature. The floor joists are the main component of your floor that your trying to add additional support to, and joists sit on beams/bearing-walls. I now assume you want to add a dropped beam underneath the joists where the fishtank will be. This would definitely be an option, but we are travelling further into the realm of complication, and calculators. When you are dealing with clear-span beams there are many calculations that need to be made based on the length of span, type of material and number of plys of the beam, and masses of live/static loads. You also cannot place a telepost on your concrete floor without a footing underneath because the point load of the telepost could potentially punch a hole in the concrete. But again its not hard to sledgehammer a section of the floor out, and hand-mix a nice little footing, and then have the other end of that beam bear onto a wood post in your frost wall. This project is not impossible, but to do it "safely" or "right" might cost more money than you want to spend, and clear span beams need to be done right to avoid catastrophe.

I totally agree with you! I built houses for 7 years before I went back to school, and adding a static load between 1500-2500 lbs to your flooring system is a big deal. We would add additional and stronger joists in the floor systems for homeowners who upgraded from the spec homes to nice tubs and Jacuzzis. Some builders even upgraded flooring systems under the older LG direct drive washers, because they had really bad warranty issues because they would shake the house apart. Nothing under your floor could safely take that load, even if its in close proximity to a bearing wall below. It would cost a stupid amount of money to get and comply with an engineered stamped plan for you to follow, but then your (as mentioned above) insurance would be happy. I can also empathize with trying to avoid the costs of doing things the "proper" way. I would build a 2x8 bearing wall, with double studs point-loading directly under the joists (@ 19.2" typical), and do double top plate on that wall, and make sure its made and installed to fit really tight :-) If the concrete floor in your basement is not super cracked, its probably settled nicely and you don't have a gap to your gravel underneath. And if there is a bearing wall close, that concrete will be supported by those nearby footings as well. Good Luck!

Killing free swimming nematodes is easy, just add your favorite antinematodal agent such as Levamisole/Fenbendazole/Piperazine, but if you do that you might get into a bunch of trouble. First you could have detritus nematodes which are not pathological to your fish, and they came out for the huge influx of food you added, and will go back into hiding in the substrate after the all they can eat dinner is over. Lots of my fish love to eat the few that periodically get shot out of my canister filters. If you do dose the aforementioned antihelminthics and wipe them out, you will be facing a major decomposition issue and its likely your system cannot handle that sudden decompositional bioload. So after dosing you need to get the timing right of waiting for the medication to take effect and kill/paralyze the worms, but not waiting too long to vacuum and waterchange. Hope that helps! - SeaChem Paraguard *might* work as well because they are free swimming... I have successfully used that in the past (not for nematodes), and when I administered it I noticed a lot of detritus worms getting spit out of the HOB filter which i assumed were succumbing to exposure to the Paraguard.

I used the National Geographic black sand (from PetSmart) and have been very impressed with it.

I went in there to buy expanded clay pellets for my aquaponics. I spent probably two hours talking to the owner getting schooled on everything. It was awesome.

AND THE PLOT THICKENS! So the brand new power converter Aqueon sent me to replace the one that caught fire... DIED! Well it didnt actually go into asystole death, just v-Tach strobe light mode, which is dead to me. So I emailed my contact again but this time I armed myself with a video of the defect and full disclosure of my setup. They are now sending me a brand new light (which is kinda cool) but refuse to acknowledge their Dongguan Hengyue Industrial Co., Ltd. power supplies are pieces of _ _ _ _. It took hours of searching and about 10 phone calls to find it, but I did find another company that makes the same power supply. Shipped to my door with exchange rates its looking to be 25 Canadian Pesos. Go HERE if your interested in it. If this replacement works, i'm gonna swap them all out to hopefully end this saga.

Well after a few phone calls and emails, Aqueon is really not giving me the warm fuzzies. They claim the unit worked as designed and when it overheated, it cut off its own power and the smoking hole in the side was not a big deal, and posed no combustible risk. They said they could ship me out a new power-supply which will arrive in 2-3 weeks. I know I bought one of the cheapest LED units you can buy (I actually bought two on 25% off so they were too cheap to pass on), but their customer service, and complete lack of respect for smoke and heat really makes me ill. Despite my indignation I dont have the cash to replace multiple 48" LED's right now, so thats the end of this story.

Am I correct to assume this pool is an outdoor one because of the annual shut down? And do you know what the Chlorine concentration is when you shock it?

I have two 48" Optibright fixtures and yesterday one of the power supplies decided to catch fire. I was fortunate to be in my office quietly studying when I heard a "snap crackle and pop". The lights on my 120 instantly flickered out, so I jumped up and yanked the cord out of my light timer. It was smoking and had a hole in the side of the unit. I inspected the surroundings, and there is nothing on my end that would cause this. No water, no salt residues, nothing. I called Aqueon this morning and emailed them pictures of everything. I appreciate that these units are made in Wisconsin, but the power supplies are made in you know where. I also wanted to mention that the power supplies to these units run a lot hotter than the rest of my LEDs. They are substantially hotter than the more powerful LEDs on my planted tank which feel slightly warmer than room temperature, but the Optibrights feel hot. I have been meaning to put my tanks on a GFCI circuit breaker... ( Watch this 120 second video ) and now i'm totally convinced that doing it could prevent my house from potentially burning down. It would certainly have cut the power in milliseconds if I was not home. I admit I have been ignoring my gut feeling on the GFCI's and it makes me sick thinking about this fire if I was not home. Please consider this for your own setups. I will keep this updated with Aqueons responses. Andrew

My curiosity is how the algae survives the water treatment plant, and then its exposure to chlorine before it goes into my Brita.

I wonder if the Chloramines in your water have a higher efficacy in algae control?

After pouring a glass of water, I noticed this nice green blanket on the bottom of my Brita. If controlling Algae in my tanks is not enough work, I need to do it in my drinking water containers. I guess its everywhere and can even evade Chlorination in our water supply!

What do you feed the fish? What is the frequency of feedings?

I was thinking about this project as well for the summer once school is done. I was considering ripping down an old tank(s) but buying sapphire glass for the viewing panel. Who sells it, and do they sell it in reasonable dimensions?

For the actual acclimation process going from bag to tank I do not recommend the drip method (unless you have an RO system, then you can ignore everything I’m about to say). The combination of high pH, and hardness of our tap water will cause any Ammonium (NH4+) in the bag to be deprotonated to Ammonia (NH3) if we add our water. This process will cause a drastic spike in the toxicity in the water and not be beneficial to the already stressed out fish. I do temperature acclimation for 15-20 minutes by placing the bag inside the tank. Then I pour the bag into a wastewater container through a large net, then add fish from net to tank. Your also decreasing the likelihood of pathogens being transferred from a potentially sketchy source to your tank. I love using SeaChem Paraguard to clean off external pathogens that are associated with the new fish going into quarantine. I usually do a 24-48h go with that stuff. If they are wild-caught I totally do a de-worm (flubendazole) and I also do an anti-protozoan med (Metro or quinacrine dihydrochloride). Finally if I’m not being an impatient fool, I QT for 4 weeks. Hope that helps!

Off the top of my head I would try the dreaded duct tape, but use good quality duct tape. Your desperate, and that calls for desperate measures. I would make sure canister exterior is dry, put lots of pressure between the motor-head and canister, and try taping it down with good duct tape. Hopefully that will hold until you can source the part from somewhere. Its cringe-worthy but i'm thinking like a desperate person who wants to keep the fish and bacteria alive. - It might not work and leak - It might leave a residue on the canister when tape is removed + It might just work as a temp fix Keep us updated as this might help someone else out :-)

Are you looking for this? Ecco handle clips

I think the proximity to cattle ranchers and agriculture has an influence as well. The extra nitrogenous compounds leaching into these bodies of water supercharge these ecosystems.

I have to agree with you Ron. I have never had any issues with ceramic impeller shafts. When I do maintenance on my motor heads I take them apart with surgical precision and care because I know how much parts are, and dont want to break anything including plastic covers and the like. I have probably removed internals over 100 times (4 canisters X monthly maintenance X two years) having no issues.

+1

My guess changes to Melanotaenia praecox, most LFS call them "Dwarf Rainbow".