FunkSolid

I went and talked to Norm @ Pisces. He confirmed they have no access to fish medications, and that most of their stock is still coming from overseas which still has access to limitless medications. The disparity between the ubiquitous use of antibiotics in overseas breeders, and customers in Canada having nothing to treat sick fish is unbelievable. He tried selling me this "Probiotic" stuff called Fish-FX but it immediately gave me snake oil vibes when it said "Chemical Free", but it contains chemicals such as (DiHydrogenMonoxide)(H2O)(Water) and no explanation on the mechanism of how it magically cures fish (as a Biologist my cynicism really gets the worst of me when people market snake oil to people who are genuinely trying to help sick animals). I guess the next step is to try and see if a new "Black Market" emerges from all this, and I can make some dubious ethical decisions just to add a few milligrams of Metronidazole to a fish tank. The last thing I will say is, once Pisces runs out of their backroom supply, i'm curious to see if the thousands of antibiotic resistant fish they import every week will hurt their profits because they might have no way to keep them alive? *For the record I love Pisces (my kids do as well) and they get a lot of money from me*

I just setup a 10 Gallon planted tank in my sons room with some new guppies. Saw some flashing, and went to order Seachem Paraguard (I have used it successfully for ectoparasites in the past) off of Amazon. Cant find it anymore. I cant believe they have removed medications that are not antibiotics as well. This is complete nonsense. What are AA people doing to treat their fish?

I certainly do. I googled "API Color Chart" and then selected "Images" which returned hundreds of examples.

I was looking into these for aquariums and tracking the temperature of my kids. Most I found for a reasonable price (0-100$) had a standard error of +/- 2 degrees which was unacceptable for what I wanted to use it for.

This is a long shot, and highly speculative, but what about dissolved oxygen? Most diseases present with some indication physically, and your group has been stable for quite some time. I’m assuming you have not added anything from another source (fish, décor, media, equipment) so disease is unlikely, or not obvious. Your chemistry seems stable (but a zero on nitrate is unusual), and the only real sign is inactivity and you observe their operculum moving possibly indicating labored breathing. I would ask what your water surface disruption is like? Try adding an airstone for a while and see if it resolves. Maybe as the colony grew their O2 demands have exceeded the tank in its current state? DO kits are expensive, and I don’t know anyone who uses them. HTH Andrew

I think you will be pleasantly surprised on how easy they are to raise. Once they become free-swimming the hard part is over, and you just need to make sure they dont get predated! Crushing up food is a great idea, and I raised hundreds feeding NLS Cichlid pellets crushed in a 10G at 80F, and had a coarse sponge over the intake of the HOB filter on it. Good luck, and let us know if you have any more questions. Andrew

Biodives I was unaware that aerobic bacteria can switch to sulfate/nitrate reduction and swap oxygen for sulfates/nitrates as a terminal electron acceptor. Could you please post a link to this because I have never come across this before. It should be scintillating read. Thank you Andrew

I agree with Geleen on this one. Occams Razor should probably be used and I think that forgetting to add de-chlorinator with a large water change could be the best explanation. Hydrogen sulfide production in anaerobic zones can happen, but if you regularly disturb your substrate while doing your twice-weekly water changes you can probably rule that out. Sorry about the disaster, but it sounds like your taking great care of your fish. We all forget simple things on occasion and it can lead to sad outcomes. The exception does not prove the rule ;-)

This video worked well for mine.

Hey Fishman44 I have a couple of comments for you. Firstly, if your doing water changes in tanks that keep Rift Lake Cichlids (I’m looking at the Haplochromine in your picture), our water from the Glenmore reservoir is beautifully suited for their needs (Chlorine excluded). I do 80-90% water changes every two weeks, and anecdotally my fish are thriving. This result would be expected because they have evolved for millennia in very similar water chemistry, so I would say ditch the RO system if you have African Cichlid specific tanks (gradually of course). As for Prime. Thats an interesting question because the city ideally wants to give everyone the same residual chlorine concentration when the water hits your house, but there are so many variables that prevent that from happening. For example, in the spring during runoff their system is taxed and our free chlorine levels can easily double (0.7 to 1.4 mg/L). So, prescribing a dechlorination free methodology may be tolerable for your fish at certain times, it could easily be toxic at other times. I would recommend to my friends that they use Prime, especially if they do really large periodic water changes like me. If your doing the more frequent but smaller volume regime, it may very well not need any Prime because those Chlorines flash off before anything detrimental happens. Your curiosity question sounds like a math/calculus problem in which I have no skill or desire to tackle. HTH Andrew

My guess is a strawberry peacock (aulonocara sp.)

I have some thoughts as well. First: I would avoid using fish like Tetras in cycling because they have evolved in (roughly speaking) acidic water, and do not tolerate ammonia well (assuming you have water with a pH >7). Typically people use fish with a better osmoregulation mechanism for ammonia to like good old gold fish. Second: The temperature of the water directly affects the speed of bacteria division. Thus cooler, room-temperature water will slow the cycle down, especially compared to something at 80F. I would trying bringing the temp up to 80 until your cycling, then gradually lower it. HTH Andrew

I have been very impressed with the FX6. Its super quiet, flows beautifully, and is easy to maintain. I would certainly recommend it to anyone.

I can think of two answers for why the UGF was selected against, and went the day of the dinosaur… Actually lets pick a better example because some dinosaurs still live today. How about went the way of the Irish Elk. 1. Money – Aquarium supply companies figured out they could make more money by introducing monthly disposable filter cartridges. By filling them with minimally effective carbon, and forcing you to throw out a huge quantity of biofilms every month with your cartridge, they can generate more revenue. I think that’s why HOB’s emerged (excuse the pun) because the individuals interested in selling them could make more money. Once filtration move outside the tank then technology pushed things along. 2. Technology – The technology has replaced your substrate with bio-media, and super-effective ion exchange chemical media. Consider the new chemical media being introduced, its placed even more impetus to use sumps, HOB’s and canisters. And now that some of those can be regenerated, its becoming even more lucrative to use them. Secondly, the industry has made huge advances in bio-media and increased the affordability of them, which also makes UGF obsolete. For example, you can have a fully customizable FX6, with lots of Purigen and Biohome Ultimate, and then you can use your Python to vacuum the sand, and keep everything clean and aerobic. All the while getting massive water flow through the canister also allowing for HUGE increases to bioload inside the tank. I know someone with 3 – FX6’s on one 140 Gallon tank. I think it’s a bit nutty, but it allows for some ridiculous ideas. Ideas that could never be supported by a UGF. HTH

I never thought I would ever see one of these for sale... In Calgary... On Kijiji! I could be naive, but have never laid eyes on one in a home or fishstore (I did see them at the Vancouver Aquarium). The red coloration is amazing as well. I dont have a 10,000 Gallon tank so I have to pass, but I am still totally shocked to see it. What do you think? Have you ever seen these for sale in Alberta before (am I naive)? http://www.kijiji.ca/v-fish/calgary/super-super-rare-arapaima/1250476856?enableSearchNavigationFlag=true Andrew

Epcor does not disclose Ammonia/Ammonium in their monthly report so its hard to find any good data on it. I would be really careful jumping to conclusions considering how crude our crude colorimetric assays are, and their huge limitations. They are still useful, and I own a kit or two (both API) but its more of a qualitative than quantitative measurement. I would trust your local Edmonton legends (who have already commented), and use your Seachem Prime faithfully. If your still worried, you could roll some Purigen or other chemical media with ammonia/ammonium absorption capabilities for a while post water-changes to try and absorb it. HTH Andrew

P. demasoni are not obligate herbivores. And I think that is the first issue here, the popular fallacy that they are. The gods of African Cichlids like Ad Konings have made the observation that they do seem to primary eat algae on the rocks, but they also happily consume the incidental invertebrates that are in the green stuff. Knowing that they do consume and tolerate animal protein then leads to the key factor of proportionality. With the correlation of animal protein and “Malawi bloat” its been posited that feeding a low animal protein and high vegetable (proportionality) diet will keep their digestive motility high and reduce the change of opportunistic pathogens (like anaerobic bacteria) from causing problems. All that to say, they have evolved to eat animal protein (to some extent), and probably will if given the opportunity. I have hundreds of demasoni in my tanks, and I have seen the smaller fry pick each other off, and use predatory-like behavior when one is weak or slow. And who knows, the beautiful bright yellow labs from Dwayne may be extra enticing? HTH Andrew

In my experience... Cycled - A tank that is older than 30 days (on average) that has the ability to produce Nitrates. A tank that you could probably start adding fish to. Established / Mature - A tank that is proven to be chemically stable, and has been reliable over an extended period of time. A tank that you could probably ad expensive fish to. HTH Andrew

What does your water chemistry look like?

Thanks for the insight Harold. I guess its my turn. One thing that I think needs to be mentioned is that Riverfront had multiple serious infractions previous to the big 300 animal one. Wayne was given the riot act and fined multiple times before this, and he knew that the justice for animals vigilantes were hot on his case. Knowing all this I wonder why he did not either comply with the demands of the authorities, or stop the sale of the problematic animals? I agree with the popular sentiment about the fish side of their operation, they (in my opinion) did a good job with them, and their fish keeping practices were no different from any other store. I think most of Wayne’s practices were overt, and not covert like most other places which in the eyes of the justice for animals vigilantes is unacceptable. For example I went there one day and I saw a garbage bin full of hatchet fish flopping around, and the dude said “they are hopeless”. I was shocked at how overt that was, and that they would not euthanize them somewhere or someway else. Riverfront and their 2 for 1 sales were my primary source for fish when I entered the hobby a few years ago, and I had many helpful conversations with Wayne and his wife helping me out as a noob. Today I still appreciate their contribution to the beautiful aquarium systems I have to this day, but I also agree that the stores that sell fish, and are perceived by our community as “experts” need to be held to a higher standard, which, moving forward, might need to shift a little bit one way in the profit-husbandry continuum.

Paying special attention to avoiding polemical or polarizing comments, what do you think of the decision handed down to Wayne (Riverfront) yesterday? I'd like to know your opinion on it. Thanks - Andrew

Hi friends I emailed Spencer this morning looking into getting fish for (Tuesday?) going to Calgary. Let me know if you want to split up some shipping. Thank You (Texting is best because I will be in the lab a lot for the next 48 hours) Andrew 403-464-3865

Just purchased a FX6 (Petsmart had an unbelievable deal for $275) and I am wanting to setup this filter correctly, so that the fine mechanical media is placed BEFORE my bio so that the pores in the bio dont clog up with crap (As per PondGuru). Considering this, do I place the fine mech on the top tray or bottom? I dont use chemical media so the center is just gonna be fine mech + bio. Thanks Friends

The best thing to do is take a good HD video of them, upload it to the YouTubes, then post a link on this forum so that the oracles can have a good look. I have done it many times and its worked out really well.

Between posting on Kijiji, and this forum, I typically sell stuff in less than a week.