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What if it’s been sitting there for more than a week? (The longest I’ve let one go is 3 days. I couldn’t stand to look at it anymore.)

Don’t treat for anything unless we’re certain what the problem is. Do you have more pictures? Maybe of the gills or of the full body from both sides? Does anything else on the fish look out of place? Take pictures and post them here. What do you mean you think there may have been issues before...

Cataracts are common in older Synodontis, but these fish can live for like 16 years. Have they grown a lot since you got them, or did you get them full grown? Are you certain they weren’t adults, maybe pre-owned, when you got them? Because if it’s not age, it could be a fungus or a bacteria or a...

Should one go out of their way to remove shrimp molt from a tank? Is it okay to just leave the molt in the tank until your routine water change, and then if it's still there suck it up with the vac? I've read that the molt contains calcium and the shrimp will eat it and it will help their new...

Could be cataracts. Cataracts are caused by all kinds of things, including water quality, nutrition, trauma, age, and hereditary factors. Sometimes they're a symptom of something else, and sometimes cataracts occur all on their own. To my knowledge cataracts are extremely difficult to treat in...

Thank you so much @Byron. I will update again after this evening's water change. (Probably post the update tomorrow) To confirm, yes, they are Corydoras Aeneus. @seangee was wondering about that earlier in this thread, too. I got them at PetSmart, and their website confirms the scientific name...

IME bettas do get lethargic at 74 degrees and below. So for me, 75 seems like the absolute minimum temp for a betta tank, warmer if it's a species only or solitary tank. Even 75 seems too low to me but I'm willing to try it. I've had a lot of solitary bettas over the years. But never tried...

The 78-79 (F) temp was selected because of the bettas. If mid 70's is better for the corys I can reassess, but I still want the water comfortable for the bettas. The bettas and the kuhlis are my pride and joy in the tank. Of course I want everyone to be comfortable, though. With what species I...

Okay cool. We're definitely on the same wavelength here. I'll do a PWC tonight and not add any more salt. It's interesting that nerite snails don't like salt. Don't they need salt or brackish water to reproduce? Currently the temp is set to 86 (F). I don't want to go too high for the...

Okay, I examined the fish last night with the tank light on. Here are my observations: The white spots are certainly becoming less and less. There's still one or two spots on a few fish, but they're a lot less noticeable, and there's less spots than there was previously. One of my bettas that...

To expand on what Colin said, the fact that your tank isn’t finished cycling yet means toxic ammonia and nitrites aren’t being dealt with by a nitrate colony yet, so you have to deal with them yourself with frequent water changes. The more fish you have in the tank, the more rapidly ammonia is...

I understand that. The room gets a lot of natural light anyway, between the windows and the skylight, and the fact that it's my living room so if I'm home the room is lit. But the tank lamp does indeed stress out the kuhli loaches. During this time of heat and salt, I want as little stress as...

If you move the gold gourami to the 120 liter like Colin suggests, that will free up the space in the 55 liter for you to bring the corys up to shoaling numbers. But that tank will be full with the guppies and a shoal of corys. If you've got the bug for a bigger tank for the red tail and the...

So kind of you to take on your friend's fish! Are the guppies all one gender? If not, expect babies... lots and lots of babies. 3 corys is better than 1 or 2, but they really need to be in groups of at least 5 or 6. Glad to hear you're looking at bigger tanks for the red tail. You're...

This happens sometimes. I've had amazon swords do that before. But something to be mindful of, when I read the reviews for your carpet grass, people were saying the root system of the carpet grass overtakes and smothers other plants' root systems. Some reviewers say they ended up ripping the...

A week later and there's an ich outbreak in the tank. I'm glad I waited and didn't get another betta yet.

Point taken, and I agree. Replicating the wild (or even attempting to) is cost prohibitive to the hobbyist, and the people who run tanks large enough to try this experiment likely have no interest in it and are busy keeping things like stingrays in those tanks anyway.

I understand your concern. I live in an upstairs unit, and heat rises, so my air conditioner is always working extra hard in the summer, too. I agree with @fluttermoth, heaters are not expensive. They're a lot more affordable than replacing all your tropical fish with cold tolerant fish, and a...

Lots and lots of clean water is the best healer for bettas. Partial water changes every day until he's looking better. It might leave a scar, but you'll be able to tell the difference between a scar and the current wound. Look for things in the tank that might be sharp. That purple plastic...

Wow that is a vague plant description on amazon. It doesn’t even name the plant you’re buying. The people in the reviews don’t even know what it’s called. And it comes as seeds that you have to plant in the aquarium and grow long before you fill it with water, according to the reviews. I can see...

The directions said 1 heaping tablespoon for every 5 gallons, and your instructions say roughly 1 level teaspoon per gallon... to be fair a heaping tablespoon is about 5 or 6 level teaspoons. So your directions aren’t that far off from what the packaging says. I can add more salt, but your...

I’m home from work. I’ve added half the recommended dose of aquarium salt. The directions say 1 tablespoon per every 5 gallons, and I have a 30 gallon tank, so I did 3 tablespoons. I also went ahead and brought the heat up to 86 degrees F. The tank is heating now. I have the light on a timer...

Yes, there are dangers to using too much dechlorinator. That stuff is super concentrated, and I've seen gill and skin irritation on fish from using too much. Follow the directions exactly. Adding more "just to be safe" can be dangerous. A little bit goes a long way. If your test strips are...

YES, on a totally unrelated note, I am very curious about wild type bettas right now. They are very much peaking my curiosity these days. However, keep in mind, this theoretical experiment is for splendins.

I found a youtube video of someone who tried this but with even more water and even less fish than I was thinking. He has 2 male crowntails and one female, in a 300 gallon tank. According to him, the bettas pretty much avoid each other, and when they see each other, they just swim away. As if...

THEORETICAL - AS IN I'M NOT CURRENTLY DOING THIS OR ADVISING ANYONE TO DO THIS I've been theorizing what it would take to actually accomplish a "Betta Community" tank that houses males and females without dividers. I keep coming back to the number 5. Keep at least 5 female bettas for a...

I'm sorry that your angelfish keep dying. That has to be scary, and frustrating! If it's been less than 14 days, and you have the receipt, Petco will refund your money. Oftentimes fish from these pet stores are sick well before you buy them, but don't show symptoms until you get them home...

I like that! Yeah, the problem seems to be that whatever is on top of the water just naturally gets drawn towards the filter output. So floating plants are always drifting into the waterfall, and getting pushed under, where the filter intake catches them. I do have some spare airline tube... I...

Yes, I actually just saw a video on that from one of the youtube aquarists. He put several sponges inside an external canister filter, but explained you could put them on the intake of a HOB. I might give that a go, too! Water sprite tends to get stuck on the intake, so I've been considering...

Another +1 for don't worry about feeding on weekends. I keep a small tank at my office and nobody feeds it on weekends, and my healthiest looking betta lives in that tank. Also +1 that you should return the tetras. They're not very community friendly and really do need to be in groups of their...

I had to google what flashing is. But all of my female bettas in this tank are doing it. They like to rub against the dwarf hairgrass, as if they are scratching an itch. I said earlier that my bettas in other tanks do it too, but it's not quite the same. My bettas in other tanks like to swim...

@Byron, you are echoing a lot of my own thoughts here. 86 degrees being the maximum temp for treating loaches and corys, even though the bettas and tetras can probably tolerate up to 90 degrees... redoing the aquascape probably being the cause of the ich outbreak... we're in agreement here...

They are albino bronze corys

Interesting story here: I used to have male guppies, and no females, and they'd all gang up on the weakest guppy, and bully him to death, then when that one died, they'd gang up on the next weakest one. Maybe I didn't have *enough* guppies to distribute aggression, although I never thought...

Is it safe for me to remove the filter cartridge from the HOB during medication, store it in a bowl of tank water, and return it to the tank after treatment, or will I need to replace the cartridge? Here is the kind of filter cartridge I have.

Colin, the white spots you are seeing in the water (look closer) only show in the background, not the foreground. Those are bubbles along the back wall of the tank, where I have redirected my filter output. The whole back wall of my tank has tiny bubbles moving along it. The spots on the fish (I...

And yes I will look for a medication with malachite green and no copper. Should a chain pet store like PetSmart have that?

Okay thanks. I'll continue to raise the temperature before I go to bed to probably 82, then in the morning up to 84. I've read that 86 is where it needs to be to treat ich, so I'll bring it up to 86 after work, as long as nobody on here stops me. I normally keep my tank at 78/79.