Search results

I've had both ND and Jewel tanks. ND has been better build quality with regard to water on the wooden bits and the filter and lighting on the Jewel I ended up replacing/repairing. Also lost the bracing bar on the Jewel after about 8 years, ND tank is still going strong in a similar time frame...

Aye, we have one of them, they use exchange resins to switch calcium (and to a degree magnesium) for sodium, the taste of salt will depend on how much calcium is replaced, we're in Wiltshire as well, so I suspect on similar water to the OP, but it will depend where in the county, and our...

Don't panic too much, you can keep a good selection of fish in Wiltshire water, although yes, it is in the liquid rock category of hardness. I have an RO unit, and would counsel you to go down the hard water fish route if you can, mainly because there's nothing like being able to dump a huge...

I personally wouldn't mix shell dwellers. Doable, but problematical, they're quite territorial and the colonies that develop as they breed (with the risk of hybridisation between some of them if kept together, just to further confound things) is a recipe for an unstable future, unless you have...

Go for length, better for territories for aggression, assuming the space doesn't result in another compromise.

Have you considered multis if you're interested in cichlids? Shell dwellers would like your water and can take the smaller tank sizes. Also happen to be beautiful fish.

I've also found this with sand. Not sure if it's residual mulm from the sand despite the washing, fresh stuff being created by the process of adding the sand after washing it or a bacterial bloom as Byron suggests. I had a tank not clear after a week, stuffed a filter full of floss and set it...

Buy the biggest tank that you can afford and house, end of. If you have the space and resources to get a tank bigger than the 220l then don't get it, you'll kick yourself in the long run. If 220l is only possible because of the deal, then take it. The rest can all be worked around. Do remember...

I've seen a fair few sleepy lizards in the South. Bizarrely my best lizard spotting (apart from geckos) was in the Maldives, known for not supporting many, but I saw a whole load of Oriental Garden Lizards and some Lygosoma albopunctata. We have grass snakes in the garden. They love the pond...

Oh boy do they heat up. They're far more efficient than most other forms of lighting that you could use, but they still churn out heat along with the light, and the ultra bright stuff that we use in aquariums do get hot. The fixture in general will tend to be cooler per light output than other...

Could simply be a hybrid from a released goldfish.

They are the same as the sun sun ones, just different branding. There was a thread a while back, that looked at flow rates and actual flow rates with real life fill a bucket tests. A couple of years old, so it's possible that they've changed things a bit, but I'd not heard of any great changes...

Slightly, yes, they used to be a lot more expensive, and the more unusual ones still are.

I've had a few of these. I've found them underpowered for what they claim, I'd certainly step up from the 1400 for a tank that size. I have the 2000 model on a 100l and it wasn't too much. Otherwise, not bad filters, good space in them. Found the pipework a little bit stiff to use but they may...

If they charged you for an anubius then you probably have a bargain there.

You missed the one moderator to close the thread after it's been resurrected 6 months on.

Sumps can hold a huge amount of filter media, so it's often not a big issue. I use alfagrog in mine. Reactors are often less useful, although they can often be repurposed as fluidised sand beds. In a rift tank you may actually have a use for reactors though.

I'm going to stop at the schooling fish for a 5 gallon tank. That's your limiting factor right there. You might get away with something the size of mosquito rasboras though, although it would depend on the shape and set up of the tank.

There's always the option of something like a Hamburg Mattenfilter. Does a similar job to the UGF without the plant issues and easier to clean. Does impact on the free space in the tank though.

I use Calcium chloride if I'm messing with the water, a bag goes a long way, but I've found it relatively hard to get it to dissolve in the format it comes in (most of the stuff I've seen is in flakes), well worth crushing before trying to add it to anything.

Your second hand is probably an ex marine system. Perfectly usable for other set ups, but the protein skimmer isn't going to help you.

They may well be trickle filter compartments, do you have a sump arrangement under the tank? The second picture is a protein skimmer, in general terms only for marine tanks.

If the tank is set up then adding an UGF is going to be hugely disruptive. There are better ways to over filter if that's what you're after.

I try not to leave fish for 2 weeks, and have relatively reliable friends so haven't had to, but would certainly run the auto feeders on a lower feeding regime, especially as it would also mean that I wasn't doing a water change while I was away.

Yeah, in principle it's great, a byproduct source of distilled water. Problem is the way it does it, cool the air and see what condenses, which won't always be entirely water. For distilled water you'd select out by boiling point to get pure water, in this case it's whatever happens to be in the...

Can't run those too often though, and last time I looked the membranes didn't last very well. I will admit though that it's been a while since I looked at them.

100 litre plastic box/water butt. Break down tank, put fish in plastic box with filter etc. Reboot tank, replace fish.

Are we going to start seeing any of these wonderful shrimp spreading through the hobby Baccus? You seem to be the only person I know who has access to them, and you collect them wild.

I've used extra filters full off floss for this. It does block up fairly well and running it in a secondary filter means that you don't lose flow on the primary, but it only really needs a small filter for this.

Is the old tank going to be kept going? Personally, my method is to take out about a third of the filter material, put it in the new filter (may need cutting up) and top both up with new media. Then you can generally run both filters. If the old tank is going then just cram as much old media in...

Is the old tank going to be kept going? Personally, my method is to take out about a third of the filter material, put it in the new filter (may need cutting up) and top both up with new media. Then you can generally run both filters. If the old tank is going then just cram as much old media in...

For cost I'd recommend looking at fire extinguisher, pub cylinder or paintball tanks, depending on what you can acquire.   Welding gas set ups aren't quite as cheap but aren't bad.   Most disposable cylinder set ups otherwise run to the expensive, as profit for the makers is based on selling...

It'll save you a lot of money in the long run.

Well you're right in the middle of hard there for water. A lot of fish are fine with this, particularly the hardy regulars. Apistos might like things a bit softer, although I've known people get away with it.   You mentioned shellies, they're more suited to your water if you want a simple life.

It can go off. Depends how it's stored and what it's exposed to. It's a strong oxidising agent, so it will react with a lot of things, given the chance.   Sealed it should do well, but various suppliers quote 5 year shelf lives for the crystal format. If yours is a couple of years old only it...

Expense.   There are some that run CO2 24/7, reckoning that it's either simpler, or creates stable levels. The lost CO2 is sometimes cheaper than adding a solenoid, particularly in a small tank.   Small systems tend to be for small tanks, so the CO2 lost overnight is a tiny amount, plus the...

If you're talking about peppered corys then yes, they tend to prefer it a little colder than 78, it's about the top of what they can manage so you might be better dropped a couple of degrees, which the rest of the fish shouldn't mind too much.   Upping the numbers of the shoalers may also help...

Nothing wrong with a freshwater sump, just makes CO2 interesting if you're going for high tech planted. They are indeed tall tanks and none too wide, so you're not looking for many territories. I can see a single pair of apistos working well (they are sometimes a bit picky about cories, as they...

Snails and aquariums go hand in hand. The only way I've ever removed them is having good numbers of large cichlids, and they came back when I removed those from the tank, so they can't all have been gone.   Personally, I've learned to ignore them, they're harmless enough but do give you a clue...

Yup, nothing too strong as you won't be able to grow plants, just algae. After that it depends what colour you like. I personally prefer a bluer light over a Malawi tank so prefer the 10k tubes. It's personal preference though really.