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Mine is just a particularly pretty, but quite abnormally colored, red abalone (Haliotis rufescens) that I found while tidepooling once. With guest appearances by purple urchins (Strongylocentrotus purpuratus) and some acorn barnacles (Balanus sp.) Abalone are always a treat to see. Some species...

Alright, so yes, that nitrite reading is really high. Water changes should definitely help, so keep doing those. Have you noticed your betta hanging out at the surface and breathing heavily, or him gulping air more frequently? High nitrites inhibit the ability for their blood to take oxygen from...

Hmm.. Depends on how you define "pretty toxic". Descalers simply use acids to react with the calcium carbonate (limescale) buildup. There are a variety of acids used, some stronger than others. The woman uses a product meant for kettles, so it has to be safe for use around food and drink. The...

Could you let us know what tests you did? I see the tubes, but it isn't clear which test each of them is. I'm assuming the left hand one is ammonia and the right hand one is nitrates? But what is the middle one? Just based on color, it could either be the upper end of the high-range pH test, or...

To be honest, I'm somewhat of a mild pleco hater too. We can form a club, get t-shirts. Their dorsal sides are usually fine, but ventrally? Their mouths do unsettle me, especially on the large plecos... Now here's my real confession: some of the larger corys I really don't like the look of (the...

As someone who's a marine biologist, I can clarify this. Marine biology is very broad and encompasses not only ecology and life history, but also things like embryonic development, genetics, morphology/morphometrics, classification/taxonomy, food web dynamics, population dynamics, and...

Sorry, I'm going to steal Gary's thunder here ;) "Fish" can refer to a single individual, or it can refer to multiple individuals of the same species. "Fishes" is only used to refer to multiple species. If you're referring to just the guppies, assuming they're all the same species (I haven't...

I second this advice. I've been going the sponge filter route, rather than media bags, but it definitely works. When setting up my newest tank, I seeded a sponge filter in a separate tank for three weeks, although I did also have a sponge filter running in the new tank for a few weeks...

I've been heavily considering getting a nicrew light for my 25gal. I have a decent light right now, but it's only manual on/off, so even if I put it on a plug-in timer, the brightness doesn't ramp up or down. I've noticed my neons get pretty spooked when I turn off the light in the evening, even...

Very lovely art! I politely disagree with Colin though. I know you're interested in animal portraiture and for portraits, you shouldn't show the whole body. After all, someone would think it was weird if they went to get their portrait taken and the artist drew or photographed their entire body...

I've never really been much of a fan of angels, but the pic of that one with kale sticking out of its mouth is too ridiculous not to love 😄 That silvery gold color is gorgeous

Agreed. As long as the tank water is warmer than the surrounding air, you're going to get some condensation, and that only becomes more true with each degree of difference

This is just providing more fuel to the fire for me... I've also been daydreaming recently about a NANF tank. There's a pond/creek that runs right beside my apartment that has some interesting things in it. Lots of aquatic plants, although I'm unsure exactly what they all are, and many tiny...

I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but it seems that Ricardo may just be at the end of his natural life span. It's possible he may have dropsy, but I can't say for sure. The thing to understand though is that dropsy is not an illness, it's a symptom, usually of organ failure. Loss of color...

Do you have a local fish shop nearby? If you raise the fry up to a decent size, reach out to them. Many fish shops will take fish bred by hobbyists, either for cash or for store credit. In fact, most places greatly prefer getting fish from local hobbyists because it means those fish are already...

The NT labs medication along with salt will probably be the best option for treatment. You can dose the whole tank and it won't harm plants or snails, but it may harm shrimp, so be very careful to not overdose. The problem is that fungal infections are very often secondary to bacterial...

I'm not saying there shouldn't be conservation for freshwater fish. There definitely should be! Freshwater fish are just as important as tigers and should be conserved as well. What I'm saying is that independent hobbyist breeding programs are not going to be the best option for conservation...

I've already talked about this issue in a previous thread of yours, but I'll try to approach the subject from a different angle. I know the WA government is different than the US, but there are a some things that still apply, regardless of a country/state's government. I've been involved in...

My vote would be for killifish! Particularly clown killifish. They're really tiny, so they'd suit the small water volume better than other speices, and they're also fast enough to escape the crabs if need be. Looking them up on SF, it says they can handle down to 20C/68F, which sounds compatible...

Thanks Gary. So you're saying I should get the hatchets, then only get the remaining 3-4 neons once the hatchets are in the display tank, correct? Yeah, I wouldn't buy in to purposefully making a fish stressed to "bring diseases out". Any fish is going to get diseases if it's stressed for long...

Yes, that's a good point, and honestly this is probably the best way to go, you're right. The LFS that usually has the hatchets in stock has a really large selection of fish so I would be comfortable betting a lot of money on them having neons too. It'd be lovely to have a fuller school sooner...

Yes, 0.25ppm can sometimes show up erroneously, depending on what test kit you're using. I've heard the API master kit can sometimes throw false results of 0.25ppm, but that also doesn't mean it can just be ignored. To Lamie: The thing to also keep in mind about ammonia readings is that most...

Maybe some of you can help me problem solve here. -I've got six neons in my display tank right now. They're the only fish in there, so that's their quarantine tank, essentially. Their 30 day quarantine will be up at the end of this month (Feb 28) and once it is, I plan on moving the lone neon...

I waited to reply to this so I could get you a picture when the sun was actually up haha. This is what it looks like. I see this all the time in my work. It happens frequently at the public aquarium I volunteer at. I think basically all of our tanks with sand substrate have this, and some of the...

This is going to be a 20gal long! So ~90x30x30cm. Good to know about the amazon swords. I knew they were somewhat larger plants, but considering it's a slightly shallower tank and I'll probably have a couple inches of substrate, they might actually get too big! Plus I'd love to not have to deal...

What I can say about anaerobic bacteria is that anaerobic conditions are much more likely to occur in sand, especially very fine sand. Basically, for anaerobic conditions to arise, there needs to be no flow to bring in new oxygenated water. Regardless of substrate type, these conditions are...

Oh man.. I didn't even think about plant uprooting... Are there any plants in particular that you'd avoid with corys? I was planning mostly for stem plants, maybe an amazon sword or two, some buces, and potentially some crypts.

I heard there was some desire for a thread about utilizing mixed substrate strategies with corys and I figured I'd start one because I also have some questions. My text tank project after the Ucayali biotope will almost certainly include some kind of cory. I already have a big bag of fine sand...

Oh! I should clarify! Pithing is done as a secondary euthanasia method ONLY. It should never be done on a live animal. Only once it's decapitated or otherwise euthanized should one attempt pithing. I think most of the pithing methods are designed to be done after decapitation.

I do love the teeny little guys! I'll have to check this channel out. I wish it would hurry up and dry out a little around here so I could go leaf collecting. I want more little buggies in my tank. The neons completely decimated all the rhabdocoel flatworms, the copepods, AND the ostracods that...

Hm... Maybe, but probably not, is my guess. It's not really a matter of nutrients in the water column so much as the nutrients in the wood itself, and I'm not sure the pothos could physically remove the fungus itself even if its roots grow well. I'm not sure there's much to do other than scrape...