Converting To Brackish?

[grayshark1956]

good advice. i will remove all my fish and replace with about ten mollys. then over 2 weeks il get the salinity to 1.010 ish. as for creating a platform and easy access im going to first create a wall all the way round the outside of the tank using house bricks, cover them in wire mesh and add moss to cover the bricks. so there will be a platform above the water round the whole tank a brick wide ect. as for making a slope. im going to use a sheet of metal or plastic about 20 cm wide which will run the whole length of the tank and will be supported by the bricks. it will be underneath the top layer of bricks. using the bit of plastic i will put on it very light rocks and some sand giving them access to the brick platform. thius is just a rough idea. but i want to do something different. i want to make life easy and good for the skippers. but still have a nice deep tank for other brackish fish. and as for skippers sharing a tank with other fish ive seen it with my own eyes and i just fell in love with the idea!! also in one of my other tanks i have a 7 to 8 inch climbing perch since it was a baby along side an amozon puffer which is a year old and is still 2cm long. it hasnt been attacked once. nor have my rainbow fish. i have a betta in that tank too and its fine. infact its lazy and is always laying down with the peacock eel and clown loach. my tank has lots of rocks and hiding spots and clean water. the fish are happy and well fed! hence why i have had no problems

Don't use metal in a tank?
Mudskippers are used to skipping about on mud/sand - I'm not sure that bricks would be a good option because it may damage their body. commonly available moss will not survive at that high a salinity.

it's probably teaching you to suck eggs but remember that you will have to feed the tank with an ammonia source while you don't have any fish in it to keep it cycled, you may just want to keep on feeding a slightly smaller amount of food as if you still had the fish in there.

What you keep in your tanks and how you keep them is your business but what may work for a while might not necessarilly work for what should be the lifetime of your fish. A happy confident mudskipper will jump up and take food from your hand (plastic tweezers) whereas a nervous mudskipper will run and hide everytime it sees you.

If you were writing to me, I know about keeping creatures I want in my tank, and you can keep your mudskippers, wish I could see a real one, but yes, I know what works for a while may not work later. Have had fish a long time, they're actually very easy to care for, its my crabs I am concerned about, they need the right environment and I'm trying to provide that, if I knew ahead of time store sold them I could have researched sooner. But they misled me into adding them to FW tank and not brackish, also denied crabs needing salt. Hey, I learn something new every day, keeps life interesting! Aren't mudskippers an unusal creature? we don't have them here.

well if worst comes to worst i could always just have mudskippers but seems such a waste of my lovely big and deep tank. i will find a way to keep the mudskippers happy, safe and with plenty of out the water space and keep a good foot depth of water atleast! i also find it hard to find a new home for my adult severum, firemouth, hoplo catfish and my very large cuckoo catfish. can i justify getting rid of those prized fish for mudskippers? i think i can because mudskippers can become really good friends, full of personality, they recognise you and you can handfeed them

If you were writing to me, would you really get rid of your fish for the mudskippers?

 

[iliveinazoo]

well if worst comes to worst i could always just have mudskippers but seems such a waste of my lovely big and deep tank. i will find a way to keep the mudskippers happy, safe and with plenty of out the water space and keep a good foot depth of water atleast! i also find it hard to find a new home for my adult severum, firemouth, hoplo catfish and my very large cuckoo catfish. can i justify getting rid of those prized fish for mudskippers? i think i can because mudskippers can become really good friends, full of personality, they recognise you and you can handfeed them

I don't think that those fish are brackish anyway and so would be uncompatible with mudskippers? If you want to keep the fish you could always buy another tank or wait for the tank to become free again

It took me quite a while and a house full of tanks to decide that less is more - for me anyway...

 

[grayshark1956]

well if worst comes to worst i could always just have mudskippers but seems such a waste of my lovely big and deep tank. i will find a way to keep the mudskippers happy, safe and with plenty of out the water space and keep a good foot depth of water atleast! i also find it hard to find a new home for my adult severum, firemouth, hoplo catfish and my very large cuckoo catfish. can i justify getting rid of those prized fish for mudskippers? i think i can because mudskippers can become really good friends, full of personality, they recognise you and you can handfeed them

I don't think that those fish are brackish anyway and so would be uncompatible with mudskippers? If you want to keep the fish you could always buy another tank or wait for the tank to become free again

It took me quite a while and a house full of tanks to decide that less is more - for me anyway...

Oh, okay, I was just wondering what you were going to do, sounds like you have your mind made up for mudskippers which is great, hope it all works out!

 

[deftuch]

UPDATE!! i have decided not to convert to a brackish tank. instead save up for a new tank! hopefully il have mudskippers in the next 2 to 3 months

 

[grayshark1956]

UPDATE!! i have decided not to convert to a brackish tank. instead save up for a new tank! hopefully il have mudskippers in the next 2 to 3 months

I thought you had mudskippers now, and do they need a brackish tank? I've never seen one in our stores, are they a specialty type pet? I'll have to look at a picture of one again, they're interesting to look at. Good luck with your new tank!

 

[iliveinazoo]

UPDATE!! i have decided not to convert to a brackish tank. instead save up for a new tank! hopefully il have mudskippers in the next 2 to 3 months

Great News! They are lovely little fish and will love a dedicated set-up

 

[deftuch]

UPDATE!! i have decided not to convert to a brackish tank. instead save up for a new tank! hopefully il have mudskippers in the next 2 to 3 months

I thought you had mudskippers now, and do they need a brackish tank? I've never seen one in our stores, are they a specialty type pet? I'll have to look at a picture of one again, they're interesting to look at. Good luck with your new tank!

yes they need a brackish tank. ive only ever seen them in one store which happens to be the closest one to me. but he keeps them in the reptile section separate to the fish tanks! also most decent stores ive come across will order any fish you want as soon as they can get one in! you should ask your local stores about them. ya never know it might encourage them to stock them

 

[grayshark1956]

i was thinking of converting my already cycled tank with fish in it to a brackish set up for adult mudskippers alongside finger fish, monos, mollies ect. but is it as simple as removing my fish getting the salt level right then adding new fish. i mean will my cycled filter lose any bacteria by adding salt? do i need a protien skimmer? ect ect? is there any does and donts please x

There is absolutly no controversy when it comes to salt and brackish water, Grayshark has had it explained to him/her a few times but it appears that he/she won't accept the advice given here.

Use marine salt, when converting to brackish just increase the salinity by no more than SG1.002 per week, you could probably do it twice weekly but once weekly would be less stressful on the nirification bacteria that keeps your tank cycled. If you increase the salinity by too much you will kill off your nitrification bacteria and you will have an uncyled tank!

If you have a cycled tank then you don't need to remove the fauna to convert to brackish. You only need to make sure that they are Brackish fish and that the fish that you decide to keep have the same salinity requirements, i.e Fiure 8's require low salinity SG1.002-SG1.005, Monos and Scats = SG1.005 up to marine conditions. Temperments and sizes all vary greatly.

I vary my mudskipper tank regularly between SG1.008 and SG1.015. They are mostly terrestrial and therefore need a large land area, I have a sand substrate that slopes out of the water into quite a large land area with a couple of large pieces of wood that jut out of the water for them to rest on also. The water is deep enough for an internal power filter, approximately 10cm deep, you do not need any more than this. Any deeper will make it harder to slope the sand out of the tank and if you only provide a floating platform in a deep tank it will make it harder for them to get out of the water.

Mudskippers do not share aquariums well, they will eat anything small enough to fit in their mouths (which are big) and they are reportedly nervous of entering the water if they see larger fish swimming about plus the lower water level will mean less water volume and a more polluted tank - because of their nature mudskippers are fairly robust and can tolerate levels of ammonia that would kill other fish! I have 2 P. barbarus mudskippers, which are apparently the more aggressive species, and they are seperated because the larger will kill the other given the chance. It is a good looking mudkipper - buy one, dedicate a no less than 1m long tank to it and you will be rewarded with its personality.

Protein skimmers are for marine tanks - you do not need one with a brackish tank and it will most likely not work, some apparently work down to SG1.015 but some don't.

No, I got the salt thing, I did listen, write if you have any questions, good luck with mudskippers! Meant to spell the word listen, hit another key by accident. But, I did listen, talked to pet store again, we reviewed brackish water, they advised me.

 

[grayshark1956]

i was thinking of converting my already cycled tank with fish in it to a brackish set up for adult mudskippers alongside finger fish, monos, mollies ect. but is it as simple as removing my fish getting the salt level right then adding new fish. i mean will my cycled filter lose any bacteria by adding salt? do i need a protien skimmer? ect ect? is there any does and donts please x

There is absolutly no controversy when it comes to salt and brackish water, Grayshark has had it explained to him/her a few times but it appears that he/she won't accept the advice given here.

Use marine salt, when converting to brackish just increase the salinity by no more than SG1.002 per week, you could probably do it twice weekly but once weekly would be less stressful on the nirification bacteria that keeps your tank cycled. If you increase the salinity by too much you will kill off your nitrification bacteria and you will have an uncyled tank!

If you have a cycled tank then you don't need to remove the fauna to convert to brackish. You only need to make sure that they are Brackish fish and that the fish that you decide to keep have the same salinity requirements, i.e Fiure 8's require low salinity SG1.002-SG1.005, Monos and Scats = SG1.005 up to marine conditions. Temperments and sizes all vary greatly.

I vary my mudskipper tank regularly between SG1.008 and SG1.015. They are mostly terrestrial and therefore need a large land area, I have a sand substrate that slopes out of the water into quite a large land area with a couple of large pieces of wood that jut out of the water for them to rest on also. The water is deep enough for an internal power filter, approximately 10cm deep, you do not need any more than this. Any deeper will make it harder to slope the sand out of the tank and if you only provide a floating platform in a deep tank it will make it harder for them to get out of the water.

Mudskippers do not share aquariums well, they will eat anything small enough to fit in their mouths (which are big) and they are reportedly nervous of entering the water if they see larger fish swimming about plus the lower water level will mean less water volume and a more polluted tank - because of their nature mudskippers are fairly robust and can tolerate levels of ammonia that would kill other fish! I have 2 P. barbarus mudskippers, which are apparently the more aggressive species, and they are seperated because the larger will kill the other given the chance. It is a good looking mudkipper - buy one, dedicate a no less than 1m long tank to it and you will be rewarded with its personality.

Protein skimmers are for marine tanks - you do not need one with a brackish tank and it will most likely not work, some apparently work down to SG1.015 but some don't.

Hi, just read your post, I get the thing about marine salt and plan on buying some. My tankmates are fine, please remember everyhwere I went I got different answers, I'm done researching salt now. I am sure of the brackish fish also. I want to find a picture of a mudskipper to see what you have! I did find out I don't need a protein skimmer, but find mudskippers interesting, can't have any, as I am happy with my fish and red claw crabs. Does this make you feel better knowing I'm ok about the salt?

Just saw picture of a mudskipper, unusual looking creature, but cute. They must require special needs? Forgot to mention my daughter is a chemist but is too busy moving to answer my questions about salt, she's hardly home at all. When she has time, I'll check out salt with her, she would know right away. She is very smart and has experience years ago with tropical fish. Does this make you feel better? Just wondered...

Just found this post, wanted to write here also: I just explained I get the salt thing and brackish water, wish you wouldn't say I didn't listen, I did. And, no, I may not use marine salt after talking with the pet store, all depends, you must not have tropical fish, right? How long have you had a tank with or without mudskippers? Why did you think I didn't listen? Just curious...