New To Malawi - My Setup And Stock

[manxjason]

Put the cabinet up tonight, just waiting on the replacement top panel

 

[saz326]

I have never understood why some companys go to the trouble of putting feet on the bottom of cabinets. They simply cause higher load on one floor section. Good call with removing them!

Nice size tank indeed. You could house about 50 gerbils in there!

 

[manxjason]

I have never understood why some companys go to the trouble of putting feet on the bottom of cabinets. They simply cause higher load on one floor section. Good call with removing them!

Nice size tank indeed. You could house about 50 gerbils in there!

Yeah it's strange why they bother, but I have a feeling its for hard floors - perhaps tiled or stone where they may not be exactly 100% aligned with each other, to prevent the wood from having an uneven load perhaps?

 

[eggo]

or maybe to keep the wood of the floor so any spilt liquid does not get trapped between the wood and the floor and rot the wood especially when there are gallons of water above the stand

 

[manxjason]

or maybe to keep the wood of the floor so any spilt liquid does not get trapped between the wood and the floor and rot the wood especially when there are gallons of water above the stand

Touché! Didn't think of that, but I wouldn't use them still unless I had stone floors or the likes!

Fingers crossed the rest of the cabinet comes on thurs.

Do you guys silicone your rocks together or just stack? They're pretty big pieces of slate so im confident that they wouldn't dislodge, but I know they can get quite slimy after being in water while..??

 

[eggo]

never silicone your rocks together, if you have a sick fish or holding female you will find it hard to catch if the rocks are stuck together, also you may need to rescape your rock's to break up territories to reduce aggression

i have 60kg of ocean rock stacked at the back of my tank like a wall just stacked on each other i have had no problem just make sure base stone's are sitting on the tank base or like mine on egg crate

 

[manxjason]

never silicone your rocks together, if you have a sick fish or holding female you will find it hard to catch if the rocks are stuck together, also you may need to rescape your rock's to break up territories to reduce aggression

i have 60kg of ocean rock stacked at the back of my tank like a wall just stacked on each other i have had no problem just make sure base stone's are sitting on the tank base or like mine on egg crate

Perfect thanks - managed to get a sheet of 8x4 Polystyrene for the bottom.

sounds good, will update with pics once I get the cabinet sorted

 

[eggo]

looking forward to it

 

[Malawi MaD]

Looking forward to the pics

 

[manxjason]

Looking forward to the pics

Still not heard from Colin though mate chased him again today with another PM. Will have to be Midlands Malawi's if I don't hear back from him.

 

[eggo]

you can not go wrong with carl @ midland malawi's his fish are fantastic, personlly i would not use malawi salts or additives only if you are using RO water with keeping wild caught fish.

 

[Malawi MaD]

He's a little busy i think at the moment mate, carl still has great fish so if you can get what you want then go ahead mate

 

[manxjason]

you can not go wrong with carl @ midland malawi's his fish are fantastic, personlly i would not use malawi salts or additives only if you are using RO water with keeping wild caught fish.

not 100% on what you mean there mate. The Isle of Man water is super super soft, I'll have to increase the PH GH and KH. With the API kits, the hardness test changes colour on the first drop - clown loach paradise over here.

Some pics:

Seachem prime, malawi buffer, cichlid salts, matrix several api kits and selection of food,

2 externals to go with the internal, currently keeping mature in large container

Guppy fry tank
http/a1.sphotos.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-ash3/546578_10150778301042251_666347250_9681935_2026911654_n.jpg

 

[eggo]

The buffer and salts most of us never bother using. Your fish will be just as happy if you just use the water out the tap and keep up the water changes. A clean healthy tank is loads better than opening your wallet and buying stuff you really don't need.

The more man made stuff you add to your tank water or filter down the line could cause you more problems with your fish or the water itself.

you could add ocean rock, coral sand or Aragonite sand to help buffer your PH

 

[Malawi MaD]

Agree with eggo to a certain degree but the seachem lake salts do consist of minerals, additives that the fish do benefit from as it mimics the lakes waters, keeping everything thats required in your setup. I would be lost without the stuff for my wilds. All you really need is bicarb n the lake salts, these will buffer your water to the required parameters and once correct, is very stable as u only need to add to what you take out.