Newbie

[Samandy]

Hi, I'm fairly new at keeping Tropical fish and have 2 Angels, a Bristlenose, An older Albino Cory, 3 Yoyo loach and some kuhli loach ( not currently being attacked by Yo-Yos!) My Albino , I think started laying eggs but she was on her own and so bought 3 more . I think the eggs look as though a few have now been fertilised....I have no idea what to do.next! Help!

 

[Samandy]

 

[10 Tanks]

Hello. Always concentrate on the water. Small tanks under 30 gallons need half the water removed and replaced twice weekly. Tanks 30 gallons and more, need half the water changed weekly. Keeping fish is pretty simple if you can follow this one rule.

10

 

[Samandy]

Hello. Always concentrate on the water. Small tanks under 30 gallons need half the water removed and replaced twice weekly. Tanks 30 gallons and more, need half the water changed weekly. Keeping fish is pretty simple if you can follow this one rule.

10

260 litre tank, was hoping fir confirmation that it was the Cory and what can I do to protect the eggs?

 

[10 Tanks]

Hello again. I kept Corydoras for years and I left the eggs alone. Didn't want to remove them, thinking I'd removed eggs that hadn't been fertilized. I fed a little more food too. My thought was to feed more, so the other fish wouldn't be as likely to eat up all the eggs.

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[emeraldking]

Welcome to TFF...

 

[Sir Guppy]

Small tanks under 30 gallons need half the water removed and replaced twice weekly

Only if not well planted. If well planted, water changes are not needed.

 

[Essjay]

Well planted tank still need water changes to remove all the things excreted by the fish and to replenish things both fish and plants take from the water.

@Samandy Could you post a photo of the eggs please - assuming they've been laid somewhere easy to photograph. Cories usually deposit eggs on the tank walls, plants, decor etc.

 

[Colin_T]

@Samandy Could you post a photo of the eggs please - assuming they've been laid somewhere easy to photograph. Cories usually deposit eggs on the tank walls, plants, decor etc.

There is a picture of 2 eggs in the corner next to the glass under the white cory

 

[Essjay]

Those are eggs? Hmmm, they don't look like typical cory eggs. I was expecting to see something like the usual eggs stuck in a group on the glass or a plant leaf

 

[10 Tanks]

Only if not well planted. If well planted, water changes are not needed.

Hello. Well, if you don't replace the water, how do you replace the nutrients the living things in tank use up? Don't the plants use nutrients from the water? What happens to the plants when all the nutrients in the water are used up?

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[Sir Guppy]

I never do any water changes, and all my plants and fish are thriving.
However, do to the dryness of my area, I frequently do top-offs.

 

[Sir Guppy]

I honestly think water changes are not as needed as many people think from personal experience.

Take an experimental tank, put some floaters in it, and never do water changes on it. I think many would be surprised at how well the tank would still do.

 

[Colin_T]

I never do any water changes, and all my plants and fish are thriving.
However, do to the dryness of my area, I frequently do top-offs.

You need to do water changes regularly even if the water tests are good. There are lots of things in water that we can't test for and they need to be removed as well.

You do water changes for a number of reasons.
1) to reduce nutrients like ammonia, nitrite & nitrate.
2) to dilute disease organisms in the water.
3) to keep the pH, KH and GH stable.
4) to dilute nitric acid produced by fish food and waste breaking down.
5) to dilute stress chemicals (pheromones/ allomones) released by the fish.
6) to dilute un-used plant fertiliser so you don't overdose the fish when you add more.
7) to remove fish waste and other rotting organic matter.

Fish live in a soup of microscopic organisms including bacteria, fungus, viruses, protozoans, worms, flukes and various other things that make your skin crawl. Doing a big water change and gravel cleaning the substrate on a regular basis will dilute these organisms and reduce their numbers in the water, thus making it a safer and healthier environment for the fish.

If you do a 25% water change each week you leave behind 75% of the bad stuff in the water.
If you do a 50% water change each week you leave behind 50% of the bad stuff in the water.
If you do a 75% water change each week you leave behind 25% of the bad stuff in the water.
If you don't do any water changes, you leave all the nasty stuff in the aquarium with the fish.

Imagine living in your house with no windows, doors, toilet, bathroom or anything. You eat and poop in the environment and have no clean air. Eventually you end up living in your own filth, which would probably be made worse by you throwing up due to the smell. You would get sick very quickly and probably die unless someone came to clean up regularly and open the place up to let in fresh air.

Fish live in their own waste. Their tank and filter is full of fish poop. The water they breath is filtered through fish poop. Cleaning filters, gravel and doing big regular water changes, removes a lot of this poop and harmful micro-organisms, and makes the environment cleaner and healthier for the fish.

Whilst you might not have ammonia, nitrite or nitrate problems, the number of micro-organisms in your tank will be growing exponentially due to lack of water changes and this will eventually cause problems to the fish. Water changes should be done to dilute disease organisms, if for no other reason.

 

[TNG]

I never do any water changes, and all my plants and fish are thriving.
However, do to the dryness of my area, I frequently do top-offs.

Sorry if this is a bit off topic.

In rural villages in the tropics, many households located away from the river have a pond for water supply. The pond is filled with rainwater during the rainy season and is slowly evaporated during the dry season, and there’s no other inflows into the pond. There’re fish in the pond, plenty of aquatic plants, but the fish are mostly labyrinth fish with gouramis being the smaller ones.

But these ponds are quite “a bit bigger” than our home aquariums, 2m or more in depth and could be 10m in diameter. So what you’re describing is a bit like a mini version of a pond. Which brings me to some questions, what fish do you keep? What is the size of your aquarium? Could you post some photos of your tanks, I'm interested to see what they're like.