Think Fish Keepers Daily News [year 2020]

Mr & Mrs Snail were "stuck together" on the glass and have just fallen off together.    Watching with intrigue to see what happens next - ordinarily, I find him lying upside down on his own but really hoping she doesn't abandon him to his own devices.

Update: Both upright and "stuck together" elsewhere in the aquarium. No point in doing a water change / tank clean until after the inevitable eggs have been laid everywhere, in case there's a few that can be removed. 

Ten months down the line, and I'm definitely able to identify who's who among the cardinals, aside from differences in sizing/colouring - each has developed its own characteristics and 'personality' and is on the verge of being named. Argh - and I was half-hoping this wouldn't happen so that I wouldn't get so attached to each...
 

  but

I also changed the filter in my betta's tank a few weeks ago. It used to be a sponge filter powered by an air pump but there was so much algae growing on the sponge that I couldn't tell it was a sponge. And water sprite has never survived in this tank, it just disappears bit by bit. So in anticipation of the filter change, I bought some Amazon frogbit, and once that was showing signs of growing, I swapped the filter with no media swap. I got an Eheim Pickup, the smallest one. This has an adjustable flow rate and an adjustable direction of flow. It is set on the slowest speed and it is on a side wall near the back corner with the outflow pointing at the back wall. I also moved some water sprite from my main tank.
To my delight, there's never been a trace of ammonia or nitrite in the tank. The frogbit now covers three quarters of the surface, and I have experimented with planting the water sprite in the substrate. I know there were 'filter' bacteria on every surface in the tank, and that 1 single betta does not make that much ammonia, but again the floating plants seem to have done their job.

I was a bit sceptical about the frogbit since I discovered that a lot of sellers are selling European frogbit rather than Amazon frogbit and this is the reason it dies in a lot of tropical tanks. But so far, so good. Apparently  you can only tell the difference when it flowers.

It's an AquaOne tank, though it was sold as just the glass, nothing else - no filter, heater, light etc. But I already had those so I was glad to get this tank quite cheap. It is a 30 cm cube, 27 litres to the brim so slightly less than 27 litres water. With the substrate in I measured 23 litres water. It now has the Eheim filter and an Eheim heater and an Aquael clip on light, the Leddy Smart, the 'plant' version.


To be honest, this light does confuse me a bit. I know that plants need a spectrum with red and blue light and some green. The K rating of this spectrum is 6500.
There are two Leddy Smart lights - 'sunny' and 'plant'. They give the K ratings as sunny 6500, and plant 8000 which means the 'plant' version is too blue and not enough red. They used to show the spectra on the website but it is on the box and that shows that 'plant' has a peak in red while 'sunny' does not. And I can confirm that 'plant' has red, blue and white LEDs.

Something I missed out - I feed the tank with Seachem Flourish Comprehensive Supplement.... every week or when I remember. I did have two pieces of wood, one with java fern and one with bolbitis, but the bolbitis never did well in this tank so I took it out last week. I moved a branchy piece of wood from my main tank which has bits of java moss on it, I'm thinking about adding more from the clump in my main tank. And of course I have frogbit too. As an experiment, I've planted a couple of smallish pieces of water sprite in the sand. If that does survive, I'll probably need root tabs for that - unless Matt says the liquid feed is enough.

Thank you  I'll stick with the liquid fertiliser. The java fern and frogbit need that.

Congratulations on the new tank  As you say, even with replacing the missing bit, it's a lot cheaper than new.

TNC Lite contains the same trace minerals but no nitrate of phosphorus.

I have just found my betta dead  He was fine during the day yesterday but didn't want to eat in the evening. he was lying on the bottom of the tank when I got up and i found him dead this afternoon.


I have been thinking for a while that when he finally passed away I would turn the tank into a shrimp tank with maybe some variety of blue cherry shrimps. But as I was removing the body I saw a juvenile red cherry shrimp in the tank which must have come in with the water sprite I put in the tank during the week. I have noticed that there aren't nearly as many cherry shrimps in the main tank nowadays, so I've caught about half a dozen and put them in the betta's tank. I hope one of them is female - or that I can catch more in the main tank.


I have been concerned about the bettas I've bought in the last few years not living very long so I had already decided this betta would be my last.

Sorry to hear this @Sue 

Can I ask where your purchased your betta from? And how long you have him? I don’t know if where we purchase our fish makes any difference in reality as they may come from the same breeders ultimately but it is also something I feel it would be worth knowing/factoring in if anyone decides to get one.

I am also thinking of perhaps having a shrimp tank next time round. The option to go filterless and heaterless (I am already filterless for my beta) is very attractive to me - from an environmental perspective. Do you think you might also try this out? I have noticed more algae in the tank since going filterless but I am hoping the ecosystem will balance itself again soon. The downside to shrimp for me is their unattractive feces - it never seems to take long for them to accumulate and for some unknown reason I never really seem to see fish feces in my tanks.

Also interested to hear what you think might have affected your cherry shrimp population in the main tank - I’m convinced pest snails before the introduction of the dwarf puffers were out competing my shrimp for food. Dwarf cichlids have sometimes gone for them too but they have never done so well since the introduction of the puffers. I now regularly see 15-20 out and about - given the heavily planted nature of the tank I’m convinced I probably have getting on for 100 or maybe more in there (there’s always more than you think it seems with shrimp!)

You should still be able to get your blue shrimp by the way - neocardinia and cardinia is species don’t cross breed and the cherries are neos and the blues normal cardinias I believe. Check this theory before you go for it as I’m no expert but it might still be possible.