Back In The Hobby

Hi all, thought I would do my intro!

I first picked up a fish tank at University, we had a shared house and we had loads of pets - between the 4 humans we had 2 russian hamsters, 1 rat, 2 gerbils, 5 mice, a snake, occasionally a bunch of tarantula's and scorpions, and two three foot fish tanks.
One tank was mine and I inherited the other when the guy left. I took them home with me and had them for a good 5 years before moving country and giving them to the local fish shop.
Near the end I had the 2 tanks on a stand with the lower tank having the larger fish and a 'deep' look to it - no plants, a bit of bogwood type hollow ceramic thing, sand and a 12"bubbler, the upper tank had a 'shallow' feel to it with gravel, a couple of plants, a matching bubbler to tie the tanks together, and smaller fish.
Lower tank - 2 4" T-Barbs, 2 5-6" Tinfoil Barbs, 13" plec and an eel (I think it was an eel, it had a wobbly nose and hid in the sand, liked eating platy babies so had to go in the lower tank)
Upper tank - 2 dwarf gouramis that were the only things to survive the heater malfunction, and a variety of platy's, neon tetra type things and harlequin rasboras.
Most of the big fish were bought as small from Pet City (nicknamed Pet Cemetary after we realised) - now called Pets at Home - we were assured they would be suitable for a community tank with Neon's
Looking back probably had both tanks overstocked, but they survived!

But that's history, and now 20 years on I am married with 2 kids and a dog, living in Yorkshire and just managed to get the wife to agree to (and in fact bought me for Christmas) a small (2ft) tank.
Some soil substrate covered in gravel in one diagonal half of the tank, the other half sand. Bogwood & plants on their way (hopefully) in the post. The plan is for small Corys and Guppies - crowd pleasers to get the family hooked - especially if we get a few babies!

Cheers,
Afterburned

Hi @Afterburner  and welcome to the forum. 

Great to hear about your previous pets and tanks.

I'd suggest soaking bogwood before putting in into your tank, not only to help it sink but also because woods often from a sort of slimy layer for a few weeks when first put in a tank. It's not really harmful, but it doesn't look great.

What are the parameters of your local water? You can usually find the information on the website of your water provider, and it is very useful when working out if the fish you like will work with your water. I will admit that I have pushed my luck several times with the fish I've kept because I have very hard water.

I'm looking forward to hearing more about your tanks, and seeing lots of pictures too. 

Hi @Afterburner  and welcome to the forum. 

Great to hear about your previous pets and tanks.

I'd suggest soaking bogwood before putting in into your tank, not only to help it sink but also because woods often from a sort of slimy layer for a few weeks when first put in a tank. It's not really harmful, but it doesn't look great.

What are the parameters of your local water? You can usually find the information on the website of your water provider, and it is very useful when working out if the fish you like will work with your water. I will admit that I have pushed my luck several times with the fish I've kept because I have very hard water.

I'm looking forward to hearing more about your tanks, and seeing lots of pictures too. 

Very hard water - according to Yorkshire Water:
pH 7.3
Water hardness type: Very hard
Water hardness average: 128.3mg/l calcium

The plan is for Guppies & Corys & maybe a banjo cat.  A few guppies first to get the tank balanced (after the cycle) and expand from there.

Looking forward to seeing your tank progress.
New tanks are very exciting. 

It's very confusing all the info out there... LFS says Fairy Corys can go up to 18 https://www.fishkeeper.co.uk/help-and-advice/freshwater/catfish/fairy-cory-
SerouslyFish for the same species says 10!

Anyway, got the wood & more plants in...
More Vallis to come & then I'm done for a bit!

My water is around 17dH, so quite similar to yours. I tend to use a mix of RO & tap water, but have also used supermarket own brand bottled water in smaller tanks to reduce hardness.
If you want to keep corys (and who doesn't) then those are a few options for adjusting your water parameters to make them more suitable.