curls
19th September 2007, 06:21 PM
Hi there. I've just discovered this site and it's great that it's Australian!
My son gave me his Aqua One AR380 tank (33 litres)and I have the bug. I intend to set up another tank as soon as I can find a suitable strong table to take the weight of my disused old style tank which is in storage.
When I fist set up my tank I ran it for over a week without any livestock, just with the plants, before introducing platy's. Had a bad run, as one of the first fish I bought was displaying signs of fungul infection within hours of purchase and I had to treat the water. Got him back on track and introduced a couple of new fish, one of which had whitespot within a day of introducing it to the tank. This resulted in more medication added to the water. Had quite a few bereavements, but persisted. Eventually, when the survivors seemed healthy, I added new fish. All has been well for about 3 months.
I think I made a mistake in becoming smitten by the colours of guppy as they are breeding like rabbits. I have babies of all sizes. My one surviving male platy has managed to reproduce two copies of himself, however I am a bit puzzled about this as the female platy died a few months ago and the mini-platy's appeared well after that. Can platy and guppy cross? Told you I'm a novice!
The plants I have are thriving (don't know what they are called) and I regularly do a 10% water change and check the ph levels. Recently (since the latest babies arrived) the water has tested 6.2 to 6.4 and I have put some upper powder in to gradually correct this each time. Our mains water is highly alkaline, so this helps to rectify the ph balance. I regularly wash out the filter wool and foam. I am aware that my tank is not going to be able to house all of these fish in the future, but I will have to wait for the babies to grow a bit more before being able to transfer them to another.
Have ranted for long enough - look forward to participating in this forum.
My son gave me his Aqua One AR380 tank (33 litres)and I have the bug. I intend to set up another tank as soon as I can find a suitable strong table to take the weight of my disused old style tank which is in storage.
When I fist set up my tank I ran it for over a week without any livestock, just with the plants, before introducing platy's. Had a bad run, as one of the first fish I bought was displaying signs of fungul infection within hours of purchase and I had to treat the water. Got him back on track and introduced a couple of new fish, one of which had whitespot within a day of introducing it to the tank. This resulted in more medication added to the water. Had quite a few bereavements, but persisted. Eventually, when the survivors seemed healthy, I added new fish. All has been well for about 3 months.
I think I made a mistake in becoming smitten by the colours of guppy as they are breeding like rabbits. I have babies of all sizes. My one surviving male platy has managed to reproduce two copies of himself, however I am a bit puzzled about this as the female platy died a few months ago and the mini-platy's appeared well after that. Can platy and guppy cross? Told you I'm a novice!
The plants I have are thriving (don't know what they are called) and I regularly do a 10% water change and check the ph levels. Recently (since the latest babies arrived) the water has tested 6.2 to 6.4 and I have put some upper powder in to gradually correct this each time. Our mains water is highly alkaline, so this helps to rectify the ph balance. I regularly wash out the filter wool and foam. I am aware that my tank is not going to be able to house all of these fish in the future, but I will have to wait for the babies to grow a bit more before being able to transfer them to another.
Have ranted for long enough - look forward to participating in this forum.