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Hi and some questions

angelah

angelah

Member
Joined
3 Jan 2011
Messages
63
Location
west London
Just joined... I found the site when using a Google search for info about Green Tiger Barbs.

Went to the Welcome thread but it seems to be Locked...

So a quick history before the questions start: I had tanks about 15 years ago but had to give up due to work pressure. yes, I had to work for a living with a disabled hubby...
So I am returning to the fold.
Why? Am about to move from London to Wales so thought I should have something else to do other than sit gawping at a PC screen all day now that my partner has passed over due to cancer.
As we had them before I thought it would be nice and a kind of memory to start again. So bought a Rome 240 'kit' (as they are called) and a second JBL CristalProfi e 900 to ensure excellent filtration (the kit came with a Fluval 305).
Also got a Juwel Korall Tropical that is running a fishless cycle right now. I put this up and ran it so I could (a) put plants in it ready for the move and (b) see how the fishless cycle worked as 'way back when' that was never heard of. There were no forums either so we are spoilt for choice now. Glad I found this one, even by accident, although I am on some others as well.
Planned stocking once the 240 is cycled is still all up in the air, in other words I can't make my mind up - typical woman!
I had originally fancied Tiger Barbs as one school of fish with Danios and Neons, planned about 15 Barbs, but was put off them because it's said they are troublesome in a peaceful community tank. However, and having done a lot of Googling (thank goodness for the Internet although I am going Google-eyed) it seems this may not always be the case provided they are kept in numbers. Is 12-15 sufficient numbers?
But I think size counts too (no snacky comments please!), so my original idea of Neons and Zebra Danios may go out of the window and instead get only Cardinals which are slightly bigger and may be better suited to life with a Tiger of some sort. A large school would look good, say around 20. Then I saw Green Tiger Barbs and they are sooooo tempting.
Of course the Barbs could be swapped for Black Widow Tetras, an all Tetra tank might look quite good.
The strata would be looked after by Corydoras, proably a mix of the smaller ones like Pandas ect.

So what do you think? Any views, comments and/or ideas would be most welcome.

Angela
 
Welcome to the fold

One thing to bare in mind with tiger barbs is they are buggers for fin nipping. So if you intend to get anything with trailing fins or slow moving id give them a miss

Rudi
 
RudeDogg1 said:
Welcome to the fold

One thing to bare in mind with tiger barbs is they are buggers for fin nipping. So if you intend to get anything with trailing fins or slow moving id give them a miss

Rudi
Click to expand...

Hi Rudi,
Cheers for a welcome.
You may have seen I was thinking about Zebra Dannios in the tank and Cardinal Tetras. Are they okay with Barbs to about 3 inches? Danios are pretty fast as are Cardinals when they want to be, and neither have large fins.
Just trying to size fish that match so if Danios are a bit on the small side (about 5cm = 2 inches I think) they could be discarded as a possible.

Angela
 
RudeDogg1 said:
tiger barbs get pretty big so if your trying to get stuff that kind of matches size wise they might get to big.
Click to expand...

Yes, I saw it says about 2 3/4 inches, which would be bigger than Cardinals certainly.
In that Case what about the Black Widow Tetras?
My plan is also about colour contrasts, red Cardinals and black other fish would contrast nicely.

Thanks again,

Angela
 
Hello Angela,
Welcome to the forum. I'm sorry to hear of your loss. That couldn't have been easy to deal with but I admire your courage and I think it's a great idea to honor his memory with the tank.

It's not really clear from your post whether your tank will be CO2 enriched or not. You need to decide which path you intend to follow. One method is low maintenance while the enriched path requires high maintenance.

Additionally, a planted tank do not require the technique of fishless cycling. If I were you I would learn how to grow plants first and delay the introduction of the fish, especially if you intend to enrich CO2.

See more on fishless cycling by clicking on this link ==> Fishless cycling and EI dosing

Cheers,
 
ceg4048 said:
Hello Angela,
Welcome to the forum. I'm sorry to hear of your loss. That couldn't have been easy to deal with but I admire your courage and I think it's a great idea to honor his memory with the tank.

It's not really clear from your post whether your tank will be CO2 enriched or not. You need to decide which path you intend to follow. One method is low maintenance while the enriched path requires high maintenance.

Additionally, a planted tank do not require the technique of fishless cycling. If I were you I would learn how to grow plants first and delay the introduction of the fish, especially if you intend to enrich CO2.

See more on fishless cycling by clicking on this link ==> Fishless cycling and EI dosing

Cheers,
Click to expand...

Hi and thanks for the hello,
Although Alan and I used to have tanks, a 4 footer and several 2 footers, everything seems to have changed since then. Filters seem to be more efficient and now we have the option of internal or external. And then all the other bits, like the Co2 setups that abound.
My plan (A) was to plant the tank fairly well and try to balance it that way rather than go downt he Co2 route. That should be possible, shouldn't it? In Wales where it will eventually be set up the water is quite soft.
But if things go pear-shaped then I would consider installing a system. I just have to get this move over first really, it is all very stressful for a lady who is approaching 73....
The tank is a Roma 240L 'kit', so has a base cabinet with it and a Fluval 305 external. I would stay with externals and have already ordered a second, a JBL CristalProfi e 900 to increase both filtration and water flow as I don't think the 305 is quite man enough, although the manufacturers say it is suitable, there'sa nothing wrong with a bit extra. The JBL filter also has different media so I have more options immediately available. Should any carbon media come out?
The Juwel Korall that is cycling at the mo will be a quantine tank.

And yes, these will be (I hope) a living memorial to a wonderful man.

Angela
 
Right, just had a ganders at that lot and I see the point.
What I can get is a good filter squeeze from my son's tank as he already lives where I shall be moving (but not the same house) so I shall have to move the water squeeze about half a mile.
Would that be enough with the plants instead of using this new idea of ammonia?

Angela
 
the ammonia is a food source for the friendly bacteria (wich will come from the fish poo and wee once they are in) I still used it to cycle mine infact im still using it even tho im cycled because it will be a few weeks befor my discus are in the contry. Gives the plants time to be nice and strong
 
RudeDogg1 said:
the ammonia is a food source for the friendly bacteria (wich will come from the fish poo and wee once they are in) I still used it to cycle mine infact im still using it even tho im cycled because it will be a few weeks befor my discus are in the contry. Gives the plants time to be nice and strong
Click to expand...

Hi Rudi,
There are many conflicting views about how to cycle a tank nowadays, all very confusing for me as it was a fish cycle when I had tank previously. Mind you, there were no forums and indeed no Internet much then. I can see the point of not using and stressing fish, but also the point that an empty tank with plants and maybe fish food added, would have a similar effect.
I have been reading about the types of bacteria needed and how they establsih in the fishless cycle, that's why I am practicing on an empty tank to see how it works, so understand the need to create the ammonia eating bacteria that then converts that into nitrite, and then the nitrite consuming bacteria form and convert that to nitrate. It's a slow process and it seems cannot be rushed.
Will a media squeeze work with the ammonia or not then? Gets confusing...
Or will the media squeeze and plants be sufficient without any chemicals or maybe Waterlife Biomature starter?
It seems I have at least two options that don't include fish.

Angela
 
trouble with using food for ammonia is it takes alot of food to get it to 4ppm so ammonia is a cleaner more effiant source. Media squeaze will be better than a bought filter aid aslong as its from a desease free tank
 
it does take a while for a fishless cycle it is sped up by it being a planted tank but still takes 3 - 4 weeks. All you do is set the tank up fill it up get everything running and planted add the ammonia. Leave it a week or so then test for ammonia and nitrIte. What you want it to do is the ammonia to start to drop and nitrite to rise. When ammonia is 0 add the same amount again (should take 24 hours to vanish again) every time its zero re add. Nitrites should go off the scale affter a while then start to drop then your Nitrate will start to rise. in an unplanted take nitrate should go off the scale but the plants use some of it mine never went past 40 ppm. Nitrate will level out and nitrite and ammonia should be zero then ur done. Then you just do a 100% waterchange or near as 100% u can go and add your first fish within 24 hours. Hope this helps
 
basically you can add the media 'squeeze' as soon as you add the ammonia, as the product of the 'squeeze' is mainly bacteria that are made for the nitrogen cycle, ie nitrifying bacteria, they will live in the filter medium and convert ammonia to nitrite then to nitrate, in a conventional fishless cycle, you add the ammonia to build up the presence of these bacteria, then with test kits test levels of ammonia and nitrite, wait for these to hit 0 then add a small amount of fish, monitor the levels again and if they are elevated perform water changes, then wait for them to hit 0 again before adding more fish.

the way you were going to do it is fine, if you can 'seed' the filter with mature bacteria or mulm, or even better some mature ceramic media, then you should be able to add a very small amount of fish immediately but you have to watch the test kits like a hawk and perform water changes as needed.

i would say the ammonia method is better than this as once filter media is in a non moving sealed water container for more than 6 hours it starts to die as it needs plenty of oxygen.

as far as plants go, theres really 2 main methods, High-tech and Low-tech.

High tech is essentially, light of 2 wpg (watts per gallon) or over, CO2 injection to 30 PPM, high filtration of 10x or more of tanks volume, use a daily dosing regime, theres a lot of them around from ready made products which are reasonably expensive, to dry powders which you can either make into your own solutions or just dose dry from measuring spoons,
use of a nutrient rich substrate, many choose to do this as it gives you a buffer to problems if you know you might miss a fertiliser dose during the week, but its not wholly neccesary in the high tech method as you are aiming to have nutrients readily available in the water column, you want really dense planting of 80/90% of the substrate from the start, and you do daily water changes for the first week then one every weekend after that. High-Tech tanks generally have a low stocking density when it comes to fish, that is essentially high-tech but theres a lot of different takes on the method.

Low-Tech is essentially light of under 2wpg, no CO2 injection, filtration needs to be strong still but your not trying to blow CO2 around the tank and get it to the plants so it isnt as imperitive, most low tech tanks use a light dosing regime but you can also use the powders i mentioned above, use of a nutrient rich substrate is essential as this is where the plants are going to get a lot of their nutrients in a low tech setup, a lot of people use a specialist substrate capped with either gravel or sand in low tech's but you can also use the higher tech aquasoils as they provide the same function without the need for 2 messy layers, you want to plant densely but it isnt as important in low-tech as you have more room for error with algae and more time to react to problems, you want to be doing water changes every week if your dosing EI on a low tech, but if your using the fish as the nutrient provider you want to do a water change every month, Low-tech tanks relying on fish waste tend to have a higher fish stock than a high-tech tank of the same size.

obviously in low tech tanks you can only grow so many varieties of plant, as some are very demanding of light and nutrients, in high-tech there is pretty much no limits depending on your set-up.

one think i would recommend is reading all the articles on this site as they are very helpful,

and do consider making a DIY water change system, as i imagine you cant lug buckets around, its alright for us young boys on here ;) http://www.ukaps.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=20&t=1729 <--waterchanger

Regards, Gus.

*edit* 1 more thing check out www.theplantedtank.co.uk it has an immense amount of information on planted tanks.
 
Thank you all, quite an amazing response!
It will be the low tech way then, at least that would be my target. The Hitech sounds far too complicated.
EasyCarb is available at the local FS?

What about Waterlife Biomature? Does that do a similar thing?

I also seemed to have missed something, what is El, or should that be what the el...! Ha ha.

Angela
 
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