Pet Forum / Aquaria / Freshwater / October 2005

I am trying to perform a fishless cycle on my aquarium. Currently I'm
adding 1/2 teaspoon of ammonia nightly (enough to bring the
concentration to 2ppm) and the next day my ammonia level is zero.
My concern is my Nitrite. About two weeks ago it spiked to 5ppm and

I have a planted 10 gallon w/ three cherry barbs and two oto cats.  I
recenty bought one of the otos.  The day after I introduced her, she
became lethargic and swollen, barely eating. I thought she was on her
way out, since I read otos can be tough to acclimate to new tanks. that

I figured since we had a "biggest lies my LFS told me" thread, I would
start this one after a little thing I saw in my LFS today.
I saw one of these
cichlids(http://bonderosa.rutgers.edu/images/Cichlid.JPG) and another

Will the carbon in my filter remove liquid fertilizer added to the
water?
Jamie

I managed to put my female guppy into a separate floating breeded trap about
2 hrs before she had little ones, so I now have about 12-14 babies. I have
had little ones before, but this time I was able to see about 1/2 dozen
being born. My question is, are they born in a sac? It ...

Assume complete ignorance, because that's what I have--I bought two
double-strip shoplights expecting to pop the bulbs in and that be that.
Of course the lights aren't working.  Help!!!  How do you wire
shoplights?  Is a starter something I have to buy separately?

I'll be going to the fish store, which is fairly far from where I live,
today for a couple different reasons and I was wondering about any
particular medications I should think about picking up.
The new-mother platy I talked about yesterday showed a white, mossy-

I went to feed the remaining 4 fish this morning and notice this bug or
something crawling up the acrylic on the inside of the tank! It is about
1/4th the size of a dime, oval shaped, appears flat and is greyish in color.
Has two small antennae sticking out the front and was slowly ...

I bought 7 discus 2 weeks ago. One of them did not make it. The reset
are fine.
I noticed one of the remaining discus now have tiny holes in the head
area, not really big and they looked more like air bubbbles. I'm worry

I bought a aquarium (fresh water, tropical) 4 weeks ago and I have 4
danios and 1 tetra and they all seem to be doing fine. I took a test of
my tank and I found the following readings from the color charts.
Nitrate:     20

I noticed, just before I left for work this morning, that I had left the
canister filter power turned off last night after I fed the fish. I'm
furious with myself and, although the fish looked fine when I left, I'm
dreading what I am going to find when I get home.

I knew we had one large clown loach (about 6" long), but I just saw two
of them! How did that happen? I guess only one used to be out at any
given time, so we assumed it was only one. :)

Update: haven't lost any fish in over a week, and all the various
tests are showing exactly what they should in a healthy tank. All the
fish look good, and the three molly fry are visibly growing.
So time for a new set of questions, I think :-)

I am getting ready to trade in all of my Red-tailed sharks, Gouramis,
Angelfish, Rosy barbs, et cetera, and turn most of my seven tanks over
to housing just Fancy Guppys, Platys and other live- bearing freshwater
fish, fish that I'm told do far better with a wee bit o' salt in their

are Frontosa Cichlid (Cyphotilapia Frontosa) very common in local fish
stores? I can't say I remember seeing any before. They seem like a great
fish to have, not to aggressive and beautiful!