Pet Forum / Aquaria / Freshwater / April 2006

Hello, just did my monthly filter clean.  Boy, are goldfish dirty
buggers.  The sponges were disgusting.  Anyway, rinsed them in some
tank water and removed some charcoal that was in there.  (ashamed to
say for about 6 weeks).  Anyway, I put it all back together.  Topped it

My wife and I just purchased a pretty cool 5 gallon hex tank with bio
wheel filter from walmart for a hospital tank.
What is the best treatment for new fishfrom the LFS? Should i treat them
with a combo of melafix and pimafix???? maybe a different regiment???

Sometimes (Like right now) the Loaches race up and down the tank at high
speed. Up and down and up and down. Like they are going crazy. Is this
normal?

Ok,
So my tank still isn't cycled.  The nitrites are at 0.  But after adding
the "Cycle" additive the ammonia seems not to spike as hard, hovering
around 1 ppm.  I really want to see some major nitrite although I realize

I've heard that non-iodized salt can be used in fresh-water tanks in place
of sea-salt.  Is this true ?? And can you tell me what the caking
ingredients are to avoid....Many Thanks ~ED

Trying to understand Thunderbird

Woke up and fed the fish, didnt notice anything unusual. Sat down to the
news and coffee, looked over and every fish in the tank was at the top of
the water, all at the same time. For a split second I thought it was
humorous they were all eating at the same time until I noticed that ...

I'm a newbie to the group and picking up my freshwater Aquarium Hobby
after 20 years.
I had fish and two tanks as a youth for about 10 years up to the start
of college.

I recently mated a pair of Bettas in a community tank with the knowledge
that no matter how hard I tried that the chances of getting surviving
young was pretty much nil.
I thought it might be amusing reading for all the aquarium, and

http://www.practicalfishkeeping.co.uk/pfk/pages/item.php?news=908
Notice how resistant the isolated strain is to antibiotics.  As well as
being a good reason to wash your hands after playing in your fishtank,
this is a very compelling reason to avoid using antibiotics in aquaria.

Lady has a large backyard pond. Looking at the temp requirements for this
fish, I dont see how it could survive even in our climate (Central
Mississippi). Opinions?

Recently purchased baby albino red oscar.  Seems today he has a 3mm
piece of red poo hanging out of his bum - and it appears to bleed (some
kind of redish brown stuff leaking slowly into the water).  I've since
put him in a smaller bucket with some malachite green and salt.  He's

Just thought that I would share this one with you all as part of the big
debate on Melafix and Pimafix. I was somewhat sceptical before not
having had much success with Melafix but what happened last night was
quite incredible....

like i mentioned iam getting ready to get my first discuss.the tank i will
be using will be a thirty gallon.first i must drasticly lower my ph.the
water out of the tap is usually around 8 where i live.iam thinking about
building a peat filled five gallon bucket with a pump and some ...

I have an aquarium that had recently suffered some sort of horrible
bacterial infection (everything I put in there died wihtin a week with
the same symptoms).  At any rate, I am planning to break the now-empty
tank down and use it again later.  A person at one of my local pet