Request for filter media (Orleans)

[briannesbitt]

Quick update!  Our main tank hasn't had any issues and everyone seems to be doing well.  QT has been a bit of chore but seems to have stabled now.  Thank goodness our main tank isn't 5g... changes happen to quick.

We have changed our flake food to New Life Spectrum, got some omega one shrimp pellets (raphael+corys) and frozen blood worms (once a week). 

Main tank is now 6 zebra danios, 6 black skirt tetras, 6 panda corys and 1 pearl gourami.

QT is only 1 striped raphael at the moment.  He hides a lot (in a fake log we bought for him special) but when he comes out and sucks down a few shrimp pellets in seconds its quite the site!!  He swims and moves like no other we have and will definitely be our gentle giant once he grows!!

Contrary to our previous plans we skipped the platies and went with only 1 pearl gourami.  This should comfortably leave us open for 1 other species/school.  We were really liking the bosemani rainbowfish but they get about 4" (depending on where you read) and a school of 5-6 might just be a little too cramped in our tank?!?  Same goes for turqoise rainbowfish... not to mention they seem to prefer slightly alkaline water.

We are now leaning towards a school of 6 congo tetras or dwarf neon rainbowfish.  Thoughts?  Both seem quite colourful and match the needs of our current species better and average a little smaller.  Cardinal tetras also look good but I think Raphael might make quick work of them when he gets bigger.

Final question on substrate!  We have typical aquarium gravel in our tank right now (blue+red my son picked  ).  After some reading it looks like a lot of people use pool filter sand.  Is that better for the corys?  Can you still use a gravel vac without sucking up too much?  Seems sum just vac slightly above and use a comb to stir it up every few weeks.  Our MTS would prevent the gas buildup so no worried about that!

[briannesbitt]

Oh ya... wanted to mention all of the plants donated to us are doing well - except the duckweed    Water lettuce is multiplying on top and I love the roots at the top in the water.  The one that Rah provided has reached the top of the water twice and 2 days ago I had to snip 8 parts and replanted them in 3 other parts of the tank!  Its starting to thicken up!  Thanks again to all for donations and advice.

[Peekay]

I love congo tetras.  Not going to speak to their compatibility, I'll let someone with more experience do that, but I think they're very beautiful fish.

Glad to hear things are coming along well.  Would love to see some pictures!   

[daworldisblack]

Glad to hear all is going well And yes, larger tanks are always better to begin with then smaller ones ( despite popular belief amongst newbies being the contrary) as its more forgiving in terms of parameter swings. Also, may have been a good idea on omitting platties from the list if you wanted another school in - livebearers usually take over a tank in no time lol. Probably might have become live food to the tetras and gourami if they did have fry though. As for rainbows, i've never personally looked at them but I was at BA Innes yesterday and saw they did have Bosemani's there - right beside Threadfins. I think Threadfins looks cool and stay smaller? Might be cool additions. As for the Asian Ambulia, that thing is essentially a weed - nice to look at though Just make sure when the time comes, compost it to dispose it properly after trimming.

[Fishnut]

Pool filter sand is OK.  I've never used it but I know people who have without issue.  Because it's so fine, however, you have to be careful when you vacuum the tank because the siphon sucks it right out of the tank.  If you have a python system, it will clog the thing attaches to your sink AND the drain if any gets through.  If you just use a siphon and bucket, don't let any grit down the drain.  The U tube under the sink will slowly but surely fill up with sand particles.

Changing gravel is a BIG job and it may cause a bit of a cylce hick-up in the tank.  Some of that beneficial bacteria is also around every stone in the tank.  When you remove that and add fresh stuff, there might be a blip.  Also, make sure you rinse the pool filter sand EXTREMELY well.  It's dusty.

I use silicate sand #10 in my tank and it's the same size.  I drain my tanks outside though.  I also siphon the tank with the hose slightly kinked to reduce the power of the siphon enough to get the crud out of the gravel and leave the sand.

Congo tetras are great...they get almost as big as the rainbowfish though.  I'm a rainbow nut so if I had the choice, I would go with the rainbows.  If you don't feel comfortable with the boesmani's, the dwarf neon rainbows are going to be an amazing addition to your tank.  The more you get, the more fun they will be to watch.  Get a dozen!  

Threadfin rainbows are lovely but not the best fish for your tank.  Yes, they are small but they are quite sensitive and they need very peaceful tank-mates.  Your tank has peaceful but boisterous fish in it...not the best home for threadfins.

[briannesbitt]

Thanks for the replies.  We were at the Grandby zoo the last couple of days and I didn't get any notifications about replies - sorry for our late reply.

I think Raphael would make the threadfins a nice live treat when he gets larger

We reserve the right to change again :-) but the dwarf neon rainbows are top of the list to be the last school added !

As for the substrate its something we are thinking about but once we come up with a good plan.  Might also change up our typical aquarium background (busy underwater plant pattern) to a simple deep blue solid colour.  All a little more natural looking.

[daworldisblack]

Might also change up our typical aquarium background (busy underwater plant pattern) to a simple deep blue solid colour.  All a little more natural looking.

Not a bad idea.. vinyl works great. You can get it from Deserres in your neck of the woods in St. Laurent Mall. Might be easier with the tank empty however. Maybe when you're changing up your substrate and have all the inhabitants out anyways. Application is easy - same idea as putting on a protective plastic screen protector on the phone - clean surface, spray some water, paste on carefully, smooth out bubbles and done!

[briannesbitt]

Cool... will look it up.

Also for the pool sand any preference?  Mermaid pools (not sure about brand but its $7) or Campbell pools (brand is Unimin for $12)?

[exv152]

Cool... will look it up.

Also for the pool sand any preference?  Mermaid pools (not sure about brand but its $7) or Campbell pools (brand is Unimin for $12)?

I've tried different ones and prefer the mermaid pool filter sand. A 50lbs bag is about $10 with tax, you can't go wrong. Word of caution, rinse it really really really well.

[briannesbitt]

Thanks, mermaid it is.

I have watched a few videos of cleaning the sand... seen how important it is for sure.

Also have seen a few other inventive ideas here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U73wRwTQ4HM
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d-XB0bwtZh8

I'd do the old standby (bucket and stiring/water rinsing) but then maybe combine it with the new bottle method.

[dpatte]

I used mermaid sand in my 150gal, and it was terrific. But that was several years ago, and I heard they change the source of their sand. Does anyone know if they have returned to the original sand they had about 8 years ago? I intend to use it in my 220.

For the sand I got, it said it was from quebec, from some river somewhere. Anyway, it took very little rinsing. I just put it in my (uninhabited) tank then added the same amount of water, stirred and repeated 3 times. The rest was picked up by my Magnum 350 using the micron filter.

[exv152]

When I set up my 125g last summer I bought a couple of bags and remember seeing  Quebec written on the bags. But it did take tons of rinsing to remove silt.

[briannesbitt]

The rebuild has started!

I got the sand from Mermaid as suggested.  I have taken pics of the packaging and the sand in hand.  I think its really nice stuff for $8.98 (with tax 50lb) and very consistent.  As you can see on the packaging its Temisca sand from optaminerals.com who are located in Quebec.  Not sure if this is the same stuff you used before or not but this stuff took about 5 rinses to get clean... it wasn't too bad.

https://www.dropbox.com/sh/gds8nuljbj2bo0d/QVdm0VyEHh/Sand1.jpg
https://www.dropbox.com/sh/gds8nuljbj2bo0d/Ao5EUDMZHW/Sand2.jpg
https://www.dropbox.com/sh/gds8nuljbj2bo0d/Ap-1l6sC05/Sand3.jpg

Its not as yellow as in the picture.... in real life its an off white as expected.

Tonight I gave them some tubifex worms as a treat and then did the first approx 25% change.  I am replacing a portion of the gravel with the sand at each water change so it will get completed over about a month or so (25% or so each week for 4-5 weeks).  My plan is to minimize the impact on the fish and to avoid a mini-cycle that would usually occur by removing all of the gravel at once.  This approach allows the fish to stay home the entire time and the new sand to gain the bacteria slowly from the existing gravel still in the tank.  Crazy?!? lol....  I read others have done it this way and it just seemed easier and better for them.  I am using a fish net to scoop the gravel out which of course releases a bunch of gunk into the water.  Since I am doing a water change at the same time I use the gravel vac to vacuum out as much of the gunk from the actual water column itself rather than the gravel.  Once the new sand was added and the filters were restarted the tank was clear again in about 15 mins.   The sand caused zero water cloudiness.

Wow!! I really like it much better.  Within about 3 minutes the cory's moved over and have just stayed on the sand so far... lol.

I'll continue to post pictures as I go and add them to the dropbox share.

Here are the shots of the tank....
Before: https://www.dropbox.com/sh/gds8nuljbj2bo0d/P_Mg1mEgGm/2012-5-28-2.jpg
After:  https://www.dropbox.com/sh/gds8nuljbj2bo0d/zqCO9ou85Z/Rebuild1-2012-7-23-6.jpg

And 2 of the cory's basking in it - you can really see them now!
https://www.dropbox.com/sh/gds8nuljbj2bo0d/fpmVpVxTJD/Rebuild2-2012-7-23-7.jpg

The next change I am going to do in the mean time is to remove the crazy plant background and change it to a fabric background attached by velcro.  I am going to try a deep blue, black and dark green colours.  I expect a piece of fabric will be fairly cheap and will be easy to try and possibly rotate each month.  This will also depend on our remaining fish colouring but I suspect it will be a school of neon rainbowfish so I think black or dark blue will be nice.

For the record the fake starfish at the front and no fishing sign are receiving non-negotiation rights from my son so they will be staying in the tank 

Dropbox album: https://www.dropbox.com/sh/gds8nuljbj2bo0d/7GnkYg2rjA

[Peekay]

I like the sand too... looks great!  And of course the no fishing sign stays! 

[daworldisblack]

Looking good! Good protocol to ensure no mini-cycles and it looks sweet to boot! Dont gorget to put some root tabs in there as well for those root feeding plants. They'll thank you for it

[briannesbitt]

Thanks!

Did another water change yesterday so again exchanged some more gravel for sand.  I also vacuumed the current sand without too much trouble and without sucking up too much.  Its heavy enough that it makes it only about 3/4 of the way up the vacuum tube and then falls back down as I move around.

After the water change we went out fish shopping! We got 4 Neon Rainbowfish to start with.  We plan to have a school of about 8 or 9 when we are done so this is the first batch to start QT.

We moved Raphael to the main tank... wow he has grown in the past 3 weeks!

Here are some new shots of the progress this week:
https://www.dropbox.com/sh/gds8nuljbj2bo0d/KkwjbevHMK/2012-7-29-1.jpg
https://www.dropbox.com/sh/gds8nuljbj2bo0d/74qgzel42H/2012-7-29-3.jpg

... and a link to the dropbox album
https://www.dropbox.com/sh/gds8nuljbj2bo0d/7GnkYg2rjA