Tank Updates

Yesterday was devoted to tank maintenance in my office, where I keep a 40-gallon planted, which contains a single wild caught ram (the mate died recently of bloat - I may have mentioned I have horrible luck keeping rams alive, like many people), the ember tetras and het rasboras. This tank gets overgrown very easily with the plantings, and the floating salvinia needs to be scooped out regularly. There is a curious substance all over the sand that I can only describe as an algae, but the rest of the tank has no algae whatsoever. It is a debris that is dark and coats the sand in clumps, and it is not possible to suction it out with a siphon. I stir the sand regularly, what little there is, and I'm not sure why this tank suffers from it, though it does make the sand look "natural," lol. I'm increasing the PWCs in an effort to gain control of it. If that does the trick then I'll know there is some kind of nutrient imbalance.

I did a PWC for dear Otis, who is just a dream in his 20 long. No issues there other than the persistent diatom algae, but this tank easily gets higher nitrate levels due to his meaty diet, and the brackish water seems to have this problem more than a similar tank that was fresh. No worries, though - he's looking great and I'm content.

The HOB filter on the 37 gets clogged quickly and I'm constantly having to clean it out, when it does not seem that dirty. At least not dirty enough to cause the clogging. Even after I rinse everything out and put it back together it seems to run as if the filter pads are clogged. I don't have any extra media trays in it at all. Recently I noticed that the water level was dropping dramatically - more so than the other 3 tanks in the room, and yesterday I found out why: the curtain hanging next to the tank was being splashed by the filter, which was clogged and not flowing properly, and the curtain was sucking up the water up its entire floor to ceiling length! I cleaned out the filter, again, and did a big PWC, and took down the curtain.

The reason I did such a big PWC was so that I could pull the rocks and get out the extra leleupi, which was cramping the style of the pair that has formed. Slowly but surely all six have whittled down to two, and now that they have the tank to themselves they are much calmer and hopefully will spawn for me. Even the one stunted little leleupi left in there was a huge distraction for them, despite the fact that he kept to an upper corner, completely out of their way. They took turns all day long chasing after him. I sold (what appeared to be) an extra dominant male initially, once that situation made itself clear, then one day my daughter happened to find a leleupi on the floor next to the tank, and my husband was able to save it and got it back into the tank alive. It was quite clear that the fish was being bullied and chased and needed to go, so I put it downstairs in the 150 with the other Tanganyikans since I had nowhere else for it to go, and the frontosa and Altolamps in that tank are of a decent size now so as not to be bullied by the wee leleupi. That left 3 fish in the 37, and it soon became obvious which fish were the pair, and yesterday I got the third one out and put him downstairs as well. I'm not sure how that is going to work out, but, again, I have nowhere else for him to go and he is very small still, so he'll either sink or swim downstairs. I fear the leleupi and the Paracyprichromis in the 150 are doomed once the frontosa get bigger, but we shall see. It is remarkable how relaxed the leleupi are in the 37 upstairs now that they are alone together. They can concentrate on making babies now! If one of them decides it wants to "own" the tank and bullies the other, then I'll just sell the pair off and take down the tank.

That leaves the 45-gallon in the office, and sadly I lost another leopoldi angel last week. It was wasting away and looked like it had been beaten up, though I did not see the other bullying it. I think it was just ill, or old, and it did not make it too long after I noticed its deteriorating condition. I now have one single leopoldi left, with some black neons and a few cardinal tetras. This tank is a puzzle to me because I don't like the looks of it and would just as soon put all the fish in the 40 with the others, but I don't think the 40 is a good place for the leopoldi. Too many plants and too much light. I think I will create a community in the 45, with more tetras and perhaps some catfish of some type. Deborah will help me determine which species would work.

This week I'll need to do a PWC on the 150 and the 20 high goldfish tank (love this tank! Too cute!). The frontosa are getting big and it is nearly time for me to swap out the small, fussy stacked rocks for larger boulder type rocks so they don't knock everything over. I'm looking forward to going rock shopping, which is something I very much enjoy, lol. I've got a great landscaping place right up the street and they've got a huge pile of the right type of rock for me to look through.

I still have all of the Altolamps that I originally put in this tank, so there are 8 of them, and the 5 Paracyps, 4 Kapampa frontosa and now the two small leleupi. I just went down to check on the new leleupi addition, and what do I see? He's somehow gotten behind the overflow box where the filter intake is located! How on earth did he squeeze into that spot and how on earth am I going to get him out??? I just swore and walked back upstairs when I saw that..... I've got work to do first before I even begin to tackle that. The hood is in the way for me to lean over at the right angle to get a net back there, so I might have to get Rick to help me take the hood down first, and then I might be able to get him if I stand on a high stool. I suppose he was chased and he was able to squeeze back there. The gap is only big enough for fry, so I'm not sure how he pulled it off. I suppose I should have them siliconed in place but I wanted more flexibility with the setup so I have it wedged, hiding the filter intakes and heater. *Sigh* I knew there'd be something, since it is hard to add a fish to a well established setup without something happening. I'll need to get some pictures of the 150 soon to show how the frontosa have grown, and how great they look. I'm really eager to see them reach their final size, when the tank will really show off well.