55G Freshwater Log

This is my first tank ever. Dino and Ross dropped it off last Saturday(Dec 8th) and gave me some Cherry Shrimp, Bristlenose Plecos, and a handful of Malaysian Trumpet Snails. The male Bristlenose is a lot more active than the female. She stays hidden under the driftwood most of the time. She has improved though and is no longer always behind the heater or under the sponge filter. I put a slice of cucumber in there tonight and I watched the male eat it up. He completely ate out the center but wouldn't eat the harder stuff. The cherry shrimp are a lot more visible with the addition of the driftwood. I don't know why but it seems like one you give the animals a place to hide they come out more. I have one really really red Cherry Shrimp. Its a female and she is really pretty. Some of them are clear. I also have 1 or 2 that are bluish brown. They live to hang onto the Red Root Floater and hang out inside and around the Java Moss. Speaking of live plants.....I have 1 Anubias, 1 Bunch of Java Moss, 1 Bunch of Guppy Grass, and two types of Java Fern. The Anubias is my favorite. It is a really nice color and is not overpowering or messing. It just looks nice I guess. I like the java moss too; it gives everything a place to hide and stays put. The java ferns are nice to; my favorite is the one grown onto a piece of rock. But I hate......the....Guppy....Grass. It is so messy and it just keeps floating back up when I try to push it under down around through or anything. Everytime I even try to move it segments of it scatter around the tank and continue to float for about an hour. So I gave up on it and let it float. O yea my bubble wand finally is making bubbles across the whole tank. At first it only did it in the first half of the wand. Over a few days now it is coming out of the whole thing. I have two types of rock in there. One is an amethyst and the other is some brown gem thing. I am sure Dino will give me the proper name. I feed the fish Veggie Sticks(2-3) and Flakes alternating morning and night. Ex: 2 Veggie Sticks in the Morning and a small few Flakes at Night. I will attempt my first water change on Saturday. Lol Its a big day for me. The tank has poop from the BN's scattered around. Its kinda gross actually =). Also some pond snail eggs were transferred from Dino to Me. I squish the babies as I see them. About 5 today lol. So far the tank is turning out really well. The next fish I am adding will be Cherry Barbs, then KuhlI Loaches, and then last but not least Marble Veil Angelfish.

 

Performed my first water change. A little messy but It worked. I shouldn't make such a mess next time. I am testing the water ATM.

PH- between 7.2 and 7.6
Ammonia- 0.25
Nitrite- 0
Nitrate- 0

The tank seems to be doing well. There is still a little poop but I got almost all of it. I just saw the most beautiful Cherry Shrimp. It is bright bright bright red. It sticks out like a sore thumb. There is also two very pretty blue ones. The plecos werent bothered by the water change. They just sat there. The plants are doing better now. Except the grass is still a little bleh.

I'll post later today I still haven't eaten and I'm really hungry =).

 

Tested water today to see if Ammonia went down.

Ammonia- 0.25
Nitrite- 0.25
Nitrate- 0

Ammonia and nitrites are up now....there is a bunch of poop so maybe at next water change I'll clean it really well and it will go down.

 

Just tested water a minute ago. Found a nitrite spike. The Nitrites were at 1 ppm, nitrate 10 ppm, and ammonia at 0 ppm. Added a capful of prime to the tank to stabilize overnight. Tomorrow I will do a 45% to 50% water change and add Aquasafe and Prime to the refill water. The plecos didn't have any different activities and I just tested the water by chance. I'm glad that I did. Thanks to Dave for being on or else I might have some not so happy fish.

 

Completed the water change at about 11:30. I added prime and aquasafe. The fish are not to stressed but they are still stressed. I ended up changing 50% of the water. I got a chance to check out the cave (I could finally see the roof) and bad news. No eggs or fry in there =(. I will test the water again about tomorrow this time and see if the spike went down. No shrimp casualties that I have seen either, I am surprised.

 

Completed the water change at about 11:30. I added prime and aquasafe. The fish are not to stressed but they are still stressed. I ended up changing 50% of the water. I got a chance to check out the cave (I could finally see the roof) and bad news. No eggs or fry in there =(. I will test the water again about tomorrow this time and see if the spike went down. No shrimp casualties that I have seen either, I am surprised.

Aren't prime and aquasafe essentially the same thing? Is there a reason you are adding both?

 

Prime helps with the nitrite spike and I normally use the aquasafe for the water conditioning anyway and it won't hurt it.

 

Yep and I just tested the water and it has helped drastically. The nitrites are at .5 PPM and are a little lighter than the picture on the chart. Hoepfully it will be down to .25 or 0 tomorrow.

 

I just added some river rocks to the bottom for no good reason. Just aesthetics. I got them from a bag of rocks. They were boiled twice and let them cool for a while then scattered them around the bottom. Also I forgot to note that a few days ago I put a rock in, I think its granite but I'm not sure. It passed the vinegar test and I boiled it numerous times. I had two of them but the tank looked to crowded with both in there. I got them from my backyard.

 

When I walked into my room at approx 11:00 PM I saw my Joey (The male BN) digging out the cave. I am very excited he made sort of an elongated pile outside of the cave and he has stopped now. He just kicked out the sand with his tail. It was neat to watch. So I will be looking out for eggs pretty soon.

 

Did a 35% water change this morning. I just tested the nitrites and they have drastically improved. They are reading at .25 PPM.

 

I just tested all of the water conditions except for PH and they are all looking great.

Ammonia:0 ppm
Nitrate:5 ppm
Nitrite: 0 ppm

I am very relieved that the spike has gone down completely. The 5 ppm on the nitrate isn't a problem since 20 ppm is considered the maximum.

 

Just performed a small sand vacuum to remove some poop. About 10% or less. I also took a sponge that was on the end of a filter intake in the 55 and put it in the 10 to seed the sponge from the 10 which I placed on the filter intake. I also moved the ceramic bead material from one of the filters in the 55 and put it in the 10 and put the bag from the 10 in the other 55 filter. I put the sponge on the right and the bag on the left filter. I am putting all of the pond snails that I find into the 10G to help cycle it further instead of killing them all. One of the male cherry barbs seems to be chasing a female. It has just recently ceased and had been going on since about 11 o clock this morning. I was not sure if it was a mating ritual or aggression. I did not want to stop them since I could not find an answer. I did not see any mouth bitting or sign of stress from the female or male so I let it continue. While I was changing the water the cherry barbs came over in a shoal around the vacuum. I just thought that has interesting behavior from the fish so I thought I might note that.

 

This morning I woke up and put the put in the water and it was extremely cold. I checked the thermometer and it was in the lower 70's!!!!!! I looked to see if the heater was plugged in and I had missed it yesterday when I did the water change. I didn't realize last night because I didn't check the thermometer and the water didn't feel cold. I plugged the heater back in, opened the curtains, turned off my fan, closed my door, and wrapped the tank in 2 layers of blankets. I will take all of this off once it goes back up into the 80's. No dead fish, thank god. If I hadn't noticed it this morning my whole tank prolly would have died by tonight, with the temperatures dropping into the 60s.

 

Well, when I just recently looked at the tank I saw little red things. I thought it was left over food but then I looked closer and they were little tiny Cherry Shrimp. Apparently one of the females that was carrying, layed eggs and they hatched. Now I have some additions to the Cherry Shrimp Family =).

 

I took the small water sprite and dwarf chain sword out and moved them to the 30G. Today was a starve day for the fish. Everytime I walked up to the tank the cherry barbs would swim to the glass and look at me. They will be glad to eat tomorrow morning. I did a 25% routine wc this morning and just tested water as well.

Ammonia:0
Nitrite:0
Nitrate:0

Finally I have ideal water parameters in the 55! Such a relief.

 

Absolutely excellent Cory !! I also looked at the pictures in your gallery and that driftwood on the right side of the tank is a very nice piece indeed.

I'm very happy for you man