I give up (at least for today)

This morning as I was about to leave home the canister filter stopped. I primed it a bit, but had to leave. Sure enough when I came back four hours later it was not on - thank God for the reliable sponge filter. I took it apart, shortened the hoses, started it back up (or so I thought), and got a terrible noise. I primed and primed and the filter failed to respond, and the noise just kept getting worse. Turns out I accidentally plugged in the old filter that had come in the hood which was lying on the floor nearby, instead of plugging in the canister filter, and that was what was causing the noise and causing the priming not to have any effect. Ai! I still do not know what caused the canister filter not to work earlier though - hopefully shortening the hoses solves this issue.

I also did a water change and swished both my sponge filter and the prefilter off the filter intake and I stirred the sand on one side of the tank. I must have stirred up a lot of stuff and done things in the wrong order because the sponge filter and pre filter looked worse at the end than at the beginning, and there is plant matter in the water that is either left overs from that najas grass that did not do well in my tank or left over from a zucchinI floating all over. It looks worse after I am done than before I started.

I measured my water params and got Ammonia .25 (!) Nitrites 0 and Nitrates 5. The Ammonia .25 after water change worries me a bit. I don't have the energy to do another water change now. I shall measure again tomorrow afternoon. Oh, I just remembered as I was typing this that I recently switched to Amquel and that measuring Ammonia right after Amquel is not going to be reliable - ugh! silly me. Does Amquel distort all three tests or just Ammonia? I never had such a low Nitrates result before - should I not trust it because of the Amquel or are my Nitrates indeed lower? I have two reasons for why Nitrates may be lower: new canister filter and new plants.

Overall a most frustrating tank maintenance experience today. I know it is because I am still new enough and doing stuff wrong, but now I am sweaty and tired, and really hoping that I will get this more right next week.

 

Aw. I'm sorry you had a bad fish day. Tomorrow will be better!

I'll share a story of woe that might make you smile, lately every time I reach into the tank I forget to rinse my hand first and end up putting cat hair in there (my cat is pretty fluffy, not a long hair, but not a short either). Not really a huge deal, I'm not talking a whole cat worth, just a few strands here and there--except it gets caught on my filter intake instead of going inside the filter where I won't be bothered by it. Then the fish come by and think it might be a worm and try to eat it, decide it's not edible and spit it back into the water column where I have to watch it swirl around for another 15 minutes while gritting my teeth. Silly platies.

 

I believe aquamel effects all 3 tests(??) I understand the pain, went to turn on my snakes lighting today, it burns out. the 4th bulb in 5 months.

 

Hey Joanna, it's okay! You've had a rough few days. Rest up and heal yourself. Tomorrow is a new day.

 

Tomorrow is indeed a new day. Tomorrow I shall have to water my orchids which I have been neglecting shamelessly. I still remember the time (about 8 years ago) when I was as obsessed with orchids as I am now with aquarium.

 

tomarrow I have to water my cactus, haven't done that in 4 months....