My Tank Problems

About 9 months ago, a dear family member "Blessed" us with a betta splendens in a bowl. This promptly died and was replaced with two goldfish - the goldfish were then upgraded to a 28 litre "aquarium" and miraculously survived - all this was done with no regard to filtration or the nitrogen cycle...

Then "the boss" took over. Goldfish were still tiny (under 1") so I got a 56L aquarium for them to cycle- moved them with the filter and ran both filters for 2 days. Goldfish move was a huge success - now I was building up bacteria in the big tank, the little tank got its filter back and promptly ended up with a motley combination of tetras and danios (I knew nothing still getting to grips with the nitrogen cycle) All died in the next 24 hours except the neons in that tank - probably from temperature shock as they were in a cupful of water during rush hour.

Next, the goldfish went back (Good) and my neons were boosted to 7 and moved to the main tank and joined by a Powder Blue dwarf gourami.

The small tank was now to become a guppy tank with 2 males. One guppy would die every week until under close observation, the small survivor was found to be the biggest bully. Solution: 7 neons moved to this tank with a single guppy - all's fine now.

The gourami tank also ended up with 6 corys and a total of 17 neons at one stage (Now 5 cory 10 neons 1 Dwarf Gorami) - plants from all over the place, lots of them wrong.

DIY CO2 was added to the tank (nearly gassing all the fish in a power outage) and that's when things started to go sour for the plants. As an aside - 7 red glo danio didn't make a week after the CO2 gassing - the last one was killed by the gourami.

Whitespot was treated with protozin but and brown spots appeared on the gloso, then the guppy grass. A fluffy white deposit was present where there were higher concentrations of CO2 - not to worry - it brushed right off..

After the protozin treatment, one of the cory was sick (Injured from the store) so I decided that I'd treat with Myxazin as the barbells were pretty short and there had been plenty of fin-nipping among the neons. It was a good idea as although the cory being treated didn't survive, the other cory seem a lot happier and the neons are recovering (They were probably attacking each other thinking that they were all injured).

So... now I have 2 tanks where the fish are fine but the plants are sick in one of them. Rusty brown spots on the leaves, black hairs, white hairs... all kinds. I'll try and get a good macro shot of it to post here.

Usually, there's a simple answer to everything going wrong. I think I'm over-feeding and a good filter rinse might remove a lot of algae food from the water but frankly, there are too many variables to count!
I've just added algimin to the water - hopefully there's an end in sight!
cb

 

hehe, had a good smile now. Been there!

 

O.k... All this problems...and you still keep fish? RIGHT ON!! the bug has bit... Now tell us what your lights are,how long they on for? Natural sunlight hit tank through window?

Waterchanges how often? What plants? How many? What fertilizers you use for your plants? Co2 - even if diy,is only one part of it.. the brown spots you mention makes me think fert problems or light problems... You have been buying good products for your sick fishies - but Im getting this "undertone" of you thinking all your fish are ravenous Piranhas...he,he.... Please post a FTS - Full tank shot - very often aggression among good community species is due to tank layout - some fish just do this....

 

I guess it takes a certain kind of person to get through it all – but I think the thing I like about this hobby is that it never ends – there’s always something to do, get creative or fix.
Anyway, in answer to your questions, there’s a lonely 15W T8 with a reflector in the tank that’s switched on about 6am and gets turned off at 22:00. It's a bit long but then again, The light is a measly 1W/gal.
w/c every weekend changing 10-13L. No daylight reaches this part of the house - it's about 6m from a south facing window.
Plants: see photo - I am absolutely useless at identifying them. I know I have Vallis and some kind of floating lily that doesn't root in the substrate. but for the others - it's what I've been able to find locally.
I've just dosed with 25ml of tetra algimin - hoping this will have some effect and rinsed the filter media in dechlorinated water. There was a LOT of gunk in there after 2 weeks but my main reason was getting rid of debris from the vallis planting.
I supplement with 5ml of Nutrafin Plant grow once per week - but I feel that this might be part of the problem as the plants aren't that "established" as yet and thus this will leave nutrients free for the algae to consume.
On one of the swords, I get 1-2 leaves/week with the CO2 running at 1-2bps and the way that the Co2 is operating, I get a lot of tiny bubbles blown all over the tank - see white specks on Algae.jpg.
The logic behind how I use CO2 is as follows: At lower depths, CO2 bubbles released from the airstone are smaller - but there are more of them for the same mass of CO2. Water pumped back at the top of the tank is subsequently mixed toward the bottom by the air curtain and filter flow giving it a long time to disolve.
I use the air curtain mostly to balance the pH drop induced by the CO2. Water pH is 7.8 at the tap and drops below 6.8 with the CO2. I try and keep it above 6.8 by increasing the air curtain at night.
We have had 3x 10 hour+ power cuts so now I have battery operated air that I can pop in to maintain my cycle. Although the aerobic bacteria in the filter may suffer - I hope that I have enough bacteria on the surfaces of the tank to keep things going.
I feed the cory tablets every other day, flakes and pellets for the neons and gourami every day - although the gourami seems to like feeding every 5 minutes (lol).
The aggression seems to have died a bit after treating with myxazin which I've now discontinued after 5 days. I'm tempted to go on for the cory's sake though and until the neons fins are all back to normal.
The system wouldn't allow me to upload more than 5 photos so I made a little gallery with all the pics in it:
http://www.tropicalaquarium.co.za/album.php?albumid=419

 

Did I say something wrong?
One thing that I forgot to mention is that the DIY CO2 seems to be leaving a white fluffy deposit all over the tank - not dissimilar to the algae that I'm seeing.
Nitrates are below 25 as measured today but that's 2 days after a w/c
cb

 

Do you use the air curtain at the same time as the co2?

 

Yes. Trying to keep the pH in check - is this bad?

 

Yes. It's bad. What you are effectively doing is injecting the Co2 into the tank, only for the air curtain to remove the Co2 from the tank. What happens is, the air movement, in the water rising and causing surface agitation actually dissolves the Co2 out of the water, so you are effectively wasting all the Co2 that you are adding to your tank.

The way you need to stabilize your PH is to add a buffering capability to your tank. There are a whole bunch of ways that you can do this. Adding a buffer is one of them. Basically, Calcium Carbonate, will buffer the PH. You will need to add this every single time you do a water change. You need to look at the GH and KH values of your water. If your KH is about 3 - 4 degrees, then you will be fine. That means that your water has a good buffering capability.

You could add crushed coral, Araganite, marble chips (the stone, not glass balls) etc to your filter in a little bag, and this will also help to buffer your water.

I hope this helps somewhat?

 

Thanks Sean. I'm not sure that it helps me directly though - although having let me explain...
Tap pH is usually around 7.6 according to my pool test kit (Phenol red). I have not run a test strip in the tap water - maybe I should.
The last hardness test I ran today with strips gave me a GH of around 8 deg and a KH of 6 deg in the tank.
I just went down to measure the pH and have had the air full on for the last 30 mins and... It's reading below 6.8 giving me CO2 above 25ppm
I had a couple of 12+ hour power outages that killed 6 of my fish through being gassed with CO2 so I'm weary to leave it without a safety net.
I turn the air up at night usually but have about 3 streams going during the day - I have been increasing the daytime use of the air to improve circulation.
The fluff is not unlike this http://www.fishlore.com/fishforum/heaters/114209-fluffy-ring-around-hagan-elite-mini-heater.html
I've also noticed that the heater suction cups are slowly getting encrusted as well with the substance - although it looks fluffy on the glass, it's positively like dried milk on the plastic surfaces.
If you look at the photos that I've posed above, you can see tiny CO2 bubbles floating all over the tank - and yet I have no pearling to speak of on the plants.
One mention I see of it is here: http://www.aquaticquotient.com/forum/showthread.php/7035-Fluffy-stuff-on-diffuser
My recipe for the CO2 involves rice, brown sugar and bicarb. Possibly one of the ingredients is causing this - now I think about it - rule out everything else first?
Brazilian Micro-sword got a hair cut yesterday but every new leaf seems infested. I might have to get some flourish excel to treat here or peroxide
cb

 

Tap pH is always higher for a few hours before settling down. You may find that your water is naturally 6.8. Take some tap water, let it stand for 2 days and test it again.

Kill the CO2. You just creating more trouble for yourself. You not running high lights, you not running a nutrient enriched substrate, nor fetilizing in high amounts. So you've created an imbalance between light, CO2 and fertz.

I actually honestly believe that the CO2 is completely ineffective on your tank with all the air you pumping in... even though my opinion on DIY CO2 is that there is more fun ways to waster sugar and yeast.

So, kill the Co2 and investigate some better lighting. Even a CFL in the cool daylight range would suffice. And put them lights on a timer. No matter what type of light you have, if they on too long, they mess up the tank.

Also, if the current light is old, its useless and thus the plants are not getting the right type of light. T8 tubes need to be replaced every 6 months.

 

Ashley,
Tap pH after settling for 1 day is..... 7.6
pH of tank water presently - below 6.8
pH of tank water after shaking for 2-3 minutes just above 7.4

If I strip out the opinion part of your post, I need to be dosing more nutrients than a dash of something once a week and look to upgrading the lights if I want radical growth. I'm looking at importing a GroBeam which should help things but it seems to me that dry ferts would make the whole operation more tolerable financially. (Any sources - please PM)

The tank's only 2 months old (as I said - I'm new at this) so the light still has another 2-3 months in it.

cb

 

Hi @ccbYes, my post was based on my opinion, which is shared with my experience.When I started fishkeeping a few years ago I was also playing around with the DIY CO2, and I will admit, it gave me fantastic results. I actually came online and punted the system big time. I then started experiencing similar problems to you. I had algae outbreaks like you cannot believe. I landed up with pH swings that cost me dearly in livestock (Something I see you have experienced already). I refused to admit it was the DIY CO2... until someone who i highly admire as a fishkeeper recommended me to just "test the tank out for 6 weeks without the DIY CO2". I had nothing to loose, so I tried it. Admittedly, the algae I battled with for over 16months. But staghorn algae does that... it's probably the most stubborn algae I know. BUT, the tank stopped all it's problems. Literally the week I stopped, I noticed that although the algae wasn't dying, it wasn't blooming any further. My pH became stable. I'll be 100% honest... I do not like DIY CO2. I find it far too unstable and unreliable. (This is my opinion). However, other members on this forum have had success with it in smaller tanks. I am unfortunately not in a position to comment on these members long term experience, as I believe most of them stop using it due to the hassle. Just a side thought... don't ignore the fact that there are other ways of introducing CO2 into a tank- Microbelift Bio Carbon (I use very successfully in my small tank) and Seachem Exel.But... I'll play fair... if you want to continue with the DIY CO2, I would recommend:First put the lights onto a timer. They are definitely on too long. Consider slowing the CO2 rate, and keeping the airpump off during the time the lights are on. Upgrade the lighting. Even changing it to a CFL will have remarkable results. Definitely get a good water column fertilizer. (Microbelift, Seachem, DSD, ADA)Get a root fertilizer in the form of tablets that you can push into the substrate.When CO2 is in the water... it is very "unstable." I use the term "unstable" loosely, because this is not a scientific explanation. Bust basically when you have CO2 in the water, and then the air-pump on at the same time, CO2 and O2 react at the surface, (because the surface tension is now increased due to airpump being on) and CO2 is instantly knocked out of the water, and replaced with O2. Thus, as Sean indicated, you are completely defeating the purpose of adding CO2. Now the plants only use CO2 during the light period. They absorb the CO2 and transpire O2. At night this is reversed. They absorbe O2, and transpire CO2. Usually with pressurized CO2 this isn't a problem, because you turn the CO2 off at night... but with DIY CO2 you don't have a way of doing this, so the only reasonable thing to do at night is to turn an airpump on. Hope that helps a bit

 

Sorry that is all typed up in one long paragraph. I have tried to fix it, but I see all my posts are coming up like this. @Rory... fix

 

Ashly - I really didn't mean the opinion thing as a dig - but wanted to illustrate that there is good information in there that I can take forward and use.
I'm not able to go out and spend over R2,000 upgrading the CO2 and the lighting at the same time so I need to prioritize and focus on aims that I can reach in a reasonable time.
Priority 1 are the ferts - this has been addressed. I believe that my trepidation and hesitation in this department was based on fear of contributing to the problem. I'm always looking for a bit of improvement in this department though. Availability at the LFS that I know seems restricted.
#2 is lighting and I can plan for that - either importing a grobeam or Arcadia light. If I spend money on upgrading, I'll want to see results over the product life and at R200 per T5, I think that LEDs provide a return within 2 years without looking at power consumption.
CO2 upgrade would be nice after that... Like you said, some people really swear by it... mine's working and as of last night, I think I have enough nutrients making a difference.
cb

 

Back to the 28l? Just a word of warning if you gonna keep them you'll need a bigger tank, they grow pretty big pretty fast especially if they the streamlined type, 20cm and up, if they the short-bodied deformed ones and they get at all stunted they are always constipated and its awful.. I still got one comet gave the other one to the exit pond at Jungle Aquatics

 

They went back to the shop... never got over 5cm so were never cramped...
cb