The Fish Thread

..after the huge success of The Cat Thread - here's The Fish Thread 🙂

Is he making a comeback?

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I used to breed Betas.

Discus too.

I’m here for advice on not killing mollys and also what gravel cleaner works best

Aquaria were my childhood hobby and fascination.

I would still love to have a big Discus tank but it's a lot of work.

They pretty much look after themselves. Over feeding is a common cause of problems.

What's the set up?

They all died

Water went pretty grim.
Will give a run down tmrw.

5 Mollys
Some plants
A 40l tank (I think)
A filter
Some plants and gravel

What I want to know is:
Cleaning the gravel, the siphon I have doesn’t appear to do fuck all. What else can u do here?
How often do I take out 20-25% of the water
Sand and gravel or just sand or ?

Better filter?

More plants?
Probably less feeding right?
Shrimps? Snails?

40l sounds quite small. It's harder to keep a small tank healthy.

If everything is working as it should, the gravel shouldn't be getting mucky that much.

Plants help. The filter needs to develop a bacterial colony to work properly, then it should be ok and just need rinsing out once a week or so.

Change water once a week. 20% should be enough. If you change too much water it can be a shock and also tap water treatments can adversely affect the good bacteria in your filter.

Start with just a couple of fish in a tank that size.

Discus is a whole kettle of fish (pun intended).

They need temperature control and can easily be spooked.

If you do decide to keep some, having some Angel fish helps tame and calm the discus down.

Definitely feed less, too.

The water didn’t get changed until 4 weeks there was confusion and also demand avoidance.

Anyway.
My plan is get more gravel. Add water get plants and filters up and going for a week or mowe. Add fish and snails?

Sounds about right. I think you can get your bacteria going by adding a really tiny bit of fish food before the actual fish arrive.

Don't get too many fish too soon. Start with two.

Put snails in last week.
Dead.
Wtf

Presumably you have cycled your tank? Have you tested for ammonia and nitrites?

When I was little my Dad had a 8’x4’x4’ tropical tank. I was always amazed by the fact that there were so many plants in there. He planted it up over 4 months before any fish went in. I’d sit and watch them for hours.
I used to keep Siamese Fighters Betas in big jars on a heated pad, looking back I feel bad about it.
(Stock photo)

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Water in. Gravel and sand in.
Plants in.
At least two weeks before I put snails in.
Snails dead.
Did not test for ammonia etc

that's odd. snails are pretty resilient. how long did they last?

as @Dogtemple says, worth getting a water testing kit to help figure out what's going on.

Well, one shell was empty so that doesn’t count.
It went in the tank and didn’t move.

I picked up the shell and it dropped out dead.

maybe they weren't healthy when you got them. try a different pet shop.

Yes I think that is a consideration

Sounds like your tank isn’t cycled.

Need to establish a colony of beneficial bacteria otherwise it’s not going to be a healthy place for anything to live in.

Google tank cycling and nitrogen cycle.

It usually takes about a month+ for a tank to cycle. You can get a head start by using an old filter from an established tank or some gravel that will already have the bacteria present but you might introduce diseases or something you don’t want.