Article Suggestions

[daniel364]

Im not sure if this has been done, but an article on velvet would be helpful to me but it depends weather its helpful to a quantity of people i suppose.

 

[Aussie_hippie_2]

Jon, I think that would be a good article to write. Even if it's just for newbies to gather inspiration it would be helpful. I'd be willing to help, though I'm sure you know more about basically everything then I do.

 

[Malbri]

I think we need a filter artical. Like saying the different kinds(sponge, hob, etc)
I looked and didnt see one, so correct me if we do

 

[jm1212]

now that ive finished the small tank stocking, how about an article that is devoted to only 55 gallon stock?

i could do a couple of beginner stocks, intermediate stocks, a couple of advanced stocks, and perhaps an expert one (ive got a good one in mind right now), and species tanks.

 

[jgavlock]

I'd like to hear your expert 55 stock.

 

[jm1212]

I'd like to hear your expert 55 stock.

you'll have to read the article

 

[necigrad]

Has anyone done anything on dieseses? I'm thinking something with pics for eneric dieseses. As a secondary part species specific dieseses could be added.

 

[Dangerdoll]

I love this disease with pics idea for an article.

 

[pik01]

I know J double R has written a good article on Detailed Drip Acclimation but I've been reading some posts on acclimating fish sent through the mail and KarlTH has said:

Nitrate, even within normally safe levels, is IME associated with what I call "small fish dieoff" - where up to 50% of a shoal of new small fish die within a short time of being added to the tank.

Another cause is acclimation. Bear with me. To explain, a bag of ten ember tetras has probably built up some ammonia in transit. Now, this isn't harmful because the organic processes will have depressed the pH. But then you drip acclimate, which means that you start putting your water - which may have a higher pH - into their water. This turns the ammonia to the toxic un-ionised form and the fish suffer ammonia poisoning.

Drip acclimation is great when you know the parameters in your tank are different from those in the bag. When the difference isn't great, I'd concentrate on getting the fish out of the shipping water and into the tank as fast as possible.

Not saying this did happen, but it's a possibility. Unless you know your water is much harder or much softer than the water the fish come from, then equalise temperatures and get the fish out of the bags. Drip acclimate only when you need to for reasons of osmotic difference. Don't worry about pH either; if the hardness (and generally therefore the TDS) of the water in the bag is close to that of the tank, a fish can swim straight from pH 6.5 to pH 7.5 and not notice. A bigger change might make it feel a bit groggy (especially if it's going from alkaline to acid) for a bit but will probably do less long term harm than ammonia.

I don't know if it's my place to say, but can I at least suggest a sticky on this? Even better, a detailed article that spells out the difference in acclimation techniques, when to use them, why a particular situation should require one method over the other? Something like that? It's still rather murky to me. In the same thread Acclimating after Shipping? OldMan47 mentioned CO2:

Actually, if you have a bag of fish that has been in shipment for a while, many shippers would recommend a plop and drop approach. It is not at all the same kind of water chemistry that you deal with when you bring fish home an hour after they were bagged. In the case of shipping, there is very little water for each fish in the bag, the fish has been in that small amount of water for at least a day or two and the text message you put in the original posting makes sense in that context. The shipping water is very likely to be seriously degraded by the time you get the fish and if you are not careful the CO2 that is holding down the pH will come out of solution and the water will become quite toxic. You don't want your new fish in the water when that happens.

Idk, maybe all this needs is a localization of all the info? I've seen mentions of flushing, drop and plop...

 

[msjinkzd]

That is a great suggestion pik, i just saw it now. LOL I will pm some members and see if they would be willing to write it up for us.