Actually the cycle won't START without ammonia (fish waste), so you need fish to even start the cycle.

For FW, I use mollies because they're very resilient. They'll usually live through the cycling process.

The cycling process often takes MUCH longer than a week. If you don't want the hassle of using a drip reagent test for Ammonia, get the 5-in-1 test strips to test for nitrite and nitrate.

At first, both values will be zero. Over a few days, the bacteria will begin to begin to convert ammonia to nitrite and you will start to see the nitrite pad change color. Eventually, a 2nd strain of the same bacteria will begin to convert nitrite to nitrate.

When the cycle is complete, nitrite should drop to zero and from then on you should only see nitrate on the test.

I kick off my cycle with a raw, uncooked shrimp from the grocery store. You'll see an ammonia spike in 7-10 days. Cycle usually takes 3-4 weeks to complete in my experience. I wouldn't risk putting in a fish right away. I've never actually done it that way, but can't imagine that it wouldn't be extremely stressful on the fish.

I made my frist major mistake in reef tanks a few weeks ago, and became the poster boy for QT tanks. I bought a fish that had ich (unbeknownst to me) and put him directly in my tank. Within two weeks all but two fish in my tank were dead. I'm fighting an uphill battle to save the last two I'm afraid. I won't be buying another fish until I get my QT tank setup.

Fish are a bigger pain in the ass than I anticipated.

I've been changing out a couple of gallons a week and vacuuming the bottom. I'm using the conditioning drops before putting in the new water. No fish have died in the making of this video, however 1 snail apparently did.

So...there has been a clear "slime" dispersed in the water that has plugged the intake of the filter twice. WTF is it and how do I kill it?

I'm starting to hate the plecco. He may find himself on a flathead hook in the spring.

Raw shrimp is a good way to introduce Saprolegnia unfortunately.

I've cycled with mollies and they get through it pretty well. Yes, it's stressful but it's really the only SURE way to cycle a tank and not end up with problems later.

What kind of tank do you have? If you don't have quarantine available, Kordon Herbal Ich Attack is a very good product. No copper (actually contains Napthoquinones) and safe for all invertebrates. It's worked will for me in the rare case a new fish brings in Ich.

Salt, 120 DT, 140 gallon sump.

Never heard of that before, but I'll look into it. I bought a garlic based product from marinedepot, who's name escapes me at the moment. I tried my first dose of it last night, so we'll see if it actually does any good.

Can you take a pic? Generally a "slime" would be algae, it's most likely not clear if you look at it closely. But it could also be a bacterial bloom or fungus.

Yeah, I've never been a fan.

Garlic is a good curative and appetite enhancer but it won't kill Ich. That being said, the Naptho smells like onions or garlic, so you might be on to something.

FYI on cycling your tank:

DO NOT use AMMO-LOCK or any other "ammonia neutralizer" when cycling your tank. It actually does more harm than good. It binds ammonia in a non-toxic form, so your fish won't die, but the molecule is not digestible by nitrifying bacteria, so they STARVE. Ultimately, your tank will never cycle or you'll have ammonia problems off and on for the life of the tank.

Not only that but the natural processes that occur in a fish tank can lower pH over time and at some point, the acidity will break the bonds and release all of that ammonia into your tank at ONCE - instantaneous fish kill.

One thing I strongly recommend is a reagent-based ammonia test. It can test for both bound and un-bound ammonia. This is important because while only the former can kill your fish, the presence of EITHER suggests your tank is not fully-cycled.

I also strongly recommend using only Seachem Prime as a dechlorinator/ammonia detoxifier. It detoxifies ammonia in a way that won't interrupt the cycling process.

Maybe the Chiefs will get this fish:

http://www.thesportsbank.net/core/wp...eff-Fisher.jpg

I've never run a QT tank, though I probably should.

The problem is that marine ich is something of an ornery little shit. Wild-caught fish all have it and virtually any distributor is going to run a mass filtration system that will pass it around as well. Freshwater ich is a different creature entirely; it's much more rare. Marine, on the other hand, is virtually everywhere and extremely difficult to ever completely eradicate, especially once it is introduced to your system.

There are 2 theories here w/ marine ich - the first is that leaving your tank fallow for about 3 months will essentially starve the ich out. What you see when you see ich is actually the little cysts that form as it 'hatches'. What emerges falls into your substrate, rocks, etc... and then attaches to the fish. Rinse/repeat, so long as there are fish in the tank. By going fallow (without fish; inverts like corals and a cleanup crew would still be fine), you leave them nothing to attach to. You have to stay fallow for a long time to ensure that you don't have any stragglers that have stayed dormant for the whole period.

I tried going fallow; ran the tank empty for 6 weeks and the first two fish in introduced were baby clowns that were bred by a local breeder. Within a week, they showed spots. I gave up. Oh, and all of the fish I removed from the tank to go fallow with it died in quarantine due to the stress of the small tank.

A QT tank has to be barren to avoid the ich having anywhere to breed. Further, you want it to induce a little stress in order to start that ich lifecycle in your QT in order to fully eradicate them. That said; I still don't trust it unless you're willing to do a 6-week QT, and even then, the malachite green and copper and formaline and all that stuff can start to have a negative impact on fish as well. Hypo-salinity (really low salt levels) is the safest option, but it's actually quite difficult to do well and can also be hard on the fish.

Oh...and I'm sure (I hope) that you know that virtually any treatment for ich cannot go into your reef. All of that stuff will kill your inverts, generally including your corals. It will get into your live-rock and never really cycle out. Worse still, it will get into your seals and run the risk of making that tank 'radioactive' in the future.

Theory 2: Nutrition and stability. Most folks now believe that if you go about 6 months without introducing 'new' ich to the system, it will essentially inbreed itself out of useful existence in your tank. I've only gone a prolonged period of time without adding anything once, and there seemed to be some merit to that as nothing showed spots ever, regardless of stress. Others will suggest that fish can develop something of an underlying immunity to it if they've had it; I don't buy that one. I simply believe they get more comfortable in their surroundings and they fight it off without it becoming visible.

What I do to address ich is simply feed a lot, feed quality food and dip it in garlic and Selcon. Additionally, try to increase your water movement to ease the strain on their gills as Ich will first attack their respiratory system (it's why you see really sick fish hang out up high and around the returns). By moving the water more, you introduce more oxygen to it and its easier for them to breathe even if their gills aren't at 100%. I've heard of people doing really well by adding a live-well aerator to get more oxygen in the water.

The Selcon is actually far more important than the garlic. As has been noted, garlic just increases appetite. The useful enzyme in garlic for health purposes has long since broken down by the time it gets to your house, let alone your tank. The Selcon, however, adds a lot of acids and fats that are very healthy for your fish (if you have tangs, get it to prevent lateral line erosion).

Water changes are also a big deal. People forget that the salt is more than just salt; it has a bunch of minerals and stuff in it that are pretty helpful for having healthy fish.

By keeping the fish healthy, fed and happy, you can fight them through that 'cyst' period. The cysts will hatch and fall into the substrate and your fish will look better briefly. They will be healthy and less stressed due to the feeding and water changes and they'll be able fight off secondary infections and have an immune system that can fight off the ich when it re-emerges and tries to attach again.

It's simply a matter of fighting through it, IMO. Keep 'em healthy and fed and you'll find that most marine fish are adapted to fight off ich. Some are pretty lousy about it (my hippo seems to always have it but that thing eats like a pig so it pulls through easily), some never get it (haven't seen a spot on those baby clowns in 18 months now; I think adding the anemone has them pretty relaxed so they never show it).

But there's really no reason for ich to be a tank-killer and more often than not, the 'cure' is worse than the disease. Try to set up the QT if you want, but I've never had the patience for them. More than anything, I think they're great for getting fish to start eating before introduction into a display, but they're of limited utility when it comes to actually keeping ich out. (Marine velvet and other more nasty boogeymen, on the other hand, it will keep out).

Same here.

Actually FW ich isn't all that rare. It's just easier to control. I don't know about marine ich, but with FW ich, if you see it on the outside of your fish, you've already lost an important battle. Ich establishes in the gills so your fish will be very sick before you ever see the actual spots. Fish hovering at the surface, appearing to "gasp" for air, is a sign of ich.

It's because most of them contain Copper, which is highly toxic in even moderate concentrations. It's very, very difficult to get rid of but it's not impossible. In a marine tank with lots of inverts and corals though, it can absolutely create a situation where the tank is toxic forever. I really suggest trying Kordon's Herbal Ich Attack. Great product with no copper.

This is absolutely true for FW tanks as well. Even low pH Amazon-style tanks need proper mineralization.

I've used Ich attack - meh.

For 150 gallons, that !@#$ gets expensive in a hurry. It makes your tank smell like crap and I'm not sure it does anything more than just feeding them does.

An interesting bit of info re: Copper - as bad as that crap is, you'll find trace of it in a lot of 'essential elements' style water additives. It's more common than we think.

Oh, and in a QT, never EVER use prime, stress coat or any of that stuff. Chelated copper can essentially be 'transformed' into a super-toxic form of copper through those de-chorinators and ammonia reducers. You essentially spin offer copper ions and you end up with some nasty stuff.

If you're going to run a QT, you just need to be prepared to do a daily small water change in it to reduce ammonia levels. You can't built up nitrifying bacteria in it because you don't want the media in there for the ich to take refuge in. Some people will keep a sponge in their sump to build up the bacteria, then introduce it to the QT when they put a fish in there, but I think I'd prefer go bare-bottom with it. You also don't want to use prime because of its impact on the copper medications.

QTs are a bit of a pain in the ass.

Really? I've used it for both Ich and FW Velvet and it works great. Just as good as copper without the side effects.

The same can be said for almost any medication, fertilizer, or tank additive. It can be an expensive hobby, especially for someone who doesn't know any better (I've been through it myself).

Even more interesting is that invertebrates like shrimp NEED copper for proper function of the blood and circulatory system. It really isn't different than iron, which is also toxic in high concentrations.

That is true. The better solution is just to not use copper. ;)

I find that bringing over nitrifying bacteria is often completely wasted effort because the use of quarantine tank is most often necessary when using antibiotics to treat things like Aeromonas or dropsy. Those antibiotics will kill all of your nitrifying bacteria (the reason you need a QT in the first place) so bringing over bio media is a waste of time.

They are.

The fact is that it still can't kill ich. Ich Attack can essentially nurse your fish through an infection, but anything that 'kills' ich is going to wipe out a reef.

So all you're doing is taking something like my selcon/garlic soak (plus the elements added by water changes), dilluting it in water, adding some phosphate to it and then dumping it directly into your tank as opposed to having them ingest it.

It just seems like surgery with a shotgun to me.

And are you sure about plants not absorbing ammonia? Everything I've read says they can absorb both ammonia and nitrates.

http://thegab.org/Plants/setting-up-...nted-tank.html

http://www.rexgrigg.com/cycle.htm

I'm quite impressed w/ the responses on here! And here I thought I was the only fish nerd. LMAO

Silock, any of the cycling methods the others suggested will work. But honestly, no matter what method you choose, seriously consider doing it the humane way w/o the use of fishes... trust me! We thought that our tank was cycled, (false reading from the test strips), and added a few fishes. Next thing we knew they began jumping out of the tank. From that point on, I never put my trust in the test strips and bought the API Freshwater Master Test Kit. It's a lot more work, but is way more accurate.

In regards to a QT... I have a spare 10g that I use and it's fairly easy to set-up. I have a small HOB filter on my 55g that I move to that tank and add my extra heater. Then, when I'm done w/ the treatment, I sanitize all of the equipment thoroughly and toss out the filter media.

The last time I used the 10g, I was treating 2 of my fishes that had Columnaris. I used MaracynII and my bacteria was still intact. I think as long as you use meds that don't alter your cycle, you will be fine. Otherwise, it's a waste to move filter media over if the meds are going to mess w/ your bacteria. I also use Prime when adding new water, (to my main tanks, and my QT).

Rid Ich worked really well when I had my Ich outbreaks, (luckily I've only had 3... thanks to not using a QT when I got new fishes). I think as long as you catch Ich in the early stages, (when the fishes are flashing against objects), it works better. Otherwise, like someone else mentioned, when you notice any visual proof that your fishes have Ich, (white "salty" substance), you're pretty much hosed.

Lots of sites recommend using straight ammonia and just letting the tank fishless cycle itself.

I've only known about plants reducing Nitrates, not Ammonia. In fact, that's the main reason why I went w/ a planted tank. Thanks to someone at the pet store telling me that I only needed to do a water change once a month, my Nitrates reached a whopping 160ppm! How my fishes didn't croak is beyond me!

But since then, I have been maintaining a strict 50% water change once a week and my Nitrates stay around 40ppm. The plants have helped quite a bit in maintaining the level, but IME, they are not lowering the Nitrate level like I had hoped. In short, I wouldn't put too much faith in live plants helping w/ your cycle.

I'm not sure how plants could absorb ammonia.

Everything I've ever known about marine plants anyway is that they only work with Nitrates. Things like chaeto algae, calupra and mangrove plants all serve to knock your nitrates down but they don't do anything for ammonia.

Nitrates aren't really that big a worry though, especially not for fish. Nitrate levels can get insanely high without having an impact on your fish, especially if you keep everything else within acceptable limits.

Technically, they use ammonium (NH4+) more readily, but ammonia (NH3) has no charge, so it passes through plant cells easily, where it bonds with free H+ to become easily digested NH4+.

But I'm only going to be putting 1-2 fish in there to begin with, and cheap ones at that, so if this experiment doesn't work, then no biggie.

If it doesn't actually kill the ich, why would it remove any trace of an infection 2-3 times faster than raising the temperature (which essentially just speeds up the ich lifecycle)?

It might seem inhumane to have a couple of fish suffer through the cycle but the alternatives are far less humane. Any other type of cycling just isn't "natural" and while the outcome may be okay most of the time, the times that it isn't usually result in tearing the whole thing down, sterilizing, and starting over. Saprolegnia fungus, for example, is nearly impossible to get rid of once it gets established.

Columnaris and some other infections respond to Maracyn, which won't harm your bio filtration. Aeromonas, on the other hand, won't likely respond to Maracyn and drugs like Erythromycin (which should be a last resort) will destroy your biofilter. I'm not a biologist but it has to do with gram-positive vs. gram-negative bacteria.

I've got so many plants I only do a water change every 6 weeks or so and my nitrates rarely get over 25 ppm.

It's the same with FW plants as far as I know. I don't ever have any free NH3 so I don't know...

It doesn't, apart from the fact that it makes your fish healthier and their slime coat kicks off the parasites and prevents re-attachment. There may not be 'traces' of the infection, but the ich is still there.

Do an experiment - treat your display tank with ich-attack for the proscribed period. Then go the the LFS and buy a new fish. Put him in quarantine for however long you'd like and treat however you'd like to get him 'clean'.

I can virtually guarantee you that the moment you put him in your display, he'll show ich. The ich in your display tank was never dead; it was simply dormant or otherwise kept under control by the immune system of the fish in the tank.

Anything, absolutely anything, that can truly kill a parasite that amounts to nothing more than a microscopic crustacean, is going to obliterate more than just said parasite.

If there was a truly reef-safe method to kill ich, it wouldn't be a 'recommendation' by anyone; it would be an order. There wouldn't be 'suggested' forms of treatment like QT or hypo-salinity; you'd just use that stuff. It would completely revolutionize the fishkeeping industry.

It simply doesn't exist. There is nothing on the market, and IMO never will be, that can kill ich in a reef tank without annihilating your invertebrate population and destroying your live-rock. There's no way to target-kill ich without also irreparably damaging your biological system, mobile and sessile invertebrates.

Must be nice, but remember that I have a foot-long Pleco crapping all over the place. ;) If I could find a home for that guy, it would decrease my bio-load so I wouldn't need to do so many water changes.

Most fishless cycles advocate just using straight up ammonia. What's wrong with that, if the idea is just to grow the beneficial bacteria?

I have about 40 fish ranging in size from 1" otocinclus to 3.5" mollies and false Siamese algae eaters in a 55G tank. ;)

Because there's no bacteria. Without the presence of some biological entity to "infect" the tank, the NH3 just sits there and does nothing. Ultimately, the bacteria has to come from the air, etc.. You have to be really patient with the ammonia method because it takes much longer than most other methods.

The other advantage of using fish is that, as you add them over time, your bacterial bed adjusts the population to support the bio-load of your tank. People that cycle with ammonia (or fish food or shrimp) often find that they have to re-cycle when they add fish because they didn't use enough to get a big enough biofilter to accomodate the number of fish they added.

Now the big advantage of pure ammonia over fish food or shrimp is that there's virtually zero chance of introducing Saprolegnia fungus.

To be fair, you're talking about marine tanks and I'm not. There's a considerable amount of science around the use of Napthoquinones to kill freshwater protozoans.

Ah.

That's absolutely right. The freshwater ich is 'killed' by ich-treatments.

Marine Ich isn't. In fact, marine ich really shouldn't be called ich at all, but unfortunately the name stuck.

They're about as similar as cancer and the clap.

Translation: I has a lot of teh poopz too. LMAO

Isn't it actually oodinium or something like that?

The thing is, my tank is HEAVILY planted. The last time I pruned the Hygrophilia - PRUNED - I removed 2.5 GALLONS of plant material. And it covers nearly half of my tank again 4 weeks later!

It's a shame that's a high-light plant or I would offer to take some off your hands. :D

I take it you use CO2? My plants are growing at a steady pace w/ just adding Excel 3x/week and I'm sitting at 1.5 wpg. However, I would love for them to grow faster. I just can't bring myself to spend the money on a CO2 system.

It's not a high-light plant at all. It's probably one of the easier to grow actually.

http://www.aquahobby.com/garden/e_difformis.php

And I did use DIY CO2 for a while but it was SO good that I couldn't keep up with the growth. There appeared to be more plants in my tank than WATER. ROFL

I use Flourish Excel now - it's good enough and it helps keep hair and staghorn algae down too.

Oh, hell, I didn't recognize it by the scientific name... it's just Water Wisteria. Yeah, I have that in both of my tanks. It's damn near growing out of my 5g! I love it! The reason I thought it was high-light was because I did a google search w/ the scientific name and clicked on a site that showed it as high-light for some reason. :shrug:

I'm not trying to be difficult, so pardon my persistence, but this goes against everything I've been reading.

Fishless cycle folks advocate building up the bio filter enough so that it clears out as much ammonia as you can throw at it in 24 hours. I suppose it could take longer than a fish cycle, but it is more humane.

You are the first person to advocate against a fishless cycle that I've seen recently. And I, too, did a fish cycle on my first tank ten years ago, so I'm not anti-fish cycling. Just curious.

Although, it should be a moot point, being that I'm going with a planted tank. Not only do the plants absorb the ammonia, negating the immediate need for a bio filter, but they have the bacteria on them just as old filter media does to spur its growth if there is any excess ammonia present.

Oh, sorry, I gave you the wrong impression. I'm not anti-fishless cycling. I just prefer to cycle with fish.

Quite frankly they all have advantages and disadvantages.

:toast:

Ah, that makes sense!

This is in Columbia, MO - but if I didn't already have a setup extremely similar to this guy, I'd buy this one in a heartbeat.

http://columbiamo.craigslist.org/fuo/2716548333.html

That's a damn nice rig and he has it price at about 1/3 of what you could put it together for (his estimates are a little high).

If anyone has a truck and is willing to drive a bit for it, this is a really good deal. If you want to break it up a bit, there's a lot of stuff in there that I'd like to get my hands on, but 75% of the package would be redundant for me so I'd maybe chip in some money as well.

Holy crap. I could afford to drive to Columbia for that.

Quick update on my situation. The garlic treatment I've been using seems to have worked. The goby and the blenny have really made a turn around, and no more signs of the ich anywhere. I only wish I would have gotten it sooner, and possibly saved my other fish.

I didn't reach the point of using the treatment that htismaqe recommended, so I'm keeping it in my back pocket in case of another outbreak.

That's great!

So I just had a flame angel go nuclear on me; still no idea what happened.

He got some popeye looking stuff in his left eye, but no appreciable loss of appetite or spots or anything. My fish have been a little annoyed over the last few days so I figured he just banged his eye on something when he was swimming. Worst case, he loses sight in it and swims funny.

It started to clear up a little bit, then I noticed one morning he just parked under a rock at the back of my tank. Still swimming, but not trying to come out. The next morning he went into a cave rock I have and just tried to stay up high in it. At that point, I'm figuring something is clearly amiss.

I set up my quarantine and was able to reach in and pull him out of the cave rock. I realize at that point that he's simply gone blind altogether. I put him in QT, drop some Clout in there (nastiest stuff you'll ever use) and give him a day. He seems to be feeling better in the tank, pecking along the bottom, etc... trying to find food even though he can't see. I grab a high-intensity LED and hit him with it and discovered that he's essentially hollowed out through his face. The eye sockets have 'eyes' still, but there's just nothing behind them. They've sunken in and he's starting to lose flesh along his body.

The next day, dead as a stone.

All told, it took about 1 week from start to finish. I have absolutely no clue what led to it or what it was. A lot of parasites are type-specific, so I'm hoping he just had some kind of angelfish funk that came in on the Coral Beauty I tried to add (died within a week).

I'll let it go with no Angel fishes for a month or so to try to let whatever is in there finish out its lifecycle. Then I'll try again and see how it goes.

Crazy; I've never seen anything like that before.

Missing tissue like that sounds like lateral line erosion, which is usually caused by severe nutrient deficiencies. It usually shows up together with an infection (the infection is actually the cause - LLE is really a "symptom")...

Have you ever used Wonder Shells? They're great little mineral blocks that can help defend against these kinds of things...

It's not lateral line erosion; I've seen that before. Besides, I've never heard of Angels getting it. If it shows up in anything, it will show up in my tangs well before the Angel.

I soak my food in Selcon anyway. I feed Mysis, Reef Crack, Enriched Brine and Formula 2, not to mention 3 Norii sheets/week.

If there's anything my fish have going for them, it's that they get fed very very well.

I just can't think of any pathogens that would completely consume internal tissue like that without ANY external signs.

Well like I said, he had that eye get all puffy and cloudy before it caved in.

Like I said, I'm at a loss. I generally have a pretty good idea of what I'm dealing with and I just don't have anything here. Angels can be polyp eaters but I don't have corals that would've done that. I suppose he could've coasted too close to the Anemone and gotten stung, but I believe theirs is a neurotoxin that would've just dropped him dead.

The only other time I've been stumped like this was by a massive crustacean die-off about a year ago. In the span of 24 hours, all 4 peppermint shrimp, both camel shrimp, both cleaner shrimp and a coral banded, not to mention all 3 emerald crabs and who knows how many hermits (though not all) all crapped out on me.

My urchin was just fine. My corals were just fine. I ran the water tests and turned up nothing. If it were water issues, the Urchin would've shown it first anyway (he's the caged canary of my tank). I would have at least shown some burn-off in the SPS and closing up on the LPS and softies. I didn't have anything that would've gone after the shrimp (besides, the Coral Banded was in the sump due to bad behavior).

I never did figure it out. I waited a coupe months, put a couple new cleaner shrimp in and re-populated the hermits, as well as a couple more emerald crabs. About the only thing I can even begin to figure is a power surge or something that put a faint charge through the water; maybe the pump hiccuped. It could also have been a nitrogen blowoff, but I still think that would have shown up somewhere else. I had a Sea Hare die on me a couple months prior, but had he released a toxin it would've shown up immediately. The only other fish in there that was venemous was my fox-face (cool damn fish, highly recommended).

Damn baffling hobby sometimes.

Of course it's just a guess, but I would guess the eye symptoms were a secondary bacterial infection. Aeromonas is a pretty opportunistic bacteria so it's possible the eye was infected because the fish's health was degraded in general. I guess it's also possible that Aeromonas was the primary culprit, since it can result in pretty severe tissue loss if unchecked. However, again it would be extremely rare for it to be bad enough to "rot out" a fish like that before you ever noticed any surface lesions.

Very, very true. We had a situation similar to yours, where we had 14 ghost shrimp all die overnight. Never did figure out why. Luckily they're only .33 each!

I'll have to look that up.

Like I said, he was hiding in the caves and rocks for a couple days. It wasn't until I got him in quarantine that I was able to give him a good look-over. The lesions may have appeared before I recognized them.

Okay, so I got my 10 gallon quarantine tank set up.

1 betta male

1 wisteria plant, 2 java moss, 1 hygro

Ammonia levels are reading 0 and it's been up for about 5 days. Plants aren't looking well, though. Should I add more CO2 and get a better light? It has a 20w fluorescent, but I'm not sure it's a real grow light.

Any advice?

You put plants in your quarantine tank? Several of the meds that might require the use of a QT could hurt the plants, just FYI.

5 days isn't near long enough in most cases. Have you checked your nitrite/nitrate levels? If ammonia is reading zero but nitrate is also zero, your cycle hasn't started, let alone finished.

I would not suggest adding CO2 - at best it will do nothing in your setup, at worst it will screw up water parameters (CO2 lowers pH, sometimes rapidly). Furthermore, the plants you chose should grow well without extra CO2, especially the hygro (water wisteria and hygrophilia difformis are the same plant, BTW).

Can you give more details on your lighting? 20W isn't necessarily insufficient for a 10G tank but there are many other factors to consider other than wattage, particularly the spectral output.

I just put them in there for decoration. Not really worried if they die because of meds. It's just kind of a test run to see how well I can manage a little larger planted tank.

I'm not worried about the cycle starting right now, because the plants should be absorbing all the ammonia.

Light is a grow fluorescent from the pet store.

Well you picked pretty hardy plants. Java moss spreads slowly but surely across just about everything and I couldn't kill the Hygro if I wanted to! :)

Just keep in mind that because you're successful with these two VERY hardy plants doesn't mean you're cut out for plant-keeping. It's been a lot of trial and error for me and a lot of the big box stores don't help because they sell a lot of plants that will NEVER survive fully-submerged no matter how much you baby them.

In the end, cycling really doesn't matter for a QT since there's quite a few meds that would kill your nitrifying bacteria anyway. Just don't leave your plants in there too long!

Grow fluorescents a lot of times come in the range from 5000-5500K color temperature. They make for good supplementary lights (I have one 5500K T5) but for plants, the bulk of your light should be in the 6500K range (usually marketed as "full daylight"). I would check the Kelvin rating just to be sure.

The reasons for this are multiple but the basics have to do with the depth of light penetration and the amount of light output in the useable spectra - yellow/green output is largely useless to plants and can lead to algae problems.

K, I thought it said 6500, but maybe it just sucks.

Also, my hygro and wisteria look completely different. Maybe same family? They're for sure not the same plant. I'll get pics later tonight.

No, if it's a 6500K "plant growth" lamp, it's probably pretty good. Any idea what brand it was by chance?

Well, hygrophilia is the genus. The particular species with the common name water wisteria is hygrophilia difformis. It looks kind of like carrot tops. That's what I have.

What does your other hygro look like, especially the leaves?

Long, and flat, kinda like an Amazon sword.

No idea on the brand. Whatever they sell at Petco.

Like this?

http://www.aquabid.com/uploads/livep...1304642455.jpg

That's hygrophilia polysperma, or dwarf hygro. I don't have any experience with it so I can't say if it is as forgiving as its cousin.

I believe Petco sells Zoo Med, which I use and have had very good luck. I don't know if I already asked this, but what size is the bulb? Is it a screw-in compact fluorescent or an actual tube?

Gotta brag a little bit here - got a new Naso Tang, cleaned the tank up a bit, have been dosing with some coral supplements and am pretty happy with the reef for the moment (though, as ever, this is always the moment things will go haywire:

<iframe width="420" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/VlGu4B4dy5Q" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

(Work is blocking youtube, so this may not work...)

Okay, should be fixed, even if I can't see it.

There's some fairly cool stuff in there now. That little pink guy that flashes around a bit is a mystery wrasse; he's pretty rare and isn't exactly cheap. I've had him for about 9 months now and he's doubled in size. He's an eating machine and has taken to pretty well torturing any new additions that aren't big enough to kick the hell out of him. I have to introduce smaller fish at night and sometimes in pairs to make sure that he'll either miss them or get distracted.

Those clownfish were no bigger than 5 centimeters when I got them from a local breeder. They were sucked into overflows on several occasions and rescued. The big delta-shaped tang is a Dejardinii Sailfin, the Red Sea model; much prettier than his Hawaiian cousin. The Naso is the silverish one with the yellow markings around his eyes. That fish is freakin' awesome - was eating out of my hands in the 2nd day.

I'm going to get a Flame Angel back in there as well as a Kole tang for hair algae control and then probably concentrate on coral growth for awhile. I may get a calcium reactor or some additional water movers that will allow for better corals. Maybe a 250W light setup or better skimmer. The nice SPS corals require extremely clean water and that's just very tough to do with the kind of bio-load I have in that tank; lots of big fish. I'm a fish guy first, corals second.

Well, that is until I inevitably backslide as is normally the case with these things. Then I'll probably want to dump bleach in the whole thing and walk away. It happens every 3 months or so...

That's a nice setup. I'm jealous.

Beautiful tank and awesome video!! I hope to eventually move to saltwater in a couple of years.

that's a fantastic red tail shark. really. i never had luck with mine. i went through 3 or 4 and finally stopped trying. they'd get some sort of bloating and look like pineapples. and die. nothing else in the tank would die/get sick. you've got great balance of fish and veg.
getting the itch to start up again!

Thanks! The RT Shark is actually Gonzo's fish. That bastard will never die, (I'm referring to the fish, not Gonzo). LMAO The shark has been in this tank since we started it up almost 2 years ago. He's been through a lot. I had a Marineland heater malfunction and damn near boil all of my fishes, but he, along w/ a few others survived.

It sounds like your sharks had Dropsy. If that was the case, none of the other fishes would have gotten it. I've had a few get it, and sadly, there's not much that you can do for them. Some suggest Epsom salt baths and feeding blanched peas, but I never had luck.

i don't know why, but i lol'd pretty hard at that.
my wife is becoming suspicious.LMAO

:evil:

My last 58 mini mbuna tank..... I had/have a good collection of rocks.

http://img39.imageshack.us/img39/5738/1001290.jpg

http://img833.imageshack.us/img833/4323/1001299a.jpg

LOVE it.

Enjoy the hornwort and wisteria while you can.

I started with two 6-inch pieces of hornwort when I first started with plants.

In 4 weeks, the flow of water had turned it into a bushy ball. When I painstakingly unraveled the ball, I had 4 strands over SIX FEET long.

I prune 4-6" off my wisteria every 2 weeks and it doesn't seem to make a real dent.

Was it a Stealth (black polymer)? They recalled those and I got 100% of my money back by mailing it to them.

Yep, pine-coning usually means dropsy. Epsom salt baths and peas (I use frozen peas and thaw them in tank water) are both excellent suggestions. I would also suggest adding Methylene Blue to the salt baths.

You can also feed anti-biotic food but it usually won't work because sick fish don't want to eat.

Thanks! I'm sure I would have the same problem w/ growth if I would remember to dose my Excel every other day. Lately, I've been forgetting to do so and my plants are looking a little rough.

Yep. It was a Stealth, (I can't remember the model number, but it was on the recall list). I ended up taking mine back to Petco and they gave me store credit. Funny thing is, I originally bought it on sale and they gave me a full price credit. Ha! Suckers! I ended up buying an Aqueon 200w Submersible Heater. So far, so good.

Excellent advice on the Dropsy, btw! :thumb:

Excel probably helps keep algae down moreso than anything else, just based on the plants you do have.

For instance, the wisteria could grow 2 inches PER DAY even without Excel, in my experience. Both it and the hornwort seem to go through an explosive growth period once they reach about 4-6" tall.

What all do you have in there. I saw Anacharis (something I've never had luck with, it just melts), maybe Bacopa, some swords, and Java Fern.

Fish sucks.

http://i1.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/...9d82822723.gif

IIRC, I have 2 Amazon Swords, Anubias (Nana and Petite), Crested Java Fern, Cryptocoryne (Wendtii and Spiralis), and Water Wisteria. In the video, you will notice 2 purple plants, (left-rear), 2 large plants, (center and right-rear), and a burgundy plant, (left-front) - those are plastic. I have since removed all of my fake plants.

Duh, I saw the crypt wendtii, don't know why I didn't mention them (since I have dozens of them). You'll like those - you carefully place them where you want them and a couple weeks later, a whole new plant springs up out of the gravel, 6 inches away. :)

I guess what I'm trying to get at is don't get "set" on your layout. It's going to change because live plants won't ever do what YOU want them to do. Once you accept that fact, it gets a lot easier (not being OCD like I am helps too!).

Oh, trust me. I've moved those plants around so much that you would think that I have OCD too. LMAO Plus, I have a 5 gallon w/ a few plants as well. When they get too big for that tank, I move them to my 55 gallon.

My main problem at the moment, (besides slow growth), is green spot and black beard algae. I recently adjusted my photoperiod by using a timer and I only have 84 watts of usable light, plus 28w Roseate.

I get GSA and BBA too. The oto catfish and SAEs help some but not completely. I honestly don't think they can be avoided. Just peel off a few leaves once in a while to reduce the ugly factor.

On my 55G I have a 54W T5 HO 6500K "full daylight" and two 15W 18" T8 6500K, so 138 total watts of full spectrum. I also have a 54W T5 HO 5500K Roseate.

I will say this - given your total wattage, I'd dump the Roseate. Depth penetration of 5000-5500K lighting is pretty poor, so it will only affect your tallest plants and even then, it's only going to help certain ones. It makes my Ludwigia turn downright pick, for example. But it doesn't even get to my crypts because they're too deep. You'd be better off adding another 28W of 6500K full spectrum light.

Thank you for the advice! Sadly, I'm not running HO. I just have 2 - 48" Coralife Aqualight 56w double strip light fixtures over my tank.

In one of the fixtures I have 1-6500k + 1-10000k. In the other fixture I have 1-6500k + the Roseate. I had considered changing out the Roseate w/ another 6500k, but I was afraid that would produce too many watts per gallon. Btw, I'm not using CO2, just dosing Excel.