Elessar78 Posted July 13, 2014 Share Posted July 13, 2014 Was at Walmart the other day and we walked by the aquariums and my kids went nuts! We're not animal people, but I can totally get behind this. What's the start-up cost and ongoing maintenace (cost and time) for a small aquarium? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
twa Posted July 13, 2014 Share Posted July 13, 2014 Was at Walmart the other day and we walked by the aquariums and my kids went nuts! We're not animal people, but I can totally get behind this. What's the start-up cost and ongoing maintenace (cost and time) for a small aquarium? depends on what ya put in it, I'd suggest a vase with a beta or some comets to test the waters it can get expensive and time consuming if ya let it....and a small one is more trouble than they are worth imo http://www.peteducation.com/article.cfm?c=16+2168&aid=1525 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mocountyskins Posted July 13, 2014 Share Posted July 13, 2014 I had Red Belly Piranhas for a few years. Got them to be the size of my palm. Fed them live goldfish. That was fun. My dad use to have 2 50 gallon salt water fish tanks for years from the time I was a baby till a few years ago. He had eel and clown fish and the Dora one from memo and a lot of them There was one big problem. Salt water fish can cost 100 per fish and its a lot of work. But anytime you lose power for more than a few hours all of the fish will die. But you said fresh water so yea Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
twa Posted July 13, 2014 Share Posted July 13, 2014 A plecostomus can get pretty big. had a couple get up to about a foot and become pond critters Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chipwhich Posted July 13, 2014 Share Posted July 13, 2014 It's a lot more work than figuring out how to stream netflix. I gave up on the aquarium scene. Water gets too dirty too fast unless you invest in a large enough aquarium and a ton of time and money. This is the only way to go to get started, and buy your sal****er. http://www.marinedepot.com/ps_viewitem.aspx?idproduct=RS40010&child=RS40010&utm_source=adwordsfroogle&utm_medium=cse&utm_campaign=adwordsfroogle&utm_content=RS40010&gclid=COG9n8zDwr8CFc3m7AodAVQArw Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Grumpy Vet Posted July 13, 2014 Share Posted July 13, 2014 I bought the whole set up (stand, filter, light, etc) from a friend. It has a filter but I don't know what kind other than it's external (hangs off the back of the tank), has a blue filter element inside of it and is fairly quiet. As far as lighting, I think it's just regular fluorescent. Glad to hear you have a HOB (hang on back) filter. That helps things. If you haven't picked up a couple replacement cartridges - you probably should. More than likely - the cartridge is a combination mechanical filter with some activated charcoal inside. You should replace that filter every now and again. The filter is nice because it gives you some mechanical and chemical filtration while helping to oxygenate the tank. If you get into the hobby more - there are all kinds of fun little tweaks you can do to your system. I've purchased a bunch of my stuff on Craig's list, Ebay or other classifieds. It can be an expensive hobby - but if you aren't in a rush - some gently used stuff usually comes along at 50 - 75% of retail. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
zoony Posted July 13, 2014 Share Posted July 13, 2014 GV what is your secret to doing a 15 minute water change on a 100 gallon FOWLR setup? I have a customer who is the world heavyweight champion of sal****er tanks. He has a few acrylic 300 gallon plus setups. The tanks consume his life. He even has an app on his phone where he can monitor the tanks I know for my planted tank it was average 16 minutes a day. Sure some days were less but when you factor everything in it averages about that. Just clipping the plants can overtake your life Just not buying the 15 minutes per month though I do agree having a balanced tank will cut the time investment tremendously Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mufumonk Posted July 13, 2014 Share Posted July 13, 2014 What we have in the fresh water tank now are 4 danios, 2 German blue cichlids and 2 German baloon cichlids. We had a snail until 2 days ago... it died. A snail dying soon after being added (all the fish have only been in the tank for about 2 weeks), is that a sign that something is wrong? Your tank is fundamentally flawed. It's too small not just for the amount but the type of fish. German cichlids are mostly passive unless they are spawning provided they have places to hide. Otherwise they become territorial and aggressive. They don't like shoaling fish either (read: Danios) so don't be surprised if they start showing signs of distress due to nipping. As for the snail? Cichlids LOVE snails. Go with a Pleco instead. Just make sure you provide algae wafers for it to munch on. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
zoony Posted July 13, 2014 Share Posted July 13, 2014 As for fish cichlids are pretty but they really limit what kind if other fish and plants and critters you can add. Also 16 gallons seems a bit small for cichlids. I would stick with tropical schooling fish, a lot less headache and if you buy the right ones they can really generate a lot of interest and beauty in your tank. Some cool cichlids tanks I've seen are usually done with large rocks and that's about it. Hard to get a lot of variety and color in a cichlids tank IMO Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mufumonk Posted July 13, 2014 Share Posted July 13, 2014 As for fish cichlids are pretty but they really limit what kind if other fish and plants and critters you can add. Also 16 gallons seems a bit small for cichlids. I would stick with tropical schooling fish, a lot less headache and if you buy the right ones they can really generate a lot of interest and beauty in your tank. Some cool cichlids tanks I've seen are usually done with large rocks and that's about it. Hard to get a lot of variety and color in a cichlids tank IMO You can get brilliant colors provided you go with African Cichlids. They require a bit more care than your average community tank but not the extremes of sal****er. And not as costly either.Edit: Profanity filter fail! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
zoony Posted July 13, 2014 Share Posted July 13, 2014 You can get brilliant colors provided you go with African Cichlids. They require a bit more care than your average community tank but not the extremes of sal****er. And not as costly either. Edit: Profanity filter fail! Yah I meant color of everything else in the tank When I was deciding which direction to go I looked into cichlids because they are vibrantly colored fish. But from what I remember you really limit what you can do with your tank. Like I said every cichlids tank I researched had rocks and more rocks. . So then I looked at sal****er and finally settled on planted tanks which, IMO, are exponentially more beautiful than sal****er setups But I never raised cichlids so I don't know much about them, really. I might actually take back my pH comment above because iirc cichlids do require a high pH. Nonetheless I wouldn't recommend cichlids for a 16 gallon beginner tank Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Grumpy Vet Posted July 13, 2014 Share Posted July 13, 2014 GV what is your secret to doing a 15 minute water change on a 100 gallon FOWLR setup? I have a customer who is the world heavyweight champion of sal****er tanks. He has a few acrylic 300 gallon plus setups. The tanks consume his life. He even has an app on his phone where he can monitor the tanks I know for my planted tank it was average 16 minutes a day. Sure some days were less but when you factor everything in it averages about that. Just clipping the plants can overtake your life Just not buying the 15 minutes per month though I do agree having a balanced tank will cut the time investment tremendously Hiya Zoony. I can understand your skepticism. Automation. I have a RO/DI (reverse osmosis / deionization) filter hard plumbed to the pipes in my basement. This unit makes totally pure and filtered water. I have floats that shut it off after the container is full.....so I always have replacement water ready to go. I've been doing this a long time - so I know I put 4 scoops of salt mix in the container with a powerhead and heater to stir it all up. That takes maybe 5 minutes. I carry that tub upstairs. I put a siphon in the tank and siphon out one tub of water from the tank and pump up the new water as a replacement. I check the salinity with a refractometer and make any corrections. I add half a tub of filtered water to the top-off reservoir that is on a timer and replaces evaporated water twice daily via an Aqualifter air pump. Ten minutes tops. Probably every four months, I clean the powerheads, filter and skimmer. One of the things I have going for me is the balanced ecosystem that is not heavily stocked. A FOWLR - is a fish only w/ live rock. The live rock helps to filter and balance the tank...but if you go full on reef - you have not only live rock filter the water, but you have crabs, shrimp, star fish, snails, fish and corals that all do their part. Honestly, I've gone months without doing water changes when life gets a little hectic - and like Jurassic Park - nature just kind of figures it out. That said, the tank was always healthier when I did regular water changes. You can make this as hard as you want. I have friends that have similar systems to your customer that automate everything from sunrise to sunset and will text them if a water parameter is out of whack. While that sounds great - the more intricate you make it - the more that can go wrong. My current tank in the living room is a pretty simple 29Gallon High. I have a 125G in the basement that I'm amassing equipment, as I find for sale used, so I can build it into the wall. Should be a fun project. I'm about 90% there. Probably the best tank I ever had was my seahorse hex tank. That was really cool. Stupid hurricane knocked our power out for 6 days.....you can keep a tank going for a while with battery backup air pumps and water pumps...but only for so long. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
zoony Posted July 13, 2014 Share Posted July 13, 2014 Is evaporation an issue? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Grumpy Vet Posted July 13, 2014 Share Posted July 13, 2014 I definitely agree on the size of the tank. It seems counter intuitive - but the larger the tank - generally the easier it is. Less room for error, especially for someone new to the hobby. The hardest tanks to keep are the nano tanks. If you like the hobby - watch for Petco's $1 per gallon sale on tanks. You can pick up a good size freshwater tank pretty cheap that will allow you more flexibility: https://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20140127113431AASIiBP Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Grumpy Vet Posted July 13, 2014 Share Posted July 13, 2014 Is evaporation an issue? Yes sir. In a SW aquarium - the water evaporates, but the salt does not - it remains constant. So if you don't replace the evaporated water, you'll kill everything with too high a specific gravity (too high salinity). The 29G tank evaporates about a 1/8th of a gallon of water per day. This is due to glass cover on the tank, high intensity light and multiple pumps for water circulation. When I had the 125G set up - it would evaporate almost a gallon per day. The lights in most sal****er tanks are pretty powerful - so most of us run open tops. On Springfield's freshwater tank - I'm guessing he has glass over the top of it and a light sitting on the glass. He'll notice that the water is evaporating but is being blocked by the glass. The water is condensing on the glass and falling back into the tank - so he'll have much less evaporation. What he will have to watch is heat. The more enclosed the top is - the more like a green house it becomes and the temperature of the tank rises. One other pretty cool thing to play with is the color spectrum of the light. Most tanks come with a soft white bulb around (5,000K) Even with a normal output fluorescent light - you can buy different color temperature bulbs. This makes an amazing difference in the way a tank looks. You can even add two lights of different colors and you'll get some colors popping that are pretty cool: http://www.plantedtank.net/forums/showpost.php?s=f2ba46d5e5e0110f10091f6747de07dd&p=916386&postcount=8 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HOF44 Posted July 13, 2014 Share Posted July 13, 2014 Pez needs to check in here. He is having a huge in the wall tank put in. I think like 250 gallons. In sure he has tons to add Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
zoony Posted July 13, 2014 Share Posted July 13, 2014 Evaporation was what finally made me throw in the towel. Every few days whether I wanted to or not I was mixing water and adding it. It is never an easy process no matter what anyone says I've read about some tank setups that have trickle inlets and dechlorinator with spillover drains... Very advanced stuff that I believe is all custom. They even will fertilize for you in the recommended doses Anyways the monetary and time investment to GET to a place where the monetary and time investment is minimal is, IMO, insurmountable. At least at this point in my life But I could see myself in retirement really attempting some truly self sustaining setups... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Grumpy Vet Posted July 13, 2014 Share Posted July 13, 2014 Certainly don't want to dominate the thread - if I can help anyone - I'm happy to do so. No matter the level of aquarist - there is something rather cathartic about watching fish swim. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Springfield Posted July 13, 2014 Author Share Posted July 13, 2014 Ok, another question. How often and how much should I be feeding them? I have flake that I've been feeding twice a day, two pinches. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Grumpy Vet Posted July 13, 2014 Share Posted July 13, 2014 When in doubt - feed less. My general rule is to turn off the pumps - feed some flakes and whatever they will eat in about a minute or two without any left over falling to the bottom - that is about right. We have a timed feeder on our tank that works pretty well once dialed in: http://www.amazon.com/Everyday-Feeder-Programmable-Automatic-Dispenser/dp/B001F2117I Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BlueinBuf Posted July 13, 2014 Share Posted July 13, 2014 I've had feshwater tanks most of my life. I currently have a 55 gallon with African Cichlids, this was my first time with Cichlids so I went all out, bought an Eheim canister filter(would never go back to HOB filters now). Bought tons of rock online(zoony is right most cichlid setups are rock to imitate their natural habitat), even bought the fish online, that part made me the most nervous but all 15 fish ended up healthy and happy that was just over a year ago and all the fish are doing well. I'm currently debating setting up a fry tank, my cichlids are breeding all the time and I think growing out some fry would be pretty cool. Just going back and forth on what I would want to do, remove female from tank and disrupt the whole tank when I put her back in or pulling her out and stripping the fry, or just putting some "traps" in the tank that only the fry could get into. Still not sure. Also I have a 75 gallon reef ready tank in my basement that I want to setup but my house isn't air conditioned and I worry about the heat in the summer and I really really don't want to buy a water chiller. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
zoony Posted July 13, 2014 Share Posted July 13, 2014 Yes Springfield you would be amazed how little food it takes. I would feed my fish 1/4 of a frozen block of bloodworms every third day or so. The more food you enter into your tank the more problems you will have Twice a day is way too much I think but maybe not, again I'm not familiar with cichlids Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Grumpy Vet Posted July 13, 2014 Share Posted July 13, 2014 Also I have a 75 gallon reef ready tank in my basement that I want to setup but my house isn't air conditioned and I worry about the heat in the summer and I really really don't want to buy a water chiller. Keep an eye out during the winter for used chillers on Ebay, Craigslist..."fish forums" etc - you can get a slightly used one very cheap. I think I picked up my 1/4 HP for around $125 and it worked like a champ on the 125G. I'd think a 1/4 HP chiller could drop the temp on a 75G tank about 30 degrees running full out. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Springfield Posted July 31, 2014 Author Share Posted July 31, 2014 So we lost 5 of 8 fish last night, right after changing 30% of the water. What we had before were 4 cichlids, 2 of which were German Blues and 2 were Blue Baloons. We also had 4 danios, 3 zebras and one neon red. My wife was concerned that two of our cichlids were unhealthy. (One of the Blue Baloons and one of the German Blues). They were less colorful than the others and slightly smaller. The LFS suggested to change the water after testing it. So she bought about 5 gallons of their "pre-cycled" water there and brought it home. We tested both ph and ammonia and both were high (the tank is less than one month old). We then syphoned about 30% of the water out and added the water my wife bought at the store. One by one the danios started to die off. They started swimming erratically and then died. After that the Blue Baloon that looked unhealthy died. We suspect that the unhealthy looking Blue German will be dead soon. So all we have left after that are the fish that appeared healthy before the water change. Any ideas or advice? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
skinsmarydu Posted July 31, 2014 Share Posted July 31, 2014 Any ideas or advice?Did you document anything by camera? I don't have an extreme knowledge of these things, but for someone to recommend only changing SOME of your water...never heard of that unless you're de-salinating slowly for experiments. So sorry, dude. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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