Tips and Tricks

[sidguppy]

I agree with Jools on this.

while salt is one of the oldskool cures for diseases like velvet, ich and other ciliates; it's not good to keep fish on "meds" the whole time

this is akin to using methylene blue every day, just not as toxic. it's the same philosophy as our industrial agriculture: like the daily dose of antibiotics they give to chickens, pigs and cattle

the results of wich we have seen in the news for years: immune germs and immune diseases.

you really don't want a salt resistant strain of ich in the hobby.

salt has it's uses:
as a cure for ich and similar ailments
as a necessity for brackish fish like hexanematichthys

but adding it on a daily base to true freshwater fish isn't good.

[apistomaster]

SA Catfish are not any more sensitive to salt than other fish when used as an adjunct to some treatments but outside of treating certain conditions, salt has no place in SA Catfish tanks unless they are one of the brackish water species.

[Dave Rinaldo]

I use squeeze bottles for feeding bits and micro pellets.

[Jools]

Dave,

I shall be very careful if visiting your place for a swift burger!

Jools

[Dinyar]

I attach a Lee's cone worm feeder to the gravel tube of my Python siphon when I'm draining water out of my tanks. Fits well and keeps even the smallest fish out.

I rarely stir up my substrate with the gravel tube. If I really need to do that, then I do it without the feeding cone.

[apistomaster]

I use nylon fly screen held in place by a rubber band.
It is easier than messing with a worm feeding cone.

[sidguppy]

Dave,

I shall be very careful if visiting your place for a swift burger!

wot?
it stimulates nice growth of good finnage and healthy scales and bright colors
we all want that, don't we?

[JoePlec]

one thing we dont want to see is a plec with bloat

[andywoolloo]

apistomaster wrote

I use nylon fly screen held in place by a rubber band.
It is easier than messing with a worm feeding cone.

I do the same.

[pleconut]

This is a great thread I found, so i thought I'd give it a bump so us later joining folks here on the forum can get in and add ours too -and maybe some of those original posters still here can update us with their latest acquired tips! Heres some of the things I do in relation to my Panoquolus sp L397 tank. Fix twisted wood roots under the back rims of the tank going down towards substrate and outwards into give them the cover they like below (and stops the wood floating around!) and handy with some plants attached (plecos won't munch on them) to shield them from light. Roots/branches are extending down to bottom of tank. I will also be attaching with silicone some twisted roots going into tank to an acrylic sheets used like a condensation tray i can simply remove it with the roots attached to it, so i can easily work in the tank as needed - and without the annoyance of getting my hands caught up in them. It gives them the wood they eat, but also keeps substrate clearer. They can reach the wood structures at different points from the slate pieces at the back and sides their caves are under. Straight bogwood roots will also make for a good background if you prevent build up and fish going behind it -but i'm still working on this. Another tip -probably required in a tank like this- but also for those spot feeders, those planting devices you can get, basically a long stick with a gripper at one end- good for placing (or removing) food like veggies by caves (good for when plecos are at a stage when they don't leave the cave) and without disturbing fish too much.

[pleconut]

Oh, and the adhesive labels you buy from stationary outlets, put on electrical plugs of equipment too- so i know exactly what I'm unplugging during maintainence- and hopefully plug back in afterwards.

[bekateen]

Although I know some people think using a garden hose to refill tanks is a bad idea, I have a garden hose dedicated just for the purpose of draining and refilling my larger tanks. One thing I worry about is having fish, floating plants, and sand get sucked into the hose while draining the tank. To avoid this, and to break up the water stream while refilling, I attach a soaker nozzle to the end of the hose:

[pleconut]

I really need to invest in something like this. Mainly as my next tank will be over 500 litres.

[TwoTankAmin]

I use a plastic garden hose sprinkler with a ball valve. The valve lets me adjust or turn off the flow.



I nip off the pieces that hold the metal lawn spike they come with- takes about 3 seconds.

For years I used regular garden hoses for refills until it became impossible to find them w/o a mold inhibitor and I switched to drinking water quality hoses. I never had any issues with regular garden hoses and I used them to refill tanks with zebra plecos and wild caught altum angels with no apparent ill effects over the years.

While I usually refill tanks using a pump and holding containers, in one area where I created a "fish space" and installed a utility sink I made sure he faucet was adapted to permit a garden hose to screw dirctly into the faucet. My portable ro/di unit comes with a garden hose adapter input already installed. Sure makes it easier to batch ro/di. I also use garden hose splitters with ball valves to allow me to get water out of two different hose adapters at the same time and independently control the flow from each one separately.

[backstreetgambler]

As any keeper of corys can testify to, they are suckers for worms. so to for freeze dried tubifex worms. Only problem is those cubes don't sink and the corys won't come to the surface for food.

Well, you can tie a bit of fishing line to a small nail. then gently drill a hole in the tubifex cube with the nail and then just drop it in and let it sink. It will within minutes.

Then just sit back and enjoy the feeding frenzy!