QUOTE(davlee @ Dec 10 2015, 03:46 PM)
Hi everyone... newbie here.
Last two weeks, went to LFS and bought 2 pairs of guppy. Just wanted to play around with it and put into my empty round bowl... after 2 weeks, one of the female gave birth! I was so thrilled of this. It seems like the first time ever that the fish that I rear gave birth. Soon, it triggered my interest again in rearing fish...
Now, I'm planning to get a proper tank, say 2ft and aim to rear about 20 guppies, for show on my living room. Been doing some reading but really dont have the time to dig much deeper. And so I found this thread, hoping all the sifus here will share some experiences with me...
Below are the items that I'm thinking to get for my 2ft tank... hope any sifu here can just gimme some guideline and tips...
For tank setup:
1) Tank and cabinet
2) Canister Filter (I thinking to get Fluval 206 or Dophin CF800. Dophin comes with UV. Will this UV helps prevent diseases?)
3) Heater and Thermometer
4) Air pump - necessary?
5) LED Light
6) Anything that I missed?
For Aquascape (Zero idea on this... I wish to get some "lazy" aqua plant)...
1) Aqua Soil - necessary? Or I can just get gravel? No idea at all
2) Aqua powder?
3) Liquid CO2?
4) Plant food?
5) Driftwood and stones (deco)
I read that some aquarium, not sure what is the setup, seems like no need to change water for months or even a year. Is it the UV at work?
These are what I have in mind right now... huh, will be quite an investment there. Hope sifus can comment a bit. Many thanks!
hello, it depend on what kind of tank you wanna do, planted tank? with co2? or breeding of guppy? it depends on your main purpose, if you are to breed pure strain guppies, 2ft is too big and 1 tank is not enough, just a bare tank will do for breeding of guppies.
but from your description, it seems like you are going to do a planted tank and put guppies in it, ppl are not really keen on putting guppy in planted tank because they are not schooling fish like tetra, etc. but you can still put of course.
let's go through your tank setup.
1) Tank and cabinet
2) Canister Filter is good, i recommend eheim 2215 for 2ft planted tank, I personally have not tried fluval or dolphin before, so cannot comment. but, no point getting the one with UV thingy, not necessary.
3) you don't need a Heater, but a Thermometer allows you to monitor your tank temperature, just a cheap one will do for reading only.
4) Air pump - it depends, often planted tank would have a layer of oil film on the surface, air pump can help break the oil film though not necessary. it also depends on whether you would have co2 or not, co2 is hard to dissolve in the water when the level of oxygen is too high, hence, normally i would recommend to switch on air pump (if any) at night only. it also helps aeration. also, it depends on whether your fauna are gasping for air, if yes, means your level of co2 is too high and hence you should have an air pump. (though generally, no need air pump for a planted tank).
With regards to the oil film, if you are using a canister filter, you can opt to have lily pipe (which you cost you a fair bit), lift the lily pipe at night to the surface, it can help break the oil film and perform night aeration and more beautiful for your tank.
5) LED Light, yes important, get a good one.
6) Anything that I missed? yes, you miss something important, to keep the temperature down, it depends on what flora and fauna you wanna keep, certain type requires low temperature like 24 or 25 degree Celsius. like crystal red shrimps etc. the temperature in our country is always high at around 30 degree. so if you wanna achieve that temperature, you need a chiller (which will cost you quite a lot, and quite high electricity consumption), if you are not planning to keep those, you can make do with a DIY fan (save cost), this would allow you to achieve around 27-28 degree which is quite good for normal plant, like Moss and some stem plants like rotala etc.
Also, do you want to use co2? if yes, buy one or DIY co2? some plants would survive and stunt growth without co2, plants would thrive with co2, right water flow and temperature. so you gotta think about it.
For Aquascape (Zero idea on this... I wish to get some "lazy" aqua plant)...
1) Aqua Soil - necessary? Or I can just get gravel? No idea at all.
it depends on what kind of tank you wanna set up, if you are trying have a full planted tank with carpet plant and stem plants etc, you should get aqua soil, i would recommend ADA amazonia, really good. Secondly, if you wanna just set up a moss tank, you might not need soil, maybe can use full sand as substrate, but white sands are hard to maintain, especially when the algae kicks in. not really recommended for a newbie (speaking from experience, my algae on my sands are just simply yucks! lol. Lastly, if you are tight on budget, there are ppl use holland sands, those cheap ones, as subtract, but very hard to keep stem plants. think about it.
2) Aqua powder? do you mean those ADA powder like penac W, penac C, bacter 100, etc? if you have the budget, yes, some ppl would recommend you to go ahead, together with power sand below the subtract, but not cheap though. also, it depends on yourself, do you like rescaping? if yes, how often? every year? ADA doesn't really rescape, if you don't plan to rescape, for a long time (like 3-5 years, or even more), yes, those ADA products can help you a lot. if you like rescaping every year, then I would say, save those, just go with ADA amazonia will do. no need the others.
But for the penac W, penac C, bacter 100, I have better use for it, buy just 2 scoops of the Penac W and Penac C, 1 scoop of Bacter 100. After you have set up your tank (water fully filled), get a 500 ml empty bottle, pour them inside, mix with water, shake well (5-10 minutes shake), then pour into your tank. Your tank will look super cloudy that you can't see a shit. Yes, you can't see anything at all. but don't worry, just let the filter run. After 24 hours, you will see super crystal clear water, no one outside will teach you.
3) Liquid CO2? I don't really encourage the use of liquid co2, they will sway your PH level, if you have shrimps in your tank, they might take the toll. if you don't have shrimp then its ok. the next thing about Liquid CO2 is that it is very good at killing algae, next time let me know when you wanna know. Seachem Excel is excellent in killing certain type of algae when you do a "specific area treatment", very hard to tell here, can share with you how next time.
I won't say you won't completely don't need it, it's good to have too, but just be mindful with the amount that you use.
4) Plant food? do you mean fertiliser? yes, plants would require fertiliser, there are plenty on the market, ADA (expensive!), DoAqua! (cheaper version by ADA), Seachem and some other brands what you can consider. you gotta have, high demand plants need them.
5) Driftwood and stones (deco), as for drift woods and ryu stone is entirely up to you how you wanna set up your scape, draw out something before materialising it. You can tie moss to the driftwoods, which can be very beautiful. Google for
IAPLC pictures to have idea on how you wanna do it. then mould one yourself.
Sorry for the late reply as promised few days ago, but i think these are more to planted tank talk than guppy talk, i think we shall take this back to planted tank talk.
Good luck in your aquascaping journey.
QUOTE(sniper on the roof @ Dec 10 2015, 03:52 PM)
Need some advice here...
Some time ago, I nbtd go pinjam my albino full red female to my colleague to distract his male sky blue.
After getting her back, she's alone in her own tank and had given birth 3 times to non-albino fries.
Do you guys think I need to get a new female for breeding?
Isn't sky blue = albino blue tuxedo? which is also albino right?
nonetheless, i reckon you could try mating back with male AFR, see if the dropping still come out non-albino?
but i think it's easier to just get a new pair, you're in taiwan right? plenty of them at a cheaper price la!