hi all
Thabo here
new to the hobby - haven't even had goldfish in the house, but I have had a successful aquaponics setup in the backyard for a couple years with some rather delicious hybrid striped bass (that tastes like tomatoes, and tomatoes that tastes like bass) so not a complete newby to the science.
I have wanted to keep fish ever since I visited the New York aquarium as a 10 year old - that was when I decided I would become a marine biologist.
Long story short... I became an aeronautics engineer and now make big metal birds all shiny again after the pilots and loaders have dented them.
Our middle kid needs some extra attention and alone-time from his father and a hobby that his siblings are not interested in, so... saltwater aquarium here we come.
I am probably going about this all wrong but after properly pricing a 75 gallon tank for myself about a year ago, all I could convince the boss would be a good idea was a small second hand 10 gallon setup.
the tank has a built in sump in the rear and came with a pump, a 25w heater that didn't work (at least it was stuck off and not stuck on), a 2w led light that burnt out within a day, and a bubble magnus qq of questionable integrity.
it also came with a couple pounds of rock which were still damp and no doubt host some STDs (second-hand transmittable diseases).
almost everything was dumped, and bought some dry rock, a new pump, 4W light and heater.
My son is bilingual and can read English but only as a second language and is much more comfortable in Hebrew.
There are only 4 books on aquariums available in Hebrew including one which is badly translated from French and is about 200 years old.
The only decent book I could find is a translation of Dick Mill's "you and your aquarium" so that'll have to do as an introduction for him.
started cycling at the begining of the year and a couple months ago before the lock-down started we added 2 small darwin clowns once the cycle had matured.
we originally used API test set but i dumped that for a Salifet set after loosing confidence in the API
after a couple months on the advice of several marine pet shops in the area we added a fridmani and an indigo psuedochromis.
since it's a really small tank we are not planning on adding any more fish other than a goby which could aid with cleaning.
we are doing water changes every 2 weeks and dosing with nitrophos minus daily
parameters have been steady throughout (no3 climbed to very high numbers until we started dosing).
ph -8.4
nh3 - 0.1 or lower
no2 - 0.0
no3 - 20
we have brown algae which i assume are diatomes over the rocks and on the lower regions of the walls.
some patches are now turning green and we have recently seen a few tiny spots which are white with a purple tinge.
any idea what these might be?
Happy to hear advice from you all
Thabo here
new to the hobby - haven't even had goldfish in the house, but I have had a successful aquaponics setup in the backyard for a couple years with some rather delicious hybrid striped bass (that tastes like tomatoes, and tomatoes that tastes like bass) so not a complete newby to the science.
I have wanted to keep fish ever since I visited the New York aquarium as a 10 year old - that was when I decided I would become a marine biologist.
Long story short... I became an aeronautics engineer and now make big metal birds all shiny again after the pilots and loaders have dented them.
Our middle kid needs some extra attention and alone-time from his father and a hobby that his siblings are not interested in, so... saltwater aquarium here we come.
I am probably going about this all wrong but after properly pricing a 75 gallon tank for myself about a year ago, all I could convince the boss would be a good idea was a small second hand 10 gallon setup.
the tank has a built in sump in the rear and came with a pump, a 25w heater that didn't work (at least it was stuck off and not stuck on), a 2w led light that burnt out within a day, and a bubble magnus qq of questionable integrity.
it also came with a couple pounds of rock which were still damp and no doubt host some STDs (second-hand transmittable diseases).
almost everything was dumped, and bought some dry rock, a new pump, 4W light and heater.
My son is bilingual and can read English but only as a second language and is much more comfortable in Hebrew.
There are only 4 books on aquariums available in Hebrew including one which is badly translated from French and is about 200 years old.
The only decent book I could find is a translation of Dick Mill's "you and your aquarium" so that'll have to do as an introduction for him.
started cycling at the begining of the year and a couple months ago before the lock-down started we added 2 small darwin clowns once the cycle had matured.
we originally used API test set but i dumped that for a Salifet set after loosing confidence in the API
after a couple months on the advice of several marine pet shops in the area we added a fridmani and an indigo psuedochromis.
since it's a really small tank we are not planning on adding any more fish other than a goby which could aid with cleaning.
we are doing water changes every 2 weeks and dosing with nitrophos minus daily
parameters have been steady throughout (no3 climbed to very high numbers until we started dosing).
ph -8.4
nh3 - 0.1 or lower
no2 - 0.0
no3 - 20
we have brown algae which i assume are diatomes over the rocks and on the lower regions of the walls.
some patches are now turning green and we have recently seen a few tiny spots which are white with a purple tinge.
any idea what these might be?
Happy to hear advice from you all
