stick with freshwater fish

I love the guys on the freshwater forum, I read 100% of what is posted and agree with 98% (except the now famous beef heart/Discus forum), At least Anthony and Holgar is on my wavelength and if I have a question, or challenge something they bother to reply.

I have not looked at the marine side of the ITFS for nearly a month, I gave up when the forum only wanted info, and would not respond to simple questions or when I challenged something.

For someone that has freshwater fish and is comteplating going marine, I personally think the ITFS marine forum is so dangerous from a factual point of view in what is been posted. I dont want to quote percentages, but lets just say our freshwater forum is second to none.

This is a shame, marines are my strong point, and plants and african fish compatibility are my weak points, my advice is to stick with freshwater or if you are going marine buy the book "beginner to breader", by Martin Moe 1992, at least you will be driven in the right direction.

Happy new year to all.
Sean

I was just about to pick your brain on Marines.
I have a 400l tank that contains only catfish and some cichlid fry. The fry will be gone in January and I might bite the bullet and change over to saltwater.
The problem I have is that the tank get tons of sunlight in the summer and if I move it to the other wall there is a radiator there.
I have beeen told that temperture fluctuations and sunlight on a Marine tank is a no no.
My other half also wants to wait till we move to a new house.
This move could be years away.
Thats why I have not built my fish house yet.

Once I get the basics right I will be ok. I will buy the books and pester everyone for help.
The reason I have not turned over before is that I love Africans and catfish and my desire for Marine fish was not that great even though they look fabulous.
I am more into the vertebrates and soft corals.

Is it possible to place a tank in any of these places. I want to keep my Africans too and if I got rid of them she would hunt me down and castrate me.
Any ideas.

" I have not looked at the marine side of the ITFS for nearly a month, I gave up when the forum only wanted info, and would not respond to simple questions or when I challenged something. "
Sean what questions did you not get a response to ?

Anthony i wouldent place the tank in direct sunlight for all the obvious reasons. Fluctuating heat, Algae, etc.
Placing the tank at the radiator could work, but first i would sell the tank you have. Keep the stand and make a new tank. One drilled to accommodate an overflow weir leading to a sump.(i can do this for you if needed)
The money you make on selling the tank should pay for the new tank, sump (both diy) and over tank luminar.(T5)
Assuming you will paint the back of the tank blue to hide the salt creep i would then put some polystyrene or similar on the back of the tank.
This will insulate the tank and prevent some of the heat entering and leaving from the back of the tank.
There are fans you can buy that sit on the back of the tank to blow air over the surface of the water to keep it cool on those hot summer days.
In winter when the heating in on full wack and the radiator is hopping of the wall, the fans can be placed hanging over the back of the tank to blow the hot rising air away from the tank and around the room.
This could be set up on timers or even to a temperature probe.
I think given enough taught this could work, it's not ideal but it could work.

Sounds like a pain.
I don`t mind waiting untill I have a proper area to put it. I recon the sun and the Radiator will have my head melted and my heart broke.

" I have not looked at the marine side of the ITFS for nearly a month, I gave up when the forum only wanted info, and would not respond to simple questions or when I challenged something. "
Sean what questions did you not get a response to ?

Anthony i wouldent place the tank in direct sunlight for all the obvious reasons. Fluctuating heat, Algae, etc.
Placing the tank at the radiator could work, but first i would sell the tank you have. Keep the stand and make a new tank. One drilled to accommodate an overflow weir leading to a sump.(i can do this for you if needed)
The money you make on selling the tank should pay for the new tank, sump (both diy) and over tank luminar.(T5)
Assuming you will paint the back of the tank blue to hide the salt creep i would then put some polystyrene or similar on the back of the tank.
This will insulate the tank and prevent some of the heat entering and leaving from the back of the tank.
There are fans you can buy that sit on the back of the tank to blow air over the surface of the water to keep it cool on those hot summer days.
In winter when the heating in on full wack and the radiator is hopping of the wall, the fans can be placed hanging over the back of the tank to blow the hot rising air away from the tank and around the room.
This could be set up on timers or even to a temperature probe.
I think given enough taught this could work, it's not ideal but it could work.

Hi Platty, you seem to know your stuff and that's great been helpful to Anthony, I dont beleive in naming shops, nor do I beleive is good idea naming members, so I cannot cut and paste any particular post that I am referring to (different if I have just come back from the pub with more dutch courage :twisted:) so I will only make a wide soft meaning statement
I get the feeling by reading in general people post that the main form of filtering from a biological point of view is live rock, and a thick layer of coral sand to act as a denitrator, lets make this interesting not only to marines keepers but lets get the freshwater keepers interested in this to.

Freshwater comparison: We know under gravel filters remove ammonia and nitrite, but clog after 2 years, we know external filters act as mechanical filters and as there is oxygen present weather we like it or not also act as a biological filter, the only problem with both of these is if the electric goes off after 4 hours it all dies, then came in the 80´s the trickle filter, it to acts as a brilliant biological filter and when the electric goes of it does not die as it takes its oxygen form the air, the other advantage is when the electric is on its does not take its oxygen from the tank water, it works too good and like any other biological filter makes nitrate, then in the nineties we had fluidized beds, it can work for freshwater or marine, basically its a column of sand and water is pumped from below up through the sand, a bit like a reverse flow under gravel filter, its has the same probs as u/g filter from an O2 point of view.
O.K now image some hippy book said get rig of all your biological filters
just use an external filter as an mechanical filter, now buy load of "live bog wood" this wood has both a wide selection of bacteria and has been collected from the Amazon, it even has small freshwater tube worms and other invertebrates living inside it. The outside of the bog wood will remove the ammonia and nitrite (provided you dont have too many fish and you feed a pathetic small quantity of food as you have just through out your 4L bio filter and replaced it with a much better 150cc MO peed engine) it wont be a "nitrate factory" like your old trickle filter is. Of course it wont as you have just half you stocking capacity and hardly feed your fish!!!!! You start adding your freshwater fish then get gill fluke and white spot at the same time, and are force to treat them in the tank, the treatment works but all the micro invertebrate have died that use to be living in the crack of the living bog wood, causes even more ammonia.

Its starts to dawn on you that you fish are not that happy every time you feed them you get am ammonia spike as you only have a 150cc engine, you have on the other hand very low levels of nitrates as the thick sand/gravel bed acts as a de nitrating filter, although 10% of the un-eaten food ends up in the first 3mm of the subrate, where the fish can not find it making even more ammonia. What a bad idea you would think? (what a shame it was not a bare bottom tank with a sprinkling or sand to give an illusion.
Yes you are right.
Well just add salt and replace the live bog wood with live rock, put it in a marine forum, and the American Circus is in town.
You also have to Brear in mind that marines look beautiful in the shops, while african chiclids look like and have the colour of an swimming aquatic form of dog shit. However 6 months later when the chiclids have colour up they can look just as good as marine, we have also recently seen the website video our members have posted, the other advantage is you can overstock African giving a more "fuller" and they are ecological as the are tank bread instead of wild caught. Don't get me wrong I am not turning my back on marines I keep them while my 5 year old son keeps africans as they are so simple to keep. I dont mind if some of the freshwater guys switch to marines, but I dony want them to be disappointed, as a little knowledge is a bad thing, and if they dont get the full potentially out of marine with morts etc it could give marines a bad name.

[Hi Platty, you seem to know your stuff ]
Stop your making me blush. I'm only on the lower end of the learning curve.
Lets step back twelve months almost to the day when i went to set up a new tank. weather this tank was for Discus, marines or Africans doesnt matter. What matters is it was new to me and i needed to do the necessary research to set this tank up.
What filtration should i use? do i need wood and plants in the tank?
What about the substrate, large pebbles, sand or do i even need substrate.
6 months previous to this i had purchased 2 books that were recommended for beginners. Between these i should have enough info to get me started on the road to success with the new tank.
So we start going through the books and what is the first thing we notice apart from the lovely pictures , The info is dated. The books are old publications with new glossy covers.
In most cases i would say these books have lasted the test of time. But...
We come to the pages on filtration and what hits us? "several different ways to install your under gravel filter"
Don't get me wrong if ug filters work for you fine. I tried it once and got about 12 months out of it before i had to remove it due to rediculiously high nitrates.
The books also covered the filtration methods mentioned by Sean above.
Between these and info from the web one method that seems very popular is that old hippy method of (yes were talking a marine set up) live rock with a deep sand bed backed up by a powerful protein skimmer, or the Jaubert system.
The skimmer serving 2 purposes; 1 to remove dissolved wastes, 2 to oxygenate the water.
This oxygen is needed not only by the fish/inverts but the nutrifying bacteria living on and in the rock. Nitrosoma to convert Amonia from fish waste into Nitrite and Nitrobacter to convert Nitrate into Nitrate.
The deep sand bed acts as a denitrator converting the Nitrate into Nitrogen which is expeled at the water surface.
But as was mentioned above a few drops of meds and bang goes the filtration.
Would medication added to the tank not have the same effect on any type of external filter ? or would it be recommended the filter be disconnected from the tank and just left cycling within itself.

Any way sorry for the long tread, i will probably come back later and edit half of it. My brain doesnt get up until after 10am.
I think the point i was trying to make was for anyone setting up a system for the first time don't believe all you read or hear.
Try talk to someone who has been there, done that and wears the T-shirt.

I think i will start a new tread discussing all types of filtration.

Hi Platy,
in the above I did not say under gravel filters are the way to go, in fact I go on to say that they tend to break down after 2 years.
Meds (except antibiotics) at the right dose dont effect that much any type of bio filter, but they have an catatropic effect on the invertebrates living inside the living rock (far less tolerance than botia and rams have to meds), although Martin Moes book is out of date from a filtration point of view, he fundamental ideas are correct so its a good book to read for general info, although trickle filters do make nitrate, they dont have ammonia peaks after feeding, Qes which is worse no nitrate but ammonia peaks of no ammonia peaks plus a back ground nitrate reading. Clown fish will still spawn with nitrates , but there comes a point at 2 years when no water changes are done, when they stop spawning as the phenols and dyes that no live rock or trickle filter can not break down need to be diluted with a water change.
Having a tank full of volcanic rock will act as a denitrating filter as deep inside there is no O2, the tank will be more balance if it is "pegged" in other wards a SMALL AMOUNT of live rock is added to seed the inert volcanic rock with a more wider range of bacteria. Ratio 95:5
There is nothing wrong with a deep gravel bed, to also remove nitrate, but it should not be in the tank as it will "fill up" with uneated food, after mechanical filtration has taken place there is nothing wrong with putting it in a sump, although I do not think this is necessary if you have porous rock. If you pick up heavy builders rock this will not be of any value as water cannot pass through it.
In summary if you already have a marine tank, full of fish and live rock, just make it a bear bottom one with a slight sprinkling of sand , with a trickle filter. Or even better a trickle filter 30% above the water level and 70% below the surface as this will do all the jobs of above providing the water is not pumped to quickly through it. (incl nitrate)
The is nothing wrong with a skimmer when they work, (tricky to get the balance with the water air mix)in a heavily stocked fish only system I would put one, I have never lost a tank of fish to protein wipe out in a lower stocked tank where it has been "pegged" and green (not red) algae growing and no skimmer present 1983-2006.

Medication can kill all nitrifying bacteria no matter what filtration you use. The advantage with a canister filter is that you can remove the biological media before you administer the medication, run it in another filter in another tank or store it in a vat and aerate it while you treat your fish. Once the treatment is complete, filter through carbon (again easier to do with a canister filter) to get all the medication out of the water. Once that is complete after a day or so you can just stick your biolgical filtration material back in the filter and you are back to normal.

Holgar,
I am sure some meds can kill the filter, at certain dosages, but not the ones I endorse especially at the 50% dosage level, in any case you dont want to treat the tank then re introduce the disease you have been home brewing in the cupboard, I would rather Brew bear instead.

Should this forum be to the the marine forum or at least a note post in the marine forum saying all the action is in the freshwater forum at the moment, as the marine guys dont even know this exists? (freshwater forum)

I didnt intend for the post to end up as a marine post so i will keep this short.
Nore did i mean you (sean) when i said "if your UG filter works for you fine. The "you" was ment people in general.

Q Amonia over Nitrate. Because Amonia is toxic to most if not all marine organisms and Nitrate can be tolerated at low levels i think it would be best to have No Amonia and a little Nitrate.
The Jaubert system is fine and a lot of people have great success with it.
I set one of these up breifly but i didnt like the gas build up in the sand.
I have about 1" of sand at the front of my tank with practically nothing towards the back. 1 trickle filter and a refugeim containing Caulerpa.
I can never get my Nitrate below 5ppm. I would like to think it is possable to get it to 0ppm.

Platty, what species of invert or fish need to live in water less than 5ppm??? and if no species come to mind why is it so important to you? bearing in mind in lots of places of the world the tap water has higher levels than that.

I have a devils finger coral (passably Llobophytum sp.) that will no longer stand erect once the Nitrate hits 5 ppm. It would appear to be susceptible to Nitrate.
I also get algae on the sand. (phosphate 0 ppm)
I have to dilute this with water changes to get the coral looking healthy again.
Unless there is something i am not thinking off causing this, i would say Nitrates are the problem.

I would say there are some species of fish and inverts that are not worth taking out of the sea, e.g Moorish idols, and some inverts, we have to ask are self's moral questions if some species are more trouble than they are worth. Thank goodness Darwin classified thousands of species to choose from and thank goodness the average 4 foot tanks can only hold 10 to 15 species, so we will catch only what we can keep.
As this is more a moral point than an useful biological solution I am not sure I can help you on that one.