Retirement and forum shutdown (17 Jan 2022)
Hi,
John Howell who has managed the forum for years is getting on and wishes to retire from the role of managing it.
Over the years, he has managed the forum through good days and bad days and he has always been fair.
He has managed to bring his passion for fish keeping to the forum and keep it going for so long.
I wish to thank John for his hard work in keeping the forum going.
With John wishing to "retire" from the role of managing the forum and the forum receiving very little traffic, I think we must agree that forum has come to a natural conclusion and it's time to put it to rest.
I am proposing that the forum be made read-only from March 2022 onwards and that no new users or content be created. The website is still registered for several more years, so the content will still be accessible but no new topics or replies will be allowed.
If there is interest from the ITFS or other fish keeping clubs, we may redirect traffic to them or to a Facebook group but will not actively manage it.
I'd like to thank everyone over the years who helped with forum, posted a reply, started a new topic, ask a question and helped a newbie in fish keeping. And thank you to the sponsors who helped us along the away. Hopefully it made the hobby stronger.
I'd especially like to thank John Howell and Valerie Rousseau for all of their contributions, without them the forum would have never been has successful.
Thank you
Darragh Sherwin
A few (hopefully) quick questions...
Just some questions I'd love some advice on.
1. At the moment I feed my fish every evening at around 5, with the lights on (the lights are currently on from 2pm-8:30pm). I'd like to feed them a little less, but twice a day, however if I feed them in the morning the lights won't be on and they won't really feed. Should I just put the lights on for a min while feeding (and they'll still be half asleep) or should I put the lights on for an hour or so in the morning and then again in the afternoon?
2. After feeding, nearly all the fish stay very close to the bottom of the tank, just keeping still (apart from swimming to stay where they are). Is that normal?
3. When the lights are off, the fish get a lot more adventurous (the Rummynoses go mid tank and the Rasboras go higher still), but when the lights are on they all swim back and forth again and again, at the front of the tank and close to the bottom. I got Rummynose and Rasboras as I wanted to fill the 'layers' of the tank, but all I'm getting is lots of fish at the bottom and the rest of the tank is basically empty of fish. I wonder if the lights are too strong? That said, it's a Rio 180 that I have, and the light unit has to have both bulbs in (or it won't work) and they're 895mm 45W bulbs (one 'Day' and one 'Nature') so I don't think I have any option of making the bulbs less bright? Or can I use less powerful bulbs?
4. How 'mature' does a tank need to be before adding Otos. Even with only 6.5 hours of lights, I'm still getting a fair bit of Algae on the plants, and I'd like to add Otos to try to take care of it.
5. I normally use Ferropol 24 every day, but it ran out on Christmas Day so I used the free Ferropol that I got from Seahorse. Should you use both (e.g. Ferropol once a week and Ferropol 24 daily) or is Ferropol 24 on its own ok?
Thanks in advance for your answers!
J.
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