Fishkeeping: Day 18 (Video)

Ammonia was very high again last night so I did 2 water changes to get it back down to normal levels. Other than that I observed the fish a little bit. I noticed that with the exception of the molly's the Danio's, Rainbowfish's, and Tetra seem to be picking on the smallest Danio.

I took this video of the Danio being chased:

Home from New York! (Video)

I just got in from New York and took a quick video of the fish after a 50% water change.

Fishkeeping: Day 9, Part 2 (video)

(Continued from part 1) After the kids went to bed, I picked up the testing kit from my neighbors and got the latest numbers.

pH = 7.2
Ammonia = 1.0 mg/l
Nitrite = 0.0 mg/l
Nitrate = 5.0 mg/l

The pH was a little high, but not really a cause for much concern. The Ammonia was spiking as expected with a new tank with fish and no real biological filter setup yet. I'm going to put some pH 7.0 in the tank, and keep checking it nightly. After a week I should see the Ammonia numbers go down, and the Nitrite numbers start to rise.

We have a trip to New York planned this weekend, so I will probably plan on doing a PWC (aka partial water change) before we leave to make sure that the ammo (ammonia) and NO2- (nitrite) levels don't get to high while were gone.

A fishy homecoming (video)

Here is a quick video I took last night before bed. They seem overall in good spirit considering they went from a 55 gallon tank to a 20 gallon tank.

Fishkeeping: The Installation, Part 3

Early in the afternoon, Tony came over with some supplies and we got to work.

First we setup the water bubbler to vent to the sunken pirate ship, and to an airstone under the gravel. we had to setup a series of valves to get the air flowing to both but after some quick engineering I think it looks nice.

Next, Tony had to work his magic and clean up the water to make it livable for the fish.

He put in 20 drops of Tap Water Conditioner to neutralize the chlorine found in tap water, A handful of Aquarium Salt to promote healthy gill function and reduce nitrite in the water, and 2 scoops of pH 7.0 to reduce the pH of the water.

Aquarium Salt

Tap Water Conditioner

pH 7.0 Solution

After a long 2 days, the tank is finally up and running. Now I just need to keep checking the water to see when they reach the proper levels of chlorine, ammonia, nitrates and nitrites. I have no idea what all that means yet so I'm going to go find that out!