I'm a new aquarium geek ! Who knew there was this fascinating new hobby out there!

We bought a small 10 gallon tank 5 weeks ago. This was my bribe to my youngest because I don't want a dog! Set it all up, let in run for two weeks, then bought three (red eye?) tetras. All ticketyboo. Bought five neon tetras last week, found one dead yesterday morning.

Already treating the tank for Ich - isn't the internet a wonderful place? That came up on the original three tetras - the neon probably went into shock with all the changes?!

I'm starting small and learning. I would love a huge aquarium in my home. But I need to learn loads more before that kind of investment.

Such a relaxing 'picture' to watch though.

Hubby taking the mickey now - "I thought this fish lark was supposed to be cheaper and easier than a dog?"

Mmm, maybe not - not at the mo anyway. What's wrong with Cycle, by the way? My little kit came with it already? What should I be buying next?

Hi Ann,

Welcome to the world of fish It's an addictive hobby and very frustrating at times too. After many many tank problems, dead fish, huge water changes - back to Petsmart day after day for water testing, new advice, more dead fish, more water changes - getting the picture? I decided to do some internet research. Read through forums, fish keeping guides and joined a forum. All said Cycle was a bottle of poo that doesn't actually do what it says and you just add rubbish to your water and your filter has something else to clean out. Stopped using the stuff and Bingo our puffer is nearly 2 years old (not an easy fish to keep!).

Also the bigger the tanks the easier it is to monitor the water problems, with small tanks if the water starts having a problem it happens much quicker. I am assuming that as your set up is only 5 weeks old you maybe having either an amonia or Nitrate spike. With a new tank the 'friendly' bacteria has to build up so it can combat the yuks you get. I would suggest taking a water sample to your pet store and don't add anymore fish for a little while. If you have amonia or something do a 50% water change and then get the water tested again. Only in the very beginning did we use any product to get rid of yuks, (we didn't know any better), now our tanks seem pretty much stable.

All our wigglers seem to have disappeared, we're hoping the parents have moved them to the car, where we can't see them - otherwise someone had a nice lunch:curse:

Thanks Piff. Yep, become a regular down at the petstore ! I'm testing daily at the moment for just about everything I can, I think. Probably don't need to test that regularly - but so far everything is coming back OK. The only thing that has changed a bit is the pH (gone down) but other than that, no nitrates/nitrites/amonia changes so far ...

Hopefully finished my Ich stuff now and will bring temp back down a little tomorrow and then change some water on Fri/Sat - see what happens.

Hope no-one had a big lunch round yours

Still can't see them, but parents are rather protective of the rusty car ornament we have, so hopefully they are in there!

Hope your tanks continues to be OK!

Hello Ann,
Neon tertas are VERY fragile and more than likely wont survive a cycling tank. You need to wait till the process is complete before putting in any more fish.

One thing, be careful you dont mix incompatable species. A lot of fish like to eat neon tertras :-(

Hope that helps

Hi all,
I've been keeping tropical fish for 12 years now, bred Angels and Kribensis sucessfully. Now just have a community tank with Harlequin Rasbora, Boseman's Rainbowfish, Bulldog Plecs, assorted Tetras, Catfish, Galaxy Pleco and a Clown Loach.

The guy who taught me fishkeeping had a golden rule, once your tank is running right, don't mess with it...

As long as you are declorinating the water and not overstocking you should not have a problem, there is no need to keep testing ammonia etc levels.

Just maintain a regular water change regime. It's not generally a good idea to change water temperatures around too much as this distresses the fish.

For algae promblems you could try using something like 'Cleanwater', this absorbs the phosphates, nitrate and nitrites, without messing with the biological filtration which your tank needs.

My parents have never stopped reminding me about the time I visited them with 44 baby angels and my brine shrimp growing paraphenalia, they thought it was hysterical...

Luckily the Kribensis did not breed at the same time! The pair I had were really protective and the daddy would scoop the young into his mouth everytime I went near the tank (Kribensis aren't supposed to do this, but obviously he hadn't read the book!).

I have always found fishkeeping really relaxing, you might want to check out this site, its full of info...

http://www.practicalfishkeeping.co.u...pages/home.php

Beware though they have a forum

Charlie

Oh Lord charlie, not another forum - run away, run away !!

Well, all seven have survived and all look fine and healthy. Changed 25% of my water on Sat and everything going OK today. Will now leave it another couple of weeks before adding anything else. Need two or three small fish - perhaps something orangy coloured (see, dead technical me) so they 'show up' more !! So - what won't eat neon or red eye tetras. My kids want some female guppies (which I admit are quite pretty). Everything I've read talks about putting 2 males and 3/4 females together - but I presume that is if you want to breed them. I do not!! Is it OK to just buy 3 females, for example.

Don't offer me the name of anything too exotic or expensive 'cos this is all still very new and I don't want to kill the buggers if I can help it!

Just wanted to report.....Our baby fishes have put in a brief appearance!

Mama and Papa fish brought them out from the scrap car and popped them by the bridge at the other side of the tank and this morning they are all back by the car They are tiny fat bodies with bulging eyes and little tails and we have between 20-30 of them as a rough estimate.

Tried taking a photo - all you can see is the blue stones and slime on the tank. Got to try cleaning the tank today, it's looking really manky (a friend commented on how clean it was a couple of days ago but I know better!)

Ann your as technical as me - honest! I used to go in the shop and say do these ones eat these ones? whilst pointing to the tanks.

Thanks Piff

Oh Lord charlie, not another forum - run away, run away !!

Hi Ann,
Exactly! I did run.... I didn't even dare look at it! (Well not the Forum, spent two hours looking into other stuff on the site, bit into my BE time... :curse:

The site is full of info though....

Charlie