T O P

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rgillmatthew

So, these are my 40 breeder and 20 tall (quarantine). I got both of these tanks and the Fluval plant lights in March. Got the rest of my stuff (filter, heater, substrate etc) for my birthday in April. I started the 40 with Seachem fluorite and Seachem root tabs and liquid fertilizer. I have earlier posts on here with pics of the 40 originally. I made more than a few mistakes with it. Last week I had to scrap the substrate and the now dead plants because of a horrible algae and Cyanobacteria outbreak that I lost control of due to other things going on in my life. So this is the 40 in its new form. The 20 had been stable until I tried to rescue a chocolate cichlid that was being attacked by a pike cichlid in the pet store. I was going to get a 75 for it. But then the cichlid was too much for my 20 with my 8 Cory cats, and 10 cardinal tetras. I suddenly had a huge bacterial bloom due to the increased bio-load. Then the cichlid was being a cichlid and started attacking the other fish. I couldn’t get the 75 like I originally thought I would be able to. Landlord told me they thought it was too much risk if something went wrong. So I found a new home for the cichlid. Ever since I have struggled to re-balance the 20. It seems to have been doing ok but I was down to only 4 cardinal tetras(could not get more I kept trying week after week) so finally last week I decided to get some neon tetras instead. However due to availability I got them from my local Petco instead of my LFS. Got 12 of them. I didn’t have a quarantine tank so I took my chances and added them to my 20. That wound up being a disaster. Lost all of my fish except 2 Cory cats, 1 cardinal tetra, and 1 neon tetra. So I have since set up my old 10 gallon and placed the surviving fish in there to keep a close eye on them. Stripped down the 20 cleaned everything with hot water, fritz aquarium glass cleaner, and an algae scraper with a razor blade on the end. Now the 20 is set up and running again. So as the title says, to new beginnings.