I Could Use Some Feeding Advice for DPs ...

[Pufferpunk]

I'm looking into a generator.

[CyberBob]

I'm looking into a generator.

well, that would certainly do it LOL

i like the little battery airpumps that i bought. i can use them for emergencies, but also for transport, etc.

small & portable:
http://www.fosterandsmithaquatics.com/p ... catid=3693

these are great also ... but a lil pricier:
http://www.fosterandsmithaquatics.com/p ... catid=8120

[CyberBob]

I'm looking into a generator.

well, that would certainly do it LOL

i like the little battery airpumps that i bought. i can use them for emergencies, but also for transport, etc.

small & portable:
http://www.fosterandsmithaquatics.com/p ... catid=3693

these are great also ... but a lil pricier:
http://www.fosterandsmithaquatics.com/p ... catid=8120

[borgey]

I'm looking into a generator.

well, that would certainly do it LOL

i like the little battery airpumps that i bought. i can use them for emergencies, but also for transport, etc.

small & portable:
http://www.fosterandsmithaquatics.com/p ... catid=3693

these are great also ... but a lil pricier:
http://www.fosterandsmithaquatics.com/p ... catid=8120

I have a couple of the Azoo Backup Battery Pumps that you listed in the second link. They're great and totally worth the 65 dollars IMO. Only negative thing is they're a little loud (at least mine are).

[LilGreenPuffer]

There is no number of inches per number of gallons!

Different fish don't just have different lengths. They have different shapes, girths, waste output levels, sensitivities, activity levels, swimming patterns, and on and on and on! Even just as a "basic guideline," that "rule" is NO GOOD.

[RTR]

The one inch per gallon rule is absolute garbage - a lie propagated these days by fish stores to sell more fish to unaware novices.

If there is any adjustment to the biological size of plecos, it should be upward. Their bioload is a function of mass and waste output - both of which are far higher for plecos than for smallish schooling fish of the same aggrgate total length.

There is no definition of Aquarium Salt - it is whatever any given company decides to use. It is a garbage term with no meaning. Additionally there is absolutely no reason whatsoever to add it routinely to any FW tank using mains water. It may be needed (along with other electrolytes) in reconstituting RODI water for tank use. It is also useful as a temporary medication in the treatment of some FW diseases.The so-called benefits of routine salt addition to FW tanks are pure mythology with no basis in fact. Salt addition is the same level of mythology as the inch per gallon rule. Both, if they have any effect at all, are more harmful than beneficial to FW tanks.

library/water-filtration/thesaltoftheearth/

And also:

ug.php/v/PufferPedia/Freshwater/C_Travancoricus/

Note the minimum tank given as 5 US gallons. That is exactly as stated, per fish, with no other fish sharing that volume of water. That would be for 6 DPs, 30 gallons of water without other fish at all. You can actually house house more DPs in that water volume if your sex ratio is ideal and the tank is very heavily planted, but if the ratio is off, you may not be able to house evem that many.

HTH

[CyberBob]

The one inch per gallon rule is absolute garbage - a lie propagated these days by fish stores to sell more fish to unaware novices.

Yeah I figured that was probably the case. I just wish there was some formula or something I could use to estimate proper stocking.

If there is any adjustment to the biological size of plecos, it should be upward. Their bioload is a function of mass and waste output - both of which are far higher for plecos than for smallish schooling fish of the same aggrgate total length.

See, I always thought they would make more waste. But the LFS has always acted like the pleco doesn't even count. They seem to act that way towards a lot of catfish species actually. e.g. cories, otos, etc (cleaning crews)

There is no definition of Aquarium Salt - it is whatever any given company decides to use. It is a garbage term with no meaning. Additionally there is absolutely no reason whatsoever to add it routinely to any FW tank using mains water. It may be needed (along with other electrolytes) in reconstituting RODI water for tank use. It is also useful as a temporary medication in the treatment of some FW diseases.The so-called benefits of routine salt addition to FW tanks are pure mythology with no basis in fact. Salt addition is the same level of mythology as the inch per gallon rule. Both, if they have any effect at all, are more harmful than beneficial to FW tanks.

library/water-filtration/thesaltoftheearth/

And also:

ug.php/v/PufferPedia/Freshwater/C_Travancoricus/

Note the minimum tank given as 5 US gallons. That is exactly as stated, per fish, with no other fish sharing that volume of water. That would be for 6 DPs, 30 gallons of water without other fish at all. You can actually house house more DPs in that water volume if your sex ratio is ideal and the tank is very heavily planted, but if the ratio is off, you may not be able to house evem that many.

HTH

I only add tanbk salt when setting up a new tank and a lil with big WCs. I try to keep the SL below 1.002.
Petco keeps all their FW fish at 1.004. But, that doesn't help catfish and other species.
1.001 - 1.002 seems to help all involved without hurting any from my experiences.

my ratio is good 1m > 5 f. That's why I'm comfortable housing the 6. I chose to have neons in there simply because they should be the least effective fish on the bioload that is still cheap and nice to look at. the otos and pleco ... well, puffs are messy, kinda had to have them.

[Pufferpunk]

Did you read that article RTR linked to on salt?

[bertie 83]

I love the way these threads go off on tangents lol. May I just add that I used salt for years in low doses, wouldn't now recommend that but had healthy fish, now salt removed fish still healthy so won't add it as they don't need it so any effects could only really be bad. Had this discussion with pp and rtr a while back lol

[CyberBob]

it has always been standard practice for me. Has the fish community recently decided salt is bad or at least not necessary? I've been keeping fish for 20+ years and have always been told to add a lil "tank salt", it's good for them. there must have been a recent study or sumtin. i think i'll only add salt when treating for disease from now on.

[Pufferpunk]

Not recently decided... long-term hobbiests were aware of this decades ago.

[RTR]

The lack of positive effects of routine NaCl addition to FW fish tanks was known in the 1960s. The possibility of negative effects was hinted at but unproven at that time as well.

Hobbyists who elect to keep mixed tanks - so-called but not really "community" tanks - cannot keep fish alive long enough to gather real long-term data. That too was known by the time I became a serious hobbyists (> half a century ago). Few casual hobbyists know much if anything about keeping fish well or properly. That was true when I came into the hobby and has never changed. What has also been constant is that folks who take advice from fish store staff (in this era especially from chains) will never learn to keep fish well.

You can tell serious and well-informed hobbyists if you know them - their tanks rarely change much. You see the same critters year after year after year. They may burn out on a particular species or even family and trade those off to study a different group or family, but that does not make a sharp change in their tanks overall.

The casual fish-keeper on the other hand rarely has many fish over 5 years old. They really believe that because many popular hobby fish such as the small semi-schooling (in captivity) Tetras such as Neons are more annual than not in the wild, that the captive life of most fish is measured in months. They could not be more wrong. Hobbyists with low-TDS water can keep those fish for up to 10 years average lifespan, while those with harder and more alkaline water can only get 8 years average lifespan from them. Of course, those who add NaCl will not do even that well, nor will those who keep them in so-called community tanks (IMHO, a better term would be stress factories).

This hobby is broad. if you elect to be a chanin-store fish-keeper, that is fully ypour prerogative. If you chose to be a serious hobbyists, you do need to learn for yourself and never accept pet store staff's comments or practices. Pure personal choice.

But do not try to sell chain store techniques on a serious hobby board. It will not fly.

So use salt and communities all you want. The chain stores will love you. But you will never be a real hobbyist, and will not contribute to learning how to keep captives better and longer.