Friday, September 28, 2012

Elijah what's going on?!

My male Platy Elijah seems to be pregnant.  Yes, my male Platy looks pregnant! His belly is squaring off, just like a female before she gives birth.  The black line is where his belly normally is, and the green one is where it is now (His fins looked like part of his belly in this picture).  This wasn't the best picture I've taken of him, but I took the picture before I fed them, so they were going crazy.
Weird, huh?  That's what I thought! I've heard of females "turning into" males (being "late-bloomers" so it was hard to tell whether it was male or female), but never a male turning into a female! Well, I'm going to fast them tomorrow, since I somehow forgot today, and maybe that'll help.  I already fed them peas in case it was SBD.  

I should be getting more baby Platys soon! Java is gone again, but I'm going to try to find him again, we'll see how that goes.  Other than that all is well with my fish!

Tuesday, September 18, 2012

My plans are almost complete.

My 55 Gallon is coming soon! And my plans for it are pretty much done.

Cycling:
I'm going to do a Fishless cycle, adding filter media from my current filter to help get it started.  It'll be good experience for me!

Substrate, rocks, and wood:
I'm using play sand as a substrate, $5 per 50lbs! I have to rinse all 100lbs of sand I have so it doesn't cloud the water, it will when I first add it, but it will settle in a few hours, to a day.  

I'm using rocks I found outside around my house, and making them safe for my aquarium one at a time by pouring boiling water over them, testing the water for a few days and watching for major pH changes, then pouring a little bit of vinegar on each rock, if there are bubbles then there is chalk in the rocks, so they can't be used as they'll change the pH drastically, then after the "vinegar trick" I put them back in hot water to clean them. 

For wood I'm going to find some Oak branches.  To make them safe for my fish I'm going to debark them, let them dry, then pour boiling water over them, and leave them for a few days to leech the tannins out.

Plants:
I've decided to grow live plants in my new tank, I've never done this before, but buying enough fake plants for it sounds even worse than growing my own! I'm going to have green or purple Cabomba, Java Fern, Christmas Moss, some Anubius, and an Amazon Sword plant.  It'll look awesome if it's anything like what I'm picturing in my head! 

Fish:
My stocking list isn't very different, but I've lost three Platys, and I've change the other bottom dwelling fish I want.  
1 Golden Gourami.
8 Platys (I'm going to bring the number back up to 8 with 3 blue ones!)
6+ Guppies (I'm going to add 4-6 females for a male:female ratio of either 1:2, or 1:3, 1:3 is better, so I'll probably go with that.)
2 L444 Plecos (I already have one, but I'd like to get a female also, maybe I'll get lucky and get some eggs!)


I'm aquascaping the tank, and I want the design to be a surprise, so no more details! Well, that's it for now, my tanks are all running well, and my fish are all healthy!

Friday, September 14, 2012

One happy fish keeper.

I haven't posted in a few weeks, so this is going to be a big update! And only one part is going to be sad.

First of all, since I moved Elijah back in with the other platys he's been eating more, and he's definitely more active.  The guppies are happy to be rid of him too, I think.

Sadly Kathrine died about 2 weeks ago.  She is the third platy I've lost, but none of those three were very healthy, and now the others have less chance of getting sick because of them. 

Muddy has been eating most of his food recently, I have to break the discs up so they fit in his mouth, but I only found two little pieces of disc today while cleaning the tank, and I've been giving him 1 disc (3 pieces) every night before I turn off the tank lights.  Pleco are nocturnal, but I've been seeing a lot more of him during the day now.

The most exciting thing happened today.  I found a baby platy! It's the first baby platy I've found, and it's only a few days old I think! Kathrine died about 2 weeks ago, and none of the younger ones showed signs of being pregnant, but I don't think this baby is 2 weeks old, so it's a mystery!

I will be putting sand, and live plants in the 6.6 Gallon soon, with the baby I need plants ASAP, and sand a little later, when it's a little bigger and won't get trapped in the gravel I take out.  This is going to be my fry tank, so I can't take it out and put it anywhere else, except with either 2 guppies, or a Betta, both of which would eat my baby, so that's not going to happen.  I just have to hope that it survives on it's own with my 4 inch catfish, and 5 inch Gourami in the tank with it!

Well that's pretty much it.  Still haven't gotten my 55 Gallon, but I should be getting it soon, I know I've said that in pretty much every post, but for real this time! :p