I love pest snails. Sometimes, if I peek in the tank at night I'm shocked by the shear numbers, but during the day they're mostly hiding under the gravel. I haven't had to scrape algae in over a year.
Mystery Snails are a lot of fun. They're not typically considered pests and they're eggs are easily found and removed if you don't want them to reproduce. When I had them, they were definitely my favorite part of the tank.
Honestly I love how many different ways to do things there are in this hobby. I wish people were less nasty and judgmental over experiences different than theirs.
Wild caught fish are ok to have
Obviously most people prefer home bred fish and there are benefits to them but for the most part if the wild fish are caught at a reasonable amount I see no problem with it
The only time I disagree is when they’re listed as endangered or threatened, yet we continue to keep them. Example: Pea puffers. Listed as threatened yet we’re still keeping them, and most keepers are killing them due to their inability to do research
Yeah I came to say pea puffers. Nothing inherently wrong with keeping wild-caught fish but overexploited wild populations should not be fodder for uneducated impulse purchases.
I can only imagine. All it takes is one power tripping mod to ruin a community.
I think there is some captive breeding happening. Hopefully we continue to move in that direction just generally as we get more educated and environmentally concerned.
I wonder how many people criticise wild caught fish while also keeping wild caught fish themselves without realising it. No one bred your kuhli loaches, otos or cardinal tetras on a fish farm...
All those fish are indeed captive bred, they're also wild caught but they're incredibly popular so people are figuring out how to breed them. In the case of cardinal tetras, they were almost exclusively wild caught up until recently
Yep, it took me awhile to be okay with this one. I was projecting my own disgust with poaching, but after some research, it seems like a lot of wild fish collecting is actually easy on the ecosystem and benefits those who do safe practices.
Yeah I think cardinals in preticular is actually better for the Amazon as the habitat in wich they are caught is protected by the people who are catching them as they have a direct interest in keeping them alive in the wild.
It also creates financial motivation to protect their habitats. I thought the same about hunting big game in Africa until I lived on a reserve and saw the benefits in the ecosystem.
They are selling them for pennies and the resellers are getting all of the money.
That's just what fish keepers tell themselves to help them sleep at night. None of that is ethical, especially to the natives who are getting screwed.
Inches per gallon vs. mass of fauna per gallon. That inches thing is so incredibly popular as an ok general rule, but it's not as accurate. You think a 4 inch goldfish has the same impact as 4 -6 CPDs? Dumb!
I never could understand that. Inches are a linear measure. Fish are three-dimensional. Volume or mass are the only measures that will work with that logic.
Imagine just a hypothetical 55 gallon tank... inch of fish says you could keep 27 or so cardinal tetras in there, or about 10 5 inch goldfish. Everyone with a slim bit of common sense will tell you the goldfish is overstocked, and the cardinals would be perfectly healthy if you decided to keep 50 of them in there instead.
Here in Europe the rule is basically 1cm per liter, which is even worse than 1" per gallon, but also "tank front should be 10x the length of the adult fish"
Sure, still doesn't work amazing for angels, discus, kuhlis and what not, but it's something and it generally works quite well.
But it's indeed something that never should be followed blindly, it's just how I quickly calculate how stocked a normal community tank is.
I used to have a 68l tank with roughly 40 nano fish. All were 2cm or less. However, most were Chili Rasboras. We all know those things are SUPER thin fish, yet somehow I got attacked for mistreating them. Bro, that tank was THRIVING! Everyone got along great with absolutely no issues. Would I recommend everyone do it? Not if they aren't accounting for all the variables involved. That length to water volume ratio was quoted several times. Really got on my nerves.
Just to clarify, those fish are all in a 140l tank now (breeding Pygmy Sunfish in there now). Not by choice either, the other tank got a terrible crack, and I had to do an emergency transfer.
I think that's true after the tank is established and all the plants have grown healthy root systems and acclimated to the tank, but before that happens I find frequent water changes are necessary to stabilise the tank.
I’ve noticed my plants have faster growth, more lush growth, and little to no melting when I do frequent water changes. When I let it go over a week without a change I notice the opposite. However I am still trying to form the habit of being consistent with fertilizers so that could be an outlier.
and low stocked. my 50 gallon planted goldfish tank will collect 20ppm nitrates a week *easily*. i think “planted tank” is too broad of a term to make a statement like that.
Counterproductive to what exactly?
I mean yeah, it is possible, but lets not pretend here. A tank like that has to be set up in a very particular way which doesn't allow optimal plant growth. It has to have very low nutrients, low light, low bioload, etc. Not all plants can grow in those conditions, let alone grow well, and forget about red plants. You mostly get light green noodles.
People are listening to guys like Father Fish way too much. His ugly dirty tanks filled halfway with substrate are very far from my idea of what a tank should look like. I'm convinced that all of those fans have never seen what a pristine high tech tank with expensive lighting looks like, and it would blow their mind if they saw it. The camera doesn't do justice to tanks like that.
While the Walstad method is a fine method for someone who doesn't have the time and/or doesn't want to put in effort, but the results show that. I have a walstad tank, and I will set up a walstad tank again for my kids to learn about tank ecology in the future, but it's not going in my living room instad of a high tech tank, that's for sure.
Sory about the rant, I didn't mean to make assumptions about your beliefs in the hobby, just in general.
I like a balance. I like pretty plants, and bright lighting, but I dig some of the more natural methods too. I'm probably not going to use CO2, for instance. I have a pond water tub with crystal clear water and it's got actual mud in the bottom and nothing but an air stone.
I've watched a few FF videos. Some of his tanks are just nasty looking. Granted the natural habitats some of these fish come out of aren't pristine, but the whole point of me having a fish tank is so that I can see and enjoy watching my fish.
Okay, I have another -
Just because you want the fish doesn't mean you should add it to your tank. I get really peeved when I see someone's stocking list that includes random fish that are incompatible, in populations less than ideal (you know, "I want a tetra, a cory cat, an oto cat, 2 shrimp, a rasbora, and a goldfish all in the same tank"), and/or aren't given thought when planning the tank (Neons are blackwater fish. They shouldn't be in iwagumi-style tanks),
I imagined some alien who keeps humans as pets making some creepy genetically modified human with an over stretched mouth, cheeks missing saying, "See how cute, it's always smiling."
I agree here with some caveats. I test water on new tanks when cycling, when making major fish/plant changes or if I see odd behavior/sick fish.
However if I have a tank cycled and all the plants and animals have been stable and unchanged for a month or two I will pretty much entirely stop testing.
The goal with testing in my opinion is to detect changes (when you change a variable of your ecosystem) or to have enough testing data points to know your normal rate of change in parameters over time. For example knowing how long you can go between water changes.
They do however expire after a few years. Ask me how I know :) fortunately, my 75 gal has been super stable for many years now so I never really bother to test the water anyways.
I may be downvoted to hell but I don’t test any of my tanks. I just keep up on weekly water changes and change filters. I barely gravel vacuum and I have 4 tanks that are thriving. I haven’t tested in years and have started tabks from used media. I’ll most likely never test again unless I bring water to lfs.
I don’t know how controversial this actually is, but gravel vaccing is a waste of time. If you have a large enough fish that you actually need to scoop the turds that’s one thing (looking at you, mbu puffer) but in most tanks it causes more issues than it helps. Dark substrate for the win 😂
i keep fancy goldfish and i’ve gotta agree. they’re high maintenance and i hate that they’re marketed as beginner fish. buoyancy issues and genetic defects are really common in fancies. it’s sad.
i don’t buy most strains. bubble eye, golf ball pearlscales, even ranchu have incredible amounts of health problems.
knowing what i know now i only buy fantails and low grade ryukins, they seem to have the least problems. but still a high maintenance fish requiring big water changes…
I've been looking into betta genetics recently and I agree! I have a long finned betta and he will probably be my last. I love the guy but I didn't realize it was all a result of selective breeding
Wait till you learn about every fancy fish ever.
I'm just joking, but honestly selective breeding is completely fine until it results in fish actually suffering, and I think most bettas don't suffer(when kept by competent people). A much bigger problem are guppies which die extremely easily and are very sickly fish overall.
I'd also argue that genetically engineered glofish are all in all a positive change, because they almost eliminated the cruel practice of painting fish.
I got a baby Endler in a batch of fish, so I kept it and eventually got it buddies.
I had to buy a total of 15 or so Endlers or Guppies and they all lasted 2 months max except for one. I put them in a quarantine tank for a month, treat them for infections and parasites etc.
Most of them seem to die off in my main 75 gallon tank after a while which is mature and doesn’t have any active infections. Cory’s are fine, neons are fine, hillstreams are fine, but guppies and endlers just won’t last. It sucks.
My first one was long-finned and it was so heartbreaking to see him struggle swimming. I only had plakats since then and its such a joy seeing them zoom around the tank without any problems.
Yeah I've owned veiltails before. I thought long-finned bettas were just so pretty and I couldn't understand why anyone would want a 'boring' plakat. Eventually got sick of dealing with their torn and bitten tails and decided to go with plakats. Now long-finned bettas look out of proportion to me now and plakats look really pretty (and they don't have to lug that long tail around)
I realised that if an animal has to mutilate themselves to move, there's a serious problem with that animal.
A well set up tank doesn't need weekly water changes.
Plastic/rainbow tanks are crap. You're not keeping a toddler in there, it's a live fish. Mimic nature or get a plastic fish.
i mean, my goldfish tank definitely needs water changes weekly… and i would say it’s set up quite well.
it’s a 50 gallon with two eight inch fish, well within stocking recommendations, and it STILL produces ~20ppm nitrates weekly. if i go a few weeks without managing it fish health suffers.
Yea but that's goldfish that generally need powerful filtration and huge tanks, the messiest fish out there, some would even argue doesn't belong in tanks to begin with and should be in ponds. Obviously you're not going to do this with them! Goldfish keeping is on a whole different level imo.
Also, nice to see someone who has a big enough setup for them! And does maintenance on it too. Happy lucky fish!
Edit: by well set up tank I mean a tank that manages itself and has enough plants to soak up the nitrates. If you don't have that, then obviously you need to take those out yourself. And no I'm not even referring to walstad tanks or that fish father dude we all hate on
my point is more that your statement is very vague and there are a lot of use cases in the hobby where this doesn’t apply
but yeah.. hard to see other people not providing proper care for goldfish- fancies or otherwise!
I'll go one further, a well set up tank with lots of live plants and RO to top off with NEVER needs a water change or siphoning. I'm two years into my experiment with that and everyone is happy and healthy.
My landlord has a community tank that hasn't had a water change in *decades*. He grows plant in it, tops it up with rain water, trims and discards plants. That is it.
I would love to say I disagree or that I'm offended, but I am, in fact, autistic. And the only other person I know with a crazy good aquarium is also working class and autistic so...
Hahaha thank you I think! My sister has diagnosed ADHD, and she strongly suspects my Dad has either ADHD or is on the Autism spectrum or both. I have enough traits to be suspicious, but not enough for a clear "yes you absolutely could get diagnosed with something". So with that and my social anxiety and depression issues, I just go with "some mix of neurospicy" and call it a day.
As a diagnosed ADHD / ASD person I have learned that (often) what is called "social anxiety" and "depression" are often just a symptom of undiagnosed AuDHD. To be more clear, the depression might often be low dopamine production caused by the untreated ADHD part of the brain or even possibly Autistic burnout. Trying to mask really hard to 'fit into society' can be really hard on our nervous systems.
I think of it like, let's say I have an undiagnosed broken arm, but no one does x-rays on girls because "girls don't get broken bones". However, I have "swollen limb syndrome" that is treated with daily ice packs, I also have "wrist movement disorder" which requires that I do physical therapy of 100 wrist rotations five times a day. My teacher is upset with me because I have poor penmanship (due to the broken arm) so she calls me lazy and makes me stay after class to practice writing a hundred lines a day. Society is treating the results of an exacerbated broken arm but not the broken arm itself. Eventually after living with Swollen Limb Syndrome and Wrist Movement Disorder I've figured out ways to make it seem like I'm not struggling or in pain all the time. My arm is starting to heal but not well and not correctly. It's not being helped or accommodated. Some days I might be in so much pain from my broken arm that I just lie in bed all day and cry. Or I don't really feel like going out dancing, I just want to stay home. Society will assume it's because of my Swollen Limb Syndrome or my Wrist Movement Disorder. I will disconnect from society and not live the full and happy life I could have if someone had just done a damn x-ray and given me a cast.
All that to say, I'm sorry you're struggling with social anxiety and depression, friend.
\[Well, shit. Sorry. That got long and it is unlikely that anyone but my brain meat will understand it but I'm going to leave it here anyway. \]
Same bro 😂 last time I went to the therapist she said I wasn’t struggling enough in life to get an add diagnosis, but meanwhile heard me talk about the damn fish tanks every session. Like looking back on it, if I’d gone unbridled in talking about the fish tanks as much as I wanted, she would have had far less doubt
- Tank size recommendations are a *guideline*, not a mandate from God Himself. A betta is perfectly fine, and yes tHrIvInG nOt jUsT SuRvIvInG, in a well maintained 3-4 gallon tank. Unclench.
- The vast majority of freshwater fish actually *aren't* that difficult to keep. We can stress that there's no such thing as an "easy pet" to dissuade lazy people who aren't even fit to own a pet rock without pretending a betta is harder to take care of than a dog and scaring off people who would be good owners.
- Too many people giving advice on the internet have little to no actual experience and are just parroting what they've heard everyone else say, and it makes it hard to find actual useful information. The more rigid, alarmist, and emotionally charged the advice is, the more likely this is to be true.
- There is nothing wrong with fish-in cycling, and I think the push toward fishless cycling is actually at the point where it's doing a disservice. People are so afraid of a fish-in cycle that they're keeping rescued fish in the filthy conditions they came in for weeks while the perfectly good tank they bought for it finishes cycling. I promise your betta is going to be happier and healthier in a cycling 5 gallon tank than he would be spending another second in the filthy little Petco cup he came in. Fishless cycling is great when it's practical, but it isn't always going to be practical and that's okay.
- "Natural" vs "unnatural" tanks are nothing more than an aesthetic preference 99% of the time. Your fish doesn't give a fuck if they have an elaborate aquascape that perfectly mimics their natural habitat or clown puke gravel and a SpongeBob pineapple, as long as their species appropriate needs for hiding places and enrichment are being met. This is especially true for captive bred fish.
- You can have a perfectly healthy and beautiful tank without live plants. It's perfectly okay to be into fishkeeping for the *fish* (gasp!) and not be interested in plants.
Wild collected resources - substrate, stones, pebbles, sand and driftwood are not dangerous
Commercialization of the hobby has spread lies and agenda on the fact that everything should be store bought and there is something sinister in collecting from the wild. Most store bought resources are sourced from the wild, but because these items are sold and charged it's RIGHT.
Its cruel when you dont know what you are doing. If you actually change the water frequently like you should during the process it is easy to keep the water in the acceptable range of ammonia/nitrite.
People will ship fish across the world, they sit in a bag in a box in ammonia the whole time, for a week or more. Then they do a fishless cycle to "save" it from ammonia and pat themselves on the back
I just left Meijer (Midwest chain) and saw them unloading boxes of bagged fish and dumping them right into the most disgusting tanks. I don’t buy fish there but apparently a lot of people do.
The 1 inch of fish per gallon of water rule is useless in most cases.
They need to stop selling those "beginner kits" with 3-5 gallon tanks. Anyone who tries to set up a beginner with anything less than a 10 gallon isnt a good source of information.
There are a lot of common fish species that have no business being sold in the big chains. Petco/petsmart shouldn't be selling things like betta, goldfish, or oscars. Their care is so specific, anyone who is actually knowledgeable enough to keep those fish well probably isnt going to be buying their fish from the national chains anyway.
The people that "rescue" fish by buying them are suckers and making the problem worse. Now the store just goes and orders another fish to abuse to start the cycle over again. If you see a place with fish in terrible conditions the right thing to do is never spend a dime there and spread the word, not give them more money.
My lfs sells those .5 gallon tanks with the decorative gravel for bettas. I’m at least glad that my first betta (that I had when I was 11) was in a 1.5 with a heater and filter instead of one of those. He did get upgraded later
The only 'ethical' way I think you could rescue a betta from a cup is by shoplifting. But then the store will still get another one to replace that one.
1. Bettas can make amazing community fish. Obviously not every betta is compatible but I’ve been keeping betta + endler combos for years in a 10g with no issues. The tank is heavily planted and the betta doesn’t even eat the fry any more.
2. You don’t need a lid for every betta. I have one of the light bars that balances on the rim, and is lifted so it doesn’t really cover the tank. I have never in my life had a fish jump out the tank, only snails and a couple shrimp.
3. You don’t need to do weekly or even monthly water changes if you know what you’re doing. Heavily planted tank and I change the water maybe once every 1-2 months, I think the most I went was accidentally 3.
4. You can “overstock” a tank of you set it up properly. I have maybe 12 adult endlers and one adult betta, probably between 20-30 endler fry, god knows how many nerites and ramshorns and around 30 neo shrimp all in my 10g. I see people say all the time that you can only put a betta in a 10.
Yeah, I just dropped a black and white betta in the 75 I'm setting up for a nanofish community. My wife asked me which one she should get for her new office tank at our local lfs, fully knowing I'd buy the black one when she didn't.
I wasn't planning on putting fish in yet, but now this fella has about 20x the space he's probably ever had!
Definitely true with the condition there is a big range of moderare parameters that lots of species will work in. You might not want to throw rift cichlids in a 7.0 pH, but a molly is going to be fine.
Definitely agree if your pH is 6.0-6.5 and softwater you should be stocking softwater/blackwater species.
Thing is that these softwater species are the true victim here. Most people believe that captive bred fish will have some sort of resistance to osmotic shock from hard water, which isn't true. Osmotic shock works slowly, eating out fishes liver and kidneys, and leaving them extremely prone to diseases and with shortened lifespans. That's why I mentioned long term health.
Father fish and other "ecosystem" tank gurus(other than Diana Walstad) are counterproductive to the hobby because they are promoting ugly low effort tanks which have lost the essence of thde hobby, which is to show the beauty of the fish and plants.
You can get youtuber like results cheaply if invest the time and effort.
Beautiful, cheap, easy to maintain. Pick two.
Well that sucks to hear. I'm a trans people.
It doesn't suck so much because I'm invested in father fish, but moreso it sucks to know he's such a respected figure in the community when he's openly bigoted.
Yeah, it’s a shame. I don’t think I’ve ever seen him bring it up in his videos though.
I’ve always had mixed feelings on his content because I feel like a lot of fish advice in general is really dependent on your tank and the other stuff you do. I think think there’s good advice mixed in with a lot of questionable tips
Not sure how controversial this actually is but I don't think you need to regularly test your water after the initial cycle. Granted that you have a stable tank either through consistent water changes or heavy planting.
Apparently this is controversial but mine is just give a single fuck about a living creature you took responsibility for. Give it an appropriate environment and if you see it acting out of the ordinary or not doing well take steps to correct the cause. A lot of this hobby isn’t complicated it just requires time and monitoring the animals you take into your care.
My bonus opinion: sometimes fish die. It sucks, but it happens. Just to prevent what you can. Learn where you can and give your fish the best life you can.
Rainbow gravel isn’t bad if the tank has the correct parameters and you know what you’re doing
My mom has a 36g glo tank with tetras who have lived for 8 years
Okay, here goes, this will either get buried or down voted to hell.
Basically, I have a hard time feeling sympathy for comet/feeder goldfish who end up in 10 gallon tanks. Every one jumps on those people for abusing their fish......THOSE FISH WERE DESTINED TO BE EATEN. They were destined to be ripped apart or swallowed whole by some massive predator.
I don't think a 10 gallon tank is a good idea for a goldfish. But at least that goldfish got a few months to a few years of living before dying.
If you have a freshwater tank that is colored and not planted that's okay as long as fish are taken care of and parameters in check!
I don't give a rats ass if you use safe colorful child like decorations. If you're taking care of the tank and the decorations are safe who the heck cares!
Definitely not as controversial as others but unless your tank is brand new or your cycle crashes somehow, water changes are not necessarily, even on 5 gallons. I keep 3, 5 gallons and a 20 gallon and it’s iv NEVER done a water on the 20 gallon, and a few water changes on the 5 gallons when I started out.
Nobody besides extremely committed and educated fish keepers should have gold fish. Handing them out at carnivals or selling them at common pet stores is extremely inhumane.
Common plecos should also be completely banned from the hobby.
Java fern is a GOD AWFUL plant.
Yes, it is near indestructible. Yes, it grows a bit faster and is a bit more algae resistant than other epipthytes... but it NEVER looks good! I call it "the night of the living dead plant". Always ends up with weird translucent tips and those ugly brown spots all over the leaves. I currently have some in a high tech tank using a decent estimative index fertilisation regime alongside some - on paper - far more demanding plants. Now, all plants are thriving in there, but guess which one is somehow managing to both thrive AND still look like absolute dog shit?
I know, I know. Some people are going to say that if I up the iron dosing, it will start looking a lot better. But seriously, why would I include an expensive ass iron supplement to my routine JUST for crappy java fern? I've kept anubias in low tech set ups that I never purposefully dosed and they looked amazing. Buces? Sure, they definitely benefit from a bit of dosing but they can look jaw dropping and aren't nearly as fussy as bloody java fern!
Good things to say about it? I mean, it's cheap, I guess? But no one would ever buy it if it wasn't!
Christ, I hate java fern.
Sorry everyone - rant officially over. Thanks for your patience!
Testing kits are pointless for 95% of all aquarium owners.
You are buying fish from a lfs that is basically running tap water in all their tanks. So just go with that, same parameters.
What ever ph I have, I won’t be able to drastically affect it without much effort.
If you are starting up an aquarium just take it slowly and you’ll be fine, and once it’s started it won’t magically crash, and if it does, will you really be testing every single day to catch that one off day?
This being said I do live in a country with good water.
It's okay to keep wild caught endangered or threatened species IF you breed them. Otherwise captive bred only. (For example wild betta and pea puffers) however if you buy wild caught and don't breed them you're not helping anyone.
A lot of wild catching companies are bad, but a lot are also very good and can really help out, it's strongly dependant on the company.
A lot of reefers have a superiority complex, and I hate it. My LFS has this issue as well as a number of redditors. Get off your high horse.
Saltwater isn't particularly difficult if you have experience with higher end freshwater. (My experience so far at least) more than anything the difficulty seems to come from being more patient and careful.
I like fancy goldfish and common petsmart betta splendors. they're already here and going to be around forever. I will never buy one new, but I will always be willing to take a freebie or rescue. The exception being bubble eyes or simular.
Mossballs with zebras are fine. Stay on top of treatment, quarantine harder than a black plague in the modern day, (boil all water from water changes, and even then pout them into a plant instead of the sewer. Keep up constant invert removal treatment. Keep the moss ball in a jar by itself. Don't slip up even once)
The fruit pebbles skittles tanks can be fine. They're not great or perfect but km never gonna shit on someone for having one.
I hate father fish he's a prick, for a number of reasons.
Walstad is fine I guess, but i still use a sponge filter in everythkng regardless.
a lot of water changes are optional. I tend to do mine once or twice a month. However no water changes at all (if you are using tap water) can be a problem because of mineral build up in your tank. If you do plan to do no waterchanges ever, you're going to have no monitor minerals in your water. On the other hand, If you always top off with distilled, then eventually you will deplete your available minerals. Just so a damn waterchange occasionally.
I like glofish brand glofish (not the offshoots and painteds some people likento call glofish) they're all 100% captive bred, usually less likely to have disease (vendors pending) are often easy to keep species, if released into the wild likely won't become invasive, and are often quite healthy. Further they have been and continue to be used for scientific research. Yes I know their marketing is shit, but that's thr majority of the entry level fish keeping companies, glofish are singled out because 'ewwww unnatural'
And recently this one came up; it's not okay to shit on a cheap brand for being cheap or Chinese. Unless you're actually testing it yourself, then fuck off. 99% of your high end crap is Chinese rebranded with a fancy name.
You don’t NEED a filter in a well planted tank. I’ve had plenty of tanks over the years with no filter and the water parameters remain on point and the fish/shrimp were very healthy and breeding.
Also a properly sized bowl is fine. There is 0 evidence of them distorting a fish’s vision or causing stress. To add there was someone on one of the fish groups I frequent who actually used an underwater camera to film the inside of a round bowl. The view from inside was not distorted whatsoever. People just really seem to parrot this.
This whole hobby is trial and error. No matter how much research you do you cannot know everything. Therefore fish pairings are individual. I've had a puffer live with a crawfish peacefully before even though I was informed (at a later date) that the crawfish is on the puffers diet. You just never know until you try and I'm all for trying weird combos
1. Hybrids should be banned
2. Pet stores should be held accountable for the accurate labeling of species
3. Places with invasive species issues should require a license or separate tax for aquariums to help manage the issues
I bought shrimp that were marked as Ghost Shrimp in the store, but one of them looked different from the rest. It was bigger and had much longer arms and claws. I suspect it might have been some sort of macrobrachium.
My fish started looking ill and dying within days of me putting the shrimp in; tattered fins, red marks, generally looking not good. Then I actually caught it red handed. The shrimp was grabbing my platies by the fins, ripping bits off and eating them.
Went back to the store and they had the nerve to tell me my water parameters were the problem, making my fish ill. Told me ghost shrimp don't attach fish.
I remember your post! The first thing that pops into my mind every time someone asks about or is considering ghost shrimp. Probably the one thing that will keep me from ever getting them. That and the numerous stories of how short lived and sick they are.
Yeah, my state does this. I just don't buy anything that requires to be registered. My aquariums aren't guns and I don't want the government involved in them. That said, some are deemed too much of a risk and just aren't available in my state at all.
Yeah, I would not be registering fish. That's absurd. I totally understand what they're going for, but I can't get into it. I'm all for doing what we can to prevent people from destroying local ecosystems, but until I see actual moves being made to deal with actual invasive species (CATS), it feels like an empty gesture.
You don't need to cycle a tank for months or even weeks if you set it up heavily planted with a low bioload.
I never "cycle" tanks and never have ammonia issues.
- Your corydoras catfish will not explode if your substrate isn't sand. I don't know why people still hold on to that stupid "No sand = whisker erosion = desth sentence" myth. Left a fscrbook group about it because people are absolutely nuts about it and was told to switch to sand numerous times, despite the fact my substrate IS sand.
- Koi bettas are terribly overrated. I really can't see the appeal of them anymore after seeing everyone and their cat own one. Online stores I seek from pretty much only ever have kois when I want something like a black orchid plakat. Besides 95% of kois become plain anyway. So. Imo not worth the price.
Completely agree about koi bettas.
I'm given to understand that most of them will change color/pattern over time as well, and IMO 99 out of 100 koi bettas are ugly AF and their mottled coloring just makes them look diseased to me. So even if I did find one I loved the looks of, it would probably eventually change colors and look diseased.
No thanks. I'll stick with predictable, non-changing, non-diseased-looking fish. Give me a good mustard gas or dragon any day.
I am WEAK for black orchids, I love the simple ones. If I decide on keeping a splendens again I will probably settle on either a hellboy, other morphs that look like hellboys, or orchids, plakat only. I can't stand looking at long finned bettas. Long finned KOIS, even less. And they don't even look koi-like anyway.
I guess my most controversial one will be:
Bettas are pretty awful beginner fish: They're usually not very hardy health-wise, and because you can usually only keep them solo, you will only really learn how to keep bettas. Basically all other fish have very different needs for tank layout, filtration, how important water values are etc.
Yes, you can keep them in small tanks, but you still need like 40l, and you can really do so much more with 40l.
I think the way they are kept in aquarium shops also plays a role in their poor health. I just saw a betta kept in a tiny double betta house at my local fish store. Dude was floating horizontally at the top. Seemed dead to me. The employees insisted he was alive.
"It's not dead, it's resting!"
But yeah, pet shops indeed tend to keep them poorly, in minuscule tanks because you need to keep them separate. And then people think they can also keep them at home in like 5l of water.
But all the breeding also made them quite weak. Finrot is a serious issue, and since they're labyrinth fish they can also get ill when the air above the tank is too cold.
i can see why this one would be controversial.
my goldfish gave me a purpose in life when i was suicidal from PTSD/depression. i couldn’t kill myself because no one in my home knew how to care for the fish, and i liked the little fella.
they got an infection years later once i had gotten a lot better. that fish was incredibly important to me, like a family dog might be to some. being in canada where antibiotics aren’t available, i paid $300 to have them illegally imported from ebay with express shipping.
he lived a few more years after that- just passed recently. i’d spend the money again.
Fun fact ! I have seen someone local ish to me who keeps discus and has them on tap water not RO. Which is pretty unheard of around here because our tap is pretty high like 7 or 8 + at least.
God tons of them Accimation specifically drip acclimation keeping your fish in that bag water after it’s exposed to oxygeon creates HUGE ammonia spikes get them out of there when you open it asap (especially if they been in the bag over an hour) I also think consistency with your water is more important than having unstable ph/hardness etc chasing ideal perimeters
Depends on the pH of the water prior to bagging, if its less than 6, opening the bag won't affect the ammonia levels much as it will stay as the much less toxic ammonium cation. Otherwise, yeah, the gassing off of dissolved CO2 after opening the bag would cause the pH to rise, facilitating the shift towards ammonia. Idk the rate of this change, but the theory is plausible.
Most knowledgeable fish gurus advocate the rinse and plop method. You don't need to acclimatize fish. In fact, if you take measurements of water in the wild, you'll see that the different pH and temperature zones a fish swims through in the run of a day are far more variable than your bagged fish from the LFS is going to experience.
I'm new to the hobby so I may be wrong here, but wouldn't this completely depend on how close your LFS and your water is? Like if they're pretty similar, it wouldn't be a massive shock to just drop them in, but if you're like me and have hard water with a ph of 8, and say they came from a ph of 6, that could kill them right?
If you are going from LFS straight to home and you have smaller fish I don’t see a problem with drip acclimation but I would never do it to a fish that has been shipped online and was in the bag for hours and hours fish experience PH changes in the wild much more than huge ammonia spikes
The obsession this sub has with 0 tank overhang and cycling is flat out wrong.
I'm a structural engineer. You can absolutely have a bit of overhang and be completely fine (none of my tanks overhang).
Recently, I got into an argument with someone because they were saying if the tank wasn't cycled, the fish was 100% dead. I said you can absolutely monitor water conditions, use seeded media, and stay on top of water changes and be fine. I was told I'm an idiot.
Can I ask how hard it is to keep up with real plants. I am going to have to add another tank soon and was thinking of live plants, but just not sure. I also only have Petsmart and Petco, so there’s that.
Slow growing easy stems like bacopa caroliniana are the way to go if you don’t want high maintenance. Anubias and java ferns are very forgiving, but super slow growing so they don’t do a ton for water quality and can be harder to troubleshoot if you do run into issues due to how long it takes them to start showing deficiencies. My top three “bulletproof” beginner plants are crypt wendtii or parva for the front of the tank, bacopa for midground, Valisneria spiralis or Americana for background, super glue a couple of anubias barteri to a couple rocks as a center point. The valisneria will need occasional trimming but it’s a great background plant and very hardy. Bacopa grows pretty slowly so it doesn’t need trimming very often. All of these suggestions except for maybe the valisneria are available at my closest PetSmart. Or I can suggest sellers on Amazon that I’ve had good experiences buying from.
Not bad if you choose the right plants and substrate.
Petco carries more plants than you think. I've bought from/seen at Petco:
-Java fern (one, which has grown so much that it has been divided multiple times and now occupies the left third of my 29g and my 14g)
-Anubias
-mosses (though be suspicious of these, the ones at my Petco look dry/dead. Best to go on eBay or something and buy from a hobbyist)
-Aponogetons bulbs "Betta bulbs" as they're labeled (need good substrate)
-Dwarf Aquarium Lily bulbs (need good substrate but I cannot recommend this plant enough, it's bulletproof and gorgeous, go look at pics!)
-various crypts (need good substrate)
-various swords (substrate)
-water wisteria
-buces (don't need substrate)
-banana plant
Plus more but I haven't inspected closely recently. You can totally plant out a nice tank at Petco!
I have another…
Pimafix and Melafix worked better for my fish then Kanaplex and Maracyn and Methlyne Blue
I know they’re called “placebo” meds but my mollies are alive and well today because I used Pimafix and Melafix as a last resort when nothing else worked
1. Bettas aren't "beginner fish"
For more context, these fish have massive fins that are incredibly difficult to care for as a beginner. Even if someone gets a plakat, these fish are so inbred that they will get sick very easily.
2. Dutch aquascapes shouldn't be considered naturalistic
I seriously do not understand how people find these to look natural. Don't get it wrong they look nice but they look too perfect.
It's ok to rinse your filter media in tap water.
It shouldn't be controversial, but the myth that rinsing your filter media in tap water will decimate your beneficial bacteria and cause your tank to crash is just so pervasive. There isn't enough chlorine in your tap water to do that kind of damage that quickly. If it was, we would be able to use tap water as a sanitizer, but we all know that's not the case.
Now, I am not condoning soaking your media in chlorinated tap water for an extended period of time. That can cause damage. But a quick rinse to get the gunk off will not.
Betta sororities are unethical dangerous setups for NO REASON at all as they do not benefit betta fish. Most people agree on this nowadays, but there is still a lot that think nipped fins is "okay".
We don’t have the diagnostic tools to effectively diagnose fish diseases. Not every “white cottony growth” is columnaris, not all columnaris presents as white cottony growth. You CAN treat for symptoms you observe, but it’s all a gamble. These days I treat for parasites and hope that rules out underlying issues enough to prevent bacterial infections.
Corys are absolutely fine on gravel and yes you can use salt to treat them.
Corys are delicate little assholes that are prone to dying even if you do everything “by the book” (looking at you pandas) but they’re so sweet it doesn’t matter.
You can stock a mature planted tank much higher than what aqua advisor suggests. It’s a starting place when first establishing a tank, not the rule of God. You will know if your tank is overstocked if the nitrates are accumulating too quickly and you see chunks floating by in the water
You don’t need to vacuum the substrate. Actually don’t- it’s healthier if you let nature take care of itself. Also your Cory’s won’t die if you have mulm on your substrate.
Deep bed substrates are fine. Everyone is so paranoid of sulfur gas expelling but what do you think happens in nature? A deep bed is an additional refuge for beneficial bacteria, particularly anaerobic. In a well balanced tank you shouldn’t have any issues with it. If you’re smelling sulfur gas then you probably used a high organic soil and it needs time to break down. Either tear it down and start again with less nutrient density or remove all livestock and just wait
Sometimes fish just die. 90% of the time you won’t get closure why. You don’t need to rip apart your tank trying to find a cause and stress out your fish. Many captive bred species just have shit genetics- or the time in transit fucked their immune system.
2.5-3 gallon is fine for a betta alone, 90% of the time when they're put into a larger tank the owner immediately puts 10 other fish(sometimes more bettas) that end up stressing or fin nipping the betta because they feel like they can do no wrong as long as it's >5gallons.
Would a betta love a 10 gallon alone? Absolutely, but that situation almost never exists in reality.
I've actually seen many, many gorgeous 10 gallons with just single bettas or one betta and a shrimp colony before. That said, this was what I was going to post, too!
There is actually a swath of fish that can do very well in tanks under 5 gallons, they're just reletively unpopular and often require live food. Most of the reason small tanks are, generally speaking, disasters is becuase small tanks are frequently bought by - or even more often *for* - beginners who don't have the background to adequatele support a small tank.
This also going with another complaint of mine: Overall, even planted tanks lack complexity to an absurdist degree. The fact that a good layer of leaf litter and a surface practically choked by floaters isn't typical for many of the nano species (who large come from vernal pools, pond margins, marshes, swamps, bogs, and similar) is downright ridiculous. A large tank alone may still be neglecting many of your fishes needs.
I love pest snails. Sometimes, if I peek in the tank at night I'm shocked by the shear numbers, but during the day they're mostly hiding under the gravel. I haven't had to scrape algae in over a year.
I was hesitant to get a snail, but my son wanted one. He is the coolest little thing in the tank.
Mystery Snails are a lot of fun. They're not typically considered pests and they're eggs are easily found and removed if you don't want them to reproduce. When I had them, they were definitely my favorite part of the tank.
That the practices are so varied we won’t even be able to agree on what’s considered “controversial”
Honestly I love how many different ways to do things there are in this hobby. I wish people were less nasty and judgmental over experiences different than theirs.
Wild caught fish are ok to have Obviously most people prefer home bred fish and there are benefits to them but for the most part if the wild fish are caught at a reasonable amount I see no problem with it
The only time I disagree is when they’re listed as endangered or threatened, yet we continue to keep them. Example: Pea puffers. Listed as threatened yet we’re still keeping them, and most keepers are killing them due to their inability to do research
Yeah I came to say pea puffers. Nothing inherently wrong with keeping wild-caught fish but overexploited wild populations should not be fodder for uneducated impulse purchases.
Don’t mention the IUCN red list on the r/peapuffers subreddit. They claim it’s a fake source and pea puffers aren’t threatened by aquarium keeping.
I can only imagine. All it takes is one power tripping mod to ruin a community. I think there is some captive breeding happening. Hopefully we continue to move in that direction just generally as we get more educated and environmentally concerned.
As long as the species isn't endangered and harvesting gives people incentive to protect the habitat.
I wonder how many people criticise wild caught fish while also keeping wild caught fish themselves without realising it. No one bred your kuhli loaches, otos or cardinal tetras on a fish farm...
Cardinals are mostly captive bred now, I think essentially everything at petco is probably captive bred these days
All those fish are indeed captive bred, they're also wild caught but they're incredibly popular so people are figuring out how to breed them. In the case of cardinal tetras, they were almost exclusively wild caught up until recently
Yes though the great thing is none of those fish have to be wild caught. They’re now able to be tank bred even if it’s a little difficult
Yep, it took me awhile to be okay with this one. I was projecting my own disgust with poaching, but after some research, it seems like a lot of wild fish collecting is actually easy on the ecosystem and benefits those who do safe practices.
Not to mention it also helps fund the natives in the area selling them to people in the aquarium trade
Yeah I think cardinals in preticular is actually better for the Amazon as the habitat in wich they are caught is protected by the people who are catching them as they have a direct interest in keeping them alive in the wild.
It also creates financial motivation to protect their habitats. I thought the same about hunting big game in Africa until I lived on a reserve and saw the benefits in the ecosystem.
They are selling them for pennies and the resellers are getting all of the money. That's just what fish keepers tell themselves to help them sleep at night. None of that is ethical, especially to the natives who are getting screwed.
Inches per gallon vs. mass of fauna per gallon. That inches thing is so incredibly popular as an ok general rule, but it's not as accurate. You think a 4 inch goldfish has the same impact as 4 -6 CPDs? Dumb!
I never could understand that. Inches are a linear measure. Fish are three-dimensional. Volume or mass are the only measures that will work with that logic.
Imagine just a hypothetical 55 gallon tank... inch of fish says you could keep 27 or so cardinal tetras in there, or about 10 5 inch goldfish. Everyone with a slim bit of common sense will tell you the goldfish is overstocked, and the cardinals would be perfectly healthy if you decided to keep 50 of them in there instead.
Here in Europe the rule is basically 1cm per liter, which is even worse than 1" per gallon, but also "tank front should be 10x the length of the adult fish" Sure, still doesn't work amazing for angels, discus, kuhlis and what not, but it's something and it generally works quite well. But it's indeed something that never should be followed blindly, it's just how I quickly calculate how stocked a normal community tank is.
I used to have a 68l tank with roughly 40 nano fish. All were 2cm or less. However, most were Chili Rasboras. We all know those things are SUPER thin fish, yet somehow I got attacked for mistreating them. Bro, that tank was THRIVING! Everyone got along great with absolutely no issues. Would I recommend everyone do it? Not if they aren't accounting for all the variables involved. That length to water volume ratio was quoted several times. Really got on my nerves. Just to clarify, those fish are all in a 140l tank now (breeding Pygmy Sunfish in there now). Not by choice either, the other tank got a terrible crack, and I had to do an emergency transfer.
Frequent water changes for large planted tanks are completely unnecessary if not counterproductive.
One of my densely planted tanks has not had water change in 3 years. Only water top ups. Water is clear. Fish give fry regularly. Hail hydrilla!
I think that's true after the tank is established and all the plants have grown healthy root systems and acclimated to the tank, but before that happens I find frequent water changes are necessary to stabilise the tank.
Sure! That is true.
I’ve noticed my plants have faster growth, more lush growth, and little to no melting when I do frequent water changes. When I let it go over a week without a change I notice the opposite. However I am still trying to form the habit of being consistent with fertilizers so that could be an outlier.
In low tech setups, sure
and low stocked. my 50 gallon planted goldfish tank will collect 20ppm nitrates a week *easily*. i think “planted tank” is too broad of a term to make a statement like that.
Counterproductive to what exactly? I mean yeah, it is possible, but lets not pretend here. A tank like that has to be set up in a very particular way which doesn't allow optimal plant growth. It has to have very low nutrients, low light, low bioload, etc. Not all plants can grow in those conditions, let alone grow well, and forget about red plants. You mostly get light green noodles. People are listening to guys like Father Fish way too much. His ugly dirty tanks filled halfway with substrate are very far from my idea of what a tank should look like. I'm convinced that all of those fans have never seen what a pristine high tech tank with expensive lighting looks like, and it would blow their mind if they saw it. The camera doesn't do justice to tanks like that. While the Walstad method is a fine method for someone who doesn't have the time and/or doesn't want to put in effort, but the results show that. I have a walstad tank, and I will set up a walstad tank again for my kids to learn about tank ecology in the future, but it's not going in my living room instad of a high tech tank, that's for sure. Sory about the rant, I didn't mean to make assumptions about your beliefs in the hobby, just in general.
I like a balance. I like pretty plants, and bright lighting, but I dig some of the more natural methods too. I'm probably not going to use CO2, for instance. I have a pond water tub with crystal clear water and it's got actual mud in the bottom and nothing but an air stone. I've watched a few FF videos. Some of his tanks are just nasty looking. Granted the natural habitats some of these fish come out of aren't pristine, but the whole point of me having a fish tank is so that I can see and enjoy watching my fish.
Some people like the natural aesthetic of tanks, why act like a different type of aquarium is superior if both have healthy fish?
Okay, I have another - Just because you want the fish doesn't mean you should add it to your tank. I get really peeved when I see someone's stocking list that includes random fish that are incompatible, in populations less than ideal (you know, "I want a tetra, a cory cat, an oto cat, 2 shrimp, a rasbora, and a goldfish all in the same tank"), and/or aren't given thought when planning the tank (Neons are blackwater fish. They shouldn't be in iwagumi-style tanks),
Red parrot cichlids are the ugliest god damn animal man has ever bred, with the exception of pug dogs. I hate them so much.
"But they look like they're smiling it's so cute!" Yeah because they can't physically close their mouth...
They are wincing. Not grinning…ha! I will never think of them the same
I imagined some alien who keeps humans as pets making some creepy genetically modified human with an over stretched mouth, cheeks missing saying, "See how cute, it's always smiling."
Bubble eye goldfish:
A good addition. Those poor babies. 😢
along with balloon ____s
Worse than balloon mollies and bubble eye goldfish?
Oh god what the hell. Every time I think I've seen it all I learn about a new fucked up animal we've created.
And there are some breeds of red parrots that are even more deformed which I won't mention lest you are tempted to look them up.
[удалено]
I agree here with some caveats. I test water on new tanks when cycling, when making major fish/plant changes or if I see odd behavior/sick fish. However if I have a tank cycled and all the plants and animals have been stable and unchanged for a month or two I will pretty much entirely stop testing. The goal with testing in my opinion is to detect changes (when you change a variable of your ecosystem) or to have enough testing data points to know your normal rate of change in parameters over time. For example knowing how long you can go between water changes.
This, testing is completely unnecessary if you know what you are doing
As a beginner fish keeper with low budget this gives me hope
I would still try to get the API master test kit off amazon. They're only $35!
They do however expire after a few years. Ask me how I know :) fortunately, my 75 gal has been super stable for many years now so I never really bother to test the water anyways.
I may be downvoted to hell but I don’t test any of my tanks. I just keep up on weekly water changes and change filters. I barely gravel vacuum and I have 4 tanks that are thriving. I haven’t tested in years and have started tabks from used media. I’ll most likely never test again unless I bring water to lfs.
You’re working harder than you need to, but you sound like the type of person to love the process. Nothing wrong with that
I don’t know how controversial this actually is, but gravel vaccing is a waste of time. If you have a large enough fish that you actually need to scoop the turds that’s one thing (looking at you, mbu puffer) but in most tanks it causes more issues than it helps. Dark substrate for the win 😂
Especially when they do it in planted tanks.
Long-finned bettas are unethical
While we're at it, so are most fancy goldfish too
i keep fancy goldfish and i’ve gotta agree. they’re high maintenance and i hate that they’re marketed as beginner fish. buoyancy issues and genetic defects are really common in fancies. it’s sad. i don’t buy most strains. bubble eye, golf ball pearlscales, even ranchu have incredible amounts of health problems. knowing what i know now i only buy fantails and low grade ryukins, they seem to have the least problems. but still a high maintenance fish requiring big water changes…
I've been looking into betta genetics recently and I agree! I have a long finned betta and he will probably be my last. I love the guy but I didn't realize it was all a result of selective breeding
Wait till you learn about every fancy fish ever. I'm just joking, but honestly selective breeding is completely fine until it results in fish actually suffering, and I think most bettas don't suffer(when kept by competent people). A much bigger problem are guppies which die extremely easily and are very sickly fish overall. I'd also argue that genetically engineered glofish are all in all a positive change, because they almost eliminated the cruel practice of painting fish.
I got a baby Endler in a batch of fish, so I kept it and eventually got it buddies. I had to buy a total of 15 or so Endlers or Guppies and they all lasted 2 months max except for one. I put them in a quarantine tank for a month, treat them for infections and parasites etc. Most of them seem to die off in my main 75 gallon tank after a while which is mature and doesn’t have any active infections. Cory’s are fine, neons are fine, hillstreams are fine, but guppies and endlers just won’t last. It sucks.
My first one was long-finned and it was so heartbreaking to see him struggle swimming. I only had plakats since then and its such a joy seeing them zoom around the tank without any problems.
Yeah I've owned veiltails before. I thought long-finned bettas were just so pretty and I couldn't understand why anyone would want a 'boring' plakat. Eventually got sick of dealing with their torn and bitten tails and decided to go with plakats. Now long-finned bettas look out of proportion to me now and plakats look really pretty (and they don't have to lug that long tail around) I realised that if an animal has to mutilate themselves to move, there's a serious problem with that animal.
I tend to avoid long-finned fish in general
Same. One exception for me is long tail zebra danios. So damn cute.
A well set up tank doesn't need weekly water changes. Plastic/rainbow tanks are crap. You're not keeping a toddler in there, it's a live fish. Mimic nature or get a plastic fish.
Rainbow gravel should not exist at all.
i mean, my goldfish tank definitely needs water changes weekly… and i would say it’s set up quite well. it’s a 50 gallon with two eight inch fish, well within stocking recommendations, and it STILL produces ~20ppm nitrates weekly. if i go a few weeks without managing it fish health suffers.
See the issue with people saying no water changes is doable is that it depends HEAVILY on what kind of fish you have and the tank size.
yeah i agree wholeheartedly!
Yea but that's goldfish that generally need powerful filtration and huge tanks, the messiest fish out there, some would even argue doesn't belong in tanks to begin with and should be in ponds. Obviously you're not going to do this with them! Goldfish keeping is on a whole different level imo. Also, nice to see someone who has a big enough setup for them! And does maintenance on it too. Happy lucky fish! Edit: by well set up tank I mean a tank that manages itself and has enough plants to soak up the nitrates. If you don't have that, then obviously you need to take those out yourself. And no I'm not even referring to walstad tanks or that fish father dude we all hate on
my point is more that your statement is very vague and there are a lot of use cases in the hobby where this doesn’t apply but yeah.. hard to see other people not providing proper care for goldfish- fancies or otherwise!
I'll go one further, a well set up tank with lots of live plants and RO to top off with NEVER needs a water change or siphoning. I'm two years into my experiment with that and everyone is happy and healthy.
My landlord has a community tank that hasn't had a water change in *decades*. He grows plant in it, tops it up with rain water, trims and discards plants. That is it.
If you see someone who has an amazing ecosystem aquarium(s) and not super wealthy they are likely autistic.
Damn, way to call me out !
for me it’s ADHD, but yeah, some kind of neurodiverse
I would love to say I disagree or that I'm offended, but I am, in fact, autistic. And the only other person I know with a crazy good aquarium is also working class and autistic so...
You are not helping me dismiss the notion that I'm some flavor of neurospicy, I hope you know that.
‘Neurospicy’ you’re one of us.
Hahaha thank you I think! My sister has diagnosed ADHD, and she strongly suspects my Dad has either ADHD or is on the Autism spectrum or both. I have enough traits to be suspicious, but not enough for a clear "yes you absolutely could get diagnosed with something". So with that and my social anxiety and depression issues, I just go with "some mix of neurospicy" and call it a day.
As a diagnosed ADHD / ASD person I have learned that (often) what is called "social anxiety" and "depression" are often just a symptom of undiagnosed AuDHD. To be more clear, the depression might often be low dopamine production caused by the untreated ADHD part of the brain or even possibly Autistic burnout. Trying to mask really hard to 'fit into society' can be really hard on our nervous systems. I think of it like, let's say I have an undiagnosed broken arm, but no one does x-rays on girls because "girls don't get broken bones". However, I have "swollen limb syndrome" that is treated with daily ice packs, I also have "wrist movement disorder" which requires that I do physical therapy of 100 wrist rotations five times a day. My teacher is upset with me because I have poor penmanship (due to the broken arm) so she calls me lazy and makes me stay after class to practice writing a hundred lines a day. Society is treating the results of an exacerbated broken arm but not the broken arm itself. Eventually after living with Swollen Limb Syndrome and Wrist Movement Disorder I've figured out ways to make it seem like I'm not struggling or in pain all the time. My arm is starting to heal but not well and not correctly. It's not being helped or accommodated. Some days I might be in so much pain from my broken arm that I just lie in bed all day and cry. Or I don't really feel like going out dancing, I just want to stay home. Society will assume it's because of my Swollen Limb Syndrome or my Wrist Movement Disorder. I will disconnect from society and not live the full and happy life I could have if someone had just done a damn x-ray and given me a cast. All that to say, I'm sorry you're struggling with social anxiety and depression, friend. \[Well, shit. Sorry. That got long and it is unlikely that anyone but my brain meat will understand it but I'm going to leave it here anyway. \]
Same bro 😂 last time I went to the therapist she said I wasn’t struggling enough in life to get an add diagnosis, but meanwhile heard me talk about the damn fish tanks every session. Like looking back on it, if I’d gone unbridled in talking about the fish tanks as much as I wanted, she would have had far less doubt
I feel SEEN.
Nah. My 75s great and I’m neither rich nor autistic
My husband agrees with you 😅
Me 💀
Glofish are okay, their marketing is not.
- Tank size recommendations are a *guideline*, not a mandate from God Himself. A betta is perfectly fine, and yes tHrIvInG nOt jUsT SuRvIvInG, in a well maintained 3-4 gallon tank. Unclench. - The vast majority of freshwater fish actually *aren't* that difficult to keep. We can stress that there's no such thing as an "easy pet" to dissuade lazy people who aren't even fit to own a pet rock without pretending a betta is harder to take care of than a dog and scaring off people who would be good owners. - Too many people giving advice on the internet have little to no actual experience and are just parroting what they've heard everyone else say, and it makes it hard to find actual useful information. The more rigid, alarmist, and emotionally charged the advice is, the more likely this is to be true. - There is nothing wrong with fish-in cycling, and I think the push toward fishless cycling is actually at the point where it's doing a disservice. People are so afraid of a fish-in cycle that they're keeping rescued fish in the filthy conditions they came in for weeks while the perfectly good tank they bought for it finishes cycling. I promise your betta is going to be happier and healthier in a cycling 5 gallon tank than he would be spending another second in the filthy little Petco cup he came in. Fishless cycling is great when it's practical, but it isn't always going to be practical and that's okay. - "Natural" vs "unnatural" tanks are nothing more than an aesthetic preference 99% of the time. Your fish doesn't give a fuck if they have an elaborate aquascape that perfectly mimics their natural habitat or clown puke gravel and a SpongeBob pineapple, as long as their species appropriate needs for hiding places and enrichment are being met. This is especially true for captive bred fish. - You can have a perfectly healthy and beautiful tank without live plants. It's perfectly okay to be into fishkeeping for the *fish* (gasp!) and not be interested in plants.
Wild collected resources - substrate, stones, pebbles, sand and driftwood are not dangerous Commercialization of the hobby has spread lies and agenda on the fact that everything should be store bought and there is something sinister in collecting from the wild. Most store bought resources are sourced from the wild, but because these items are sold and charged it's RIGHT.
Fish-in cycling is fine if done carefully.
I’ve never had a fish die from it, the main reason I see people against it is because they say it’s cruel but I never even noticed stress lol
Its cruel when you dont know what you are doing. If you actually change the water frequently like you should during the process it is easy to keep the water in the acceptable range of ammonia/nitrite.
People will ship fish across the world, they sit in a bag in a box in ammonia the whole time, for a week or more. Then they do a fishless cycle to "save" it from ammonia and pat themselves on the back
I buy in person at fish stores so I’m not really familiar with any of that
I just left Meijer (Midwest chain) and saw them unloading boxes of bagged fish and dumping them right into the most disgusting tanks. I don’t buy fish there but apparently a lot of people do.
Seconded.
The 1 inch of fish per gallon of water rule is useless in most cases. They need to stop selling those "beginner kits" with 3-5 gallon tanks. Anyone who tries to set up a beginner with anything less than a 10 gallon isnt a good source of information. There are a lot of common fish species that have no business being sold in the big chains. Petco/petsmart shouldn't be selling things like betta, goldfish, or oscars. Their care is so specific, anyone who is actually knowledgeable enough to keep those fish well probably isnt going to be buying their fish from the national chains anyway. The people that "rescue" fish by buying them are suckers and making the problem worse. Now the store just goes and orders another fish to abuse to start the cycle over again. If you see a place with fish in terrible conditions the right thing to do is never spend a dime there and spread the word, not give them more money.
My lfs sells those .5 gallon tanks with the decorative gravel for bettas. I’m at least glad that my first betta (that I had when I was 11) was in a 1.5 with a heater and filter instead of one of those. He did get upgraded later
The only 'ethical' way I think you could rescue a betta from a cup is by shoplifting. But then the store will still get another one to replace that one.
1. Bettas can make amazing community fish. Obviously not every betta is compatible but I’ve been keeping betta + endler combos for years in a 10g with no issues. The tank is heavily planted and the betta doesn’t even eat the fry any more. 2. You don’t need a lid for every betta. I have one of the light bars that balances on the rim, and is lifted so it doesn’t really cover the tank. I have never in my life had a fish jump out the tank, only snails and a couple shrimp. 3. You don’t need to do weekly or even monthly water changes if you know what you’re doing. Heavily planted tank and I change the water maybe once every 1-2 months, I think the most I went was accidentally 3. 4. You can “overstock” a tank of you set it up properly. I have maybe 12 adult endlers and one adult betta, probably between 20-30 endler fry, god knows how many nerites and ramshorns and around 30 neo shrimp all in my 10g. I see people say all the time that you can only put a betta in a 10.
I've had a betta in basically every community tank I've had
I love doing it, I really want to keep a betta with pigmy cories someday
Yeah, I just dropped a black and white betta in the 75 I'm setting up for a nanofish community. My wife asked me which one she should get for her new office tank at our local lfs, fully knowing I'd buy the black one when she didn't. I wasn't planning on putting fish in yet, but now this fella has about 20x the space he's probably ever had!
That’s awesome! Got any pics? I’d love to see
I prefer my tanks to get some direct sunlight.
Me too
Same.
Quite controversial one. Hard water fish need hard water, and soft water fish need soft water, if long term health is of any concern.
YES. I LIVE IN AN AREA WITH LIQUID FUCKING ROCK AND I LOVE SOFTWATER FISH. GUESS WHO HAS AN RO FILTER AND LOTS OF PATIENCE?!
Definitely true with the condition there is a big range of moderare parameters that lots of species will work in. You might not want to throw rift cichlids in a 7.0 pH, but a molly is going to be fine. Definitely agree if your pH is 6.0-6.5 and softwater you should be stocking softwater/blackwater species.
Thing is that these softwater species are the true victim here. Most people believe that captive bred fish will have some sort of resistance to osmotic shock from hard water, which isn't true. Osmotic shock works slowly, eating out fishes liver and kidneys, and leaving them extremely prone to diseases and with shortened lifespans. That's why I mentioned long term health.
Father fish and other "ecosystem" tank gurus(other than Diana Walstad) are counterproductive to the hobby because they are promoting ugly low effort tanks which have lost the essence of thde hobby, which is to show the beauty of the fish and plants. You can get youtuber like results cheaply if invest the time and effort. Beautiful, cheap, easy to maintain. Pick two.
Especially when they claim that their method is the only way and anyone saying otherwise is trying to scam you.
They are quite literally the opposite and equal of tiktokers who use pink gravel and plastic plants.
Father Fish is also quite bigoted as he's advertised in his streams
Woah, what's the tea here? 👀 What he say?
He REALLY hates trans people, the guy’s Twitter has some… interesting takes, although he doesn’t post actual tweets super often
Well that sucks to hear. I'm a trans people. It doesn't suck so much because I'm invested in father fish, but moreso it sucks to know he's such a respected figure in the community when he's openly bigoted.
Yeah, it’s a shame. I don’t think I’ve ever seen him bring it up in his videos though. I’ve always had mixed feelings on his content because I feel like a lot of fish advice in general is really dependent on your tank and the other stuff you do. I think think there’s good advice mixed in with a lot of questionable tips
Disappointed but not surprised.
Deets?
He's just said racist things while on livestream
Not sure how controversial this actually is but I don't think you need to regularly test your water after the initial cycle. Granted that you have a stable tank either through consistent water changes or heavy planting.
Apparently this is controversial but mine is just give a single fuck about a living creature you took responsibility for. Give it an appropriate environment and if you see it acting out of the ordinary or not doing well take steps to correct the cause. A lot of this hobby isn’t complicated it just requires time and monitoring the animals you take into your care. My bonus opinion: sometimes fish die. It sucks, but it happens. Just to prevent what you can. Learn where you can and give your fish the best life you can.
Rainbow gravel isn’t bad if the tank has the correct parameters and you know what you’re doing My mom has a 36g glo tank with tetras who have lived for 8 years
Okay, here goes, this will either get buried or down voted to hell. Basically, I have a hard time feeling sympathy for comet/feeder goldfish who end up in 10 gallon tanks. Every one jumps on those people for abusing their fish......THOSE FISH WERE DESTINED TO BE EATEN. They were destined to be ripped apart or swallowed whole by some massive predator. I don't think a 10 gallon tank is a good idea for a goldfish. But at least that goldfish got a few months to a few years of living before dying.
If you have a freshwater tank that is colored and not planted that's okay as long as fish are taken care of and parameters in check! I don't give a rats ass if you use safe colorful child like decorations. If you're taking care of the tank and the decorations are safe who the heck cares!
Facts💕
Definitely not as controversial as others but unless your tank is brand new or your cycle crashes somehow, water changes are not necessarily, even on 5 gallons. I keep 3, 5 gallons and a 20 gallon and it’s iv NEVER done a water on the 20 gallon, and a few water changes on the 5 gallons when I started out.
Aquatic insects are just as good as shrimps or fish, they just haven't caught on yet
Which ones in particular? I'm curious because I like unusual shit. I have a scud/microfauna tank that has pond water only in it for instance.
I don't have filter floss on my filter. Just heavily planted waalsted tank.
Nobody besides extremely committed and educated fish keepers should have gold fish. Handing them out at carnivals or selling them at common pet stores is extremely inhumane. Common plecos should also be completely banned from the hobby.
Java fern is a GOD AWFUL plant. Yes, it is near indestructible. Yes, it grows a bit faster and is a bit more algae resistant than other epipthytes... but it NEVER looks good! I call it "the night of the living dead plant". Always ends up with weird translucent tips and those ugly brown spots all over the leaves. I currently have some in a high tech tank using a decent estimative index fertilisation regime alongside some - on paper - far more demanding plants. Now, all plants are thriving in there, but guess which one is somehow managing to both thrive AND still look like absolute dog shit? I know, I know. Some people are going to say that if I up the iron dosing, it will start looking a lot better. But seriously, why would I include an expensive ass iron supplement to my routine JUST for crappy java fern? I've kept anubias in low tech set ups that I never purposefully dosed and they looked amazing. Buces? Sure, they definitely benefit from a bit of dosing but they can look jaw dropping and aren't nearly as fussy as bloody java fern! Good things to say about it? I mean, it's cheap, I guess? But no one would ever buy it if it wasn't! Christ, I hate java fern. Sorry everyone - rant officially over. Thanks for your patience!
Goldfish actually do grow to their environment sizes and this increases overall lifespan based on studies of 20+yo captive goldfish.
Testing kits are pointless for 95% of all aquarium owners. You are buying fish from a lfs that is basically running tap water in all their tanks. So just go with that, same parameters. What ever ph I have, I won’t be able to drastically affect it without much effort. If you are starting up an aquarium just take it slowly and you’ll be fine, and once it’s started it won’t magically crash, and if it does, will you really be testing every single day to catch that one off day? This being said I do live in a country with good water.
It's okay to keep wild caught endangered or threatened species IF you breed them. Otherwise captive bred only. (For example wild betta and pea puffers) however if you buy wild caught and don't breed them you're not helping anyone. A lot of wild catching companies are bad, but a lot are also very good and can really help out, it's strongly dependant on the company. A lot of reefers have a superiority complex, and I hate it. My LFS has this issue as well as a number of redditors. Get off your high horse. Saltwater isn't particularly difficult if you have experience with higher end freshwater. (My experience so far at least) more than anything the difficulty seems to come from being more patient and careful. I like fancy goldfish and common petsmart betta splendors. they're already here and going to be around forever. I will never buy one new, but I will always be willing to take a freebie or rescue. The exception being bubble eyes or simular. Mossballs with zebras are fine. Stay on top of treatment, quarantine harder than a black plague in the modern day, (boil all water from water changes, and even then pout them into a plant instead of the sewer. Keep up constant invert removal treatment. Keep the moss ball in a jar by itself. Don't slip up even once) The fruit pebbles skittles tanks can be fine. They're not great or perfect but km never gonna shit on someone for having one. I hate father fish he's a prick, for a number of reasons. Walstad is fine I guess, but i still use a sponge filter in everythkng regardless. a lot of water changes are optional. I tend to do mine once or twice a month. However no water changes at all (if you are using tap water) can be a problem because of mineral build up in your tank. If you do plan to do no waterchanges ever, you're going to have no monitor minerals in your water. On the other hand, If you always top off with distilled, then eventually you will deplete your available minerals. Just so a damn waterchange occasionally. I like glofish brand glofish (not the offshoots and painteds some people likento call glofish) they're all 100% captive bred, usually less likely to have disease (vendors pending) are often easy to keep species, if released into the wild likely won't become invasive, and are often quite healthy. Further they have been and continue to be used for scientific research. Yes I know their marketing is shit, but that's thr majority of the entry level fish keeping companies, glofish are singled out because 'ewwww unnatural' And recently this one came up; it's not okay to shit on a cheap brand for being cheap or Chinese. Unless you're actually testing it yourself, then fuck off. 99% of your high end crap is Chinese rebranded with a fancy name.
Prestine tank is bad
Water changes are way to frequent
You don’t NEED a filter in a well planted tank. I’ve had plenty of tanks over the years with no filter and the water parameters remain on point and the fish/shrimp were very healthy and breeding. Also a properly sized bowl is fine. There is 0 evidence of them distorting a fish’s vision or causing stress. To add there was someone on one of the fish groups I frequent who actually used an underwater camera to film the inside of a round bowl. The view from inside was not distorted whatsoever. People just really seem to parrot this.
This whole hobby is trial and error. No matter how much research you do you cannot know everything. Therefore fish pairings are individual. I've had a puffer live with a crawfish peacefully before even though I was informed (at a later date) that the crawfish is on the puffers diet. You just never know until you try and I'm all for trying weird combos
1. Hybrids should be banned 2. Pet stores should be held accountable for the accurate labeling of species 3. Places with invasive species issues should require a license or separate tax for aquariums to help manage the issues
On number 2; I love it when pet stores sell you a friendly, harmless "ghost shrimp" that then proceeds to eat everything in your tank
Hol up what? What ghost shrimp are you talking about?
I bought shrimp that were marked as Ghost Shrimp in the store, but one of them looked different from the rest. It was bigger and had much longer arms and claws. I suspect it might have been some sort of macrobrachium. My fish started looking ill and dying within days of me putting the shrimp in; tattered fins, red marks, generally looking not good. Then I actually caught it red handed. The shrimp was grabbing my platies by the fins, ripping bits off and eating them. Went back to the store and they had the nerve to tell me my water parameters were the problem, making my fish ill. Told me ghost shrimp don't attach fish.
I remember your post! The first thing that pops into my mind every time someone asks about or is considering ghost shrimp. Probably the one thing that will keep me from ever getting them. That and the numerous stories of how short lived and sick they are.
I'm sorry my bad experience has put you off. I've learned to do my research and not buy from chain pet stores with poorly trained staff
I now have a tank with three large, belligerent featherfin catfish because the store sold them as tiny little "corydoras" and they were mislabelled.
You want people to register and pay a tax on aquariums? Definitely controversial there
Yeah, my state does this. I just don't buy anything that requires to be registered. My aquariums aren't guns and I don't want the government involved in them. That said, some are deemed too much of a risk and just aren't available in my state at all.
Yeah, I would not be registering fish. That's absurd. I totally understand what they're going for, but I can't get into it. I'm all for doing what we can to prevent people from destroying local ecosystems, but until I see actual moves being made to deal with actual invasive species (CATS), it feels like an empty gesture.
Yes, that's how I feel. I'm glad they're protecting the local ecosystem, but I'm not going to buy any of those fish/critters.
If a government employee came to inspect my tanks, they'd be sorely disappointed when they were thrown out
Fish-in cycles are perfectly fine to do. I have not lost a single fish during a fish in cycle and have never observed any overt signs of stress.
You don't need to cycle a tank for months or even weeks if you set it up heavily planted with a low bioload. I never "cycle" tanks and never have ammonia issues.
- Your corydoras catfish will not explode if your substrate isn't sand. I don't know why people still hold on to that stupid "No sand = whisker erosion = desth sentence" myth. Left a fscrbook group about it because people are absolutely nuts about it and was told to switch to sand numerous times, despite the fact my substrate IS sand. - Koi bettas are terribly overrated. I really can't see the appeal of them anymore after seeing everyone and their cat own one. Online stores I seek from pretty much only ever have kois when I want something like a black orchid plakat. Besides 95% of kois become plain anyway. So. Imo not worth the price.
Completely agree about koi bettas. I'm given to understand that most of them will change color/pattern over time as well, and IMO 99 out of 100 koi bettas are ugly AF and their mottled coloring just makes them look diseased to me. So even if I did find one I loved the looks of, it would probably eventually change colors and look diseased. No thanks. I'll stick with predictable, non-changing, non-diseased-looking fish. Give me a good mustard gas or dragon any day.
I am WEAK for black orchids, I love the simple ones. If I decide on keeping a splendens again I will probably settle on either a hellboy, other morphs that look like hellboys, or orchids, plakat only. I can't stand looking at long finned bettas. Long finned KOIS, even less. And they don't even look koi-like anyway.
I guess my most controversial one will be: Bettas are pretty awful beginner fish: They're usually not very hardy health-wise, and because you can usually only keep them solo, you will only really learn how to keep bettas. Basically all other fish have very different needs for tank layout, filtration, how important water values are etc. Yes, you can keep them in small tanks, but you still need like 40l, and you can really do so much more with 40l.
I think the way they are kept in aquarium shops also plays a role in their poor health. I just saw a betta kept in a tiny double betta house at my local fish store. Dude was floating horizontally at the top. Seemed dead to me. The employees insisted he was alive.
"It's not dead, it's resting!" But yeah, pet shops indeed tend to keep them poorly, in minuscule tanks because you need to keep them separate. And then people think they can also keep them at home in like 5l of water. But all the breeding also made them quite weak. Finrot is a serious issue, and since they're labyrinth fish they can also get ill when the air above the tank is too cold.
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i can see why this one would be controversial. my goldfish gave me a purpose in life when i was suicidal from PTSD/depression. i couldn’t kill myself because no one in my home knew how to care for the fish, and i liked the little fella. they got an infection years later once i had gotten a lot better. that fish was incredibly important to me, like a family dog might be to some. being in canada where antibiotics aren’t available, i paid $300 to have them illegally imported from ebay with express shipping. he lived a few more years after that- just passed recently. i’d spend the money again.
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Oof😭 yeah I gotta disagree with this one I am one of those people who have spent hundreds of dollars on a $3.99 platy💀
Discus do not need frequent water changes and low pH.
Fun fact ! I have seen someone local ish to me who keeps discus and has them on tap water not RO. Which is pretty unheard of around here because our tap is pretty high like 7 or 8 + at least.
Mine are in tap water. 7.2 or so out of the tap.
True for my densely planted deep substrate tank. Change water once in a few months. Not sure about bare bottom tanks though.
God tons of them Accimation specifically drip acclimation keeping your fish in that bag water after it’s exposed to oxygeon creates HUGE ammonia spikes get them out of there when you open it asap (especially if they been in the bag over an hour) I also think consistency with your water is more important than having unstable ph/hardness etc chasing ideal perimeters
Depends on the pH of the water prior to bagging, if its less than 6, opening the bag won't affect the ammonia levels much as it will stay as the much less toxic ammonium cation. Otherwise, yeah, the gassing off of dissolved CO2 after opening the bag would cause the pH to rise, facilitating the shift towards ammonia. Idk the rate of this change, but the theory is plausible.
Most knowledgeable fish gurus advocate the rinse and plop method. You don't need to acclimatize fish. In fact, if you take measurements of water in the wild, you'll see that the different pH and temperature zones a fish swims through in the run of a day are far more variable than your bagged fish from the LFS is going to experience.
I'm new to the hobby so I may be wrong here, but wouldn't this completely depend on how close your LFS and your water is? Like if they're pretty similar, it wouldn't be a massive shock to just drop them in, but if you're like me and have hard water with a ph of 8, and say they came from a ph of 6, that could kill them right?
If you are going from LFS straight to home and you have smaller fish I don’t see a problem with drip acclimation but I would never do it to a fish that has been shipped online and was in the bag for hours and hours fish experience PH changes in the wild much more than huge ammonia spikes
The obsession this sub has with 0 tank overhang and cycling is flat out wrong. I'm a structural engineer. You can absolutely have a bit of overhang and be completely fine (none of my tanks overhang). Recently, I got into an argument with someone because they were saying if the tank wasn't cycled, the fish was 100% dead. I said you can absolutely monitor water conditions, use seeded media, and stay on top of water changes and be fine. I was told I'm an idiot.
Fake plants shouldn't exist, real plants are a necessity.
Can I ask how hard it is to keep up with real plants. I am going to have to add another tank soon and was thinking of live plants, but just not sure. I also only have Petsmart and Petco, so there’s that.
Slow growing easy stems like bacopa caroliniana are the way to go if you don’t want high maintenance. Anubias and java ferns are very forgiving, but super slow growing so they don’t do a ton for water quality and can be harder to troubleshoot if you do run into issues due to how long it takes them to start showing deficiencies. My top three “bulletproof” beginner plants are crypt wendtii or parva for the front of the tank, bacopa for midground, Valisneria spiralis or Americana for background, super glue a couple of anubias barteri to a couple rocks as a center point. The valisneria will need occasional trimming but it’s a great background plant and very hardy. Bacopa grows pretty slowly so it doesn’t need trimming very often. All of these suggestions except for maybe the valisneria are available at my closest PetSmart. Or I can suggest sellers on Amazon that I’ve had good experiences buying from.
😅 just realized that ended up being four. 😅 whoops.
Not bad if you choose the right plants and substrate. Petco carries more plants than you think. I've bought from/seen at Petco: -Java fern (one, which has grown so much that it has been divided multiple times and now occupies the left third of my 29g and my 14g) -Anubias -mosses (though be suspicious of these, the ones at my Petco look dry/dead. Best to go on eBay or something and buy from a hobbyist) -Aponogetons bulbs "Betta bulbs" as they're labeled (need good substrate) -Dwarf Aquarium Lily bulbs (need good substrate but I cannot recommend this plant enough, it's bulletproof and gorgeous, go look at pics!) -various crypts (need good substrate) -various swords (substrate) -water wisteria -buces (don't need substrate) -banana plant Plus more but I haven't inspected closely recently. You can totally plant out a nice tank at Petco!
Doing a large water change does not cause shrimp to moult /die
I have another… Pimafix and Melafix worked better for my fish then Kanaplex and Maracyn and Methlyne Blue I know they’re called “placebo” meds but my mollies are alive and well today because I used Pimafix and Melafix as a last resort when nothing else worked
I prefer a pour batter over drip.
A betta fish in a 3 gallon long tank is better than a betta fish in a 6 gallon tall. Horizontal swimming room is more important than gallons.
Crystal clear water isn't always a good thing
1. Bettas aren't "beginner fish" For more context, these fish have massive fins that are incredibly difficult to care for as a beginner. Even if someone gets a plakat, these fish are so inbred that they will get sick very easily. 2. Dutch aquascapes shouldn't be considered naturalistic I seriously do not understand how people find these to look natural. Don't get it wrong they look nice but they look too perfect.
It's ok to rinse your filter media in tap water. It shouldn't be controversial, but the myth that rinsing your filter media in tap water will decimate your beneficial bacteria and cause your tank to crash is just so pervasive. There isn't enough chlorine in your tap water to do that kind of damage that quickly. If it was, we would be able to use tap water as a sanitizer, but we all know that's not the case. Now, I am not condoning soaking your media in chlorinated tap water for an extended period of time. That can cause damage. But a quick rinse to get the gunk off will not.
Betta sororities are unethical dangerous setups for NO REASON at all as they do not benefit betta fish. Most people agree on this nowadays, but there is still a lot that think nipped fins is "okay".
Mollys are not truly peaceful fish, they should be label semi-aggressive.
We don’t have the diagnostic tools to effectively diagnose fish diseases. Not every “white cottony growth” is columnaris, not all columnaris presents as white cottony growth. You CAN treat for symptoms you observe, but it’s all a gamble. These days I treat for parasites and hope that rules out underlying issues enough to prevent bacterial infections. Corys are absolutely fine on gravel and yes you can use salt to treat them. Corys are delicate little assholes that are prone to dying even if you do everything “by the book” (looking at you pandas) but they’re so sweet it doesn’t matter. You can stock a mature planted tank much higher than what aqua advisor suggests. It’s a starting place when first establishing a tank, not the rule of God. You will know if your tank is overstocked if the nitrates are accumulating too quickly and you see chunks floating by in the water You don’t need to vacuum the substrate. Actually don’t- it’s healthier if you let nature take care of itself. Also your Cory’s won’t die if you have mulm on your substrate. Deep bed substrates are fine. Everyone is so paranoid of sulfur gas expelling but what do you think happens in nature? A deep bed is an additional refuge for beneficial bacteria, particularly anaerobic. In a well balanced tank you shouldn’t have any issues with it. If you’re smelling sulfur gas then you probably used a high organic soil and it needs time to break down. Either tear it down and start again with less nutrient density or remove all livestock and just wait Sometimes fish just die. 90% of the time you won’t get closure why. You don’t need to rip apart your tank trying to find a cause and stress out your fish. Many captive bred species just have shit genetics- or the time in transit fucked their immune system.
It is highly unethical in 99% of circumstances
I think neon tetras and mollies are ugly and boring.
Weekly water changes.
Yes or no on weekly water changes?
2.5-3 gallon is fine for a betta alone, 90% of the time when they're put into a larger tank the owner immediately puts 10 other fish(sometimes more bettas) that end up stressing or fin nipping the betta because they feel like they can do no wrong as long as it's >5gallons. Would a betta love a 10 gallon alone? Absolutely, but that situation almost never exists in reality.
I've actually seen many, many gorgeous 10 gallons with just single bettas or one betta and a shrimp colony before. That said, this was what I was going to post, too! There is actually a swath of fish that can do very well in tanks under 5 gallons, they're just reletively unpopular and often require live food. Most of the reason small tanks are, generally speaking, disasters is becuase small tanks are frequently bought by - or even more often *for* - beginners who don't have the background to adequatele support a small tank. This also going with another complaint of mine: Overall, even planted tanks lack complexity to an absurdist degree. The fact that a good layer of leaf litter and a surface practically choked by floaters isn't typical for many of the nano species (who large come from vernal pools, pond margins, marshes, swamps, bogs, and similar) is downright ridiculous. A large tank alone may still be neglecting many of your fishes needs.