Sunday, December 23, 2012

The New Addtions - Voodoo & Saffron

Welcoming Saffron (gold fantail) and Voodoo (black moor). They have been happily swimming around in the 100L tank, that finally hit correct parameters last week!! We got Saffi and Voo on Sunday, 17th Dec.

Enough writing, here are photos!!...

Saffron

Saffron and Voodoo

Voodoo

Wednesday, December 5, 2012

Fishless Cycle Update - 100L Tank

As you may or may not know I have started my 100L tank from scratch, a good few weeks ago. I'm doing a fishless cycle with it. Given the difficulties of acquiring exactly what is described as needed in the information linked. I had to resort to putting fish food in my tank everyday for 5 days and leaving that to decompose. (Something I was recommended from the Koko's).

In my previous post I wrote about how I could see a slight reading of Nitrites when I did the parameter test. Today, I got the following readings for Ammonia, Nitrite and Nitrate...


Ammonia = 4.0-8.0   Nitrite = 0.50-1.0   Nitrate = 0
Most importantly is that the Nitrites reading has jumped! It was barely purple yesterday now it's definitely unmistakeable. I'm rather happy with these results! It means we are closer to adding to our fish collection and family hehe! *insert happy dance*

Tuesday, December 4, 2012

Nitrites Appear, Cosmos and Gel Food

So it looks like there was a slight reading of Nitrites for my 100L tank when I did the parameter tests yesterday!! Ammonia is still at 4.0 ppm and Nitrites looked like they were between 0 - 0.25 ppm, Nitrates at 0 still but hey, looks like things are on there way. Slowly but surely.

Below is a picture of what the 70L tank Cosmos is in looks like at the moment. I added some more fake plans and such. Especially near and behind the filter head mainly. I did this because he was getting in the habit of swimming behind the filter head with some force (Cossi is a strong swimmer). He manage to lose a scale the other day. It flared up a little yesterday but today you can barely tell he did anything to himself. It's healing really well.


I also ended up making a batch of Goldfish Gel Food. If you are interested there is a absolute load of recipes for this online. With me being not the best of cooks, found a fairly simple one and changed it a little to suit the ingredients I could get a hold of. Below is a picture of the Gel Food setting in my fridge. Luckily it didn't work out too bad haha! Cosmos eats every morsel when I feed him bits. I have also fed him Bloodworms which he seems to enjoy as well.


The next time I do Gel Food I think I will stick spot on to a recipe. My Gel could have been a lot more gel-like.

Oh! and to finish this post off. Here is another video of Cosmos swimming around in his tank from the other week...

Sunday, November 25, 2012

Cosmos is home!

Ok so a few things have happened since my last post, such as... I bought another tank! Yes you read correctly... haha. I'm still cycling my 100L don't worry - that one has not been forgotten about!

Thing is, I bought a 70L tank to transfer my 7 year old ryukin goldfish (Cosmos) into. He has been at my parents since I got him. Since back when I wasn't too knowledgeable in the keeping of goldfish. Unfortunately he was in a 38 - 40L tank, which is much to small. So, with my recent research in mind I decided to upgrade him!

I got his new 70L tank on Wednesday 21st and did his transfer last night. All went well thankfully. I ran his old filter in his new tank for some time to get the water parameters right for him. Along with also transferring an amount of his old water into the new tank for him.


Cosmos in his new home!

This morning I had a bit of a scare, as he was floating upside down and I thought he had past! My heart pretty much skipped a beat, It was not a nice way to start the morning. Luckily when I got closer to the tank he moved his eye to look at me then started swimming!

I've come to the conclusion that he has Swim Bladder Disorder / Floating Disorder. Which I believe might have developed due to feeding problems. "Gulping air whilst feeding at the surface or eating food with too much air inside, such as dry floating foods." - Kokos Goldfish
I'm planning on feeding him some cooked/steamed skinned peas soon, as the treatment for SBD suggests. Hopefully that is as far as I will need to go and he will be happy and healthy.

Other than floating a little he does seem happy in his new home. I'm sure it was a rather "freeing" experience to go from a 38/40L tank to a 70L. I am aware that technically the 70L is a little small for one fish, as 75L is the going size. But, seeming that he has been in a very small tank for 7 years, 70L would be a lot better! That and I believe his growth has been stunted due to being in such a small tank for so long.

Sunday, November 18, 2012

Fishless Cycle - Update

So today is day 8 since starting the cycle. This is what the past week looked like in regards to food,

Sunday 11 - Food
Monday 12 - Food
Tuesday 13 - Food
Wednesday 14 - Food
Thurday 15- Food
Friday 16 -  Nil
Saturday 17 - Food
Sunday 18 - Nil

I put food in on Saturday because my tanks ammonia levels were still quite low after 6 days.

Today the ammonia level is at 2.0 - 4.0ppm, Nitrites are at 0 still and so is Nitrates.

Just a matter of waiting a whole heap now.

Also, quick tip - if you need to cycle your tank with food like I have - put the food in a nylon stocking or mesh bag!! I didn't do this and I wish I had (messy).

I freaked out because I saw these moving dots along the inside of the tank! They may be a harmles bug thing, or small airbubbles caught in the biofilm that's formed on the glass according to some lovely people on Kokos.

Photobucket

Wednesday, November 14, 2012

Fishless Cycling with Fish Food + Gravel

I'm doing a Fishless Cycle with my tank. At this stage, I've decided to go with using fish food - and waiting for it to decay to build up the ammonia. I've been advised to put a teaspoon of fish food in the tank every day for 5 days. Today, I'm on day 4 of putting food in. The food I put in from Saturday and other days is still in there as well, decaying slowly - which is exactly what I want to happen (faster would be nice though! haha). I tested the Ammonia levels this morning and its at 0.25ppm/0.50ppm. The colour is a bit greener than the 0.25 indicator and a little yellower than the 0.50ppm indicator. The ammonia reading needs to be around 3-4ppm from what I've researched. Then a few days after that I should start to get readings for Nitrite as well. Once I get nitrite readings, Ammonia readings should start to decrease. After some more time, Nitrate will start showing in readings. Once the Ammonia reading is 0, Nitrite reading is 0 and Nitrate reading is at a high spike (100 range), I can do a 50%-75% water change and then we are all good!

Before I put food in on the first day of starting the Fishless Cycle, I decided I wanted a bare bottom tank (no gravel). So I took out the gravel I had put in prior. The information I had been given about gravel from various sources was somewhat conflicting, so I weighed out my pro's and con's of having gravel and then decided against it.

My Pro's of using gravel being -
  • I have it -I had been talked into getting two 1kg bags of gravel from my local pet store. By their calculations, apparently I needed a kg and a bit, however one bag did the job quite well.
  • I had spent the money on gravel already so I may as well use it.
  • It looked quite nice with the gravel in (down to personal preference really).
  • Tank decorations sat nicely in the tank and it all blended well.

My Con's of using gravel being -
  • Possibly choking hazard to my future fish.
    Something I didn't consider when buying it, it was all a bit rush rush at the time). The gravel ranged from bits being 2mm to 8mm in some cases, of various shapes. And with the history of Cosmos (my Ryukin of 7 years which is living at my parents place) playing with his gravel and getting it lodged in his mouth once - I don't want a repeat of that experience!!
  • Can scratch the tank.
  • Builds bacteria.
  • Collects fish poop and food waste, which fish would forage through and eat if bored.
  • Can make the tank look "cluttered".

So... I've decided to go "bare-bottom" for my tank. I do actually prefer the look of this, even though my decorations don't look 100%, or don't suit at all. The "log tunnel" (pictured) I had in there before actually doesn't sit flush on the tank floor, which means it would rock if fish nudge it etc. Which then may cause scratches to the bottom of the tank *sad face*. What somewhat irritates me in this situation, is the way that the log was packaged when I bought it you wouldn't be able to tell if it did or didn't have a level base on it. You can see from the picture, the packaging is a "box", which the ornament was actually suspended in and tied to - so it doesn't really allow for a full inspection to see if it is suitable and what you want. Although, I wasn't aware of the fact I was going to end up with a bare bottom tank so a level deco wasn't the top on my priority list!

Long story short - had I have been aware of all this from the start I wouldn't have bothered with gravel, and I would not have bought this tank deco. I hope to use the gravel and deco in future tanks of mine, hopefully!

Sunday, November 11, 2012

Fish - Not yet!

Thankfully, with the help of members from Kokos Goldfish Forum, I was introduced to information about tank cycling before getting my fish! I would have had them today had have I not been told about it. Bit of a bummer, however, I would rather have healthy, strong and happy fish!!! So, I have no issues waiting that little bit more.

I have been doing my research on the Tank Cycle and learning the ways of how to go about it. At the moment I'm looking at my options on how I am going to do it. I did attempt to jump start the cycle of my tank using API's "Quick Start" water treatment formula, however I found that the water parameters have not changed at all from the readings I took prior to putting Quick Start in my tank. The option I'm currently looking into is obtaining established filter media for my filter, which will make for an instant cycle to occur (ie. won't take a month).

Also, I've been looking into what I can feed my future fish. I've learnt that they like peas, pumpkin, zucchini, even steamed carrot some other research of mine has told me. Check this out Solid Gold's "Goldfish Food Frenzy" video on youtube!

I have been glued to Kokos Goldfish Forum it's amazing. So much information, and lovely people as well!

Tuesday, November 6, 2012

Art - Goldfish Collage

Below is the picture of a special piece of mine that I completed a few months back. Titled - "The Inner Spin". It was featured in an exhibition in October.

"The Inner Spin" - by Lisa-Marie VanDarlin 2012
I plan to have this hanging in my home somewhere. It is not for sale and probably never will be. The amount of work I put into this was immense, well over 5 hours at least. Also, I am very connected to it personally.

My 100L Tank Setup

Below is a picture of my new 100L fish-tank, on it's 3rd day of filtering (setup was on Saturday 3 Oct) . The tank, as you can clearly see, is awaiting it's fishy friends.

100L Tank awaiting it's fishy friends - 5/11/2012
I intend to get two special fish friends this Saturday. Hopefully, a Black Moor and an orange/red Fantail.