Back in the hobby after 20 years!

[Afterburned]

Hi all, thought I would do my intro. Apologies if you have seen this already on other forums, still trying to work out which ones are active!

I first picked up a fish tank at University, we had a shared house and we had loads of pets - between the 4 humans we had 2 russian hamsters, 1 rat, 2 gerbils, 5 mice, a snake, occasionally a bunch of tarantula's and scorpions, and two three foot fish tanks.
One tank was mine and I inherited the other when the guy left. I took them home with me and had them for a good 5 years before moving country and giving them to the local fish shop (amazing place near Heathrow with a shark aquarium attached).
Near the end I had the 2 tanks on a double stand with the lower tank having the larger fish and a 'deep' look to it - no plants, a bit of bogwood type hollow ceramic thing, sand and a 12"bubbler, the upper tank had a 'shallow' feel to it with gravel, a couple of plants, a matching bubbler to tie the tanks together, and smaller fish.
Lower tank - 2 4" T-Barbs, 2 5-6" Tinfoil Barbs, 13" plec, Banjo cat and an eel (I think it was an eel, it had a wobbly nose and hid in the sand, liked eating platy babies so had to go in the lower tank)
Upper tank - 2 dwarf gouramis that were the only things to survive the heater malfunction, and a variety of platy's, neon tetra type things and harlequin rasboras.
Most of the big fish were bought as small from Pet City (nicknamed Pet Cemetary after we realised) - now called Pets at Home - we were assured they would be suitable for a community tank with Neon's
Looking back probably had both tanks overstocked, but they survived!

But that's history, and now 20 years on I am married with 2 kids and a dog, living in Yorkshire and just managed to get the wife to agree to (and in fact bought me for Christmas) a small (2ft) tank.
Some soil substrate covered in gravel in one diagonal half of the tank, the other half sand. Bogwood & plants on their way (hopefully) in the post. The plan is for small Corys and Guppies - crowd pleasers to get the family hooked - especially if we get a few babies! Tank is cycling, however put a load of plants in and that messed it up a little (plants eat ammonia - who knew?!) and is now silent cycling, to be honest is probably ready but it's only a couple of weeks 'till my birthday and might get some vouchers for fish, and who wants to do unnessesary shopping at the moment (not buying fish online either, seems cruel to post them).

I'll put a pic on once I work out how to do it!

Cheers,
Afterburned

[Andys temperate tank]

Welcome to the forum mate.

You might want to rethink your stock though. Cory's need softer water and guppies need it harder.

[Afterburned]

Thanks
Yeah, I know most Corys are soft but there are some Corys that are rated for hard(er) water - fairy corys for example. Still undecided as I can't find anything else suitable (60l tank). Guppies will be first.
May have a banjo cat again as they are good for hard water (and are happy solo), also some Cherry shrimp which is a whole new world I never knew about.
Will take some water with me when I finally get to go to the shop so I can find out just how hard the actual tank water is after two months of settling & changes (15% once a week at the moment).

[fr499y]

Welcome to

I take it your are doing a fish less cycle ( with ammonia or other sources )

Certainly is an active forum here with plenty of good advice. While fish health is number one priority, no one will go mental at you for making mistakes ( unless you blatantly ignore advice and then complain hehe ), unlike some other places!!!!

[Stephen]

Welcome to the forum.
You have come to the right place (hopefully) for good advise.

You need to find out what your water hardness is as this will determine which fish are best suited to your water.
Beverley (example) is very hard water at around 20dGH (degrees German); Driffield is also hard at around 15.4dGH. This is great for Guppy but not good for Corydoras.
Check with Yorkshire Water for your water hardness.
Fairy cory (Corydoras atropersonatus) definitely need soft water (below 10dGH).

All the best

[Afterburned]

Thanks fr499y, it started fishless with some Dr.Tim's ammonia, then the plants took over so now is a 'silent' cycle (the plants take up so much of the ammonia and nitrate that it ruins the cycle, best just let nature get on with it). From what I understand when fish go in there is a mini cycle anyway, no matter what you have done before
Tried some ammonia the other day and next day there was 0 ammonia & nitrite, small amounts of nitrate (hope I got those the right way around).
It's all new to me, just chucked water & fish in last time I did it - same day usually!

[fr499y]

With a fishless cycle you won’t get a mini cycle as the filter should be able to cope. IIRC it was the cichlids keepers that came up with the ‘idea’ so they could fully stock a Malawi tank without the spike in ammonia

[Afterburned]

Hi Stephen,
Yorkshire Water has it at 18. Which is very hard according to them!

https://www.fishkeeper.co.uk/help-and-a ... airy-cory- Maidenhead Aquatics say Fairy Cory can go to 18 - is this a typo do you think? Or just a case of 'dont believe the fish shop'?

The only catfish I have found that would fit in my 60l tank with that hard water is a banjo cat, but wanted something more active as well.

Funnily enough my hardness seems to be coming down according to the (admittedly cheap) test strips. Will take some water in to get tested when I go for guppies.
To be honest if the Guppies go mad (which is likely) I'll have to get something that will eat the fry!

Cheers
Afterburned

[fr499y]

You want the middle of what they can take really. It’s like red lining a car everywhere. It can do it but isn’t great for its overall health

[Afterburned]

18 is getting on the red line for most species!! Oh dear! Any suggestions for hard water small bottom feeders?