# Hi all, need some help for my first aquarium



## Eclipse (4 Jan 2019)

Hi guys, I just got an aquarium and wanted to ask you if you could help me with it. It's the first one I've ever had and already kind of furnished. I really don't know much about cleaning, aquascaping, avoiding algae, etc. It's an old one from my brother sothe water is fine but there are already two Corydoras aeneus in it. I cleaned the whole aquariuum and bought 4 plants which are already planted. Want I wanted to ask you is if you could give me some recommendations for some other plants, fish or some interior fitting or some general advice for a beginner like me (picture follows, it's a 60x30x30). I'd be happy if you could help me and yeah... thanks


----------



## Stu1407 (4 Jan 2019)

I'm a beginner myself. But I would be inclined to take the 3 pieces of what looks like Limestone out of the tank and replace it with something inert that won't affect the PH of the water, like the slate or pebbles you have already. Then it depends whether you want high or low tech in terms of lighting, substrate and C02 injection. There are a lot better informed people on here than me and I suspect some will chip in later.

Stu


----------



## Edvet (4 Jan 2019)

Welcome.
THere are a lot of articles on the forum worth reading
If this is your first tank I would start reading the low tech artticles first (https://www.ukaps.org/forum/forums/el-natural-low-tech.27/)
Plants need 2 things: food, light . It's very easy to give to much light, it's virtually impossible to give to much food. 
For new tanks we generally advise to do two large waterchanges/ week ( 50% of the tankwater each time) and start with a large plantmass. This will help stabilizing things. Look for cheap  plants, even pond plants will do in the beginning. Feed the plants after each waterchange.
But start reading the forum first.
For your tank we need to know: what are your lights, how long, how do you do maintenance, what plantfood etc etc.


----------



## Tommy (4 Jan 2019)

Eclipse said:


> Hi guys, I just got an aquarium and wanted to ask you if you could help me with it. It's the first one I've ever had and already kind of furnished. I really don't know much about cleaning, aquascaping, avoiding algae, etc. It's an old one from my brother sothe water is fine but there are already two Corydoras aeneus in it. I cleaned the whole aquariuum and bought 4 plants which are already planted. Want I wanted to ask you is if you could give me some recommendations for some other plants, fish or some interior fitting or some general advice for a beginner like me (picture follows, it's a 60x30x30). I'd be happy if you could help me and yeah... thanks View attachment 120458 View attachment 120458



Hi, you should get yourself a good water test kit and check your water regularly for ammonia, nitrites and nitrates. Ammonia kills and you need to make sure your water is free from it, doing regular water changes helps keep the ammonia, nitrites and nitrates down


----------



## Keith GH (5 Jan 2019)

Eclipse


Eclipse said:


> It's an old one from my brother sothe water is fine but there are already two Corydoras aeneus in it.



Those white rocks look very much like Limestone and are not the best for Aquarium fish except a species.  In saying that it would be very interesting to know what your brother had in that tank including plants etc.

Water if your brother lived in a different area and used a different water supply it "could" be completely different.

You will have to find an excellent LFS who are interested in you not your money.  All LFS can pick a new owner immediately, if only interested in your money they will be of no help at all to you.

Keith


----------



## ian_m (5 Jan 2019)

Tommy said:


> Hi, you should get yourself a good water test kit and check your water regularly for ammonia, nitrites and nitrates. Ammonia kills and you need to make sure your water is free from it, doing regular water changes helps keep the ammonia, nitrites and nitrates down


Hmmmm. A test kit really....what a poor start leading to the path of poor fish health and algae.

Please read an digest this link.
https://www.ukaps.org/forum/threads/what-about-test-kits.52487/

Some test kits are fine, these will give correct results in most aquariums.
https://www.hach.com/single-paramet...est-kits/family?productCategoryId=35547009718
But at £50 - £100 a kit you will have to be serious about testing to need these.

Best is to just "cycle" the tank for 8-12 weeks, much less if many plants are present. No testing required.


----------



## Tommy (5 Jan 2019)

ian_m said:


> Hmmmm. A test kit really....what a poor start leading to the path of poor fish health and algae.
> 
> Please read an digest this link.
> https://www.ukaps.org/forum/threads/what-about-test-kits.52487/
> ...



Ive always been under the impression that you test the water regularly even on a mature tank, if this is wrong then I guess I have got a lot more basic learning to do and I will save money on buying test kits in the future.


----------



## foxfish (5 Jan 2019)

Hi Tommy, it is generally excepted that hobby grade test kits are not reliable and can cause more confusion than they are worth. 
We tend to carry out large water changes and rely on good maintainace and good filtration.


----------



## dw1305 (5 Jan 2019)

Hi all,





Tommy said:


> Ive always been under the impression that you test the water regularly even on a mature tank,


It would be nice to know the exact composition of your tank water, but it isn't a realistic proposition, unless you are a water company. 

Scientists who work on water pollution tend to use a combination of analytical techniques and bioassays, have a look at <"Best way to cycle.....">, also the <"Which NO3 Testing Kit...."> thread. 

If you just take the most fundamental requirement of fish, that the water contains enough dissolved oxygen to support life, it is really difficult to test for, and it only needs a very brief interlude of low oxygen to see of some of the more sensitive fish. I wrote  <"Plecoplanet: Aeration and dissolved oxygen....">, specifically for keepers of rheophilic plecs, but you can use the same approach for all tanks. 

It was the difficulty in testing for all the parameters that I was interested in which led me to the principles that underlie the <"Duckweed Index">.

In the DO case my approach is that rather than trying to measure the amount of oxygen in the water, just put protocols into place that maximise water oxygenation.  It is really a <"risk management technique">.

cheers Darrel


----------



## Keith GH (6 Jan 2019)

Eclipse

I never owned a complete test kit reason my LFS would test my water for me FREE.  

Keith


----------



## ian_m (6 Jan 2019)

.





Keith GH said:


> Eclipse
> 
> I never owned a complete test kit reason my LFS would test my water for me FREE.
> :


And give you misleading and erroneous and unrepeatable results for FREE. Bargain, don't have to spend your own money setting the tank up to grow algae.


----------



## Keith GH (7 Jan 2019)

No defiantly not (they were privately owned) as they knew if they did that they would lose a lot of customers as there were other excellent LFS in the area.

One other point you could watch them do it and see the readings for your self.

Keith


----------



## Tommy (7 Jan 2019)

ian_m said:


> .And give you misleading and erroneous and unrepeatable results for FREE. Bargain, don't have to spend your own money setting the tank up to grow algae.



All my LFS test your water for free, now say I buy some fish get them home acclimatise them put them in the tank and the next morning they are dead. I call my LFS tell them about it and they tell me to bring a water sample in for testing along with the fish. 

They test the water and it shows some ammonia, they then say my water quality is the cause of the dead fish and that they cant refund my £60 I just spent on them, am I supposed to turn around and tell them water tests are useless and inaccurate, Ian on a forum told me so?

I don't mean to sound a **** but you can see how this could be a problem


----------



## dw1305 (7 Jan 2019)

Hi all, 





Tommy said:


> All my LFS test your water for free, now say I buy some fish get them home acclimatise them put them in the tank and the next morning they are dead. I call my LFS tell them about it and they tell me to bring a water sample in for testing along with the fish.
> 
> They test the water and it shows some ammonia, they then say my water quality is the cause of the dead fish and that they cant refund my £60 I just spent on them, am I supposed to turn around and tell them water tests are useless and inaccurate, Ian on a forum told me so?


I appreciate it is difficult. 

You are likely to find some ammonia in that context, whatever test kit you use, but they/you have no idea whether the ammonia, or the dead fish, came first. 

I'm fairly secure in my scientific knowledge, but I've been called all sorts of less than complementary things by a wide variety of people, and the cycling posts particularly still generate what I can only describe as "hate mail", even though it has died down a bit in recent years (possibly because more people use facebook now etc. rather than forums and I haven' made any cycling posts on facebook (although I did have an "interesting" exchange of views with a lady on the "The Fish Hut" facebook pages earlier in the year).

The thing with any dead fish scenario is that an LFS can always find an excuse not to give you your money back if they don't want to.   

cheers Darrel


----------



## Tommy (7 Jan 2019)

dw1305 said:


> Hi all, I appreciate it is difficult.
> 
> You are likely to find some ammonia in that context, whatever test kit you use, but they/you have no idea whether the ammonia, or the dead fish, came first.
> 
> ...



Hi Darrel, I don't doubt what yourself and Ian are telling me, I was just pointing out a possible scenario one could face.


----------



## foxfish (7 Jan 2019)

Tommy you make a good point, however there are several key members on this forum who have supplied plenty of links and information that identifies the issues and reasons that test kits can never be consistenty reliable.

Test kits must be a multi million pound industry, testing your tank or pond water has always been part of the hobby!

Trying to convince the masses otherwise would be a dead end life time job... it is all part of the Matrix as Ceg would advise...
I would not even consider trying to convince my local Facebook groups of anything outside of the box, let alone that their test kits might just be their biggest issue!


----------



## Tommy (7 Jan 2019)

foxfish said:


> Tommy you make a good point, however there are several key members on this forum who have supplied plenty of links and information that identifies the issues and reasons that test kits can never be consistenty reliable.
> 
> Test kits must be a multi million pound industry, testing your tank or pond water has always been part of the hobby!
> 
> ...



Hi foxfish, I have been reading the links provided, I don't doubt what Darrel and Ian have said. But in my scenario I wouldn't be trying to convince a facebook group of test kits being a waste of time and inaccurate it would be one person standing behind a counter


----------



## dw1305 (8 Jan 2019)

Hi all, 





foxfish said:


> Test kits must be a multi million pound industry, testing your tank or pond water has always been part of the hobby!


I think that is the problem, it is very much case of <"_shoot the messenger_">. 

My suspicion would be that the companies must know that the products that they are <"selling aren't very useful (at best)">, mainly because they are described in ways that suggests they perform a certain function, but they never explicitly make any scientific statements that are testable or refutable. 

There are good sources of information on the WWW from  people who are also sellers of their own product.  If you look at <"Tim Hovanec's">, or <"Stephan Tanner's web pages"> they offer properly referenced articles. 

I'm not a goldfish or a koi keeper, but I've looked through the web pages at <"Manky Sanke">, and while I don't necessarily agree with all of it, there is a lot of <"good content">. 

cheers Darrel


----------



## foxfish (8 Jan 2019)

It some way test kits have helped me to make money.
25 years back when I was flat out building koi ponds, I was based in a large garden centre and operated a small retail shop selling all things pond related.
I also sold cold water fish, goldfish were very popular, however at £1.50 each there was zero profit to be made once you take into account the time spent looking after them but, a master test kit was £19.99 and only cost me £7!
Then you had the distraught  customer who had just tested his pond water and found he had dangerous levels of nitrate, so I would get work from going to check his pond and offering him a bigger filter...


----------



## Kalum (8 Jan 2019)

foxfish said:


> It some way test kits have helped me to make money.
> 25 years back when I was flat out building koi ponds, I was based in a large garden centre and operated a small retail shop selling all things pond related.
> I also sold cold water fish, goldfish were very popular, however at £1.50 each there was zero profit to be made once you take into account the time spent looking after them but, a master test kit was £19.99 and only cost me £7!
> Then you had the distraught  customer who had just tested his pond water and found he had dangerous levels of nitrate, so I would get work from going to check his pond and offering him a bigger filter...



It's a shame they didn't make a pond version of the Twinstar back then as well or you would have been rolling in it.....


----------



## sparkyweasel (8 Jan 2019)

foxfish said:


> Test kits must be a multi million pound industry, testing your tank or pond water has always been part of the hobby!


Not always, when I started no-one I knew tested. Then various kits appeared in the shops, and people started testing for things. Nobody seemed to realise that their fish and plants had been perfectly healthy for years without all that.


----------



## foxfish (8 Jan 2019)

Kalum said:


> It's a shame they didn't make a pond version of the Twinstar back then as well or you would have been rolling in it.....


Ha no but there were lots of Koi pond gadgets like ozone generators, auto back flush filters and pressurised trickle towers.....
I have told this story before but ... the lowest maintenance, healthiest and cleanest ponds that I built all used a basic under gravel filter system.
A few years back I joined a few koi forums and got shot to pieces when I made that claim, even though I showed detailed pictures of the ponds and their 30 year old residents swimming in crystal clear water!


----------



## Parablennius (8 Jan 2019)

sparkyweasel said:


> Not always, when I started no-one I knew tested. Then various kits appeared in the shops, and people started testing for things. Nobody seemed to realise that their fish and plants had been perfectly healthy for years without all that.


Agreed, back in the Early 70,s all I can rember was Nitrite and pH test kits from WaterlifeResearch, was that Graham Cox's company?


----------



## foxfish (8 Jan 2019)

sparkyweasel said:


> Not always, when I started no-one I knew tested. Then various kits appeared in the shops, and people started testing for things. Nobody seemed to realise that their fish and plants had been perfectly healthy for years without all that.


I guess I must of been gullible then as I was waisting  money on test kits 45 year ago!
I also bought PH correction powders as it was preached in the magazines and shops at the time, that plants only grew in soft water with a PH of 6-6.5.
I did work it out in the end that rain water was the way to go but not until I had killed numerous fish by overdosing those powders....


----------



## Tim Harrison (8 Jan 2019)

foxfish said:


> Ha no but there were lots of Koi pond gadgets like ozone generators, auto back flush filters and pressurised trickle towers.....
> I have told this story before but ... the lowest maintenance, healthiest and cleanest ponds that I built all used a basic under gravel filter system.
> A few years back I joined a few koi forums and got shot to pieces when I made that claim, even though I showed detailed pictures of the ponds and their 30 year old residents swimming in crystal clear water!



Haha, that reminds me of a story I might have told before too, when I was keeping a reef tank way back when. Nowadays it's not uncommon to spend £000 on just a small basic set up. I think I'd be crucified, and then hung drawn and quartered if I confessed on facebook or a reefing forum, how I did it back then...
I Heath Robinson'ed my set up for less than a few hundred quid. Not a single test kit in sight, other than a hydrometer. All inhabitants, anemones, soft corals and assorted critters etc more than happy. Like I've said before, it's amazing what we didn't need before it was invented...


----------

