less than six months old in a 75g tank

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apricot
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Joined: Sun Jan 14, 2024 8:15 pm

less than six months old in a 75g tank

Post by apricot »

currently have in my tank
2 acei, 5 baby peacocks, 3 peacocks around 2-3in, 1 green terror - hoping he recovers from bloat, 1 texas green, 2 yellow labs, 3 crawdads, and 1 algae eater.

filter's running at around 200gph with floss and carbon.
substrate is a mix of play sand and cichlid bio shell, decorated with lava rocks and slate.
plants are doing alright - got a sword rubia and some other stuff i'm still figuring out.
next on my list - black background and eventually switching to black sand.
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apricot
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Re: less than six months old in a 75g tank

Post by apricot »

I've made some changes to my tank - added new brown gravel to tone down the bright sand and lights. I know gravel isn't ideal for my corydoras, but I've created patches of sand using my zen garden raking style, so they should be okay with their long barbs.

I'm revamping my used tank and my dog loves cichlids almost as much as I do.

I have a few questions - if I use a siphoning cleaner, will I lose sand? What are the usual guidelines for cleaning sand? Should I just get more detritus feeders? I'm still running my two EFs, and I have bubble stones and a bubble strip under my substrate. Will that be enough to lift out extra ammonia? Ammonia seems to be the one issue we're having with both our 75-gallon tanks.
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apricot
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Re: less than six months old in a 75g tank

Post by apricot »

my bf's awesome sand cichlid tank that i'm super jealous of
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apricot
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Re: less than six months old in a 75g tank

Post by apricot »

they seem to be loving the new gravel. now, i'm thinking of adding a mantle-like cover and working on a DIY hood for the tank.
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fluxy9
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Re: less than six months old in a 75g tank

Post by fluxy9 »

Your tanks look great.

I've got a 120gal cichlid tank and it's been taken over by my 5 inch Blue Thai Silk Flowerhorn. The thing is a monster - he's killed a 6 inch jack Dempsey and a 7-8 inch buttikoferi in under 6 hours each. I've had to remove all the other fish.

Here's a pic of my flowerhorn from about a month ago. He's bigger now, closer to 5 1/2 inches. I've had jaguars, dovii's, red devils, and all sorts of other aggressive fish, but this one takes the cake.
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onika9
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Re: less than six months old in a 75g tank

Post by onika9 »

When cleaning the tank, I'm curious - do you guys take everything out or just work around the decorations and stuff?
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fluxy9
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Re: less than six months old in a 75g tank

Post by fluxy9 »

I work around everything when I'm cleaning the tank, only thing that has to come out is the fish, and that's just because he's so aggressive, attacks everything in sight, including my hands as soon as they touch the water. I have to relocate him to my spare 40gal while I'm cleaning his 120gal.
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apricot
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Re: less than six months old in a 75g tank

Post by apricot »

I clean around all my tank decorations, haven't had a chance to update pics of this 75g in a while - been busy with my other tanks and moving my larger cichlids to their new home. Recently got a female JD, didn't know she was a female at the time, now I have a lovely bonded pair of JDs. Mostly african aggressives in that tank, but they get along great, just a few mouth puffs of aggression every now and then.

Also, we've added some new fish to the family - an arowana, a 2" titanium flowerhorn I got for Christmas, and an oscar. Been experimenting with plants in three of my tanks and it's going great, even giving away extra plants to my family so they can ditch the artificial ones.
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fluxy9
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Re: less than six months old in a 75g tank

Post by fluxy9 »

Word of advice, arowanas need space to thrive. I've learned that an 8x3x3 tank is a good starting point, but trust me, bigger is better. These fish grow at an alarming rate and can reach up to 3 feet in no time.

If you're planning on getting a flowerhorn, be prepared for a solo act. Mine's a perfect example - it's a killing machine that'll take down tankmates bigger than itself. No joke.

That being said, they're absolutely stunning fish. But let's get real, plants and flowerhorns don't mix. I had a thriving plant setup, but once my flowerhorn hit the 5-inch mark, it was game over. Ripped them all up in no time.
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apricot
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Re: less than six months old in a 75g tank

Post by apricot »

this is him now, all grown up

ive actually witnessed him taking down 3 feeder fish i had leftover, talk about a ruthless little guy... we're currently rehoming the arowana soon, just took him off the lfs hands since he outgrew their 30g, poor guy was stuck in there since he was a baby.. once my flowerhorn hits that 4-5 inch mark, i'll definitely be upgrading to at least a 125g tank, i'm really leaning towards a plywood build, we'll see... and yeah, he's not messing with my plants yet, but i know that's just a matter of time... i recently added some mopani wood and a bundle of hornwort, wrapped the hornwort around the wood with sewing thread, and now the channel cat has a sweet little spot to chill under, he's basically got the bottom of the tank all to himself, so i think he's good for now... been making some major adjustments to all my tanks, but i'm not gonna list them all out, just know that they're all way more suitable now
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