Aquarium Tips of the Day | Stop Feeding before Moving your Fish

By on May 21, 2012 in Conservation, Fish, Freshwater, Maintenance, Marine, Saltwater, Tank Setup

Today’s Aquarium Tip Tank tip of the day is another easy little piece of advice to help you keep your fish a little bit healthier during transportation from one fish tank to another. Maybe you’re moving and its time to take all of the fish with you. For whatever reason you have to take your fish out of the tank and put it in a bag for a little while. In order to keep from fouling the water in the bag during transport, just stop feeding your livestock about 36 hours prior to the big move.

Hopefully, you’ve been performing regular water changes and your fish and other livestock have been enjoying clean, ammonia free water, with little to zero nitrates and nitrites. Well, your now about to put your fish in a bag with no live rock, no live sand, and no helpful bacterial population. There isn’t anything in that bag to keep the waste from that fish from fouling the water. So, it would be nice if the fish didn’t make any waste in that water. The only way to stop this from happening is to not feed your fish for a little while before putting it in the transport bag. Allow your fish tank to “fast” for about 36 hours prior to placing them in plastic bags and your livestock should’ve had a chance to digest just about everything they’ve eaten. Then, they won’t have anything to make waste out of!

Moving your fish soon? Ever had any trouble with fish transport? Leave a comment below.

TJ

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Coral Time-Lapse Video

By on May 18, 2012 in Aquarium Photography, General Updates, Maintenance, Saltwater

I recently got a new toy. My new Canon 60D takes amazing pictures (actually I guess I’m the one taking the pictures, but I use the 60D to do it), and one of the first things I did was make a time lapse of my green star polyps. Head on over to my new Google+ page and check it out! While you’re there, go ahead and give me a +1!

This is actually a very rough video. I figured out how to set up the camera, put it on a tripod, read a little bit of the manual about taking some macro pictures and started taking some pictures of my small reef tank! I made sure the aperture, shutter speed, and focus were all set up the way I wanted, turned on the small metal halide lamp that lights this nano tank and set the timer to take a picture every 5 seconds for an hour and 15 minutes!

I ended up with 900 photos. I did absolutely nothing to them as far as post-processing goes. Each picture is a frame and the movie was set to 24 frames per second. Export as an avi file to keep the size down a little bit, and this is what I ended up with for my first time-lapse. Enjoy!

Take some cool pictures and videos of your home aquarium? Share and comment below!

TJ

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Choosing a Fish Store

By on May 16, 2012 in Conservation, Fish, Freshwater, Maintenance, Marine, Saltwater

Maybe you’ve seen some of our aquarium tips about selecting fish. All of that applies and we will definitely get into that here, but choosing a fish store is also about personal preference. Do you like the sales force? Are they knowledgeable? Do they give you the time of day even when it is crowded on a Saturday afternoon? Are they fun people to chat with?

You may not even spend a lot of money at the local fish store of your choice. You may end up buying some small things like fish food, or your saltwater, but your local fish store may end up just being a place where you like to check out the new fish, look at their tank set-ups, and have some good fish talk. From my own experience I’ve found that I can find a lot of the actual equipment for an aquarium much cheaper on the internet. However, there are still some important factors that we should all take into consideration when choosing our local fish store.

Check the Fish Tanks

As your walking around the store make sure that you not only look at all of the wonderful fish that they have, but do a little inspection of the tanks and ask yourself a few questions.

  • Are most of the tanks clean or are the tops and sides encrusted with residue?
  • Is the water in the tanks clear or is most of the water in the tanks discolored?
  • Are there any dead fish in the tanks?
  • Are there any sick fish?

If you notice any of these unsightly conditions that make it look like the fish store does not do a very good job caring for its livestock, then you’ll probably want to find a different fish store. This isn’t to say that you should abandon the store all together if there is a little salt creep on one of their tanks, but if there is more than one dead fish floating around and all of the tanks look dirty with residue, then its definitely time to walk out and never look back.

Choose an Eco-Friendly Dealer

No, I’m not talking about a fish store owner that drives a Prius. I’m talking about a fish store that encourages conservation of fish, coral reefs, plants, rivers, oceans, and all of Earth’s environments. They can do this in several ways.

  • Offer captive-bred fish
  • Offer aquacultured invertebrates
  • They have a live fish guarantee
  • Participate in sustainability efforts and Foundations
  • They know their collectors, harvesters, and distributors and know that they use responsible and sustainable methods.

The fish store you use should either have these items posted, and advertised in plain site, or if you ask them, they should be able to answer without hesitation. Selecting captive-bred fish and aquacultured invertebrates keeps organisms from being taken off the reef and out of their natural environment. If the fish store has a live fish guarantee, they are confident in their fish keeping skills. Keeping fish alive keeps more fish in the stock, and less fish from being pulled off the reefs. All you have to do to make sure that you’re purchasing items for your fish tank from an Eco-friendly dealer is ask a few simple questions.

Looking for a fish store? Leave a comment below!

TJ

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Aquarium Tips of the Day | Go One Size Larger for your Aquarium Filter

By on May 15, 2012 in Conservation, Fish, Freshwater, Maintenance, Marine, Saltwater, Tank Setup

Today’s Aquarium Tip Tank tip of the day will help you keep your water clean and your feet propped up when the thought of your aquarium filter pops into your head. You ever buy that filter that was recommended for 20 – 30 gallons for your 30 gallon tank? Then, you were constantly scrubbing, cleaning, buying and changing filter media? Save yourself the hassle, and possibly the expense of buying a whole brand new aquarium filter and size up! Purchase the aquarium filter that is one size larger and rated for tanks that are larger than yours.

It may cost $10 extra to get that hanging power filter that is rated for 55 gallons instead of 30, but that is much better than the stress and added work that may come along with buying the filter rated for 30 gallons. If you end up purchasing a filter that is too small, you may even end up throwing it out and just buying the larger filter in the end. Instead of learning your lesson the hard way, just pay the extra $10 for the larger filter and relax while having the confidence that your aquarium filter is going to keep your water clear!

Purchasing an aquarium filter? Ever have a filter problem in your tank? Leave your comments below!

TJ

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Aquarium Tip Tank Podcast 006 | Lighting the Aquarium Part 2

By on May 11, 2012 in Compatibility, Fish, Freshwater, Lighting, Marine, Podcast, Saltwater, Show Episodes, Tank Setup

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Aquarium Tip Tank Podcast 006

In this episode of Aquarium Tip Tank we finish off our discussion about lighting your home aquarium. We had talked about fluorescent and metal halide lighting systems in the first part of this lighting system and we had to get to LED aquarium lighting systems. In this episode we make sure that we discuss all of the criteria and specifications that you should look for when selecting LEDs for your aquarium. I also tell the story of how I went about choosing the lighting system that I will use for my new 30 gallon marine reef aquarium.

Aquarium Lighting Mentioned in this Podcast:

What lights do you use with your aquarium? Leave a comment below!

TJ

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Aquarium Tips of the Day | No Copper in Reef Tank!

By on May 10, 2012 in Compatibility, Conservation, Fish, Maintenance, Marine, Saltwater

Today’s Aquarium Tip Tank tip of the day will save lives…of your invertebrates in your reef aquarium that is. Maybe you’ve kept a fish-only tank in the past and your fish caught a case of the ich. Fish are a little more resiliant to copper based treatments and when you went to your local fish store to find a cure for the Ich disease the medicine they sold you was copper based. You took the treatment home, followed all of the directions, monitored everything very carefully, and in a little while all of your fish were cured and your aquarium was back to normal! This won’t be the same story you tell if you decide to use the same copper based treatments in a reef aquarium with invertebrates. So, don’t use copper based treatments in your reef tank that contains many beautiful and thriving invertebrates!

Copper is toxic to invertebrates, and if copper based treatments are used directly in your main reef aquarium you will end up killing all of your corals. Then, you will be dealing with much bigger issues than the Ich. You will have an overload of dead organisms and waste in your tank, creating too many nitrites and too much ammonia in the tank for the beneficial bacteria to handle. You then run the risk of complete aquarium meltdown!

Instead, set up a quarantine tank if you haven’t already and move all of your fish into quarantine. There, you can treat your fish without having to worry about taking out all of your inertebrates. I’m not saying that you should just go ahead and dump copper based treatments into your quarantine tank. After all, fish are hardier than corals, but copper can still be toxic to fish if not used correctly. You may want to try the Hypo-Salinity method of curing the Ich in the quarantine tank, but that’s an entirely different topic. For now, just don’t use anything copper based in any tank that you keep corals and invertebrates in, nor in any tank that you think you may keep them in in the future (the copper could get stuck on the sides).

Comments? Leave them below!

TJ

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Fish

By on May 8, 2012 in Compatibility, Conservation, Fish, Freshwater, Marine, Saltwater, Tank Setup

After all, fish are the reason you’re here right? I’m assuming you found this site because you’re interested in starting an aquarium, or maybe you already have an aquarium and just want some aquarium tips to help you out. I’m also guessing that the majority of people out there with an aquarium are trying to keep at least one species of fish. More detailed posts on different species of fish will be published here in the future, but for now..the basics without regurgitating everything from Wikipedia.

The Whale Shark is the biggest fish in the world. I don’t think any home aquarium hobbyist is going to be able to keep one of those any time soon, but realize that I said biggest FISH in the world. It is not a whale, a mammal, but a cartilaginous shark with gills and fins for limbs. In general, this is the type of animal we’re concerned with when talking about fish. They have skeletons made of either bone or cartilage, gills, and fins.

Cuttlefish, jellyfish, starfish, and crayfish can be kept in your home aquarium, but are not actually considered to be “fish”. Cuttlefish are cephalopods or molluscs, starfish are echinoderms, and jellyfish are cnidarians. Is that enough of the scientific names for you?

What we’re mainly going to deal with here are the smaller tropical fish that are able to be kept in the freshwater and saltwater tanks that you typically have in your home. These are fish like angelfish, tangs, clownfish/anenmonefish, discus, goldfish, koi, anthias, damsels, boxfish, and the list goes on. We may deal with some smaller sharks and rays, but we’re going to start with the fish anatomy diagram below.

Fish Anatomy:

Different species of fish have different traits and uses for many of their fins and parts of their anatomy. Some, like groupers, have a thick, muscular caudal peduncle with a large caudal fin that they use to ambush their prey. Some, like the crevalle jack, are very sleek with a thinner caudal peduncle and are made for speed. Some, like the boxfish, use their fluttering pectoral fins to swim instead of moving their caudal fins back and forth. There are more than 30,000 species of fish. With such diversity, each fish species has developed many different shapes, sizes, and uses for their fins, eyes, mouth, and all of their anatomy so that they can adapt to their environment and survive for the last 500 million years. Take a look at your fish. What fins do they propel themselves with? How big are there eyes and where are they located? How big is the mouth and how is it oriented? What are the teeth like? Can they crush coral and shells like a triggerfish?

Most fish also have extraordinary sense organs. Their vision is usually just as good, if not better, than human vision. So yes, they can see you, and most daylight fish even see colors. They also use their chemoreceptors for extraordinary senses of taste and smell. As far as hearing goes, they do have ears, but their hearing may not really be that good. I guess that depends on what you call hearing. After all, hearing for humans is actually the translation and interpretation of vibrations at different wavelengths. For this, fish have sensitive receptors along both sides of their body called the lateral line that detects the most subtle of vibrations, currents, and the motion of other fish, predators and prey.

The great thing about some of these fish that we like to keep in our aquariums is that they come in so many exotic shapes, sizes, and colors. Those colors usually serve a purpose in their natural environment. Like anglerfish, that use their color, unique anatomy, and unusual appearance to camouflage itself from predators and prey. Its predators don’t know its there so it doesn’t hunt it, but neither does its prey, allowing the anglerfish to wait until its prey unknowingly swims right in front of it. It will even use its angler like a piece of bait. There’s also the square-spot anthias. If it has a square, it is male, and that male will even change color when in nuptial display.

Finally, we want to collect and keep these fish because of their vast diversity and beautiful colors, but please do so with conservation, learning, and teaching in mind. Many marine are harvested from the ocean reefs, and this impacts the ocean reefs that they came from. We just ask that you first check to see if you can purchase a tank bred version of the type of fish that you want to keep. Tank bred fish used to be very expensive, but recent advancements in marineculture and fish farming, it is now possible to breed and rear many species of fish such as the clownfish, dottybacks, gobies, and angelfish. These days majority of freshwater fish that are available for the home aquarium are bred in tanks. Tank bred fish are also hardier and easier to keep. They haven’t been stressed by being taken from their reef home in Indonesia and transported half way around the world. They adjust more quickly to the conditions and are fully accustomed to aquarium life. After all, that is where they were born, and the only conditions that they have ever known. This will greatly reduce the chances of infection and disease.

We’re not saying that you shouldn’t keep a marine aquarium because or that you must always purchase tank bred fish, but do a little homework about the fish store that you are buying from. Make sure that they sell fish that are sustainably collected and/or aquacultured. Make sure that the store has some sort of sustainability mandate, have a guarantee policy for their fish, and are involved in ocean conservation. Ask them where their fish are from, how they are collected, and if they are tank-bred. The salesperson at your fish store should be knowledgeable to answer all of these questions, and if not, then find another place to buy your fish. A great place that I have found to purchase fish is Saltwaterfish.com.  They have a sustainable mandate and a 15 day Live Guarantee.

One last thing about fish conservation and that’s just to keep your fish alive. If you have the patience, take your time, and keep your fish alive and happy, then you won’t constantly be heading to the fish store to buy another one. You will be keeping more fish in the store for other aquarium hobbyists to enjoy or on the reef where they belong.

TJ

 

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Aquarium Tips of the Day | Cure your Live Rock

By on May 3, 2012 in Compatibility, Fish, Maintenance, Marine, Saltwater, Tank Setup

Today’s aquarium tip from Aquarium Tip Tank will keep your fish tank a little bit cleaner and a little easier to handle when adding live rock to your home aquarium. So, you’ve decided to set up a marine aquarium and you’d like to have some live rock in it right? You either need some more live rock to fill out your tank or you decide to use live rock to help with the cycling of your tank. Well, all of the fish stores have this live rock that is uncured and much cheaper. So you decide to save a little loot and get some of that instead of the cured live rock! Off you go and its time to put it into your fish tank! Here’s the kicker, make sure you cure your live rock before placing it into your marine aquarium!

Live rock isn’t actually alive, but its called live rock because its been sitting out in the ocean being aqua-cultured for the last several years. Small, microscopic organisms have been able to populate the rock and now call it home and make it “live”. Then, the live rock is harvested from its perch in the ocean, wrapped in paper that is wet with saltwater, and shipped to your local fish store or directly to you. You think all of those organisms stay alive when that live rock is out of the water and being transported? Absolutely not!

At this point there are still some beneficial organisms residing in the live rock and enough of them should still be alive, but there are also a whole lot of dead organisms and pests that you don’t want and you need to get out of the live rock before placing it into your aquarium. You know what a spike of dead organisms means to your fish tank water right? Yes, it means introducing a whole lot of unwanted nitrites, nitrates, and ammonia into a tank that probably doesn’t have the beneficial bacteria necessary to handle the sudden water quality change. If its an established tank, be prepared for some dead fish and corals. If you’re cycling your tank, be prepared for a jump in ammonia levels and a longer wait to complete the cycling.

Our recommendation? Either pay the little bit extra for the live rock that has already been cured by your dealer or cure the live rock yourself before putting it into your aquarium tank.

Curing some live rock? Leave your comments below.

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Free Tank Selection Worksheet!

By on April 30, 2012 in Freshwater, General Updates, Maintenance, Saltwater, Tank Setup

One of our Aquarium Tips of the Day here at Aquarium Tip Tank is to use checklists and worksheets to keep your aquarium adventure simple! Its much easier to remember the maintenance tasks that you have to perform if you have them written down in front of you and can just check them off as you go. It is also much quicker and easier to go through a worksheet to pick out the new equipment that you want, or to see if the new fish that you want to add to your tank is compatible with the rest of your livestock.

Personally, I’ve read all of the books and tried to absorb all of the information in them, but I hate having to climb up my bookcase, pull all the aquarium books out, and scan through them until I find the information that I’m looking for. These days I’ve gotten a little more efficient by just making up checklists, worksheets, and charts that I use for everything from buying equipment like tanks or lights and selecting livestock to performing water changes and testing water quality.

I’ve decided to give my Tank Selection worksheet away for free! Just sign up for the Aquarium Tip Tank e-updates and news up there in the upper right hand corner and we will send you the link to get your free worksheet! Then, feel free to change it and update the checklist as you wish.

Have you made up any checklists of your own? Leave comments below.

TJ

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Aquarium Tips of the Day | The Fish Growth Factor

By on April 28, 2012 in Fish, Freshwater, General Updates, Marine, Saltwater, Tank Setup

Today’s Aquarium Tip Tank tip of the day will keep you from doing extra work several months down the road. Some fish grow so fast that they may outgrow your tank in a matter of weeks. Personally, I would hate to have to find a new home for my fish so quickly. One of the best things to do when aquiring new fish or livestock is to make sure that you know and take into account the growth factor of the livestock that you plan to add to your aquarium.

You have to understand that if you buy a young, healthy, juvenile fish that it probably still has some growing to do. You also have to take into account that your live plants and corals will also continue to grow. It is very easy to find the maximum length of your species of fish, and use that as a guide, but also consider that the fish may grow wide as well! Just make sure that you know the size and the limits of your tank, what you plan to keep in it, and the size and speed at which that livestock tends to grow!

Ever relocate due to something outgrowing your tank? Leave a comment below.

TJ

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