Bill's Grow Out Challenge Thread 2018

[danotaylor]

During the mid-summer in Toledo, when Lake Erie is suffering it's blue green algae blooms, the municipal water supply is hit with a major increase in chlorine & chloramines (and who knows what else) to avert microcystin poisoning from the blooms. Sadly the microcystins are not destroyed by this practice. I 1st discovered this issue when after doing my regular water change on my tropheus tank all my fish were gasping on the floor of the tank within minutes. It took 10 times the regular dose of prime and running fresh carbon in my sump to save them. From then on I ran all of my water through a 5lb carbon filter prior to adding it to my tank. Changes to standard water treatment practices should really be disclosed so the aquatics community can make the necessary adjustments.
I am glad you caught it early and moved to action Bill, and I hope all is well by the morning.

[Filip]

Im sorry for your loss Bill .
I hope you'll have more luck with the remaining 5 .
Unaged water may have stressed the grown discus in the other tank . Do smaller
30-40% WCs when your water is unaged .

[Willie]

During the mid-summer in Toledo, when Lake Erie is suffering it's blue green algae blooms, the municipal water supply is hit with a major increase in chlorine & chloramines (and who knows what else) to avert microcystin poisoning from the blooms. Sadly the microcystins are not destroyed by this practice. I 1st discovered this issue when after doing my regular water change on my tropheus tank all my fish were gasping on the floor of the tank within minutes. It took 10 times the regular dose of prime and running fresh carbon in my sump to save them. From then on I ran all of my water through a 5lb carbon filter prior to adding it to my tank. Changes to standard water treatment practices should really be disclosed so the aquatics community can make the necessary adjustments.
I am glad you caught it early and moved to action Bill, and I hope all is well by the morning.

This is another reason for conditioning your water if you live in a part of the world with four seasons. The leaves will be dropping soon in Minnesota. The amount of decomposition will raise the BOD level in our sewer systems and the local water company responds with a high pulse of chloramine. I experience this most every Fall. Fortunately, using 2 - 3X dechlor will take care of the problem with conditioned water.

Willie

[Pices]

Wow Bill it sounds like you’re between a rock and a hard place. Glad they are perking up but it does sound like your water is the issue. Can you add an aging barrel?
Patty

[Tshethar]

Hey everyone,

Thought I'd jump in with an update after taking a few days away. Appreciate the feedback and suggestions re. the water issue I was having.

Honestly, I think my thread might be thought-provoking here and there and might also illustrate how things can go wrong even when we are paying attention and trying to get it right! Good news is that experience really does make a difference and I'm getting some. Nothing ventured, nothing gained, right?

So, if people are looking for someone to emulate, hard to ignore what Brian is doing over in his thread, and Pat is no slouch, either. I have a feeling others are getting good results, too, just without as much to see so far. As for me... well... a couple of mistakes so far and we'll have to see whether I can stay in the game.

I'd say both mistakes are easy to make, though hopefully I won't make them next time.

The first had to do with the water changes. Seeing other people doing large ones, I couldn't resist the idea that 90-95% was better than 50% or 75%. In my mind, lots of clean water was going to promote growth, and I didn't think I was taking a risk. What I learned is that everyone's water is different, and in my case I didn't take seriously enough the distress I saw in the fish. Not really blaming myself on this one, as normally a big water change with aged and temp matched water is common practice, and doesn't kill fish. (And it was prefiltered with carbon.) In hindsight, wish I'd added more Safe and carbon or something similar (like the polyfilter) when things looked off. I'd like to think I'll have a better idea what I'm seeing if something like this happens again.

Since then, I'm changing no more than 75%, twice a day. (And being careful with my larger fish, too.) All's been normal since.

The next mistake I made was one that was more my fault, to be honest. I fed crumbed up Hikari pellets on Tuesday night and noticed that on Wednesday morning one of the fish looked bloated, and was hanging out a bit by itself. These pellets are good quality but their moisture content and softness isn't as high as the DiskusGold Al sent; as my larger fish love them, I thought I'd see if the small guys might go for them more aggressively, but it was too soon. I didn't have epsom salts in the house, and didn't think I had an emergency on my hands. Watched the fish during the day and thought, "yeah, he's bloated, not going to eat today, we'll treat him tonight" and went about my business for the day. Saw him in the evening and thought he'd didn't look too good; went out to the store and came back with the salts only to find him dead on the bottom of the tank. So, learned that intestinal obstructions can go bad pretty fast, and that it's a good idea to have everything you might need on hand before you need it.)

This means I'm down to four fish. A pretty horrible showing, no? Oh well. Try to learn and get better, right? Good news is that the fish I have left are getting along fine and after seeing what others are doing and what these guys like, I'm feeding more BBS and FDBW. The largest fish is a snakeskin and I think has good potential, so we'll keep at it and hopefully keep learning (and without further fatalities!!!)

2018-10-11 22.33.54.jpg

[Second Hand Pat]

Pulling for you Bill. These little guys have been learning curve for me too. I think I am finally on the straight and narrow with them and hope you are also. Crossing fingers that all goes well from here on out for you.
Pat

[Paul Sabucchi]

Glad you manage to be positive and rightly chalk it up to experience. Hang in there!

[Pices]

The biggest reason i didn’t get in on this challenge was my 12 hr work days. From what I’ve read, things can go south quickly for even the keenest observer. I like your attitude going forward and the biggest one is pretty big so here’s hoping you and yours can stay strong! Hats off to you.

[Tshethar]

Pulling for you Bill. These little guys have been learning curve for me too. I think I am finally on the straight and narrow with them and hope you are also. Crossing fingers that all goes well from here on out for you.
Pat

Thanks, Pat. I see you experimenting and changing course in small ways, which does at least help prevent me from thinking that everything up to now should have been a piece of cake and I'm an idiot! Here's hoping we all get past the first stage and hopefully things will move along steadily, predictably, and positively from here!

Glad you manage to be positive and rightly chalk it up to experience. Hang in there!

Thanks, Paul. I'm doing pretty well with it. Obviously disappointing, but so it goes. I learned before that discus aren't for the faint of heart, but I still like them and I'm pretty determined to be successful. Fortunately things have calmed down and my other grow out tank is doing well, which helps.

The biggest reason i didn’t get in on this challenge was my 12 hr work days. From what I’ve read, things can go south quickly for even the keenest observer. I like your attitude going forward and the biggest one is pretty big so here’s hoping you and yours can stay strong! Hats off to you.

Thanks, Patty! I think you're wise (discretion, valor, all that...), but I also would bet you'd do great. (I could understand, however, if you didn't want to do extra fish work right before and right after your shifts!) My work schedule is flexible and has been especially so this fall, which is one reason I went for it. I can be home more than usual, and can go back and forth a fair amount. Admittedly, though, I'm trying to do a balancing act and I may have underestimated what it takes, and not really accounted for how much time I actually do or don't have. (Times like these I really envy those who are retired, or have grown kids, etc., let alone things like landscapers and house cleaners! Unfortunately none of my water changes impress my spouse when there's work to be done around the house! :-)) Last Saturday morning when I lost three of them, I consciously chose to go to my 8-year-old's game with my wife rather than stay home and keep an eagle eye on them, which I otherwise would have done, and maybe should have in hindsight. While I'm happy about my priorities in general, the fish could certainly accuse me of failing them, partly out of ignorance but also because I was short on time when they most needed watching.

Oh well. We do the best we can, right? If I think back to my teenage self I'm sure he'd be amazed to find I am as consistently responsible as I am!

Hope everyone is having a good weekend and I'll try to get some encouraging footage of the fish I have soon.

[Tshethar]

Post-water change video from Sunday night... group is small now, but looking good today:

[danotaylor]

Looking great Bill. Nice clean set up. Happy little buggers

[Tshethar]

Looking great Bill. Nice clean set up. Happy little buggers

Thanks, Daniel. They are looking happy right now and I'm glad to see them all eating vigorously and feeling comfortable in the tank. I was worried that the small numbers might mean more hiding, less eating, or targeted aggression--and I'm sure any or all of that can still happen--but so far, so good. The biggest one is really happy to pack away food and fortunately the smallest is also doing a good job of stuffing itself right now. At least with the small numbers I'm not having to worry about bio-load problems in the small tank.

I also admit I've been testing the percentage of water changes and noting that the fish seem fine with more than 75%. I now use a foam block to diffuse the agitation (and bubbles), and the process right now seems stress free. I also treat the aged water with a liberal dose of Safe.

Feeding BBS, FDBW, DiskusGold pellets, and Brine Shrimp Direct flakes. Probably feeding 6-10x/day and changing between 150-180% daily.

[Tshethar]

Well, I'm not much of a photographer, and I moved the light to see if it would help, but it only succeeded in getting these guys to huddle in the front corner. The good news there is that I could add least get a group shot that way. :-)

Here they are, saying, "What the hell are you doing, changing the lighting like that?"

2018-10-20 22.48.52.jpg
2018-10-20 22.49.25.jpg

Otherwise, been a good week. I have two snakeskins and two turqs. The turqs were among the smallest fish I received and they're still smaller, but growing and making progress. One of the snakeskins (far left) was one of the "bigs" I got, and has also stayed that way. Food has generally been small and diffused throughout, so everyone has access and I've rarely seen the big one "resource guarding," though once or twice at the end of a feed I've seen him do it a little with FDBW. Dynamics overall are good. Realistically I'm probably feeding 6x a day (not 10!), but try to let them have enough to graze on for a while. Looking forward to seeing how they go from here!

[Tshethar]

Here's a better look at them before this morning's water change... hanging out with the occasional graze...




All's been well with them. I add extra Safe with the WCs, but otherwise haven't seen or done anything unusual. Colder nights now, starting to feel like real fall weather--makes me want to get outside! (Could see changes with municipal water, but so far, so good.) Hope everyone has some nice weekend weather wherever you are!

[Second Hand Pat]

They look great Bill. Glad the small number of fry does not seem to have any issues. I have noticed with wilds that if you have a large group and remove some of the fish the smaller sized group still seems stable.
Pat