I got new fish today! My big tank is extremely stable. I was worried about my tanks when I went on holiday, but it turned out to be needless. The ammonia in my little tank spiked briefly, and I got some algae in my big tank, otherwise everyone was alive and well. Regular water changes (and for the big tank, gravel cleans) since and everything is back to normal.
My big tank had zero ammonia and zero nitrites and low nitrates even after going away, so I figured it was time to add more fish. As it was, my danios were being a little too boisterous as well, and I thought a larger community may make them calmer. I went to the pet shop and I talked to the guy there who said with my size of tank, I could get 50 small fish in there. That can’t be right, can it? He also said I could add 10 more fish today, as long as I kept a close eye on things in the coming weeks. I was wary, I had come there with the intention of getting 5 or 6 fish, but I let myself be persuaded. After all, they have discounts the more fish you buy. Thus I bought- 3 leopard/snow danios, 2 hi-fin zebra danios, and 5 silver white cloud mountain minnows. I tucked their bags into an insulated cooler bag, in the hope they wouldn’t freeze before I got them home, although thankfully I managed to get the bus quickly, and a limited stop bus at that, so it was ok. I got them home, cleaned the tank, changed the water, then put them in. Everyone is now shoaling beautifully. My new minnows are absolutely tiny, barely a centimetre long (so so tiny!!) and I hope the danios don’t bully them, but thus far everyone looks happy. It’s kind of amazing to watch them swimming around. There’s just so many of them! There’s 19 fish in the tank now…
I also picked up a new fake plant whilst at the store. The nymph episode has put me off real plants for life. I want to build up a more dense ‘forest’ in my tank though, as I’m hoping to eventually get some cherry shrimp. As shrimp are essentially fish food, I want to give them place to hide/escape. My minnows probably won’t care about them, they are extremely lethargic and indifferent fish, but my danios are very inquisitive and active and I am not sure how they will be around shrimp. I’m very pleased with this plant – its the huge bamboo one in the center. Yes, it’s nice and large and dramatic. Plus, it fits my Japanese theme nicely. I’m hoping to get some more medium sized plants to line up in front if it. This plant is unfortunately not silk like I wanted, but it’s a nice soft, gentle plastic. I’m hoping to get some silk plants for those medium ones. They have a softer, more realistic look. My Betta tank is silk only and it looks too pretty .
As for my betta, the only addition to his tank is a cut up coke bottle. Wait, it’s actually a thing called a baffle that you use to reduce the flow of the filter. My Betta was getting blown about by the outtake of the filter, and he seemed to be cowering in one part of the tank. So I googled about, found about the “water bottle hack” and did it. His water is a lot stiller now and he can explore his kingdom quite happily now without all those pesky bubbles. :) I’m not putting more fish in there, as he seems very content to lord over his kingdom all alone…