Rehab a Loach Tank

[AutoCat]

Hello,

I am a fairly new aquarist and am looking to rehabilitate my planted tank for my Clown and Kuhli Loaches. I hope that the knowledgeable members of this forum can give me some suggestions.

My current setup is not ideal as as I can tell from my research to date, unfortunately I'm stuck with it for the foreseeable future due to space constraints.

Current Tank:

20G Tall
eco complete substrate
T5HO lights 40W
Marineland Penguin 150 HOB filter
Fluval 105 canister filter
(i'm looking to replace the HOB with the canister filter, but for now they're running simultaneously)
DIY CO2 injected via a modified in-tank filter directed through a bottom mounted spray bar
1 small powerhead to provide some sub-surface current
Large driftwood centre piece
Java Fern
Giant Hair Grass
2 Cryptocorene Willisii
A few more plants whose names I can't remember now

Tank Stock:
3 Otocinclus
1 Dwarf Albino Bristlenose pleco
4 Kuhli Loaches (although I never see more than 3 at a time...)
4 small(ish) Clown Loaches

It's a cycled tank, I add flourish complete as a fertiliser for the plants once a week. I was performing weekly 10-15% water changes until recently when I was advised to only top up the tank with distilled water and occasionally vacuum the gravel. This advice was given in response to a question I had re: a small algae outbreak and my plants weren't really doing well.

I would like to change the habitat to reflect the loaches needs, but I'm not sure that best way to go about it. I've noticed since placing the brighter light for the plants that they're not as active as they once were preferring to hang out at the bottom of the tank.

Unfortunately I can't get a bigger tank just yet due to space restrictions as I stated above, however I would like to implement any other suggestions the form members may have!

Thanks,

Joel

[Diana]

T5HO, 40 watt is a lot of light for that size tank. (20 tall). When you run that bright light the CO2 is important, and fertilizer.
Flourish comprehensive is not a complete fertilizer. It is rich in trace nutrients, which is good. Fish food might supply nitrogen and phosphorus, but is usually low in potassium.
http://www.seachem.com/Products/product ... urish.html
With that bright light I do not think that fish food can supply enough nutrients. That much light makes it a high tech tank, and needs careful attention to carbon dioxide and fertilizers. Are the plants keeping the NO3 really low (under 5 ppm)?

The fish prefer low light. There are a few ways to help them:

1) Grow taller plants such as Amazon Swords (Do some research, there are many species, and some are too large for your tank), Valisnaria (same comment) that would grow near the top of the tank, or would provide shade from large leaves.

2) Grow floating plants that you can remove as needed, to maintain about 25%-50% coverage, whatever brings out the fish. Phylanthus fluitans, any of several Salvinias, Frogbit and others are good possibilities. If there is a planted tank club near you someone may be able to get you some of these plants to try.

3) Turn the lights on and off on a schedule that inhibits the algae, and combine with 4) to see the fish. Use a timer to set up 4-5 hours on, 2 hours off, then 4-5 hours on. In planted tank sites this is referred to as a siesta.

4) In the evening, when the room is dark, have a moonlight (a blue light) come on and you can watch the nocturnal fish then. I am afraid the orange fish look sort of funny in blue light.

5) Set up a more complex lighting:
A couple of hours of about 1/2 as much light, then several hours of full light, then several more hours of 1/2 light. This replicates a 'dawn and dusk' sort of natural light, and the fish are likely to be more visible when the light is lower, and hide mid-day, in the brightest light. In planted tank sites this is referred to as a mid-day burst. The exact timing is variable, you need to set it up and see how the plants, fish and algae respond.

[Jim Powers]

Unfortunately, your tank is way too small for clown loaches.

[AutoCat]

I am aware that my tank is too small for the Loaches in the long run, unfortunately this knowledge came a bit late in the game for me.... I am hoping to have a longer tank for them in the new year.

@Diana: Thank you so much for one of the clearest, most concise answers to a question posted in a forum I have received to date. I will try to implement as many of your suggestions as I can in the near future. I have limited the lighting to 4-6 hour lengths, this is when I run the C02 injector (it's off when the lights are off).

I performed the first water change in a couple of weeks today (I've only been topping it off on the advice of another aquarist) I measured the PH at between 7.2 and 7.6, the Ammonia was 0 ppm and nitrate was measured at 50 mg/l (don't know it in ppm, sorry).

Something that I have been noticing is a white "foam" that appears floating at the top of the tank...

Since I stopped running the light 12-13 hours a day, the loaches are more active (even "dancing" at times).

Does anyone have an opinion on using distilled water vs. reverse osmosis vs. tap water?

Thanks again for all the advice,

Joel

[NancyD]

You need to increase water changes both amount & frequency to keep nitrates below 20ppm (same as mg/l) preferably ~10ppm, unless you have nitrate in your tapwater. What are your tapwater parameters, GH, KH, nitrate, ammonia etc? It's much easier to use tap if you can. You should vac every WC to remove the poo & any plant debris. Topping up does nothing to remove waste dissolved in water (think unflushed toilet). That's probably the foaming problem too...

Most of us change water at least weekly, say 25-50%. BUT because you've been remiss in that you need to do smaller amounts, say 10-15% every day or 2 to get the nitrate down WITHOUT shocking your fish. Overstocked tanks need more attention to water quality.

[Diana]

What she said^

Distilled and RO are about the same as far as aquariums go. No minerals, so the fish cannot live in pure RO or distilled water.
Tap water almost always has minerals in it. Some water has such a high level of minerals it is referred to as 'Liquid Rock'. Well suited to Rift Lake Cichlids, but not great for most other fish.
If you need to make the tap water softer, then mixing with RO is the best way to do that.
By mixing tap water (usually has minerals) with RO or distilled water (no minerals) you are diluting the minerals.
For example if the tap water GH is 10 German degrees of hardness and you mix 50/50 with RO then the mix ends up with a GH of 5 degrees.
However, once you start doing that you need to keep it up, preparing for every water change ahead of time by making the proper mix of tap and RO. Topping off would be with pure RO water.

If you will post all the test results for tap and tank we can offer more ideas and see if there even is a problem that needs to be dealt with. Many fish are quite adaptable within a range of water hardness, as long as it is stable.

Stable is the key when you need to do larger or more frequent water changes. As Nancy said, do more frequent, smaller changes until the NO3 is lowered into a safe range.

[NancyD]

Oh yeah, & get a bigger tank as soon as possible, you're living on the edge of disaster as you should realize...I keep baby clowns in a 20g long for quarantine, 4-8 weeks or so but there aren't any other fish in there. May Santa bring you a bigger soonest...Happy holidays!

[AutoCat]

Oh yeah, & get a bigger tank as soon as possible, you're living on the edge of disaster as you should realize...I keep baby clowns in a 20g long for quarantine, 4-8 weeks or so but there aren't any other fish in there. May Santa bring you a bigger soonest...Happy holidays!

Thanks for all the good advice and help everyone... After some thought I've decided to trade the loaches back for fish better suited to my current tank.

Unfortunately a bigger tank just isn't in the cards for me in the near future and I would prefer not to kill off my fish due to poor living conditions!

Cheers,

Joel

[starsplitter7]

Dear Joel,

I know it was hard to give up the fish. Please let us know what you get and post pictures of your tank and new inhabitants. Lots of us have many fish outside of loaches, and love to hear about those too.

Good luck.

[AutoCat]

Dear Joel,

I know it was hard to give up the fish. Please let us know what you get and post pictures of your tank and new inhabitants. Lots of us have many fish outside of loaches, and love to hear about those too.

Good luck.

Thanks for the good wishes, my wife and I are both a little upset about having to give up the loaches as we both enjoyed their antics.

We've also both notices that they're not as "peppy" as they were at the beginning...

Does anyone have any suggestions for more suitable replacement fish for my tank? Preferably a "flashy" schooling variety as we have a little one who absolutely loves watching the fish dart about.

Thanks,

Joel

ps. I will post photos shortly.

[AutoCat]

What she said^

Distilled and RO are about the same as far as aquariums go. No minerals, so the fish cannot live in pure RO or distilled water.
Tap water almost always has minerals in it. Some water has such a high level of minerals it is referred to as 'Liquid Rock'. Well suited to Rift Lake Cichlids, but not great for most other fish.
If you need to make the tap water softer, then mixing with RO is the best way to do that.
By mixing tap water (usually has minerals) with RO or distilled water (no minerals) you are diluting the minerals.
For example if the tap water GH is 10 German degrees of hardness and you mix 50/50 with RO then the mix ends up with a GH of 5 degrees.
However, once you start doing that you need to keep it up, preparing for every water change ahead of time by making the proper mix of tap and RO. Topping off would be with pure RO water.

If you will post all the test results for tap and tank we can offer more ideas and see if there even is a problem that needs to be dealt with. Many fish are quite adaptable within a range of water hardness, as long as it is stable.

Stable is the key when you need to do larger or more frequent water changes. As Nancy said, do more frequent, smaller changes until the NO3 is lowered into a safe range.

I picked up a GH/KH test kit (API) and tested my tank water and got these results:

PH = 7.6
Ammonia = 0
Nitrates = 25 mg/L
GH = 11 dKH
KH = 5 dKH

I did a 15% water change just after these results were obtained, unfortunately I wasn't able to re-test the water or test my tap water just yet.

Joel

[Diana]

The NO3 is looking a lot better.
The GH is at the high end of OK for soft water fish, I would not try to alter it. Too much work.
However, when you get the tap water results, lets have a look.

[AutoCat]

The NO3 is looking a lot better.
The GH is at the high end of OK for soft water fish, I would not try to alter it. Too much work.
However, when you get the tap water results, lets have a look.

With the nuttiness of the holidays slowly receding I finally had a chance to test the GH/KH of my local tap water, the results are below:

GH = 9 dKH
KH = 6 dKH
pH = 7.6

At the same time I realized I was due for a water change, so I tested the tank prior to performing a 30% change (using tap water as I didn't have time to get any RO water), test results below:

GH = 12dKH
KH = 6 dKH
pH = 7.6
Ammonia = 0 ppm
Nitrate = 50 mg/L

I was surprised at the identical KH and pH values, especially as I had replaced nearly 50% of the tanks water with RO water (over a 2-3 week period). The higher GH value of the tank water surprised me too....

Could this be a result of the type of substrate I have in the tank? (it's the ecocomplete brand, black in colour).

I appreciate the groups indulgence of my off Loach topic questions....

Cheers

Joel

[djbutterflyx]

I hate being the bearer of bad news but I dont know how smart it would be to add anymore fish to your tank at this point. You stated that you have a 20gallon and as a rule of thumb you should only have 1in of fish per tank. With what you have, minus the clowns, at adult size, you will have around 20" of fish. Kuhlis grow to around 4" so just with those 4 at adult size would be 16". The octinoclus will make up 3" and then I dont know how big dwarf BN plecos get but if any bigger than an inch than you would be above 20". The amount of fish you have now are good for your tank load. If you add anything it should only be a school of 5 neons, rasboras, something like that that shouldnt get too big! Good luck with your endeavors! (Oh yeah, wish I could help you with the GH question but I dont know much about that!!! )