AquaAurora's Goldfish MTS Chronicles

[shelbysfish]

 

Any ice cream with "swirl" in the name should work.  

Good diea, I'll have to go look up teh multatudes of differnt iceacream names this weekend and find one.

 

 

 

I'm a bit disappointing my my nerite, he's so insanely slow going.. I put him on an anubias leaf at lunch time yesterday, 24 hours later he is still working the same leaf and not even 1/3 of it is clean yet.. ugh!! My pond snails clean faster!! But I don't want a population explosion (and it would be nuclear) with all the diatoms present for them to feed on... thus leading to dangerously high nitrates.  So I decided to start cleaning want I want clean and leave the rest for the nerite, I'm working on the anubias leaves during water changes with a paper towel, and then will get the front glass.  Between the rock and back/side walls and the entries slow eating habits I'd say its set for life.

Need to dip my qt anubias to get rid of pond snails then transfer them over tot eh goldfish tank.. also need to get to a landscaping yard some time to pick up some nicer looking rocks to tie the anubias too.

 

 

Oh I don't know if I mentioned it but a few weeks ago I found out both goldfish are girls!  At first I thought I saw mating behavior as Chocolate chased Sprinkles around and nipped at her crotch.  I thought "oh great I'm gonna end up with eggs and more goldfish that I don't have room for!" But then I saw Sprinkles do the same to Chocolate, and periodically they'd break off and eat the eggs they were releasing... that's some fresh roe!

 

 

I feel ya. Mine is pretty fast moving but he is a CLUTZ! 

One day I will find him fallen over on his back. He's not the brightest, but once I flip him back over he does okay. lol

[FishyMandy]

Wow you tank is so amazing. Love all those plants!

[AquaAurora]

Chocolate Caramel Swirl 

Mmm sounds yummy

 

 

 

Any ice cream with "swirl" in the name should work.  

Good diea, I'll have to go look up teh multatudes of differnt iceacream names this weekend and find one.

 

 

 

I'm a bit disappointing my my nerite, he's so insanely slow going.. I put him on an anubias leaf at lunch time yesterday, 24 hours later he is still working the same leaf and not even 1/3 of it is clean yet.. ugh!! My pond snails clean faster!! But I don't want a population explosion (and it would be nuclear) with all the diatoms present for them to feed on... thus leading to dangerously high nitrates.  So I decided to start cleaning want I want clean and leave the rest for the nerite, I'm working on the anubias leaves during water changes with a paper towel, and then will get the front glass.  Between the rock and back/side walls and the entries slow eating habits I'd say its set for life.

Need to dip my qt anubias to get rid of pond snails then transfer them over tot eh goldfish tank.. also need to get to a landscaping yard some time to pick up some nicer looking rocks to tie the anubias too.

 

 

Oh I don't know if I mentioned it but a few weeks ago I found out both goldfish are girls!  At first I thought I saw mating behavior as Chocolate chased Sprinkles around and nipped at her crotch.  I thought "oh great I'm gonna end up with eggs and more goldfish that I don't have room for!" But then I saw Sprinkles do the same to Chocolate, and periodically they'd break off and eat the eggs they were releasing... that's some fresh roe!

 

 

I feel ya. Mine is pretty fast moving but he is a CLUTZ! 

One day I will find him fallen over on his back. He's not the brightest, but once I flip him back over he does okay. lol

 

One of my previous nerites wedged herself in a chunk of driftwood and couldn't get back out without some help, thankfully she didn't make the same mistake again.

 

Wow you tank is so amazing. Love all those plants!

Thank you ^^

 

 

 

 

Sadly the nerite died.  I noticed 2 days ago that it wasn't moving, I put it on a rock and checked every hour.. nothing.. Pulled it out and phew... yep, dead snail stench.  Kinda sad, loved the shell.. so debating if I want to return it for a refund or get the 'meat' out and save the shell.

I went back to the petco I bought it from yesterday and after tangent-ing on bettas (omg they had such a lovely selection of kings this time!!! Not the standard wild coloration but 2 blue and blacks (one a darker blue, the other a more blue-green), a metallic green and red, and a marble with lovely tropical feeling hues-light blue, white, light green, and peach-ish sort of orange-pink) I spoke with an employee who kinda knows me (always use to play with/gave treats to my previous dog-she knew the dogs name but I don't think she knows me.. but I can't recall her's either so shh).  She said all the snails up and died a few days ago (after I'd bought mine), I suspect it was ammonia positioning as there was a dozen in small under 1g hang on breeder baskets...Who knows when/if they ever got water changes.  So now I'm not blaming my goldfish for the nerite's death, but likely ti was already deing from poor water quality at the store, hence its insane slow-ness to eat... New shipment will be coming in in a few days so I'll pop by the store and snag a new snail before it has time to stew in filth too long.

Edited June 7, 2016 by AquaAurora

[AquaAurora]

So I decided to buy a peppermint mystery snail from a member on anther forum.  It should be here tomorrow, fingers crossed it makes it ok!  I've always wanted to try a peppermint mystery snail very since I fist saw a photo of one, so when I saw a journal for someone breeding mystery snails that had some peppermint babies I asked and bought one ^^

Its still a baby around nickle size so I'll likely let it grow in some of my qt tanks and clean out my black worm culture bin that has diatoms too.

Not sure how big I should get it before putting it into the goldfish tank, anyone have suggestions for minimum mystery snail size to try to reduce it being on the menu?

[hannah]

Your fish and tank's lovely!

Edited June 9, 2016 by hannah

[AquaAurora]

Your fish and tank's lovely!

Thank you^^

 

 

Veggies are growing nicely, need to rip out 3 of the 4 cucumbers soon.. debating if I want to stick others in my qt tank and just dump in removed tank water each day for nitrates or if I should simply toss em.. hmm..  Lettuce is starting to look more like lettuce as it grows, spinach is still a bit puny..

Crappy underwater shot sorry.  Water sprite has been growing like a beast!  Had to thin it out today to give the anubias and swords some light.  I have 2 packages for sale in the "For Sale" sub forum.

No shots of the goldies, everything came out supper blurry today.

 

...I have no clue why 3 of the 4 pictures enlarged.. they're' all 800px across...

[DawnMichele]

Your plant's look great.

[AquaAurora]

Your plant's look great.

Thanks ^^

 

Mystery snail arrived this morning.  It was wrapped in a not so damp paper towel and looked very retracted into its shell.. at first I thought it was dead and dried out but it was cruising around the anubias qt tank shortly after putting it in!

I moved the sponge filter over from my unused black worm bin as well as sticking in a heater... and an air stone for good measure.

For a peppermint its a bit more purple-burgundy than I'd thought but its still cute

 

I put some soilent green in but so far the snail is just scouring the walls looking for diatoms (sadly I'd cleaned the walls a few days ago since some greens pot algae was taking hold in the qt).  If it doesn't take an interest in the soilent green by fish dinner time I'll remove it and try an algae wafer.

[Hidr]

I love mystery snails.  They can get huge too.  I have a few in my pond and in all but the oscar tank.  Pretty sure he would eat them. 

[AquaAurora]

I love mystery snails.  They can get huge too.  I have a few in my pond and in all but the oscar tank.  Pretty sure he would eat them. 

This one is still young, about thumb nail size-maybe a little larger.  Can't wait for it to grow up more. 

Yeh I think an oscar would have escargot dinner instead of a live in janitor ^^

I'd be tempted to buy more of these snails but most of my tanks already have smaller snail species cleaning things up so don't need one there,no lid (ripariums),  betta in the tank that eats snails (and large shrimp), or just too small a tank for the bioload (2-3g betta tanks).. I'd like at least 5g for a big snail species, or 10g like the qt this one is in.

Edited June 10, 2016 by AquaAurora

[AquaAurora]

Mystery snail was added to the goldfish tank several days ago.  Its still alive/not on the menu and munching away on diatoms.  Most of the time I can't find amongst the plant mass.  But got a shot of it before it left qt tank, and a shot today during water change.  Its shell is a pink-ish purple but the spiral/tip is more purple.  I'm thinking of naming it something along the lines of "Very Berry" and calling it "Berry/Berrie" for short. I'm nota  fan of that flavor of ice cream but mmm there are some yummy looking photos of it on google!  I think I'm going to go make a chocolate and orange sherbet (yes if I ever get an orange goldie that will be its name) cone now ^^

 

Have a [censor] ton of removed water sprite I don't know what to do with too, 5 10"x6"x2" bins worth.

 

[DawnMichele]

Your Snail is very pretty. 

[TikiLola]

Mystery snail was added to the goldfish tank several days ago.  Its still alive/not on the menu and munching away on diatoms.  Most of the time I can't find amongst the plant mass.  But got a shot of it before it left qt tank, and a shot today during water change.  Its shell is a pink-ish purple but the spiral/tip is more purple.  I'm thinking of naming it something along the lines of "Very Berry" and calling it "Berry/Berrie" for short. I'm nota  fan of that flavor of ice cream but mmm there are some yummy looking photos of it on google!  I think I'm going to go make a chocolate and orange sherbet (yes if I ever get an orange goldie that will be its name) cone now ^^

 

Have a [censor] ton of removed water sprite I don't know what to do with too, 5 10"x6"x2" bins worth.

Do you have any long pieces (water sprite)? If shipping isn't too much, I might be interested in taking some off your hands.

~~~~

VeryBerry is a pretty snail! 

[AquaAurora]

Your Snail is very pretty. 

Thank you ^^

 

 

Have a [censor] ton of removed water sprite I don't know what to do with too, 5 10"x6"x2" bins worth.

Do you have any long pieces (water sprite)? If shipping isn't too much, I might be interested in taking some off your hands.

~~~~

VeryBerry is a pretty snail! 

 

Thank you and yes.  Here is a photo showing all water sprite over 9"-most over 10"(excluding roots) there are 10 separate plants.  They are on a 16.5" board.  If you are interested in more I have several ranging from 4-8" (excluding roots).

Sadly I don't have enough posts to have access to the PM privilege on this forum yet, if you'd like to discuss shipping costs etc you can email me at aquaaurorapb at gmail dot com, as I don't believe we're suppose to talk about sales in the non marketplace section (but may be confuse that with another forum's rules).

[AquaAurora]

Water sprite was sold to a member on another forum, they took all my excess water sprite, I could barely cram it all into the priority shipping box!

 

I promise to get a shot of the goldfish again someday! But for now have another couple photos of Very Berry.  Love the spots on their flesh.

Edited June 20, 2016 by AquaAurora

[AquaAurora]

Ok got some not so great but at least not complete blur shots of Chocolate and Sprinkles!  Hate the glare/reflection from the other tanks..  Also one more of Very Berry ^^  Slow snail is much easier to photograph than speedy goldies.

Isn't s/he cute?!

 

Not full tank shots at I have a diatom explosion atm, and Very Berry did not get the memo about cleaning the glass and anubias leaves as top priority =.=

 

 

Sprinkles is getting noticeably fatter than Chocolate, I'm assuming because she's more aggressive at eating food off the substrate.  Chocolate has no problem with hand feeding (prefers it to sifting sand) so I'm trying to make sure more foods gets sucked in to Chocolates mouth rather then mostly fall to the bottom.   

Speaking of eating, Very Berry was on the cucumber munching away when I gave the other two their breakfast ^^

I may actually try catching and weighing them today, might take some above perspective photos of them in the smaller bucket too if they aren't splashy spaz-zoids about it.

Edited June 22, 2016 by AquaAurora

[AquaAurora]

So finally weighed them.  Used 2 orange 1g (or less?) buckets from home depot I got specifically for this and borrowed a food scale.  Chocolate was very calm the entire time. Sprinkles wasn't too keen on the initial grab to remove from tank but did great for the rest of her handling!  Not much for photos, orange bucket doesn't make for good photo shoot.

Pudgy sprinkles actually weighs as much as Chocolate, both at 39 grams.  Going to go weigh out food for them now to have a better idea of how much to give each.

Here are some quick photos

 

 

I don't know what the [censor] is up with photobucket lately but its ticking me off!! I resize my photos to 800x600 or 600x800.. preview post is showing them at 800-1000 + pixles grrr =.=

Edited June 22, 2016 by AquaAurora

[AquaAurora]

Loooook deeeep into my heaaaart (of lettuce ^.~ )

Tasty looking isn't it?

 

I tore off two pieces from a smaller lettuce plant that had a little damage and put them in with the goldies to try.  No blanching.  Spotted Chocolate under the lettuce nibbling at it a short time ago.

 

 

Sorry so many shots of the snail but its just so much easier to get non blurred shots of!  Hubby really liked how this one turned out.  Ignore the algae covered food clip and particles floating around-took this right after dropping in soilent green dinner.

Edited June 24, 2016 by AquaAurora

[AquaAurora]

Soooo looking around on this forum I just realized I might be over feeding my goldfish >.<

I thought you ed 10% their body weight.. looks like it should be 2-3% for mine based on age (assuming under a year from their size) and temp(74F)... whoops!

Will keep same feeding schedule and just reduce amount of food given.

Plus slide: less food will be a little less poop!.. right?

Edited June 24, 2016 by AquaAurora

[AquaAurora]

Ended up pulling off the scallions and shifting the lettuce around so the smaller lettuce plants had a chance to grow (and not be smothered by the big one).  Cucumber plant is getting big.  I realized I probably should have kept 2 plants to cross pollinate.. oops >.>  Fish are doing well as well as mystery snail which i feel has noticeably grown more since it arrive! S/he has been working on the diatoms, side wall has the cool tracks of sail noming all over. Water sprite is growing like a bloody best, need to thin it out AGAIN!  Can't wait to get to 200 posts so i have access to PMs.  Will probably celebrate with a RAOK (random act of kindness aka 'just pay shipping') including a lot of water sprite, n.Taiwan (light green small leafed water lily), maybe some leopard vals and whatever else I have around at that time.

[AquaAurora]

Quick batch of photos showing the plants.  Debating if I should raise the lights to keep them above the cucumber or let it  just do it's thing.

Water sprite mass is huge!  its 30" across, 13" wide, and a good 4.5"+ deep!  I'm debating if I should keep the water sprite more aggressively thinned or sell off the anubias that's smothered under it.

 

 

Suction cups keep giving out on the food clips.. I'm thinking to getting magnetic ones.. but I may also simply DIY with glass beads and fishing line (like my rhizome plant anchor diy).

[DawnMichele]

Great picture's.

[AquaAurora]

Great picture's.

Thanks ^^

 

 

Speaking of pollinating.. first cucumber blooms are started already!  That was fast 0.O

Dunno if I can pollinate successfully with 2 blooms from same plant but will try once I have a few opened up.

Edited June 28, 2016 by AquaAurora

[TikiLola]

So very cool! I hope they do pollinate for you! 

How do you get your watersprite to grow so crazy? I don't think mine has grown at all and is slowly getting nibbled to death.

On the other hand my anubias and crypts are growing nice and steadily.

[AquaAurora]

So very cool! I hope they do pollinate for you! 

How do you get your watersprite to grow so crazy? I don't think mine has grown at all and is slowly getting nibbled to death.

On the other hand my anubias and crypts are growing nice and steadily.

I honestly don't know. I just leave it floating at the surface.  Its not getting a ton of light as the LEDs and T5 are over the veggies not the display section of the tank but they get a lot of spill over/indirect light.  They've been sucking up the nitrates and just growing like mad. If its any help my water temp is 74-75F, pH 7.5 tsd 210 range...gh and kh uuhhh... I can't recall now... >.<

Chocolate and Sprinkles don't really nibble the water sprite since they always have access to a blanched cucumber for their veggie needs.