bizarrely NOT a disaster...

[sophie]

....or not so far.

went away on Saturday.
religiously set new timer on lights.
sadly failed to notice high-tech addition of little switch on set with
three positions: off, timer on and - significantly - timer off.

came back today to find tank full of slightly disturbed fish, though the
kuhlis seem less fussed. Dwarf gourami was displaying constantly,
harlequins schooling tightly - including, weirdly, the very tiny,
unhappy and undersized one who hasn't grown at all since I got him.

Elaine had suggested he might have internal parasites, which sounded
likely, so imagine my shock on discovering that four and a half days of
constant lighting in combination with reduced feeding seem to have given
him back his nice bright colours and behaviour (no hiding under
driftwood at the bottom of the tank).

I was also interested to find that the water was absolutely crystal
clear (I don't have any fine mechanical filtration in the tank, so
usually there are some tiny bits) and that there had been NO noticeable
plant growth - the hornwort usually grows pretty visibly - and despite
the constant lighting, no algae growth.

For the good of the fish, it's not an experiment I'd care to repeat, but
I'm interested in (though baffled by) the seeming improvement in the
sick rasbora and the lovely water clarity.

odd.
--
sophie

[dfreas]

I don't think this has as much to do with the constant light as you
might think. Was anyone feeding your fish while you were gone? If so
were they feeding them as often as you would have?

My guess is that for 3 days no food went into the tank so the plants
cleaned up the water and then had nothing left to clean. The lack of
nutrients stopped plant and algae growth and cleared up the water. Also
the fish are probably moving around less, thus stirring up the water
less, thus no tiny bits floating in the water.

The constant lights stressed the fish a little bit, but not too much.
The added stress caused the rasboras to school together which meant
they stopped picking on the runt. The runt, who was over stressed
before, is now a little stressed by the lights but all in all the
reduction in stress resulting from no longer being picked on while you
were gone caused his overall stress level to go down - thus he looks
better than when you left.

So what have you learned? Stressed underfed fish don't fight or pollute
the water as much as happy well fed fish do. You have unlocked the
secret that your LFS uses to keep massive amounts of fish in small
spaces without having them die ;-)

Seriously though I think this is possibly evidence of the fact that
your runt is getting picked on - you may want to try and do something
about that. I haven't any suggestions as to what since I've never kept
harlequins.

Neat experiment. Even if it was accidental.

-Daniel

[sophie]

In message . com>,
dfreas > writes
>I don't think this has as much to do with the constant light as you
>might think. Was anyone feeding your fish while you were gone? If so
>were they feeding them as often as you would have?

once a day instead of twice, and only pellets not anything live - I made
him count the pellets he fed them, suspicious and distrustful person
that I am.
>
>My guess is that for 3 days no food went into the tank so the plants
>cleaned up the water and then had nothing left to clean. The lack of
>nutrients stopped plant and algae growth and cleared up the water. Also
>the fish are probably moving around less, thus stirring up the water
>less, thus no tiny bits floating in the water.

I didn't think the plants actually filtered visible bits out of the
water? (nitrates are about 12.5, which is what they usually are, so
though they haven't gone up they don;t seem to have been used up either;
I don't measure for any other nutrients) though the kuhlis have probably
been rootling around a bit less, which would make a difference. Though
it always surprises me how little gack is in the sand.
>
>The constant lights stressed the fish a little bit, but not too much.
>The added stress caused the rasboras to school together which meant
>they stopped picking on the runt. The runt, who was over stressed
>before, is now a little stressed by the lights but all in all the
>reduction in stress resulting from no longer being picked on while you
>were gone caused his overall stress level to go down - thus he looks
>better than when you left.

Nice idea, I like that.
>
>So what have you learned? Stressed underfed fish don't fight or pollute
>the water as much as happy well fed fish do.

Can I add "apart from dwarf gouramis?" He looked fairly snippy to me.

> You have unlocked the
>secret that your LFS uses to keep massive amounts of fish in small
>spaces without having them die ;-)

hee. and there was me thinking it was the
sell-em-quick-before-the-spots-come-out policy.
though to be fair I like both my lfs a lot.
>
>Seriously though I think this is possibly evidence of the fact that
>your runt is getting picked on - you may want to try and do something
>about that. I haven't any suggestions as to what since I've never kept
>harlequins.

as they're schooling fish I think he might be even more unhappy on his
own. At the moment I'm going for letting nature take its course.
>
>Neat experiment. Even if it was accidental.

and slightly disturbing.
the other tank, on the other hand (coldwater) had no feeding going on at
all and I came bcak to nitrates of below 12.5, algae all over the glass
and a mild case of green water. I bloody hate goldfish.
let me modify that.
I bloody hate _keeping_ goldfish.
--
sophie

[dfreas]

sophie wrote:
> I didn't think the plants actually filtered visible bits out of the
> water? (nitrates are about 12.5, which is what they usually are, so
> though they haven't gone up they don;t seem to have been used up
either;
> I don't measure for any other nutrients) though the kuhlis have
probably
> been rootling around a bit less, which would make a difference.
Though
> it always surprises me how little gack is in the sand.

Plants don't filter visible bits out of the water, but you'd be
suprised at what sort of changes can make visible bits disappear. I
have theories but none have stood up to repeated testing. I once was
convinced that cucumbers were responsible for the disappearance of
visible bits as every time I fed my pl*co one the water would clear up
noticeable about two days later. I never did figure out what caused
that mystery (I'm fairly confident that it was not in fact the
cucumber).

I was actually thinking more along the lines of the plants using up the
nutrients and thus killing off any free floating algae you may have had
which would make the water clearer. The floating bits being gone is
probably a result of the fish not stirring up as much junk.

While your tank is obviously not nitrate limited at the moment it may
be lacking phosphate or some other nutrient that caused the plants to
stop growing and the algae to disappear. I don't know for sure though.

> Can I add "apart from dwarf gouramis?" He looked fairly snippy to me.

Looking snippy and being snippy are very different. Sometimes fish
flare up like that precisely so they don't have to be agressive. He
could be just telling the other fish to stay away because he's in no
mood.


> as they're schooling fish I think he might be even more unhappy on
his
> own. At the moment I'm going for letting nature take its course.

I thought the same thing, which is why I didn't have a suggestion for
you. Hopefully it will work itself out.

> the other tank, on the other hand (coldwater) had no feeding going on
at
> all and I came bcak to nitrates of below 12.5, algae all over the
glass
> and a mild case of green water. I bloody hate goldfish.

Indeed. Goldfish are second only to lobsters/crayfish in their
destructive power over an otherwise stable aquarium.

-Daniel