muddyfox wrote:

Hi,

Thanks for that.

I can easily change the water twice a week and I always give the gravel
a good going over when I do that.

In an established tank gravel vacuuming can be counterproductive, as the
mud -albeit a bit unsightly- actually contains useful bacteria. You
don't want an operating theater, but a working biological system.


I don't think the pH should be too much of a problem since the LFS
suffers with the same mega hard water that we have here so they should
be acclimatised.

IMHO it is much better to keep fishes that fit the water one has. Second
best option is to alter the water to fit the fishes one likes to keep
(e.g. reversed osmosis). Puting fishes into water with very different
params from what they require may harm them in the long term, for
example there are reports that neons get kidney stones in hard water.


In terms of space and tank size there is plenty of room in the tank
for swimming from one end to the other unimpeded but I'll take on board
what you said. (My LFS said that these would be perfect for a 5G tank
too!) I'm in the process of setting up a 60-65 litre planted tank

Corys are swarm fishes, group size should be no less than half a dozen
and the more the merrier. At about 5 cm each that means a minimum of 60
l for the tank (approx 15 gal), better more since they are so active.
Indeed as a rule of thumb tanks of 100 l (25 gal) or more tend to be
more stable and easier to maintain than the very small ones.

which will have a lot more space for fun and frolicks. It may also be
more acidic since I'm thinking of using ADA Aquasoil which buffers the
water to about pH 6.5 ish.

I have made bad experiences with pH-lowering chemicals. At least some
contain phosphate as buffering agent, I wonder which homo hebes got that
idea. Better use peat or oak leaves (corys love to play with those!).

It won't have a bubble stream though
because that would dump my CO2 out of the water.

Do you add CO2 to your tank? That is not realy necessary, plants grow
just fine with the CO2 that the water contains in equilibrium with air.
The money for the CO2 unit is better spend on a larger tank, IMHO