Aquarium update
So, I didn't get to work on the voting rant at all yesterday, but I'll finish it eventually 8)
Background posts.
My aquarium is finally starting to develop a balanced ecosystem. I noticed Wednesday night that the ammonia levels had suddenly gone way down. Of course, that means the nitrite levels should have gone way up. They don't seem to make persistent in-tank detectors for much other than temperature, pH, and ammonia, so I had to get the test tubes out and run all the water tests to see how things were going. As usual, pH was high, but that's because of the local water - the fish don't seem to mind, so I'm not going to worry about it. Ammonia was indeed almost gone, which is good - it should stay around 0 in a balanced tank. Nitrites, however, were off the chart (literally - the color of the test solution was bright purple, which was as high as the chart showed). Nitrates were present, but not awful. So I did a quick 25% water change, so that my fish didn't die of nitrite poisoning. The ammonia levels have been staying low (so close to 0 that it doesn't matter). I'm sure that I'll have to do another water change this weekend, unless the ecosystem suddenly blooms, but I suspect it will take another week or so before everything is balanced out. Then I can get more fishies!
When I did the water change, I thought one of my otos had died (more specifically, I thought he had become betta food). Normally they run from the gravel vacuum (which is basically a piece of tubing with a short piece of rigid pipe on the end used to siphon out water and clean gunk off of the surfaces, and then they hide somewhere. Then when you approach their hiding place, they run to another one, etc. The betta normally just stays near the top of the tank and out of the way and watches you. As I cleaned, I was only seeing two otos zipping around. I ended up looking around and under everything in the tank trying to find the third. Then I looked in my filter to make sure it didn't get sucked up in there. I couldn't find it anywhere. I was just about to give up and assume the betta had eaten him when I finally found it, squeezed between the base of the heater and the tank wall. I thought it was cooked for a second, but when I wiggled the heater it swam away. So I was back to three healthy otos and one healthy betta. All of the fish seem overjoyed that the ammonia and nitrite levels are down. They've been spending a good deal of time zipping around the tank - the otos just like to swim fast and zip around, and the betta likes to investigate everything and threaten his reflection in the tank walls. And build a bubble nest.
Lots and lots going on at work. Almost ridiculously busy. But things are getting done.
Background posts.
My aquarium is finally starting to develop a balanced ecosystem. I noticed Wednesday night that the ammonia levels had suddenly gone way down. Of course, that means the nitrite levels should have gone way up. They don't seem to make persistent in-tank detectors for much other than temperature, pH, and ammonia, so I had to get the test tubes out and run all the water tests to see how things were going. As usual, pH was high, but that's because of the local water - the fish don't seem to mind, so I'm not going to worry about it. Ammonia was indeed almost gone, which is good - it should stay around 0 in a balanced tank. Nitrites, however, were off the chart (literally - the color of the test solution was bright purple, which was as high as the chart showed). Nitrates were present, but not awful. So I did a quick 25% water change, so that my fish didn't die of nitrite poisoning. The ammonia levels have been staying low (so close to 0 that it doesn't matter). I'm sure that I'll have to do another water change this weekend, unless the ecosystem suddenly blooms, but I suspect it will take another week or so before everything is balanced out. Then I can get more fishies!
When I did the water change, I thought one of my otos had died (more specifically, I thought he had become betta food). Normally they run from the gravel vacuum (which is basically a piece of tubing with a short piece of rigid pipe on the end used to siphon out water and clean gunk off of the surfaces, and then they hide somewhere. Then when you approach their hiding place, they run to another one, etc. The betta normally just stays near the top of the tank and out of the way and watches you. As I cleaned, I was only seeing two otos zipping around. I ended up looking around and under everything in the tank trying to find the third. Then I looked in my filter to make sure it didn't get sucked up in there. I couldn't find it anywhere. I was just about to give up and assume the betta had eaten him when I finally found it, squeezed between the base of the heater and the tank wall. I thought it was cooked for a second, but when I wiggled the heater it swam away. So I was back to three healthy otos and one healthy betta. All of the fish seem overjoyed that the ammonia and nitrite levels are down. They've been spending a good deal of time zipping around the tank - the otos just like to swim fast and zip around, and the betta likes to investigate everything and threaten his reflection in the tank walls. And build a bubble nest.
Lots and lots going on at work. Almost ridiculously busy. But things are getting done.