However, upgrading will not be just a matter of buying a bigger tank. You will also need to buy the necessary setup accessories such as filters and light tubes that are able to cope with the larger body of water in a bigger tank.

3 Things To Consider When Buying A New Aquarium Tank

Materials: Aquariums are made of a variety of materials: plate glass, plexiglass, fiberglass, concrete, etc. Each type has its inherent advantages and disadvantages. The most commonly used ones are made of the traditional plate glass.

Shapes: Generally, there are two categories of tank—“long” or “tall.” Most people would prefer a long tank because they provide an illusion of a larger tank, as compared with their tall equivalents. The front face of the tank will generally determine its apparent size, so large rectangular tanks are more popular. Tanks are available in curved, octagonal or hexagonal shapes too.

Size: The number, type, and size of fish kept matter.

• Number Of Fish: Of course, the more fish you intend to have, the bigger the tank you require. As a guideline, you need about one gallon of water for every three to four inches of fish. The number of fish you can have is calculated based on the surface area of the water, not the depth.
• Type Of Tank: Fish rarely need a tank much deeper than 15 inches. Tanks that are too deep are not only able to hold fewer fish but its water pressure can become too great for the fish. Also, cleaning the bottom of such tanks may pose a problem. Longer and faster moving fish cannot be kept in them as they need a long run of space to move about in.
• Size Of Tank: Another point worth noting is that in a longer tank, there will be more room for error. With a larger body of water, problems such as disease, pollution or temperature changes will take a longer to deteriorate the quality of the water in the tank, thus allowing more time for the problem to be rectified.

How Often Do I Change The Tank’s Water?

Generally, the smaller the tank, the more often you would have to change its water (assuming that you keep the same number of fish).

What Size Of Tank Should I Get?

Before you go out to shop for your tank, consider where you plan to put it, and measure the space that is available. This will probably be an important deciding factor as to the size of tank to get.

If you still have trouble deciding on the size of the tank you should get, go to an aquarium shop and take a look at the tanks it has set up for a better idea.

What Is New Tank Syndrome?

When a tank is newly set up, it will exhibit what we called “new tank syndrome.” This phenomenon is responsible for early death of fish, which are unfortunate enough to be “dumped” into the new tank.

There are several factors leading to the new tank syndrome:

1. Immature water: The water may not be “aged” enough. This together with leftover solvents or cleaning agents, makes a lethal combination. So, the tank must be rinsed at least once with light soapy water. Then its inside surfaces must be thoroughly scrubbed and rinsed at least twice, before filling up the tank with water.

2. Overstocking: Always understock your new tank for at least two to three months before adding more fish to the tank. It would be good to invest in three basic test kits—for pH, ammonia, and nitrite. Water is colorless even if it is polluted with byproducts excreted from the inhabitants in the aquarium. Water with high ammonia level is colorless and odorless. This invisible “toilet bowl” soup of ammonia, when not properly managed, is usually the cause of fish slowly dying off. This problem often baffles many new hobbyists.

By observing your fish, you would be able to see some of these symptoms in their behavior: stress, nervousness, poor appetite, and lethargy in swimming movements. However, note that this is not necessarily an indication of high ammonia levels in the water.

The ammonia test kit is the only way to test the ammonia level. An ideal level would indicate a “zero” reading. You can manage the ammonia cycle by combining small numbers of fish with reduced feeding. If the ammonia level is high, bring it down by changing the water more frequently during the initial stage of the cycle.

3.  Lack of good bacteria: When the ammonia cycle is peaking, good nitrification bacteria would have started to colonize your filter media. These bacteria are essential to filtering the water, and keeping it in good condition. They will convert ammonia to nitrite (which is still a harmful product), and then reduce the nitrite to nitrate. The latter byproduct is harmless, though a high level of it will have an impact on fish health. To speed up the cultivation of good bacteria, buy a bottle of dried bacteria from a reliable aquarium store. Simply follow the instructions and recommended dosage.

4. The bacteria need two key ingredients to survive: well-oxygenated water and enough carbonate to help them convert ammonia to nitrite and nitrate. Hence the need for a pH test kit. Strictly speaking, pH is not an indication of carbonate presence. However, there is a positive correlation between higher pH levels and higher carbonate presence. A reading of pH7 and pH8 is a good enough indication of carbonate presence. Add a bag of coral chips to one of the filter compartments. This not only provides a home for the nitrification bacteria, but also allows carbonate to slowly leach out into the water.

When the bacteria in the filter can successful convert ammonia to nitrate without water-changing, and the ammonia and nitrite reading are always at zero, the full nitrification cycle has been established. Your tank can then be considered as having matured.

Salinity: A measurement of the mass of all the dissolved salts in a given mass of solution. It is usually expressed as parts per thousand (ppt) and used to determine the salt level in a saltwater aquarium, the normal range of which is 30 to 34 ppt.

Silicone sealant: A transparent, rubbery adhesive used in aquariums to bond glass and plug leaks. It can also be used in reef tanks for the attachment of rock and coral formations.

Syphon: A length of tube that makes use of gravity to move water from one location to another. This term also refers to the organs used by some molluses to inhale and exhale water.

Trace Elements: This refers to elements or compounds which are naturally present in the water in very small quantities. These elements, such as chromium, cadmium, selenium, silver and cobalt, are important in physiological processes.

Tickle Filter: A filtration system where water is dripped over a filter medium which is exposed to the air. The air helps to enhance the nitrification process. The filter medium usually consists of small plastic balls or strips of plastic.

Water Quality: A term that encompasses the entire range of physical, chemical and biological environmental factors in an aquarium. It is subjective in that what would be considered good water quality for one species of fish may be poor water quality for another.

Please keep in mind that this list here is by no mean extensive. I will add them periodically whenever there are more queries. For now, I’ve divided this list into 7 parts in alphabet order.

Common Aquarium Terms Series:

• Part 1: A
• Part 2: B
• Part 3: C
• Part 4: D
• Part 5: F to L
• Part 6: M to P
• Part 7: S to Z

It is possible to have a healthy tank without using a single test kit. However, test kits are useful when you suspect something is not quite right with your aquarium (e.g. fish appear stressed or weak). It helps to take the guesswork out of detecting the likely problem.

The Four Types of Test Kits

Of course there are many than four basic types of test kit. In this article, I will cover:

• Ammonia test Kit
• Nitrite test kit
• Nitrate test kit
• pH test kit

Ammonia test kits indicate the ammonia (and nitrite) levels in your tank and help to account for problems such as unexplained fish deaths.

Firstly, these are useful during the tank-cycling phase. Regular testing will tell you whether the first phase of the nitrogen cycle has been completed.

Secondly, conducting a test for ammonia will help verify whether your tank’s biological filter is (or isn’t) working properly. Sometimes, even in an established tank, the biological filter can malfunction or fail. These are the common causes of the problem:

• The filter has not been cleansed regularly—water cannot flow through a clogged filter, where the nitrifying bacteria reside.
• Fish medication has been added indiscriminately—antibiotics kill nitrifying bacteria as well as disease-causing ones.
• The filter’s capacity is unable to cope with the fish load.

Ammonia levels are measured in ppm. At concentrations as low as 0.2 – 0.5 ppm (for certain species of fish), ammonia can cause rapid death. Even at levels above 0.01 – 0.02 ppm, fish become stressed.

The standard test kits do not register such low concentrations. Thus, a test kit should never detect ammonia in an established tank. If it does, the ammonia level is too high and will be stressing the fish. Take immediate action to correct the situation—by changing the water or identifying the source of the problem.

Nitrite test kits are used in most of the same circumstances as ammonia kits would be. The main difference is that they are able to provide information that the second phase of the nitrogen cycle has been completed. Once a tank has been cycled, nitrite test kits are pretty much useless.

Nitrate test kits help detect the nitrate levels in established tanks—which is the end phase of the nitrogen cycle. The exception to this is heavily-planted tanks or reef tanks which may be able to consume nitrogen faster than it is produced.

As nitrates become toxic at high concentrations, they must be removed periodically (through regular water changes). Nitrates become toxic to fish (and plants) at levels of 50 – 300 ppm, depending on the fish species. Nitrates can become toxic to fry at even lower concentrations. Using a nitrate test kit would help you determine whether or not the nitrates in your water are being removed quickly enough.

pH test kits are used to indicate whether the pH of your tap water suits the requirements of the fish species you are keeping in your aquarium. Over time, you can use these to check whether there has been any significant decrease or increase in the tank’s pH level.

Sometimes, tank decorations such as driftwood (which can slowly leach tannins) or gravel (made of coral, shells, or limestone) can increase or lower the acidity or alkalinity of your water.

You can find more on Aquarium Water Testing Kits here.

Buy a good fish. As the luo han is a territorial species, keep only one fish per tank. If you want to bring out the best in your fish, get a tank at least three feet long with drip trays and overhead filter system.

Q. I would like to know how often I need to feed my luohan. How do I enhance its color?

You should feed it two or three times a day at most. Give it spirulina-based food to enhance the color.

Q. Does feeding dried shrimps help to enhance the red color in my luohan’s body?

Yes, but not the “hae bee” type.

Q. Why does my jingang luohan keep changing its color? It turns to a dirty brown, then orange. How long will it take to develop fully into a solid color?

The jingang luohan is a strain of the flowerhorn. When they are juveniles, they look like conventional flower horn fish. While growing up, they undergo a color changing phase, where the black markings fade and the fish turns yellow with a deep red patch around the first-third of its body.

When the colors are changing, pigmentation is quite unstable and may revert temporarily to the darker markings. In times of stress, these black markings can also be more prominent.

It is hard to tell when color changes will take place. There are fishes with small three-inch color changes. Some change color only when they become adults.

Q. Is it true that heated water set at 30 – 32 deg C helps stabilize the flower horn fish and enhance the growth on its head?

The size of the hump is genetically predisposed. You can help your louhan attain the maximum size its hump is genetically programmed for, but not beyond that.

A balance diet and good husbandry will contribute to optimum conditions of growing your fish. Keeping an optimum temperature is just one of the many factors involved in making the environment stable for your fish.

Q. My Luohan appears very frightened, often turning black for no reason. Is there any way to remedy this condition?

There are various reasons why the color of a fish changes or fades. One important attribute is the bloodline of the fish. If it has a good bloodline (or breeding), it is more likely that the color of the fish will remain stable. Another reason could be that the water temperature in the aquarium is too low, so perhaps you should use a heater with a temperature gauge and set it at approximately 29° to 30°C.

Q. My luohan’s tail seems to have something that looks like a tear in it. I think that this could be due to an infection caused by some sort of microscopic mites. What can I do about this?

Try changing 50 per cent of the water and keeping the salt level at 0.05% for at least a week.

Q. How do I differentiate the sexes of the flower horn fish? Is it by the black dot on the dorsal fin or the hump on its head?

Black patches on dorsal fins in the earlier varieties of the flowerhorn were good indications of a female fish. However, with increasingly complex hybridization of flower horns, themselves a hybrid, this does not seem to hold true anymore.

As for the hump on the head, males tend to have a larger hump than the females. However there are always exceptions in hybrids.

White spot is a disease that is common in luohan. The infection is caused by the Ichthyophthirius Multifilius parasites. White spots will first appear on the fins and then gradually spread to the other parts of the body.

It is important to medicate a new fish in a separate container before introducing it into the tank containing your other fish.

To remedy this problem, I would place the fish in a pail, add about four or five drops of anti-white-spot medication (methylene blue) and aerate it for two hours. After that, the fish is returned to its tank. After doing this daily, over three days, the white spots usually disappear. I do not add the medication to the tank as the bacteria in it will be killed as well.

Installing a heater will definitely help. The ideal temperature should be about 28° and above. For diseased fish, a temperature of 30° to 31°C degrees is recommended. Salt is also effective in treating the disease. A salt concentration between 0.3 per cent and 0.5 per cent will upset the osmotic balance and dehydrate the cells of the parasites, thus killing them.

More articles on Ich and how to treat them

• What You Need To Know About Ich?
• How To Prevent And Treat Ich Without Killing The Fish

Fact: The Japanese name for Koi is Nishikigoi.

Believed to be capable of swimming upstream against rapid currents, the koi has become a popular motif in Chinese and Japanese art to symbolize strength, courage, and patience in the face of obstacles.

According to Chinese legend, a carp that courageously climbed up a waterfall was transformed into a dragon. While in Japan, it is customary for boys to pray on Children’s Day that they will take on the characteristics of koi and live their lives strongly. They also hang out giant koi-shaped streamers on that day.

Fact: Koi with more than one color are unique because no two are exactly alike.

Keeping Koi As Indoor Fish

Koi usually look best in outdoor ponds, especially those that are beautifully done up. However, I know of fish hobbyists who have taken the trouble to create an artificial pond in their condominiums just for their koi. Although more work needs to be done to set up a pond, the end result is worth the while—you have an excellent aerial view of how beautifully and gracefully they swim.

Water Temperature: Though graceful and elegant, fragile they are not. Sturdier than even the common goldfish, koi can withstand relatively wide temperature ranges, even extremely cold ones, as long as the water doesn’t freeze.

Filtration: If you keep koi in a pond (be it outdoor or indoor), it must be aerated and filtrated 24 hours a day, and be free from debris, especially at the bottom.

Pond’s Size: The depth and width of the pond should be sufficient to allow the koi’s comfortable growth—the fish’s maximum length is about three feet. Do not overcrowd the pond; the fish will require more room as they grow bigger. And try not to keep the water level too close to the pond’s edge as the fish may jump out.

Feeding: Twice-daily feedings should suffice for koi. If your pump stops, do not feed the koi as they will use up more oxygen when fed.

Health: Stress is a major cause of koi deaths, so avoid sudden changes in pond conditions. Do not over-handle or over-medicate them either.

Common symptoms of stress: the fish is lethargic and hovers at the bottom of the tank; its gills are red or bleeding; it is gasping for air at the water surface; it has a lack of appetite.

To prevent fish from falling ill, provide them with a stress-free environment. If you detect tell-tale signs of stress or disease, remove the possible causes immediately, then diagnose and administer the right treatment if necessary.

The Four Areas That You Need To Monitor

Thermal Fluctuations

Fish may suffer thermal stress when they are taken from one environment and placed instantly into another with a higher or lower temperature. They should not be subjected to sudden temperature fluctuations of more than two to three deg C.

If you use a heater in your aquarium, keep regular checks on the water temperature. Adjust the heater if the temperature is out of the correct range.

pH Level

Most aquarium fish live in environments with a pH level of between 6.5 and 8.5. To avoid pH trauma, the pH levels of the water must remain fairly constant. Use the appropriate pH test kits and/or alkalinity test kits for your aquarium.

If the level needs to be corrected, make gradual adjustment of not more than +0.3 pH units per day. pH level can be lowered by using distilled water when making partial water changes.

Oxygen Level

2 levels in excess of 25 to 30ppm are dangerous for fish and can lead to suffocation. This can be easily checked with Mini Lab Oxygen Test Kit.

Check the filter to ensure it is working properly to keep the water well-aerated. If there is oil or scum on the water surface, carefully scoop water of the surface until you have removed about two inches of water. Use fresh water to replace the amount that has been removed.

Toxicity Levels

Toxicity levels vary, depending on the species, size, and metabolic rate of the fish. Toxic substances usually come in contact with fish through the gills, rather than the skin. The toxins act rapidly as they enter the bloodstream directly. And degree of poisoning will weaken the fish, making it vulnerable to disease.

Lack of maintenance and an extended power outage may also lead to the formation of hydrogen sulfide within the gravel or the filtration system.

Gravel improves the aesthetics of your aquarium but it also traps decaying matter. You can avoid problems by not having any gravel, or keeping only a very thin layer in the aquarium, or cleaning it regularly.

The standard filter can only perform the basic function of filtering dirt onto the cotton wool, and does not have a filter mat for enough waste-eliminating bacteria to grow.

A standard filter for a two feet tank is usually only 10 per cent of its size, and is not powerful enough to totally eliminate waste. For it to work effectively, the filter should ideally be at least 30 per cent of the tank size.

It would be rather difficult for a standard pump to suck all the dirt, unless the water is directed to circulate below it. If you are using such a pump, you may have to remove the dirt manually with the help of a net, once in a while. A more powerful pump will not necessarily be more effective. In fact, a slower pump could be more conducive for waste-eliminating bacteria to do the work of cleaning up the tank.

Placing some stones or coral chips on the bottom of the tank may help. However, it is very important that you use a net to remove the dirt occasionally. Some hobbyists use an under-gravel filter that is placed beneath the stones on the tank floor. This is another way to keep the water clear. However, if the dirt that has accumulated beneath these stones is not properly and regularly cleared, the water condition becomes unhealthy and this may lead to the fish being infected with diseases.

Here are some internal filters you might want to consider for your Luohans’ home.

Mechanical Filtration: The trapping of particulate material from aquarium water by straining the water through a pad, sponge or other media, and the subsequent removal and cleaning of the media.

Nitrate (NO3-): A form of nitrogen that is the end product of nitrification. Nitrate is also the initial substrate for denitrification. Nitrate is not considered very toxic to aquatic organisms. The nitrate concentration in an aquarium will continue to increase unless steps are taken to remove it from the water. The most common removal method is regular water changes. Other means are the use of live plants, which utilize nitrate for their growth, or having a denitrifying filter installed.

Nitrification: The oxidation of ammonia to nitrite, and nitrite to nitrate by bacteria. Nitrification is the most important biological process in an aquarium as it forestalls the build-up of ammonia, which would otherwise increase to toxic levels. Nitrification takes 30 to 45 days to become established in a new aquarium, during which time ammonia and nitrite may reach toxic levels (called new tank syndrome).

Nitrite (NO2): A form of nitrogen that is produced during nitrification and denitrification by bacteria. Generally, nitrite is very transient, as it is quickly utilized by bacteria.

pH: A measure of the hydrogen ion concentration. The “p” stands for power while the “H” stands for the hydrogen ion (always capitalized because it is a chemical element); together they mean the power of the hydrogen ion. The pH of natural waters falls mostly in the range of 6 to 8.

Powerhead: A small submersible pump commonly used inside an aquarium to provide additional water movement. Several powerheads can be used in conjunction with a controller unit to stimulate natural wave actions.

Please keep in mind that this list here is by no mean extensive. I will add them periodically whenever there are more queries. For now, I’ve divided this list into 7 parts in alphabet order.

Common Aquarium Terms Series:

• Part 1: A
• Part 2: B
• Part 3: C
• Part 4: D
• Part 5: F to L
• Part 6: M to P
• Part 7: S to Z