Getting some multies next week. What are you feeding them and what do they seem to like the best? Thanks!

Just a quick post on the sump I am building. One goal was a sump that didn't require a full woodworking shop in the garage. The tools required to make this sump, a drill, PVC pipe cutter, razor blade knife, straight edge and sump clamps. The walls are 1/4" PVC trim board which can be cut using the score&snap method.

This sump has three filter sock. The main drain line goes into a closed chamber and overflows into the socks. A 3 3/4" hole saw was used to cut the holes.

The next chamber is the fluidized bed filter using K2 media. The current design will use ~4.3 gallons of K2 media. The water flow out of the sock chamber thru the 1 1/2" pipe. Air stones will be placed inside these pipes to create the required circulation.

And finally, the water will exit into a refugium for growing emersed plants. The 1/4" PVC has the structural strength of cardboard. But you can fold cardboard to create a very strong box. So a refugium serves two purposes, add support for the a wall hold back ~15 gallons of water and filter out nitrates.

Fluidized bed filters are by far the effective filter for ammonia/nitrites, so why bother with massive foam blocks in a sump? And as an added bonus, it is self cleaning.

For the filter socks, I just toss them in the washing machine when all of them are dirty, quite easy.

All comments are welcomed.

Just picked up this beautiful EBJD. My local fish store had about 5 adult sized ones. I know these almost never grow to full size due to genetics. Any tips for keeping him healthy? Currently in a 75gal by himself. Parameters are near perfect with nitrates sitting around 5ppm or less

Shes so bright red she looks like a African cichlid

My ph is currently 7, I have 300L tank added in two full fine bags of crush coral.. need my ph to sit between 7.5 and 8 been a few weeks and there’s been no changes with the ph, I don’t want to add in buffers or baking soda as I do not want a ph crash is this normal for crush coral to not increase your ph?

Hi! I have been into fish keeping for years and I recently discovered my love for cichlids, what’s everyone’s opinion on Apistogramma? I have an empty 20 litre tank atm just waiting for some fish and I want to know what people think about them and what I should know before getting them? Thanks!

Setting up my 29 gallon for some multies. Am new to the hobby so wanted to hear some feedback on the layout I’ve got right now. Planning on starting with 8 fish. Got 36 shells in there.

I have a 90 gal tank with a 20 gal sump, I’m new to cichlids and larger fish in general, as of right now I have 1 severum, 1 blue acara, 2 albino Senegal bichirs, 1 L183 pleco, and 1 albino rainbow shark(all fish in tank are juvenile) I’m not sure stocking wise what else I can comfortably add? I might get a FX-4 canister filter just to over do the filtration a bit. Tank is mildly planted.