#THIS GOT INSANELY LONG I AM SO SORRY. IM VERY AUTISTIC ABOUT FISHKEEPING

[tauforged]

got any tips for beginner aquarists? :O

any advice i’d give is highly dependent on what you’re looking to accomplish — all fish are very different and have different needs! however in all my years working in the aquatics department at a pet store, i’ve found that water quality can be hard to grasp for some people — understandably so, it can get complicated, but it’s very important for the health of your fish. here’s some of the important stuff that i learned the hard way so you don’t have to!

- FOR THE LOVE OF ALL THAT IS HOLY. DECHLORINATE YOUR WATER!!! seachem prime is the most concentrated dechlorinator you’ll find at most stores at 2 drops per gallon, and it lasts a good while. it’s got a strong sulfur smell to it in the bottle, but unless you massively overdose it you won’t smell it in your tank. the #1 mistake people make is not dechlorinating their tap water before filling a tank or doing a water change, and it sucks because it’s such an easy fix but can totally wipe a tank. always pre treat your water!!

- if you’re going to be using tap water, consider testing your water’s pH at the very least so you know what you’re working with. pH is integral to the health of aquatic animals down to a cellular level — if your pH is too high or too low, it doesn’t matter if you’re doing everything else right. keep an eye on that shit.

- if you need to adjust it, look into more natural ways to do so rather than bottled pH booster or reducers (sometimes chemical additives can react with eachother in funky ways). to raise your pH, put a mesh baggie of something like crushed coral sand in your filter. to lower it, look into driftwood that leeches tannins - it’ll turn your water a bit brownish, but that’s okay. in fact, a lot of fish in the hobby naturally come from waters thatre tannin-y, and will be quite alright with things a little murky!

- if you can’t use your tap water for whatever reason, bottled spring water is next best. distilled is really only good for topping off after water has evaporated, but it lacks a lot of minerals thatre important for your fish’s health, so don’t JUST use distilled.

- the larger a volume of water you’re working with, the more forgiving the entire tank system will be. i usually don’t recommend going smaller than ten gallons for your first tank — maybe a 20long or 29 if you want lots of options. you can definitely make tank volumes smaller than ten gallons work (i’ve got a planted low tech 3gal that’s been going strong for quite some time now) but it’s generally a lot more finicky and will be much easier for a mistake to snowball into an emergency

- filters are good! please use a filter on your tank. in general every tank should have a mechanical filter for water movement and to help maintain good bacteria (more on that in a bit), an airline bubbler to help keep the water moving and make sure it’s oxygenated, and a heater because most fish in the hobby are tropical and like things toasty.

- make sure you get a heater with a built in thermostat that will shut off if it gets too hot, ideally one that you can adjust instead of a pre-programmed one. they’re a bit pricy at box stores because they’re the ‘advanced’ option, but hygger is a solid brand and you can get a really nice one of theirs with a temp control dial on amazon for like 20$.

- PLEASE NEVER EVER EVER LEAVE YOUR HEATER PLUGGED IN WHILE ITS OUT OF THE WATER!!! it will overheat and break and is also a fire hazard. i recently had my water level on my reef tank drop due to a pump malfunction and the heater was SMOKING when i got home from work and found it. it will also make your heater thoroughly nonfunctional, and replacing them is a pain. most have a minimum waterline marked, make sure you pay attention to that. unplug it during tank maintenance if you’re worried about it not being fully submerged.

- you’re going to want to be patient. while you COULD fill a tank with water and then plop fish into it the next day, you’re not going to be as successful as if you’d aged the tank a bit and allowed a biofilter to establish itself . i recommend doing some research about the nitrogen cycle and nitrifying bacteria, but the long and short of it is as follows:

— biological waste (fish poop, uneaten food, dropped plant leaves if you have live plants) in your tank produces ammonia. ammonia is highly toxic to fish even in small amounts, so you want this to be as close to 0 as possible.

— there are certain bacteria that will process ammonia into NITRITES. nitrites are still not great to have a lot of, but are much less toxic than ammonia.

— there are OTHER bacteria that will then take those nitrites and turn them into NITRATES. nitrates are the least toxic of the three, and so your end goal is to establish a healthy population of these various bacteria so that any available ammonia is quickly processed into nitrite, which then becomes nitrate. nitrate can only be removed from the system via a water change, but some is absorbed by plants as well. you still definitely want to do water changes even in a well planted tank.

- there are lots of different ways to introduce these bacteria populations to your tank and establish a biofilter. bear in mind that you want to treat your biofilter like any other living thing, so make sure things like temperature and pH stay as consistent and stable as possible. ideally, you want to decide what sort of fish you’d like to keep and then figure out what their preferred ranges are, and then keep your tank at that for the entire bioseeding process

- if you want to do it au naturale, these bacteria will colonize any body of dechlorinated freshwater if given enough time. you want to add a source of ammonia (some people will buy cheap feeder fish and put them in there, but i find that a bit unfair to the fish as if it doesn’t go smoothly they could suffer from ammonia burns or other health issues. plus, it could introduce all sorts of parasites and pathogens to your tank that can be a pain to clean out without hurting your bacteria) . the safest and cheapest way is to ‘feed’ your tank with little bits of fish food every now and then

- either invest in a test kit, or find a fish store that can test for you. chain stores like petco or petsmart offer testing, but they use the cheap strip tests that are probably the least accurate. they’re mostly good for telling you ‘yup, ammonia is there’ but not actually indicating if it’s decreasing over time or not. do some digging to see if there’s any local fish stores in your area that can test for you, and ask what methods they use. chemical tests are good for giving a ballpark and generally the highest quality the average hobbyist will get. i use a spectrophotometer at work so i’m spoiled LMFAO but you don’t need all that

- you want to see an initial spike in ammonia, which will then start to go down. you don’t want it to go down TOO much and starve your bacteria, so keep feeding your tank as this happens. eventually, you’ll also see a nitrite spike — this is good! this means the first group of bacteria are here and working hard. once the nitrites start decreasing you will hopefully see nitrates start to go up, and then congrats, your tank has a biofilter!! you can start adding animals now, although make sure you don’t have too much leftover ammonia or yucky food on the bottom first. i would start small — nerite snails are the roombas of the freshwater aquarium world, so you’ll want a couple anyway. add these first. if they’re still chillin after about a week, you’re good to proceed.

- this process can take anywhere from a few weeks to a few months. the longer you wait, the more well established and stable your tank will be.

- you CAN buy bottled bacteria to speed this process up a bit — your success may vary. most of the stuff you’ll find on shelves at a pet store likely isn’t alive anymore, but it doesn’t hurt to add because even if the bacteria are dead, you’re still adding waste material to help kickstart your cycle. the brand i’ve had the best luck with (and that we use for bioseeding systems at the aquarium i work at) is dr tim’s. not sure how many stores carry it, but you can find it online easily. there’s freshwater and saltwater versions, make sure you get the right one.

- even if you’re adding bottled bacteria, i would still let the tank run empty for a couple weeks. this lets you make sure all your equipment runs well and lets you play around with decor or lighting without stressing any fish out.

- when adding animals to your tank, do so gradually to avoid overloading your biofilter with ammonia. how gradually depends on tank size, but it’s always better to be more cautious than not.

- information about the hobby in general varies in quality depending on where you get it — so seek information from as many sources as possible! look through forums! read articles! ask the guy at your local fish store! ask another guy at a different fish store! don’t take any one source as fact, but bear in mind that not everyone may be right. the more opportunities you take to learn, the faster your knowledge base will grow and the easier it will get.

- tank size is its own beast, but my rule of thumb has always been that there’s never any such thing as giving a fish TOO MUCH space, but there’s absolutely such thing as not giving them enough. a betta fish, for example, can SURVIVD in 1-3 gallons of water… but will absolutely thrive in 10-20. in general, take a recommended tank size for any species as the bare minimum if anything.

- most of all, don’t be afraid to make mistakes! it happens to everyone, and it’s part of learning. anyone who tries to make you feel bad for not knowing something is just being rude. if you’re willing to learn, that’s the most important thing!

- pet store employees usually aren’t experts, but they’ve got questions they’re obligated to ask before they sell you an animal. if they deny you a sale due to tank size or something like that, don’t argue with them. they’re not judging you personally, they’re just doing their job. if you absolutely must lie to them to get them to give you the fish, at least be consistent with it. nobody ever likes having to go ‘well actually…’ halfway through scooping a half dozen fish because you let slip that you only have a ten gallon after insisting you have a 40.

- unless you have a pond or space for several hundred gallons of tank, stay away from goldfish. they’re adorable, i know, but they’re carp. they get big. they live a long time. they poop so much. they aren’t worth the hassle for most people.

- please never ever release fish you don’t want into the wild. if a pet store won’t take them for whatever reason, that sucks, but it’s on you. we don’t need any more invasive species. please

- please don’t flush fish that are still alive. if you absolutely must euthanize a fish, look into how to do so humanely (yes, people do this, and yes, there’s a right and a wrong way to do it)