Marina S10 Power Filter - Review

This is my review of the Marina S10 Power Filter which I purchased a few weeks ago from my LPS (Local Pet Store) for my betta's 2.5 MiniBow Aquarium, and I'm using this to replace my old/broken Red Sea Nano Filter.

Although the system is slimmer than most typical HOB (Hang On Back) Power filter systems, I actually find it to be wider in comparison. This filter is suppose to filter up to 10 gallons of water but I'm not sure how true that claim to be. I do not understand why they make a semi-clear filter system rather than making it completely clear as it's a black transparent color (so, it will only flatter black background aquariums). I could see some people liking the semi-transparent look just because they want to view inside the intake tube or perhaps see the filter cartridges, and with it being semi-transparent any filter buildup would be less noticeable had it been completely clear (much like with the Red Sea Nano Filter).

I find that the filter motor which is attached to the base of the units intake tube (rather then inside the unit as with most HOB filters) unappealing as you're stuck looking at the motor inside of the aquarium (which is not clear nor transparent, but rather big, bulky, and solid black in color). However, this does leave more room inside the filter box which will allow you to add in additional media, or you could even add in a small aquarium heater although there is no hole for a power cord to go through so you would have to leave the tank lid off if that's what you wanted to do (or possibly drill a groove to fit the power cord). Another good thing about the motor being at the base of the intake tube is that it requires no water priming to start the power filter, which is good in case of power failure. I also like that this motor comes with an attachable pre-filter which will keep fish from getting stuck onto the intake tube. I do find this unit to be pretty quiet compared to a lot of other power filter systems I've had in the past which may be because the motor is attached onto the intake tube and also because the waterfall bridge seems to be fairly long so that you could partially submerge it underwater thus reducing water noise. However, the motor tends to cause a lot of noisy vibration inside the tank and may require constant re-adjusting, this is the biggest flaw I have found with this unit. You can also adjust the length of the intake tube slightly by sliding the base of the intake tube up or down. This unit also has an attachable clip under the filter box so that you can level/adjust how the box rests on the aquarium. There are also some run-off grooves around the filter cartridges in the box so I don't think water would ever make its way outside of the filter box and onto the floor.

The filter cartridges this unit comes with is the Marina bio–carb and bio–clear, and I do like that this has two separate cartridges however, I'm not sure that water will flow through both of them at the same rate since the cartridges don't overlap one another inside the box (so far it looks like more water runs through the filter cartridge furthest from the intake tube). Thus far the filter media seems to do nothing in terms of discolored water. The bio–carb cartridge states to remove pollutants and odors, where as the bio–clear states that it includes zeolite to absorb toxic ammonia and reduce fish stress (I have not noticed any traces of ammonia in my new setup thus far).

The main reason this power filter is perfect for betta aquariums is because it has an easy to adjust control valve (although you do have to remove the lid to reach it, but not a big deal) inside the filter box on the intake tube which allows the water to come out as either a trickle or a more turbulent water flow. Overall, I would definitely recommend this filter for small betta aquariums (probably won't fit properly on tiny cube tanks though), and thus far I am really loving it over my old Red Sea Nano filter I had prior (and I do think it's fairly difficult to find a low flowing filter for betta tanks) although the Red Sea Nano would be a better option if you do have a tiny cube aquarium (since the Red Sea Nano is much smaller than the Marina S10).

Treating Ich on Ranchu

This past week I made a big mistake thinking that my ranchu would be fine in a temporary bucket of water while I cleaned out the aquarium. Well, it took me awhile to get around to actually cleaning my tank so I transferred my ranchu into a new bucket of water and they ended up going through a drastic temperature change (ranchu can only handle around a 3-5F temperature change at time) and thus suffered from it. Bumblez is not at all a fan of cold water and thus he began slowing down his swimming, while Oakki had broke-out in ich on the front of his wen. Luckily I was able to remedy both of them at the same time, here's how I cured and treated the ich in under 3 days (be sure to treat ich ASAP)...

1: Do at least a 50% water change to the aquarium water (be sure the new water added in is within 3-5F of the current tank water temperature), and treat the water with Seachem Prime according to directions (Seachem Prime helps reduce stress, helps slime coating, and dechlorinates water).

2: Keep the water temp in the aquarium around 74-76F (I use an Aqueon heater), as this seems to be an ideal temperature for ranchu in general.

3: Add 1-TBSP of Aquarium Salt (I used the Jungle brand) per 8-10 gallons of water (aquarium salt reduces stress, provides electrolytes, and cleans.. it may also raise your pH so be sure to dose accordingly). Although it may not be necessary, I added in a pinch of aquarium salt everyday after this initial dose until my ranchu no longer showed signs of ich.

4: Turn off any aquarium lighting to reduce any stress caused by glare, etc as these fish have already undergone enough stress at this point.

5: Be sure to run an air diffuser in your aquarium (along with a 24/hr running filtration system) for at least several hours a day to insure the fish are getting plenty of oxygen in the water (this is very important if you are using any other water treatments to remedy your fish outside of what I have on this post), this is especially important for smaller aquariums and/or ones with a higher temperature.

I hope my ranchu ich remedy works for others just as well as it did for my ranchu, and be sure to do another 50% water change a few days after having done the first one as to reduce the risk of having ich spread, etc (just be sure the new water you're adding into your aquarium is in the ideal temperature range as I mentioned before, too drastic a change may only worsen or cause the ich to reoccur). Good/adequate water quality can solve a lot of problems (be sure ammonia levels are also in a safe range, preferably no traces of ammonia, this is especially important if you have a small or overcrowded aquarium).

Ranchu Artwork

My awesome new artsy friend Chris made me this cool drawing of Bumblez (my new sakura ranchu) the other day and I totally love this so, I just had to take a moment to share it with everyone on here!

"BLUH?"

If you want to checkout more of his work, etc you can find him at www.ChrisSpade.com.

East Coast Ranchu - Review

For a really long time now I had been wanting a ranchu and looking all over my local pet stores in hopes of coming across any. I really didn't have much luck and I did actually see what I believed to have been ranchu at a Walmart one night but... it was bad timing, I was worried about the quality of the fish, and so... I missed my chance. I even sent out e-mails to fish stores within a state or so of me since I burnt out all my options locally in the DC area, and either I didn't get any response or I got weird rude replies back.

It wasn't until I went searching again on eBay that I looked into eSeller eastcoastranchu. Turned out these 'side-view' ranchu are bred in New Jersey by a very kind and patient lady named Cynthia of East Coast Ranchu. I also found that East Coast Ranchu donates 10% of their earnings to GoldfishKeepers, and if you buy 5 or more ranchu's you can get 10% off. As you may have seen from a previous post I did on here she made a video of several ranchu for me after I told her the type of ranchu characteristics I was looking for. I ended up picking the one that stood out from the lot and got the cute red-capped sakura ranchu whom is even cuter in person. I did get the 2-day shipping and my poor fish ended up spending so much unnecessary time in its box going from NJ to lower VA, and VA to MD, and then they spent a good 9-hours of delivery time when I was only an hour away from the UPS location. Then my package finally arrived right before I had to leave for work that night (watch my video below to find out what happened next!).

Here's my adorable new pet ranchu's Bumblez and Oakki after a week of them settling into their new home!

Bumblez

Oakki

I will be doing another post in the near future on how I care for my new pet ranchu's.

Meet Meko

Sadly while I had taken an unexpected week long trip my fish sitter had informed me that Ebo was not looking so good, a few days later he passed on to the big fish bowl in the sky. However, I now have a very awesome new veil-tail betta I got from PetSmart this past weekend and his name is Meko. I picked that name because my betta's seem to follow a pattern of their names ending in 'o', the 'k' is his own unique letter, the 'e' is to carry on Ebo's memory, and the 'm' is to carry on the beloved Mr. Moto's memory. While Ebo was a green-blue color, and Moto was a blue-black color, Meko is a blue-red color... I wish I could have found a betta that wasn't so blue but ultimately I picked him over the rest regardless. Meko does seem to have one flaw currently... his right fin-side gill seems to always be flared out slightly so I am currently trying to treat him to see if it changes.

Meko

Unlike my past betta's Meko seems to be a picky eater as he does not care for the usual Aqueon floating pellets. I had yet to find a betta that didn't like bloodworms, that did seem to catch his interest and get him eating. BTW I don't recommend the Aqueon Betta Treat Bloodworms, they're a bit too big for betta's in comparison to the Hikari brand which has smaller and redder colored bloodworms (I do recommend those ones as they seem better quality in my opinion). I even tried to pass the Aqueon pellets onto my hungry mollies but they too didn't care for them.

It was by chance that I tried out some new goldfish pellets which I just bought for my expecting ranchu, the New Life Spectrum 1mm goldfish pellets. Not only were the NLS pellets about half the size (probably a bit more than that even) of Aqueons but they were actually a better size for the small mouth of my betta. Shockingly, Meko LOVES them (his gills even flare open at times and he quickly gobbles them up, two at a time if he can)... although he refuses to eat the ones that sink to the bottom, fair enough. He even prefers the NLS pellets over the Aqueon bloodworms, he just goes crazy for the NLS pellets, it's awesome to see (I kind of feel bad for my past betta's seeing how happy Meko is with this new food). I had never seen a betta fish eat so much, so now I'm buying Meko the NLS for betta's (the cheapest I found for this food was on eBay for $8.99), and while this may be a bit pricey for betta food it will last a very long time as betta fish do not eat that much (eh, normally).

I also did some research on NLS for betta's online and was surprised to find that so many people and betta breeders were highly recommending it. I also found it interesting that people were mentioning that it may not have the highest amount of protein compared to other betta foods, but they were saying that it's actually a higher quality of protein and food that the betta is getting that matters more, which ultimately seems to make this NLS great for betta's.

*I will try to update this post later down the road when my NLS betta food arrives and let you know what Meko thinks of that. In the mean time here's a good video I found on the NLS food.

R.I.P. Ebo

Airline Tubing

This week I wanted to blog a bit about aquarium airline tubing (something I haven't really seen anyone mention much online). Airline tubing is fairly inexpensive, and while you may not have put much thought into what you're really purchasing I'm posting this to give my personal opinions on choosing the right tubing for you.

Size and Length
Most standard aquarium airline tubing is all the same width (standard airline tubing for most all air pumps is 3/16" diameter). When it comes to length, I would probably buy the longest length available in the desired type. Airline tubing can be easily cut at any length you need using a pair of scissors, and a year or so from now you'll possibly be wanting/needing to replace your old tubing. If you want an approximate length then I'd suggest doing the measurements, but I'd tack on an extra 2 feet to that length as the ends of tubing tend to discolor a bit over time (I like to trim mine off when it does that), more so if you're buying clear tubing.

Texture/Type and Color
The typical colors for most airline tubing sold at local petstores is typically clear, blue, or black (although you can probably find a variety of other colors available online).

Most flexible airline tubing is either a smooth matte silicone type or a slippery shiny rubber type, and their is also a hard plastic pipe type, often refered to as "rigid" (similar to the shiny rubber type but not flexible). The silicone type is a bit more soft, flexible, and easier to work with but it can harbor a bit more buildup and bacteria since it has a slight texture to it. The rubber type is slightly less flexible than the silicone type, and can be a little harder to work with but its slick shiny surface is less likely to harbor buildup and bacteria. Less buildup in your airline tubing will also allow air to flow through the tubing at its optimal performance.

The silicone type is generally matte in texture, not shiny like the rubber type so, if you don't want any glare while possibly doing some flash photography then this one may be the way to go... although the shiny rubber type in my opinion looks classier and cleaner when viewing an aquarium in general. Often times I have noticed silicone airline tubing making claims that the tubing does not harden over time, I find that to be very false... unless of course you are changing your silicone tubing every so often. Both types of tubing can become hard over time and it doesn't matter if you have very hard water or very soft water.

Clear rubber air line tubing comparison

Other Things to Consider
Not all brands of airline tubing are created equal. If you found two different brands of clear shiny rubber airline tubing (as seen in the above image) you may notice they both have a different amount of clarity (meaning one brand of tubing looks more clear, or even better quality than the other) as the PETCO brand is more clear than the TopFin brand, although the PETCO one is about twice the cost (although still relatively cheap in my opinion). You can also use all these different types of tubing together (such as silicone with non-silicone) and attach them with things like air check valves, connectors, gang valves, etc.

Maintenance
You should replace airline tubing if it gets damaged, discolored, dirty inside tubing, etc.

If you have solid colored airline tubing it may be hard to visually tell what's going on inside your tubing. For solid colored silicone tubing you may be able to tell when it needs replaced or trimmed by examining the cut ends of the tubing by squeezing these ends to see if it feels harder than the center areas of the tubing, if so then it's probably time to replace or trim off the hard areas of tubing as these areas could have bacterial growth and/or some type of debris blockage, etc. It could also mean that you've had or have some water or condensation built up or accumulating in the tube over a period time, so be sure you have an air check valve and that it's working properly, as doing so will help protect your air pump from weakening or breaking overtime due to water damage.

My Current Top Pick and Advice
I really do like and currently use this clear rubber type PETCO tubing on all my tanks and I highly recommended it in generally, especially if you have no background or a background other than black on your aquarium, and this particular PETCO tubing is also kink resistant (which is beyond great to find for this type of tubing). If you do have a black background than I recommend trying a black silicone type of airline tubing for the tubing going inside of your tank (if you want it looking less noticeable against a black background anyway) and then use the PETCO clear rubber type airline for outside the tank. The other great thing about clear airline tubing is that you can better view when your tubing needs to be replaced and to insure your air check valve is working properly and not allowing water to travel down into your air pump (which could ultimately slow and/or damage your air pump).