Alright, so help me out here. I've got a few questions.

[Googlybubble]

Alright. So, I'm going to re-do my tank. (See my topic in "Diseases" board)

So I just need some tips and whatnot.

Here is my equipmet.

10g tank
Light hood
2 bags of white gravel
1 tetra 10i filter (Carbon filters)
1 air pump
1 heater (72-88 degrees F)
Melafix
Tetra water conditioner
Pimafix
Fish food
Two green plastic-ish plants. One fluffy one and one straight one.

I read that we should cycle our tanks for 4-6 weeks adding pure ammonia and testing it and whatnot.

Is that seriously something I should do even though I have a carbon filter which will (as I have read) take out anything harmful to the fish?

And, how many fish should I have in there?

I want one crowntail betta and I have two bottom feeders. One is an albino (might be a cory?) and the other is a cory of some sort and probably at max size. He's about 1-2 inches.

Would it be okay to get two glofish (they are neon tetra-sized) and two tetras of some sort?

I can easily change the filter every two weeks if that is required with more fish and change the water as often as needed... I just need advice on how often I should change the carbon in the filter and what % water change and how often.

I mean, when I set the tank up for the first time (before I bought a diseased fish which ruined my tank) all I did was add tap water, water conditioner, let it run for about 6 hours, and plopped the fish in. The fish were great for the two weeks I had them before I bought the diseased pepper cory.

Any tips would be greatly appreciated. Thanks for your help. =)

[trashion]

no. if you don't cycle a tank before putting fish in, it will cycle on its own when you do. you can't blame it on the cory, either. the fish were probably very stressed from the ammonia, which would have made them very prone to disease.

buy some bio-spira. add it at the same time as the fish, and things should go much better. pretty much an instant-cycle.

no, you cannot keep glofish and tetras in pairs. if you want these fish, you must buy them in groups of at least 6. i personally wouldn't put glofish into a 10 gallon tank, zebra danios are much too active for a tank that small. your cories also must be kept in groups.

a good stocking amount would be 6 small-bodied tetras (pristella, silvertip, neons, glowlights) and 6 cories, preferably all of the same variety. do a 30% water change once a week, and you should be good to go

[Scuba Kid]

I agree with trashion. You wiped out your own tank, not the cory. You added a huge bioload to a new tank and the small amount of bacteria could not keep up with the ammonia you were adding. Basically, your fish most likely died of ammonia poisoning.

I would either do a fishless cycle to get your tank running or add live bacteria by either adding gravel or filter media from an established tank (one that is cycled and has been running for at least a few months) or from a commercially available source, either Bio-Spira (the best option you can buy) or Stability (which isn't quite as good as Bio-Spira). Stay away from products like Cycle which claim to be a bottle of live bacteria. Cycle is useless because it has the wrong kind of bacteria in it...it really doesn't do anything to cycle a tank.

Once your tank is cycled, you can begin adding your fish. And again, I agree with trashion. If you want tetras or other schooling fish, you need groups of 6 or more. If schooling fish are not kept in large enough groups, they can suffer from stress.

By the way, carbon does not remove ammonia, nitrite, and nitrates. In fact, its not really related to cycling a fish tank at all. Carbon actas as a water polisher and can remove some toxins, but it does not remove chemicals created by waste. That is why you need to cycle your tank, in order to allow the buildup of beneficial bacteria. This bacteria (along with regular tank cleaning and water changes) is what removes these nasty chemicals.

As far as the fish you can keep, if you want a betta, I would go with the betta ans possible one school of small fish such as harlequin rasboras. Cories also need to be kept in schooling groups, but a 10 gallon tank is not big enough to house a school of the cories you have. The only kind of cory you could really get away with would be hastatus pygmy cories which tend to be hard to find.

[Googlybubble]

Okay, so what's the best way to go about it right now given that I have my beta and two cories in the current tank that hasn't been cycled?

Should I put them in their own bowl and continue the aquarium salt treatment for the ick and then start the 10g tank over and let it cycle for a week or so with bio-spira?

Should I just leave the fish in there as they are, follow the rest of the ick treatment per this site and add bio-spira today?

[TheOldSalt]

Since you only have these very few fish in the tank, and since you'll be making some water changes soon enough anyway as part of the treatment for ick, you can probably safely ignore all the cycling stuff for now. Take care of the first problem, and then add some BioSpira or Stability. There's no sense in letting these get in each other's way.

[Googlybubble]

Okay, thanks much.

So, once the ick is done with... well, my betta's got fin rot as far as I know... Fins have gone to crap when the ick started going away... Kinda whitish on the ends. I'm still adding melafix to try to help him with that....

So say my ick is gone, my betta is healing from fin rot, and my other two fish are just normal.... Should I put the betta in his own bowl and medicate him, stick the other two in their own bowl with normal water and then clean the tank, start over fresh, and cycle it and do the BioSpira stuff? Or do I leave them all in the 10g and just add the BioSpira?

[Googlybubble]

Also, if I do find that other kind of corys, could I buy 5 of them and add them with the cory I currently have and they will be alright? There really isn't any way of getting rid of him. =\

And, is there any other fish you could recommend me that would do well in a 10g if I can't find the harlequin rasboras?

Thanks

[trashion]

i vote for lemon tetras. they look kinda bland in the store, but once they color up, they're beautiful little schoolers.

i think you could get away with having 6 cories and 6 lemons. just do regular weekly water changes.

[Googlybubble]

6 of the cories like the one I already have? (I have no idea what kind it is, check my picture in my topic on the diseases section of the site) or six of the smaller cories?

How about for the filter, how often should I change the carbon in it once I re-do my tank?

[TheOldSalt]

Don't put the betta in the main tank again. It's badly infected, it sounds like, and there's no point in just reintroducing those germs into your tank after going to all the trouble to get rid of them.

carbon can either be ignored or changed once or twice per month. It doesn't do a whole lot, you see, and does most of whatever it is going to do within the first 10 days or so. After that it gets covered with slime and rendered useless.

[JustOneMore20]

Just wanted to add that I don't like keeping any cories in a 10g tank. Even the small dwarf cories need swimming space and they aren't really bottom feeders, but use the middle area of the tank as well. 20g would be my minimum for any cories, although there is a 15g footprint (the longer one)that small cories would be ok in. If you were to get Dwarf cories for a 10g, give them the tank to themselves and have it mostly open.

Albino cories should not be kept in a 10g. They can get about 2.5-3" and are too large for that tank size. I wouldn't keep them in anything less than 20g.

And carbon does not take out ammonia and nitrites which are the harmful effects of a cycle.....so cycle the tank before adding the fish.

[neilfishguy]

I agree. Corys get big. Too much for a 10

[Googlybubble]

I suppose I shant trust a pet store worker? She said it wouldn't get much bigger than it is... It's maybe 1.5 inches right now.

Alright, so would lemon tetras would work... Six of them? Anything else that would go along with them (Other than one betta) or is that really all I should have in a 10g?

And do tetras like lots of hiding places and plants, or mostly open?

Thanks so much for your help, guys. It's much appreciated. =)

[Plecostomus]

I have found that I usually know more about fish than the Pet store people do(or at least the ones at Petsmart), so I wouldn't completely trust anything they say, although i have gotten good advice before. I think you could have a few more fish, but then you'd have to do more water changes, and nobody wants to do that. I have found that tetras like the cover of plants(live plants are best), if you only got tetras and the betta, you could probably have 8 tetras. I think cories and even Danios could do just fine in a 10g tank, but that's just my opinion.

[Googlybubble]

It said on some sites cories can be in 10gs but on most sites it said 15+

However, I'd really like to get my cory some friends... So I think I'll try it out and if it fails miserably then I guess I'll have learned my lesson.

[neilfishguy]

Originally Posted by Googlybubble

It said on some sites cories can be in 10gs but on most sites it said 15+

However, I'd really like to get my cory some friends... So I think I'll try it out and if it fails miserably then I guess I'll have learned my lesson.

My dog lives in a closet. He needs a friend. I will get 5 more dogs for the closet. If the dogs all die, I will have learned my lesson.

[Googlybubble]

Okay... So would you rather me kill the fish, keep it in the tank an apparently stressed his whole life, or TRY something?

It's not really like that. Some people here have said cories would be fine. Probably about 50%. On the other hand 50% said they wouldn't be fine. So obviously it's something that I could try out that I KNOW isn't horrible, but it also might not work out.

I said I don't have anything else to do with him unless you'd like to pay me to ship him to you.

[Cichlidsrule]

If you dont want the fish, a lot of stores will let you give him back. But I have only three cories in a 20 or 25g tank and they do just fine. Then again, I don't know a lot about cories.
Like the others said, I think what happened was that your tank wasn't cycled and your tank's ammonia level spiked after around two weeks-- which was, coincidentally, the same time you brought your diseased cory. The high ammonia level stressed out the diseased cory as well as the other fish and so they all got sick.
I would go with your instincts. If you think your cory is doing fine on its own, then I would get maybe one or two more. If you really want more, get more.
Can you post a pic of your current cory if you want to know what it is? We might be able to help.

[Googlybubble]

http://img262.imageshack.us/my.php?i...scn1017zl1.jpg

I'm not really sure how to tell if a fish is "fine on its own." I mean, he swims around 24/7. He's spazzy as all heck... I can even have my face near the tank, move it like 1 inch to the side, and he flinches. He eats day and night... And he seems fine.

He's the opposite of how my betta is acting.

[Obsidian]

If your Cory is flinching at every movement, and he has been around long enough to be used to you, then for me I take that as a sign of insecurity. Cories like to be in groups, it makes them feel safe and chances are he would stop flinching at every move if he had friends. Give him at least places to hide if you can't do anything else for him.