u/mistersprinklesman

TLDR my multis won't grow. Help?

7 or 8 weeks ago I got 7 baby multis from my friend in a trade we did. The remaining fish from this batch back at his place are much larger now while mine are not growing.

Tank: 10 gallon standard. 2 small sponge filters, 1 small hang on back with a pre filter foam, bucket filled with biomedia and crushed coral. Substrate: quartz sand and aragonite mix. Decor: 2 pieces of old dead reef rock that we use in all the african tanks here. Currently there are a few endler guppies living in the upper waters in here. They were put in as dither fish because the multis were initially a bit shy. So far no problems. Once these multis get bigger I had planned to move them into a similar layout20 gallon tank where they could really build a colony. They would have the 20 gallon to themselves.

I know I need more shells but I never see them using the shells they have now and there are 14 shells in here for 7 cichlids.

pH stays at 8-8.2 which is what the water comes out of the tap at, and hardness and kH stay at about 12-16 which should make tanganyikans quite comfortable. The breeder is using the same water parameters and temperature as me, and he has success while I do not.

Temperature is 76F.

The tank has quite a few floating plants and these keep the nitrates at undetectable levels. I do water changes @ 20% every 7 days. Dechlorinated with seachem safe (powdered version of prime).

Now, they do eat. They prefer powdered food so I feed the Aquarium Co-op magic small fish feed as well as powdered cichlid flakes, and I give them shrimp wafers which they also peck at. Every time food is offered which is 2-3x per day, they do eat quite a bit of it. They never refuse food. They show no signs of illness or discomfort as far as I can see, and water quality as far as what I can test is good. I can't really afford the extortion level prices on frozen fish food where I live in Ontario Canada. It used to be in my budget and I had a freezer full all the time but they want like $30 for a small cube 12 pack now and I just can't. I am building up a colony of grindal worms and will soon begin feeding them to all my small fish, and I am planning to get decapsulated artemia (shelled brine shrimp eggs) which I've used before. You just soak and feed fish love it. My source is out of stock but getting some soon.

Anyways something doesn't add up here. I know these fish don't have parasites because their batch siblings are almost full grown already at the breeder's house.

Help??

My goldfish have grown so much latetly. Despite what I have been reading, that more protein helps fancy goldfish grow better, the super heavy-on-veg diet I've been feeding the past month has boosted their growth way more than a half protein/half veggie ever did in the past. Non-goldfish people might think this tank is sparse and cruel to the fish- but all the advice I've gotten from pros said don't cramp the tank- wide open space is what they need. They get stuck easily too. I have tried many floating plants in here (water lettuce, frogbit, hornwort, duckweed, etc) but the goldfish have eaten all of it. These are Beebop, Rocksteady, Goldeen and Gojira and they are my absolute favourite fish. At present their diet is 60% New Life spectrum algaemax, 15% duckweed, 10% Fluval Bug Bites pleco formula (Has high choline and lots of veg), 10% Hikari Goldfish Wheat germ (Wheatt germ is the first ingredient. For skin/scale health), and 5% Hikari Vibra Bites.

In addition to these foods they also get a large helping of duckweed every 2-3 days which I grow in other tanks, and once a week I give them a tiny bit of heavily boiled skinned green peas.

TLDR Need cleaning crew that betta antuta adults wont eat, and cleanup crew wont eat baby antuta.

Longer, did read version:

I have my juvenile 3" betta antutas nearly alone in their 15 gallon (they're going to a 30 gallon in the next week or two the tank is currently growing in). The only tankmates they have are 3 endler guppies and a few ramshorn and malaysian trumpet snails. The antutas haven't attacked the endlers but they definitely eat the endler fry. They have also eaten the small number of cherry shrimp I put in the tank as a test. I have occasionally seen these guys also attack snails- they bite them and spit them out.

I do get some algae issues in this tank nothing horrible- and the snail population helps eat the algae. What I'm looking for is something I can add that will eat even more algae without the antutas attacking said creature, and ideally, I'd like for the creature in question not to be able to consume antuta fry.

That was actually the idea behind the endlers. Their mouths are too small to eat even their own fry let alone larger antuta fry. And the endlers do eat some hair algae. I was just curious if there was something that was working for you all like some kind of larger snail? Maybe amano shrimp (if purchased jumbo??). I'm open to all ideas and suggestions.

The 30 gallon I'm preparing for them currently has a bunch of ramshorns in it for cleanup but again I'm getting some algae on the plants and I'd prefer to not have that algae.

Video here: https://youtu.be/PFO49CF_qfg A couple of my saulosi are developing single lesions like this guy. Always on the side of the fish, always just one lesion. So far about 4 of my 20 saulosi have it. What is this? The fish are peaceful with eachother I don't think they are battle injuries.

The two smaller ryukins have been with me since late last year but my friend recently decided to go in a new direction and gave me her two goldfish- the bigger ryukin and the little oranda. Everyone has been together for about 5 days now. They get along great. I added some duckweed this morning and Gojira (top left) has been obsessed with finding every last piece of it as you can see here. Sometimes he decides he's had enough and swims away from the surface but within 5 seconds he changes his mind and looks for more duckweed. I love goldfish they're so great. Sorry for the lid situation here I had just done a water change and I was doing some filter maintenance.

Since changing their diet from purely New Life Spectrum Algaemax to Algaemax + Tetra cichlid flake the change in body shape and color has been tremendous. Clearly the tetra flake provides something they need and were not getting with the New Life food.

This guy has held about 6 times in the past 2 months. Never for more than about a day and a half. He values meal times too highly. I don't think he will ever hold eggs all the way thru.

About a month ago, my ten gallon planted tank leaked all over the floor all the way down. It's toast. I scrambled to save the shrimp that lived in it and the plants, and quickly setup this 10 gallon that was sitting empty. The Seachem flourite substrate in the old 10 gallon was infested with malaysian trumpet snails so I used some fresh aquasoil for the new one, and most of the plants dried up when the previous tank leaked but I was able to take little stem cuttings from the base of the stem plants, maybe just 2" worth, and nI planted them all over this new tank. I didn't really aquascape much. I was more in a rush to save the plants. But so far so good and every plant I've moved to this tank is showingn growth and vigor. If anybody knows any methods to completely and permanently eliminate duckweed from the surface of an aquarium please let me know because this tank has a bit of a problem but it is doing well. Shrimp and plants are good. I instantly cycled the new tank by moving over a sponge filter and hang on back filter from another tank--I have many tanks running and all run multiple filters. Knock on wood this new tank has been solid.

Next step is to move some wild guppies (they look like endlers but they're P reticulata I was lucky to score a group in a trade) and also some more cherry shrimp from another tank andn really get this thing vibrant and Looking good. I'll be moving those critters over today as well as adding a couple of small caves andn a little piece of cuttlebone for the shrimp to munch on. Just wanted to share.