Here are pics of my tank and my pleco. I am going to post over in the pleco forum and find out for sure what s/he is.
I am a bad fish mommy. :-( Some questions.
- Thread starter purplekelly
- Start date
There's your problem right there. By replacing the filter media you removed your benifical (good) bacteria needed to keep your nitrites and ammonia in check. More than likey you have high traces of ammonia preset in you tank now, which is why your fish is freaking out. Do 25% water changes every day; or feed every other day and do 50% water changes every 2 days for about the next 2 weeks.........And on the new tank. Just run the new filter for your 29G on your 10G tank in conjunction with your old filter for about 2 weeks. Then move the new filter to your 29G, fill it up, wait 24hrs for your ph to stabliize, then add fish..............purplekelly;3965324; said:
How long will it take my filter to reestablish good bacteria? How often do I need to do water changes while that happens?
You will have to test the water and do water changes so as not to let ammonia or nitrite get above .25ppm hard to tell how long it will take to recycle depends on how much BB is in the gravel and on other stuff in the tank.
Rubbing the new filter medea in the gravel in the tank may help speed things up by seeding the BB in the filter.
Rubbing the new filter medea in the gravel in the tank may help speed things up by seeding the BB in the filter.
purplekelly;3965631; said:
It might just go through a mini cycle since alot of the bacteria is in your gravel and decor in the tank. What i did when i had hang on the back filters was buy a sponge from an aquaclear 110 and cut it to fit inside the filters. That way i could just rinse it out in tank water and not spend another penny on replacements.
BODYDUB;3965628; said:
Like a few others have mentioned, they can get 18-24" and are huge producers of waste. I really think you should try and trade it in towards a bristlenose or other smaller breed.
I am inclined to agree that I may need to trade him in, but I really don't want to. I'm attached. 
And the whole reason that my husband agreed to the bigger tank was for the pleco. But it's likely that I will end up doing it anyway, because it's the right thing to do for the fish.
And the whole reason that my husband agreed to the bigger tank was for the pleco. But it's likely that I will end up doing it anyway, because it's the right thing to do for the fish.So what you're saying is that they can't get up to a foot? And I've seen maybe a total of five 18-24 long plecos in person. Yes they do get that big, but to me it's pretty rare to see them that size in the normal aquarium hobbyists tank................
