How to Make a DIY Fry Trap for Breeding Aquarium Fish In our previous article How to Raise Baby Fish Fry in Your Aquarium, we mentioned several techniques that help prevent the adult fish from predating on their offspring. Many fish farms and breeders have significantly increased their fry survival rate by making DIY fry traps — simple enclosures with holes that are small enough for the young to swim through but not big enough to let the parents pass. You can put all the adults or a pregnant livebearer inside the trap so that the eggs and fry es...

Top 10 Live Foods to Feed Your Aquarium Fish If you are looking for the very best fish food to feed your aquarium animals, most veteran fishkeepers will agree there is nothing that tops live foods. This premium food is the closest thing to what fish eat in nature and has numerous benefits. The movement of the food entices the fish to eat, which is especially useful if they are underweight or growing and need to consume more nutrients than usual. Plus, hunting provides both physical and mental enrichment for your aquarium animals and all...

10 Easy Plants for African Cichlid Aquariums When you think of the stereotypical aquarium for African cichlids, it usually has a somewhat barren appearance consisting of sand, rockwork, and maybe fake decorations. The reason for the lack of live plants is because (1) many omnivorous and herbivorous cichlids like mbunas love to eat vegetation and (2) a lot of them enjoy digging to create spawning sites, which inadvertently uproots plants. At Aquarium Co-Op, we’re all about aquarium plants because of their natural beauty and ability to ab...

5 Best Fish Tank Ideas for a 40-Gallon Breeder Aquarium The 40-gallon breeder aquarium is a very popular size because of its 36” length x 18” width x 16” height (91 x 46 x 41 cm) dimensions. Other 40-gallon tanks have a more rectangular base, but the 40-gallon breeder tank has a deeper base without being too tall so that you can easily reach inside to clean the aquarium and catch fish that you have bred. The 18-inch width also lets bigger fish to turn around more easily, making this one of the first footprints that allows you to keep either a larg...

Care Guide for Pencilfish – Surface-Dwelling Schooling Fish The pencilfish is such an interesting surface dweller that everyone should keep at least once. These hardy and active fish come with pointy snouts and slender, pencil-like bodies, as described by their common name. Plus, they exhibit unique behaviors that differ from your typical schooling fish. If you’re interested in getting an unusual nano fish for your next community tank, learn about the wonderful world of pencilfish. What are Pencilfish? These distant relatives of the tetra family are f...

Care Guide for Black Ghost Knifefish — 18-Inch Electrical Oddball Fish We get a lot of requests for this care guide because knifefish are such unusual-looking curiosities with an undulating fin that allows them to swim both forward and backward. While there are many kinds of knifefish, the black ghost knife (BGK) is the most readily available in the pet trade and often attracts the attention of beginners. Unlike your average betta fish though, it is a considerably larger pet that requires a ton of room and may live for over a decade. Before you make the commitme...

Care Guide for Forktail Blue-Eye or Furcata Rainbowfish Many people gravitate towards guppies, platies, and zebra danios sold at major pet store chains because they are small, energetic, and colorful. But if you’re looking for a slightly uncommon fish to liven up your aquarium, let us introduce you to the forktail or furcata rainbowfish. What are Forktail Rainbowfish? Pseudomugil furcatus hails from the rainforests of Papua New Guinea, where it is often found in clearwater streams that are teeming with plant life. This 2-inch (5 cm) rainbowfish is...

How to Make DIY Spawning Mops for Breeding Aquarium Fish Many aquarium fish like to lay their eggs by scattering them or sticking them onto plants and various surfaces. To protect the eggs from being eaten and improve the survival rate of baby fish, veteran breeders often make spawning mops for the fish to deposit their eggs. Unlike live aquarium plants, this artificial spawning media does not require any light or fertilizer, and they are quite easy to transport without breaking any plant leaves or roots. People even use them with livebearers (or f...

Top 7 Helpful Snails for Your Next Freshwater Aquarium Not everyone is a fan of aquarium snails, but we love them because of the important role they play in an underwater ecosystem. As detritivores, they help to clean up and break down organics in the tank, such as leftover fish food, dying plant leaves, algae, and even deceased animals. To help you see the value in these amazing creatures, we put together a list of our top 7 freshwater snails that we enjoy keeping. Most of these snails are completely safe with aquarium plants, but there is cavea...

Cookie Cutter Setups for 10-Gallon Freshwater Aquariums Everyone loves 10-gallon fish tanks because they are small enough to sit on a kitchen counter or kid’s bedroom dresser but big enough to give you many options to choose from. Whether you are interested in schooling fish, breeding fish, or oddball animals, there’s something for everyone. Most of these tropical fish do require a heater and filter, so review our 10-gallon aquarium checklist if you are not sure what to get. Then once your aquarium is set up and has begun the cycling process, take...

Is Nitrate Good or Bad for Your Aquarium? If you search online for information about nitrate in fish tanks, many articles immediately pop up to warn you about the dangers of high nitrate and the best methods for lowering it. But how much nitrate is considered dangerous? And if nitrate is so toxic, why do many aquarium plant fertilizers increase nitrate levels when they are made to be safe for fish, shrimp, and snails? Let’s talk about one of the main points of confusion in the aquarium hobby — nitrate. What is Nitrate? When fish and ...

Why You Need a Pre-Filter Sponge for Your Aquariums Looking for a very easy way to optimize your hang-on-back (HOB) or canister filter? Try a pre filter sponge (or intake sponge). This simple foam cylinder has a hole in the middle that allows you to slip it onto the intake tube of your filter, much like a sock. But why in the world do we need a prefilter sponge when we already have an aquarium filter? Intake sponges have a surprising number of benefits, such as: They provide more surface area to grow beneficial bacteria, which purify the wast...

Top 10 Cichlids We Love to Keep in 29-Gallon Aquariums Cichlids are a very diverse group of primarily freshwater fish that are known for their brilliant coloration and feisty personalities. Many of them require larger tanks to accommodate their size and territorial behavior, but several species are small enough to fit in a 29-gallon aquarium or less. Find out which of these diminutive cichlids made our top 10 list. South American Cichlids 1. German Blue Ram Mikrogeophagus ramirezi This 2–2.5-inch (5-6 cm) dwarf cichlid boasts an amazing array of...

3 Types of Planted Aquariums to Inspire Your Next Tank Build Did you know that a planted aquarium can be more than just adding aquatic plants into a fish tank? There are even a handful of different layout styles and techniques that can make one planted aquarium really stand out from another. Each style has a uniqueness that might add that extra pop to your aquarium you’ve been looking for. Let’s take a look at three different types of easy-to-build aquascapes to help inspire your next planted tank. Iwagumi Style Aquarium The first style that we will co...

Care Guide for Honey Gouramis – Our Favorite Peaceful Gourami Looking for a beautiful centerpiece fish that is similar to a betta but isn’t as aggressive and plays well with other tank mates? We recommend the honey gourami. Like betta fish, honey gouramis are brightly colored, make bubble nests to house their eggs, and have a special labyrinth organ that allows them to absorb oxygen directly from the air. Learn all about this peaceful nano fish and their easy care requirements. What are Honey Gouramis? Trichogaster chuna comes from India and Bangladesh ...

Top 12 Tank Mates to Keep With Cherry Shrimp Cherry shrimp (Neocaridina davidi) are exceptionally popular in the freshwater aquarium hobby because of their dazzling array of colors, but unfortunately, their petite size makes them irresistibly delicious to other fish. If your goal is to breed as many shrimp as possible, your best course of action is to keep a species-only tank with no other types of animals living in it. However, if you primarily want to keep adult cherry shrimp as pets with a few surviving offspring, then keep reading t...