(no subject)

Yesterday I said to my mother that I was thinking about tearing down my aquarium and replacing it all with fake plants-- the cries of aquarists that artificial plants are the devil be damned. I'm sick and tired of fighting algae. Every time I look up solutions there is always one guy, it doesn't matter if it's a post from last month or 2005, no matter what forum I look at, who says "more co2." I won't use co2 and you can't make me, guy! I know it's your job and you're famous and award winning but I won't do it!

My mother said it would be a good idea to go fake.

"Maybe... maybe I'll just bleach my plants again, dose Excel really hard, and give it one more shot," I said.

Then I came home to another dead fish. This time, the female pleco. Like all the others, she showed no signs of sickness (in fact I was a little worried about the male because he hides in the rocks a lot).

Cue: screaming, frothing rage.

Followed by: hardcore googling on nice fake plants. I know I've seen some gorgeous setups like this and I've managed some really great displays myself-- even my technicolor nightmare I have a betta in (I have a soft spot for aquariums that looked like the 80s). I've also seen this thread with great examples. Problem? Most of those plants are Sydeco, a UK company. Finding anything similar in the US is... hard. Some of those plants bear striking similarity to ones I see in Petco, except the ones in Petco have weird coloration and just don't look as great. I can't figure out a way to get Sydeco products in the US.

I even went to craft stores to look at their fake plants based on comments I saw, but I didn't find anything that looked planty as opposed to fake bouquet.

I know the algae and the fish deaths are not related. They probably don't even have the same genesis, but it tipped me over the edge. I'm fighting multiple battles and losing all of them, it feels like.

"Maybe it's high nitrates," I said to myself. "That weakens fish and causes algae growth, and you do have decaying plant matter in the tank pretty much all the time because you're too lazy to trim." But I tested my nitrates several times last night, and I still don't believe the results (maybe I can't count the drops in the tester right, I don't know) because my nitrates are less than 5 ppm-- in fact, the tester is the yellow of 0, which I find extremely hard to believe.

There is, simply, no answer to my question. I'm also having fears about fish tuberculosis again, because I saw a couple with a wasting disease and if you google that you get fish TB, even though if you look for fish TB itself it looks different than "wasting" and it doesn't take out fish one... by one... by one.... But fish TB is transmissible to humans so OMG I CAN'T PUT MY HANDS IN THERE WAAAAH SCARY.

I've tried everything to bring my tank down to low tech specifications-- it's running one light. I have no idea how to get it to "low light" because one T8 bulb on a 75 gallon is still "medium light," and my plants are getting off on the sunlight (the rotalas arch toward the sun).

In the cold light of day I remind myself that I am not stupid, I don't need a nuclear option, BBA can be dealt with and even if I lose again, I can take out my fish and blow up the tank again with some good old fashioned bleach and elbow grease. Though I'm already planning on a total tank tear down and changing out my substrate for sand (black blasting or pool sand, in this case), I'm not sure if I want to give up on plants yet. I'm really fond of my rotala and my vals, and even my green temple is coming around.

But I know that ultimately switching over to artificials will mean much less frustration. I keep thinking to myself "yeah I can trim and groom daily" but I can't, and I don't need a hobby that serves as another excuse to beat myself up. I am not a maintenance person. I am a "freak out and do all the things once a month" person. I need to remember this about myself, because promising to myself that "yeah, but it's easy to do this daily..." is just setting myself up for failure.

It just makes me mad because I've heard from several people that "I keep wanting fish, and then I remember the trouble you have..." and it makes me feel bad, because my troubles are not at all fish related. They are 100% plant related. I'm running a 20 gallon no one hears about because nothing happens to it. It's all fake plants and the fish are happy as can be despite my changing to water only when I feel like it.

Gah. I just. I don't know what to do.