Fun little tool

[jeremyh81]

Very fun!

This is basically an "aquarium stocking advisor". You select your tank size from a list, or enter your own values, and select up to 2 filtration systems from drop-down lists. Then start selecting your fauna by species and amount.

The advisor said that Angels would be too aggressive for my diamond tetras. My thoughts, and advice from others, was that diamonds would be ok with angels. Most tetras are very fast swimmers and could easily find a hiding place from any aggressors within the underbrush.

I know this first hand from my rescape this weekend. Since then, any time I open the lid, they go into hiding for about an hour, and I can't find the little buggers! ;D

[angel]

Just further evidence that experienced fishkeepers we know and trust from real life are more believable than what we read here and there on the web. But these things do give us cool ideas.

[sirknight]

If it said neon or cardinal tetras I would agree, only because the angels could make a meal of them. Most of those compatibility charts or programs are to general and can not take every situation into account, but they are fun to play with. I love the ones that say with caution, which to me means one out of a thousand may work for a time. Hell you can have guppies with baby Oscars for a time until the Oscars find out they taste good and are big enough to eat them. Or minimum tank size for a grouper is 75 gallons, yes it is true until the fish is 3 feet long and it doesn't take into account the type of grouper, see what I mean.

[jeremyh81]

Agreed, Joe.

We can have fun with the calculator, and ask the experts when in doubt.

[yhbae]

Hi guys,

I am the one who created this site. I spent over a year of my time building this site, and went live since Sep 2009. You will find that this calculator is a bit different from other aquarium calculators on the net.

Feb 1, 2010 6:13:33 GMT -6 @jeremyh81 said:

Very fun!

This is basically an "aquarium stocking advisor". You select your tank size from a list, or enter your own values, and select up to 2 filtration systems from drop-down lists. Then start selecting your fauna by species and amount.

Small correction - you can add as many filters as you can by clicking on "Add a filter" link.

The advisor said that Angels would be too aggressive for my diamond tetras. My thoughts, and advice from others, was that diamonds would be ok with angels. Most tetras are very fast swimmers and could easily find a hiding place from any aggressors within the underbrush.

This is a perfect example where AqAdvisor "learns". If this example indeed turns out to be wrong, I will correct it. You can think of AqAdvisor as an application that holds (currently) 700x700 matrix between every species and I can define any rules between them. Hence I can customize any relationship between any species. It starts off by going through many general rules and if there are any exceptions, I define them. I can define Diamond Tetra to be safe with Angels.

If anyone sees any other wrong result from this app, please let me know here. I'd like to fix every single one of them!

Thanks! ;D

[yhbae]

Feb 1, 2010 7:24:40 GMT -6 angel said:

Just further evidence that experienced fishkeepers we know and trust from real life are more believable than what we read here and there on the web. But these things do give us cool ideas.

Yes this I support 100%. I will do my best to capture as much experienced keepers' knowledge in AqAdvisor's DB but it will never be able to replace them. And I even put this on the calculator's page.

[yhbae]

Feb 1, 2010 19:17:56 GMT -6 @sirknight said:

If it said neon or cardinal tetras I would agree, only because the angels could make a meal of them.

One of the attribute I have in the app is called "mouth size". Any species that are smaller than the mouth size of the other species and if it is marked aggressive enough, then an appropriate warning will be displayed. In this case, Neon + Angle will produce this warning, while Cardinal + Angel won't because many have reported that they have successfully raised this combo in the same tank.

Most of those compatibility charts or programs are to general and can not take every situation into account, but they are fun to play with.

This is very true. Even AqAdvisor started off with about 20 general rules. But then there's that matrix I talked about earlier that allows me to define more BAD or GOOD exception rules between any species. I'm sure I've missed many of these exception rules, but whenever I get reports from users, I add them. You can see all the releases I worked on here:

www.aqadvisor.com/forum/viewforum.php?f=3

I do at least one release per week with significant updates to the species DB.

I love the ones that say with caution, which to me means one out of a thousand may work for a time. Hell you can have guppies with baby Oscars for a time until the Oscars find out they taste good and are big enough to eat them. Or minimum tank size for a grouper is 75 gallons, yes it is true until the fish is 3 feet long and it doesn't take into account the type of grouper, see what I mean.

Agreed.

[yhbae]

Feb 1, 2010 19:54:15 GMT -6 @jeremyh81 said:

Agreed, Joe.

We can have fun with the calculator, and ask the experts when in doubt.

Agreed as well. And if possible, point out the wrong results from AqAdvisor as you discover them. From what I can tell, most of the common species look ok now - I probably went through more than 1000 individual updates since the launch of the site and I am still actively collecting more feedback. I'd much appreciate if anyone could report these, and I'm sure other future newbie keepers would appreciate just as much as well. ;D

[angel]

Thanks for joining yhbae! It looks like a complicated labor of love.

[yhbae]

Feb 2, 2010 14:20:34 GMT -6 angel said:

Thanks for joining yhbae! It looks like a complicated labor of love.

lol I guess so... ;D

[yhbae]

Feb 3, 2010 20:57:39 GMT -6 bunnie1978 said:

Welcome yhbae! Thanks for chatting with us. I personally enjoy the tool very much, especially useful for experimenting with fish I'm considering.

Glad to hear that it is useful for you. ;D

Don't forget that if you have any suggestions or found something that doesn't make sense, please let me know. I am here to listen!

[jon carman]

I still haven't put in half my fish yet, but this is what I got- confusion and warnings

These fish I have selected- (I wouldn't mix fronts and mbunas) do go together fine. They have been housed together for years in some instances, and I find that Malawi and Tangs get better together sometimes better than Malawi and Malawi. If someone is stocking more than a 55 gal tank these recommendations can be overwhelming.

Suggestion: Minimum recommend male to female ratio for Frontosa is 1:4 (M:F). You will less likely to experience problem if you get even more females.
Warning: Frontosa is not recommended to be with Grants Peacock - lake Tanganyika species should not be mixed with other groups.
Warning: Frontosa is not recommended to be with Labeotropheus trewavasae - lake Tanganyika species should not be mixed with other groups.
Warning: Frontosa is not recommended to be with Orange Peacock - lake Tanganyika species should not be mixed with other groups.
Warning: Frontosa is not recommended to be with Taiwan Reef - lake Tanganyika species should not be mixed with other groups.
Warning: Frontosa is not recommended to be with Yellow Lab - lake Tanganyika species should not be mixed with other groups.
Warning: Frontosa is not recommended to be with Gold Nugget Pleco L018 - lake Tanganyika species should not be mixed with other groups.
Warning: Frontosa is not recommended to be with Bristlenose Pleco - lake Tanganyika species should not be mixed with other groups.
Warning: At least 5 x Grants Peacock are recommended in a group.
Warning: Grants Peacock is not recommended to be with Frontosa - lake Malawi species should not be mixed with other groups including mbuna species.
Warning: When Julidochromis Marlieri starts to breed, they may become too aggressive to co-exist with Grants Peacock.
Warning: Grants Peacock is not recommended to be with Julidochromis Marlieri - lake Malawi species should not be mixed with other groups including mbuna species.
Warning: Grants Peacock is not recommended to be with Labeotropheus trewavasae - lake Malawi species should not be mixed with other groups including mbuna species.
Warning: Grants Peacock is not recommended to be with Synodontis Multipunctatus - lake Malawi species should not be mixed with other groups including mbuna species.
Warning: Grants Peacock is not recommended to be with Yellow Lab - lake Malawi species should not be mixed with other groups including mbuna species.
Warning: Grants Peacock is not recommended to be with Gold Nugget Pleco L018 - lake Malawi species should not be mixed with other groups including mbuna species.
Warning: Grants Peacock is not recommended to be with Bristlenose Pleco - lake Malawi species should not be mixed with other groups including mbuna species.
Suggestion: Minimum recommend male to female ratio for Julidochromis Marlieri is 1:1 (M:F). You will less likely to experience problem if you get even more females.
Warning: Julidochromis Marlieri is not recommended to be with Grants Peacock - lake Tanganyika species should not be mixed with other groups.
Warning: Julidochromis Marlieri is not recommended to be with Labeotropheus trewavasae - lake Tanganyika species should not be mixed with other groups.
Warning: Julidochromis Marlieri is not recommended to be with Orange Peacock - lake Tanganyika species should not be mixed with other groups.
Warning: Julidochromis Marlieri is not recommended to be with Taiwan Reef - lake Tanganyika species should not be mixed with other groups.
Warning: Julidochromis Marlieri is not recommended to be with Yellow Lab - lake Tanganyika species should not be mixed with other groups.
Warning: Julidochromis Marlieri is not recommended to be with Gold Nugget Pleco L018 - lake Tanganyika species should not be mixed with other groups.
Warning: Julidochromis Marlieri is not recommended to be with Bristlenose Pleco - lake Tanganyika species should not be mixed with other groups.
Warning: At least 5 x Labeotropheus trewavasae are recommended in a group.
Suggestion: If you want to keep more than 5 Labeotropheus trewavasae, minimum recommend male to female ratio is 1:4 (M:F). You will be less likely to experience problem if you get even more females.
Warning: Labeotropheus trewavasae is not recommended to be with Frontosa - mbuna species should not be mixed with other groups.
Warning: Labeotropheus trewavasae is not recommended to be with Grants Peacock - mbuna species should not be mixed with other groups.
Warning: Labeotropheus trewavasae is not recommended to be with Julidochromis Marlieri - mbuna species should not be mixed with other groups.
Warning: Labeotropheus trewavasae is not recommended to be with Orange Peacock - mbuna species should not be mixed with other groups.
Warning: Labeotropheus trewavasae is not recommended to be with Taiwan Reef - mbuna species should not be mixed with other groups.
Warning: Labeotropheus trewavasae is not recommended to be with Gold Nugget Pleco L018 - mbuna species should not be mixed with other groups.
Warning: At least 5 x Orange Peacock are recommended in a group.
Warning: Orange Peacock is not recommended to be with Frontosa - lake Malawi species should not be mixed with other groups including mbuna species.
Warning: When Julidochromis Marlieri starts to breed, they may become too aggressive to co-exist with Orange Peacock.
Warning: Orange Peacock is not recommended to be with Julidochromis Marlieri - lake Malawi species should not be mixed with other groups including mbuna species.
Warning: Orange Peacock is not recommended to be with Labeotropheus trewavasae - lake Malawi species should not be mixed with other groups including mbuna species.
Warning: Orange Peacock is not recommended to be with Synodontis Multipunctatus - lake Malawi species should not be mixed with other groups including mbuna species.
Warning: Orange Peacock is not recommended to be with Yellow Lab - lake Malawi species should not be mixed with other groups including mbuna species.
Warning: Orange Peacock is not recommended to be with Gold Nugget Pleco L018 - lake Malawi species should not be mixed with other groups including mbuna species.
Warning: Orange Peacock is not recommended to be with Bristlenose Pleco - lake Malawi species should not be mixed with other groups including mbuna species.
Warning: Taiwan Reef is not recommended to be with Frontosa - lake Malawi species should not be mixed with other groups including mbuna species.
Warning: When Julidochromis Marlieri starts to breed, they may become too aggressive to co-exist with Taiwan Reef.
Warning: Taiwan Reef is not recommended to be with Julidochromis Marlieri - lake Malawi species should not be mixed with other groups including mbuna species.
Warning: Taiwan Reef is not recommended to be with Labeotropheus trewavasae - lake Malawi species should not be mixed with other groups including mbuna species.
Warning: Taiwan Reef is not recommended to be with Synodontis Multipunctatus - lake Malawi species should not be mixed with other groups including mbuna species.
Warning: Taiwan Reef is not recommended to be with Yellow Lab - lake Malawi species should not be mixed with other groups including mbuna species.
Warning: Taiwan Reef is not recommended to be with Gold Nugget Pleco L018 - lake Malawi species should not be mixed with other groups including mbuna species.
Warning: Taiwan Reef is not recommended to be with Bristlenose Pleco - lake Malawi species should not be mixed with other groups including mbuna species.
Warning: At least 5 x Yellow Lab are recommended in a group.
Warning: Yellow Lab is not recommended to be with Frontosa - mbuna species should not be mixed with other groups.
Warning: Yellow Lab is not recommended to be with Grants Peacock - mbuna species should not be mixed with other groups.
Warning: Yellow Lab is not recommended to be with Julidochromis Marlieri - mbuna species should not be mixed with other groups.
Warning: Yellow Lab is not recommended to be with Orange Peacock - mbuna species should not be mixed with other groups.
Warning: Yellow Lab is not recommended to be with Taiwan Reef - mbuna species should not be mixed with other groups.
Warning: Yellow Lab is not recommended to be with Gold Nugget Pleco L018 - mbuna species should not be mixed with other groups.
Note: Gold Nugget Pleco L018 is a juvernile form of L085.
Note: Bristlenose Pleco needs driftwood.
Note: You have selected mbuna species. These species in general, need to be overstocked to control aggression (over 100% stocking level). Make sure your filtration is sufficient and keep up with water changes. (Read more about beginner mbuna species here).
Warning: Your selected species may eventually require 124% of your aquarium space. You may need to deal with territorial aggressions later on. Try removing some of (Julidochromis Marlieri, Synodontis Multipunctatus, Baryancistrus sp. L018, Ancistrus sp.) or get a larger aquarium tank.

[oneyoda]

Wow. Looks like we've all been doing this wrong the whole time. That is confusing.

[yhbae]

@jon carman,

You have a fair point. But the purpose of AqAdvisor is to give advices to beginners and those who don't have any prior experiences in new species. In general, I do believe people give advices not to mix biotopes between different lakes in Africa. Nor mix of mbuna and peacocks. Nor mix of Julidochromis and mbuna, etc. But I do realize there will be exceptions and I can easily mark those exceptions out in DB if needed. I also have to emphasize that experts will be able to pull off tanks with interesting mixes - I have two tanks right now that looks awful if you run them through AqAdvisor but I would not suggest such setups for beginners. I trust you that your tank has been doing fine all these years but when I look at your stocks, I would not suggest such combo to someone who is starting their hobby.

Looking at your list though, I can see that I should mark Peacocks as compatible with Lake Tang species. If I set this flag, half of your warnings will go away.

I will also make Bristlenose compatible with Tang species. Not sure how I missed it but I will also make it mbuna compatible.

Same for Gold Nugget Pleco.

I have been collecting feedback through a lot of forums and been fine tuning DB for the past 4 months or so, collecting more than 1000 feedback in the process. The nice thing about this app is that it evolves quickly. When I see undesirable results, I try to fix it. You can run your stock plan again this weekend and let me know how it looks. It should look better.

After cleaning up my DB based on your feedback I have the following remaining:

Suggestion: Minimum recommend male to female ratio for Frontosa is 1:4 (M:F). You will less likely to experience problem if you get even more females.
Warning: Frontosa is not recommended to be with Labeotropheus trewavasae - lake Tanganyika species should not be mixed with other groups.
Warning: Grants Peacock is not recommended to be with Labeotropheus trewavasae - lake Malawi species should not be mixed with other groups including mbuna species.
Suggestion: Minimum recommend male to female ratio for Julidochromis Marlieri is 1:1 (M:F). You will less likely to experience problem if you get even more females.
Warning: Julidochromis Marlieri is not recommended to be with Labeotropheus trewavasae - lake Tanganyika species should not be mixed with other groups.
Warning: At least 5 x Labeotropheus trewavasae are recommended in a group.
Suggestion: If you want to keep more than 5 Labeotropheus trewavasae, minimum recommend male to female ratio is 1:4 (M:F). You will be less likely to experience problem if you get even more females.
Warning: Labeotropheus trewavasae is not recommended to be with Frontosa - mbuna species should not be mixed with other groups.
Warning: Labeotropheus trewavasae is not recommended to be with Grants Peacock - mbuna species should not be mixed with other groups.
Warning: Labeotropheus trewavasae is not recommended to be with Julidochromis Marlieri - mbuna species should not be mixed with other groups.
Warning: Labeotropheus trewavasae is not recommended to be with Orange Peacock - mbuna species should not be mixed with other groups.
Warning: Labeotropheus trewavasae is not recommended to be with Taiwan Reef - mbuna species should not be mixed with other groups.
Warning: Orange Peacock is not recommended to be with Labeotropheus trewavasae - lake Malawi species should not be mixed with other groups including mbuna species.
Warning: Taiwan Reef is not recommended to be with Labeotropheus trewavasae - lake Malawi species should not be mixed with other groups including mbuna species.
Note: Gold Nugget Pleco L018 is a juvernile form of L085.
Note: Bristlenose Pleco needs driftwood.
Note: You have selected mbuna species. These species in general, need to be overstocked to control aggression (over 100% stocking level). Make sure your filtration is sufficient and keep up with water changes. (Read more about beginner mbuna species here).

If you see anything here that you would whole heartedly recommend to beginners, please let me know. I can look further into it.

Thanks for your feedback! Much appreciated.

[yhbae]

Feb 11, 2010 17:39:24 GMT -6 oneyoda said:

Wow. Looks like we've all been doing this wrong the whole time. That is confusing.

AqAdvisor is still work in progress. Even with more than 1 year of development, I am still spending significant amount of time on this app. More common species have been fine tuned more than rarer species and I am updating rather significant amount of DB attributes each week. As you can see, with 1 hour work, I am able to address most of the issues the above post found. The key thing to realize is that AqAdvisor was built with flexibility in mind. If you can describe a problem between species, I can probably address it in the app. Give it enough time and I'm sure it will greatly improve its report, even for rarer species. ;D