fishes checkup

The snails alerted me to cycling conditions in the thirtyeight- when I saw three nerites hanging out at the water line I tested it. Not terrible- ammonia was .5, nitrite below 0.25 ppm, nitrates over 40 ppm. Did a 25% water change. Have to keep checking every day. Second day after, ammonia was a little lower, nitrite spiked higher. Another water change. Third day ammonia is almost nil and nitrite going down, so I can see the bacteria colony is recovering. I did a smaller water change that day, and the snails are descending into the tank again. Funny, the horned snails once more are hanging out together:

I took these pictures a day before the substrate change, so you still see green algae on the backwall. Barbs are all doing well, except for one that died because she jumped out of the holding bucket. I didn't notice until it was too late. Kink is fully colored up now, and his coloring is darker than the other males.

He has a wider, black stripe up across the face, and his red is darker, wine-hue. Nearly purplish in certain light.

Snaky Fish is also showing different colors. He's gaining some girth and has small freckle spots along his belly that I never noticed before. This is hard to get a good picture showing, though.

My four-year-old didn't realize that I had changed part of the substrate out for smaller-size gravel, instead she suddenly yelled: "Mommy, come see! the snaky fishes got bigger!" She thought they'd grown overnight, haha.