I think the whole ananerobic, hydrogen sulfide pocket issue is WAY overblown - I have yet to meet someone in real life who has run into a problem with this.

Glock - Many congrats! Mine are just about the same age so I am hopeful it happens soon for me as well! Any pointers, or things you noticed that might be helpful advice to others???

The zebras won't dig that deep - mine only dig maybe 1 cm max. However the current in the tank is more likely to sweep up and re-distribute the sand more than the zebras - at least that's been my experience. Reguardless, I'd try to keep the substrate layer thin - it will stay more clean that way.

It varies - mine hop from caves under the giant flat rocks that cover nealy the entre bottom of my tank. Sometimes they see me - weven with all the cover, and still swim off to hide in another portion of the tank.

do a wter change before you leave and don't worry about them. I've left mine for well over a week without issue.

I noticed it took a long while for mine to take to caves. Also if there isn't cover and they have to be "exposed" to get to the caves they probably won't use them during the day. I'd suggest checking in the middle of the night to see if they venture to and explore the caves - then you at l...

I don't vaccum the sand that often as to not disturb the zebras - and can't really vacuum the sand under the rocks. Every so often I sitr up as much sand from under the rocks with my hands and it does the trick. I also have an impressive clean up crew of assassin snails which help aerate the sand an...

There are a total of 7 zebras - 2 are most likely female, 3 are most likely male, and 2 were too difficult to sex last time I exmained them (about 1 year ago). There are now a total of 5 caves in the place - although 2 of them are only "play caves" that get explored at night and vacated by...

I'd like ot share this picture of my setup...

Helio - I though that was hysterically ironic too - and many of my friends from the AAPE forum said the same thing! I know about some of the horror stories on this website - folks losing lots of money or getting ripped off to a much larger degree. This is my first time getting taken for my money on ...

I hate getting ripped off - and that is exactly what happened with these people. I wish folks like this get what's coming to them. I purchased two items from them - two bottles of Snail Shell Milk. I did this December 9, 2008 (it's now February 16, 2009). Over two months of waiting, trading phone ca...

TTA - who says anything about stress coat? I don't use that stuff - only Prime for tap water, obviously RO water doesn't need it. Can you describe the process of dropping your TDS? Do you go through a period where you try to ramp up the TDS by not replacing evaporated water, then do an RO water chan...

I did my "rainy season" water change this past Sunday to correspond with a storm front. How long should I keep the water cooler for? How many more cool water changes should I do before I give up and put them back at the normal temperature?

The reason I ask is if nobody falls into the category (i.e, all the conditons ARE met and they have bred), this would inidicate that it's up to the zebras to breed and there isn't so much dependance on cave size, rainy seasons, RO vs. tap water, etc. since different folks do different things. So - a...

I did a big cold water change - dropped the temp from 85F (29C) to about 75F (24C). All that seemd to happen was the fish stressed out - I'd guess my TDS dropped from slightly 300 to close to 100 based on the volume of water changed, knowing the TDS of my tap water, and doing math. I brought the tem...