Impulsivity

I ran out of algae wafers for Allan and Budgie last night, so I went to the fish shop to buy some more. Found me a nice big packet of them and stocked up on a big packet of flakes for when they run out too. However, I also found myself tempted to buy a fish or so for my tank.
I told myself, and one of the assistants, "No, I'll go home and think on it and just stick to the food for now." Later, I came to the front counter and purchased the food and 2 little albino corydoras catfish...Sigh.

 I don't know their genders yet, though one is noticeably smaller than the other. Both are quite young, I don't really know much about sexing corydoras, I hear males are smaller and thinner, but any differences I find now may not mean anything till they're both older. We shall see.

Aww, they're so friendly.

Currently they both only come to about an inch in length, but I'm told they may get to 3 times that.
The smaller one has been sedately exploring it's new tank, while the larger has been zipping up, down, left, right, all over the tank.

Oooh! A rock!

 In other news, the number of visible snails has leaped. They're all over the place, but not too populous yet. Though while I was cleaning the tank, I found a snail shell, nearly 5mm in diameter (compared to up to 2.5mm of the ramshorns), of a different sort. I figured it had been with the gravel as just an empty shell. But I later noticed that it was climbing up the side of the tank. No idea where it came from, nor why I'd never seen it before. Can snails survive for extended periods in the substrate? Ah well.

Snails!

Well...
I'm going to assume this occurred when I bought the plants. Apparently they had a cluster of ramshorn snail eggs. These eggs have since hatched, and for a little a couple of snails were visible at once around the tank.
After a week or 2 I still don't know whether or not this will turn out to be a bad thing or not. On the one hand, these snails will apparently breed like crazy if the tank isn't clean enough and may eat the plants to nothing (I hear mixed reviews on this bit), on the other hand I've heard they're good with dealing with hydras (those dragon things that gain extra heads every time you chop one off), which may or may not be a problem in my tank, and will help get rid of algae. Plus they're kinda cute.

First spotted out and about.

Adorable, no?

As I was looking around for the last 2 penguin tetras today (I lost them somehow, really couldn't find them, but they were there later so I guess they're good at hiding), I picked up the wood, and found no less than 8 or 9 of these snails of various sizes...
In other news, on one of my hair grass, and in various other places around the tank, there is, for lack of a better term, some 'stuff'.

Stuff on hairgrass.

Various other place, though this one is more hair like...

Well for all I know it could just be wet dust in the first pic and  a hair or a spiderweb that dropped in. Or they could be hydra related... Research time!

Om nom nom.

I leave you with this picture of Budgie the adorable Royal Whiptail.