ben0119 Posted January 20, 2017 Share Posted January 20, 2017 OFFICIAL UNEVENEDGE AQUARIUM & FISHKEEPING DISCUSSION It's simple, really. I wanted a place to discuss, well, pet fish and other such things you might keep in an aquarium. I'm talking srictly water-dwelling or at least amphibious stuff here. So, fish, live aquatic plants, shrimp, crabs, corals, snails, octopus, frogs, turtles, etc... I used to have the little fiddler crab dudes in with my fish tanks. They were pretty cool to watch. There were frogs you could get too. Of course, frogs eat fish that will fit in their mouth (as will any fish), and crabs are natural enemies to catfish and vise versa. I'm big on bottom feeders so the crabs... sorry, guys, haha. Had to retire picking up fiddler crabs. Anyway! I'm rambling. Please post topically, respectfully, civilly. Without further ado... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
1pooh4u Posted January 20, 2017 Share Posted January 20, 2017 My boyfriend would like you. He has been bugging me for a fish thank for 6 years. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
enad Posted January 20, 2017 Share Posted January 20, 2017 You ever flush any of them so they'd go back to the ocean? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ben0119 Posted January 20, 2017 Author Share Posted January 20, 2017 You ever flush any of them so they'd go back to the ocean? I put smaller fish in gardens, and bury larger ones, when they die. No. If I have a problem fish I trade it in to Aquatek. FishStop haha. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wacky1980 Posted January 20, 2017 Share Posted January 20, 2017 we kept an angel tank for a few years (plus some clown loaches and other random inhabitants), even got a pair to mate and produce offspring. that was pretty cool. eventually they all died though. i think it had something to do with our water. the dechlorinator is supposed to remove the harmful elements, but every major water change was always super-stressful on the tank. it would take several treatments and constant monitoring for a couple weeks before we could get it stablized again. and we weren't terribly keen on buying 50 gallons of distilled water whenever we cleaned the tank, so we just dealt with it. when the last angel died about a year ago, we took the tank down for good. now that we've moved, we are considering setting up a saltwater tank. i think the kiddos would enjoy some live rock and a couple tangs or eels or something. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ben0119 Posted January 21, 2017 Author Share Posted January 21, 2017 we kept an angel tank for a few years (plus some clown loaches and other random inhabitants), even got a pair to mate and produce offspring. that was pretty cool. eventually they all died though. i think it had something to do with our water. the dechlorinator is supposed to remove the harmful elements, but every major water change was always super-stressful on the tank. it would take several treatments and constant monitoring for a couple weeks before we could get it stablized again. and we weren't terribly keen on buying 50 gallons of distilled water whenever we cleaned the tank, so we just dealt with it. when the last angel died about a year ago, we took the tank down for good. now that we've moved, we are considering setting up a saltwater tank. i think the kiddos would enjoy some live rock and a couple tangs or eels or something. I use reverse osmosis filtered water from a machine. It works well and is cheap. You just refill your jugs. Your local fish store might have easier to handle and better pouring jugs designed specifically for aquariums. Mine does. Then you gotta have the water chemistry right. Neutral pH is best and easiest to go for with most fish. Look into Seachem Neutral Regulator for balancing your pH. Seachem Replenish will give the water the minerals it and the fish need. You put this stuff in for however much water you remove. (they don't evaporate) I change my water once a month on the 15th and change my filters on the first, along with rinsing out the whole pump system. Never use soap on anything involving fish. Better to use "RO" water than trying to treat tap water which can be very bad for fish and humans too in certion places. I'm told it was once possible to use tap water and let it sit until the chorine naturally leaves. Now it has chloramines which are toxic to fish and microorganisms, including your benificial bacteria. Chlorine is obviously bad as well. But yeah just do 25% water changes once a month should be ok. Never clean everything at once. The stuff on your rocks, ornaments, fake plants, substrate, etc. are all part of your natural filter. Never a good idea to clean all the stuff at the same time. That's why I don't do water changes and filter changes at the same time. I learned some from books and Internet articles, my Grandma, but most of it I learned from Aquatek. Dunno about salt water though. Could get more involved and difficult. I know keeping marine fish, and especially reef tanks, is "hard mode", so I don't mess with that. But yeah you don't have to use distilled water. Just refill jugs at Glacier machines or any other machine that says somewhere on it that the water is reverse osmosis filtered. Now I am no master, so you may want to get with someone with more experience, but just letting you know what I DO know about thanks to my years of doing this and talking to others with even more years in the hobby. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
1pooh4u Posted January 21, 2017 Share Posted January 21, 2017 we kept an angel tank for a few years (plus some clown loaches and other random inhabitants), even got a pair to mate and produce offspring. that was pretty cool. eventually they all died though. i think it had something to do with our water. the dechlorinator is supposed to remove the harmful elements, but every major water change was always super-stressful on the tank. it would take several treatments and constant monitoring for a couple weeks before we could get it stablized again. and we weren't terribly keen on buying 50 gallons of distilled water whenever we cleaned the tank, so we just dealt with it. when the last angel died about a year ago, we took the tank down for good. now that we've moved, we are considering setting up a saltwater tank. i think the kiddos would enjoy some live rock and a couple tangs or eels or something. Have you ever had salt water fish before? Sounds hard to keep the water right they are pretty though. I love blue and yellow Tangs. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ben0119 Posted January 22, 2017 Author Share Posted January 22, 2017 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ben0119 Posted February 3, 2017 Author Share Posted February 3, 2017 I had a beautiful pair of Angelfish. They complemented each other well. Unfortunately, the white one with black bars and brownish orange top was overly aggressive and would bully the silver, black, and orange-topped one. The other fish eventually got sick of the treatment and started fighting back with equal force. I had to separate the fish to stop them from fighting to the death. This was after I tried adding plants to cut down the line of sight so the tank would appear larger and they could have their own territories, not having to see each other, it should've theoretically stopped them from fighting. This worked for a several days. But when they ultimately ran into each other again, they started fighting again. It was odd because for a while they were peacefully coexisting, even swimming beside each other without incident with the extra plants added. But, it didn't last. So, the fish was moved to a 10 gallon I had originally set up to separate the Peacock Gudgeons to prevent them from being eaten in the main tank. Put the Gudgeons in a divider inside the main tank and the Angelfish into the 10 gallon for a few days, then finally bid him a sad farewell at Aquatek. And now that my remaining Angelfish is so big, I can't have any more, unless I somehow manage to locate a school of Angelfish the exact size as mine, or trade in the one I still have at home and start completely over - get like 5 or 7 the exact same size at the same time. Otherwise you have to have a pair that gets along, which is not easy to do, it seems. SO! I will just have one Angelfish for a long time. They can live up to 10-15 years! That fish, you can see in my other videos, is the silver and black one with orange on the top. Beautiful fish. Turns out this guy was actually put in a tank not suited for him. Those Severums, as Bruce called them, would've torn him up. But Bruce made sure he was moved to a tank where he'd be fine. In any case, that's this video! A goodbye to one of my long-kept fish and a little more of Aquatek can be seen in this video! More of the display tanks, the giant fish trade-in tank, and more. Enjoy! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mthor Posted February 3, 2017 Share Posted February 3, 2017 What the ever-loving fuck is this doing here? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wacky1980 Posted February 3, 2017 Share Posted February 3, 2017 i missed your response, sorry! there's none of those refill stations anywhere here in town. i could always get the culligan man to drop a couple jugs off at the bar each month and use that water for changes (not sure of the chemical properties of ph of culligan water though). our tap water is hard as balls, to the point that we can't even use it to grow many types of plants from seed. they ...calcify?... or something as soon as they sprout. i killed three avocado seedlings before figuring that out. wife worked in a pet store for a few years, and she was responsible for all the freshwater tanks for most of that time. i have a good resource in her for this stuff. we had a pretty decent 55gal setup for the angels, but the hard water was a pain and we couldn't ever buy new fish from local pet stores because they were almost always infected with ich. we used a lot of various seachem products, including one to fight a nasty bit of black beard algae that we couldn't kill with anything besides seachem flourish excel. we lost a couple fish to that infection and the aggressive treatment schedule to fix it, but eventually got it under control. at my last job, the owners kept a saltwater tank and i made it my duty to learn and assist with maintenance on it as much as possible. filtration will be the big hurdle for us, because our current setup will need some heavy modification to accommodate that need, but i think we're capable. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
stilgar Posted February 3, 2017 Share Posted February 3, 2017 What the ever-loving fuck is this doing here? It's in the ben pen. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chapinator_X Posted February 3, 2017 Share Posted February 3, 2017 It's in the ben pen. It fits the autistic vision of the boards Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ben0119 Posted February 9, 2017 Author Share Posted February 9, 2017 Published on Feb 5, 2017 Things are finally back in order now. My water parameters finally tested good today. Sadly, I lost four fish in the space of a week and a half to an ammonia spike and possible bacterial infection in one of the fish - the Bosemani. I also lost the female Peacock Gudgeon, my Emerald Rainbow, and my Yellow Rainbow. I was attached to them, of course. I had the Bosemani for years. He would hide so he wouldn't have to deal with the Rainbowfish school "politics", haha. The Emerald was nice. Had him for many months and he was well on his way to having his full colors. I had looked forward to having a Peacock Gudgeon pair again for years. I have to wait a week or two and make sure my tank is stable, then I can add some new fish to replace the ones I lost. Of course, all three Rainbowfish will take a year to get up to full coloration, and I'll always miss the originals I had. The Emerald was bluish-green with fins that went from silver to light blue to deep blue to light blue to silver to red, and was getting more and more of the bluish green filling in on the body. He'd follow my finger all over the place. The Yellow was new and already quite colorful. As mentioned, the Bosemani was over 3 years old and basically at full color, but not full size. Rainbowfish live a good 6-10 years and get huge and very broad and tall, in the males at least, topping out around 4-5 inches. These were all around 2-3 inches. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest The Hound Posted February 9, 2017 Share Posted February 9, 2017 I have an oscar that would eat all of your fish in on sitting. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts