| Tanks for all the fish! |
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| My first "real" tank, a 24" x 12" x 15" with a plain pine stand that I stained with teak oil. Capacity around 60 litres. Yes, I'm aware that bigger is better, but it's all I have space for in our living room. Only one live plant, an anubia on a piece of bog wood: all the rest is fake (I'm good at killing plants). The tank has been set up since 27 September 2004 (about 6 weeks when this picture was taken). Current occupants are 3 mollies (male black lyretail, female silver and female gold-dust): 5 platys (1 male comet, 1 male sunset wag, 2 female wags, 1 female red wag): 5 Pacific blue-eyes (2 males and 3 females, called the Sinatras, what else?): 1 bristlenose catfish: and 16 or so assorted molly and variatus platy fry. My only green variatus platy, Debbie, was PTS after an undiagnosed ailment. I made most of the classic newbie mistakes with the tank: ignored advice and stocked too quickly, resulting in an outbreak of whitespot and assorted funguses. Tried starting the cycle with Hagen Cycle, which did nothing much except make the water smell like cat's pee for weeks. Nonetheless, I didn't lose any of my starter fish (with the exception of poor Debbie, who was a bit strange right from the get-go. She was also the presumed mother of the first lot of fry, who suddenly appeared after Debbie went missing for several days). I'm a bit paranoid about filtration, especially with the tank fairly fully stocked, so it's running two small Resun internal power filters (one with venturi, one with a spray bar) and a corner box filter packed with de-nitrating granules. Couldn't afford proper aquarium lights, so what lighting there is is provided by a compact fluoro desk lamp. Local water is slightly hard, with an average pH of 8.0. I decided early on not to bother with trying to alter the pH, and only go with fish that are tolerant of alkaline conditions. I use a low dose of aquarium salt in the tank (1gm/litre), mostly for the benefit of the mollies. I'm a bit worried about the future fry situation, given the proclivities of livebearers. Future fry will have to take their chances, and those that survive to juvenile size will probably be transferred then to a grow-out tank. My kindly LFS has already agreed to give me store credit for any healthy fish I can offer them! BTW, the mollies are Vinnie, Marilyn and Gloria: the platys Fat Pattie, Gemma, Nell, Bruce and Karl: the Sinatras are Frank, Albert, Nancy, Tina and Francine: and the bristlenose is Ian, after the LFS owner). |
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| The goldfish tank so rashly provided by Grandad to house Nemo and Chum (who didn't make it). Apart from Nemo, a 10cm comet, and Eddie, a similarly-sized calico fantail, the tank is shared by Mr Simon Snail and 4 black-line rainbowfish (Melanotaenia nigrensis). This is a bit of an experiment, really. The tank (24", 55 litre) will be too small for the goldfish sooner or later: the rainbowfish are a sub-tropical (native north Australian) species) as opposed to the "coldwater" goldfish. However, this is Queensland, after all, where the temperature of unheated water in summer is close to 30 deg C. I figure both species should be able to be comfortable with a minimum temperature of 23 deg or so. For now, there's no problems with incompatability or keeping the water clean. (When the goldies get too big, we'll re-house them). Filtration is provided by a corner box filter and twin sponge filter, both powered by a twin outlet air pump. I've got an 800l/hr power filter in reserve if required. (NB. Eddie was Tony's choice. As I predicted, he picked the ugliest fish in the shop. And he calls the rainbowfish Phil, Joe, Larry and Mo). |
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| This is a 20 litre, AA-manufactured all-in-one plastic tank, imported and rebadged for sale by Woolworths Big W. For $58, it isn't bad value. The hood encloses a small power head and wet-dry trickle filter, and a 6w compact fluoro light. All I had to add was a 25w heater and the fish. Decoration consists of a pale. fine gravel substrate, a nice chunk of holey rock, an anubia on a piece of bog wood and a plastic plant to hide the heater. I taped some black cardboard on the back, and am quite pleased with the overall effect. I set the tank up using the fishless cycling method, giving it a kick start with a bag of used filter floss from the goldfish tank, and a good squeezing from the filter sponge out of the community tank. Cycling only took 8 days. This pretty little tank houses a coral blue dwarf gourami (Colisa lalia), 8 neon tetras and 2 albino corys (Corydoras aeneus). The gourami, Ginger, gets a kick out of darting into the middle of the tetra shoal (the Rockettes) and scattering them, but otherwise is not seriously aggressive (although he does try to boot the corys, Pinky and Perky, away from any tasty tidbits). 14-- 18.11.04 Poor Ginger died of an apparent tumour. His place was taken by another coral blue gourami, Adolf. Three days later I found Pinky dead, no apparent cause. Adolf proved to be even more aggro than Ginger, and the tetras took to hiding, so back to the shop he went. The Hex Householders are now the Rockettes; a blue female crowntail betta, Doreen; and three albino corys, Pinky II, Perky and Zebedee. |
| Last updated 14 November 2004 |
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