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Snakeheads are going to be difficult, and likely illegal, to acquire. If you're interested in sleek predators that get to a decent size without being tankbusters, may I recommend the saxatalis pike cichlids? They'll max out at about 8 inches and can be kept in a 55 gallon. Dollar per gallon sales usually only go up to the 55 gallon tank sizes, boooooooo. Not too much noteworthy is going on with my tanks these days, I am not really adding much stock at the moment. Was able to sell off some neon swordtails and the butterfly goodeids at our local club's fall auction, and picked up some pygmy cories. :3
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Oct 12, 2014 22:49
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Hey guys, been a while. RE: INSECT SPRAYS AND TANKS -- I have not done this personally, but over the years, the consensus in threads that I have seen on different forums is this: for spraying, the entire tank and stand should be shrouded in those thin plastic sheets that painters use as drop sheets. Turn off filtration, but leave on aeration, during the spraying. Foggers and tenting are completely incompatible with fishtanks. RE: IS THERE ENOUGH ROOM IN MY TANK? https://www.aqadvisor.com won't do much for you if you are searching for personality or behavior compatibility of fish, but it will tell you what your situation is like based on your current tank's size, stocking, and filtration setup. The very first post links to it as well, but this thread is getting up there in page numbers, so I'm putting that out there for any newcomers to check it out if they haven't already. The 300 gallon is ticking along fine, the peacock bass are both over a foot long each now and horsing around in the 'no I don't want to make babies with you' sort of way, the severums are dish-sized, the phenomenal Raphael is placing in open-category bowl shows, and unstoppable force of the fully grown breeding pair of jags are still eternally meeting the immovable (or at least impenentrably armored) force of the saddleback bichir. I haven't come across (or grown out) any other large fish lately to add to the tank, but eh, that's fine. Just not terribly interesting to write about.  I picked up a pair of cockatoo dwarf cichlids Apistogramma cacatuoides at our club's most recent post-meeting mini-auction, and they spawned a grand total of 4 days after purchase. I screwed up though fiddling around with the tank netting out some tetras, so they got upset and abandoned the eggs.  Womp womp. Glad they like the tank set up and water though, better luck next time.I also have joined the ranks of discus keepers -- which doesn't seem as terrifying a prospect as I had previously imagined. I took a shot on a half-dollar sized trio that I purchased for like... $5.33 each. The water change schedule that I am used to with large predators (aka lots of nitrogenous waste which requires beaucoup water changes) seems to mesh well with the requirements of these guys. I was expecting some fragile things permanently wed to a diet of tiny live worms, but they do in fact have the charm and personality that you'd expect for New World cichlids, and have started accepting Massivore and occasional scraps of flaked chicken. They are called Stendket Santarem, which as far as I can tell, is the (legal) exporter and German importer names of the parents. These rate as my first pedigreed fish, haw.   
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Nov 11, 2014 22:54
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Awww, sad. I really do like roselines. As rapidly as the Denison's declined, I would say columnaris, which is a very aggressive gram-negative bacterial infection -- surface infections would look white and patchy. A lot of pictures on the image search show it as ulcers on much larger fish, although I have never seen that particular presentation in person. It's pretty bad news because anything that works on it also kills your beneficial bacteria. For now, I would increase the frequency of water changes in the origin tank, possibly add some in-tank UV filtration, if you didn't want to get rid of your stock. It can rip through a whole tank in a few days if water conditions aren't improved. Be very careful. (Here's a URL to refer to: http://freshaquarium.about.com/cs/disease/p/columnaris.htm )
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Nov 22, 2014 02:02
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Re: Page 68 -- Jesus Christ, you loving savages, just buy some goddamned Tricaine already. Give a little bit at first to get the fish stoned off its rear end, then dump the rest in to send it off to lala land. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tricaine_mesylate http://www.wchemical.com/tricaine-s-ms-222.html ----- Big fat stupid bass are still around. Here's some pics.   Have a gross lumpy head too. This is Stripey, a hybrid between an azul and a monoculus.peacock bass. 
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Dec 21, 2014 03:20
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75 gallons, wanting a large centerpiece fish thaat is reasonably compatible with other tankmates? Start researching severums. 
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Dec 31, 2014 23:13
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Dantu, can you check the pH? Severums can tolerate much lower pHs than oscars, and I know many hobbyists, myself included, don't check pH if all the nitrogen tests check out. Lately, I have found this to be the case when my jags (who come from clear, faster waters with more neutral pHs like oscars) start languishing because the pH has dropped down REALLY low. The severums snd peacock bass don't give a single gently caress since they come from black water habitats with pHs as low as 3.5, and I have to adjust the pH up with incremental additions of baking soda. I usually try to keep mine above 6, since anything below that causes most nitrifying bacteria to stop working. Also, can you provide us with some pics or video? I'm particularly interested in closeups of your Oscar's head. The sluggish behavior and loss of appetite is consistent with advanced Hexamita or Spironucleus disease, but it doesn't match your water conditions (which I will assume have been like that for at least the past few months). These type of protozoal intestinal diseases usually are the result of resident parasites blooming when an animal has a weakened immune system -- and if it's advanced enough that he's listing, then I expect that he may be showing hole in the head or lateral line erosion (hence why I am asking for pictures). If that does turn out to be the case, I have a horror story with a happy ending for you. Otherwise, it sounds like swimbladder disease or other organ failure.
Fusillade fucked around with this message at 19:19 on Jan 17, 2015 |
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Jan 17, 2015 17:40
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Cowslips Warren posted:Reminds me of Monsterfishkeepers, where people openly keep illegal fish and brag about it. And wonder why more legislation is passed to make more species illegal. NOW you're painting with broad strokes.
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Jan 17, 2015 20:04
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If he's worth it to you, quarantine him and pound him with tetracycline. It kills gram negative bacteria like Flexibacter columnaris /and/ your beneficial nitrifying bacteria, hence my suggestion to isolate. :P While it is true that columnaris is ubiquitous, we should not ignore the role of increased pathogen dose and the degree of exposure for your other tank residents.
Fusillade fucked around with this message at 01:17 on Jan 19, 2015 |
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Jan 19, 2015 00:57
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Large fish can take a gruesomely long time to die. :< Hope to see pics soon enough to diagnose. Doesn't sound like fungus to me. something's going on with his slime coat -- oscars will do that when they are ill. Entire sheets of it will slough off and be replaced once the fish is feeling better. I'd advocate for a water change and a dose with salt at a rate of 1 tablespoon per 5 gallons as a tonic. Did you do the pH check?
Fusillade fucked around with this message at 02:57 on Jan 22, 2015 |
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Jan 22, 2015 02:53
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I see the pics now -- he doesn't have ich, he doesn't have hole in head either. The white sheet looks like an opportunistic colonization by bacteria scavenging his slime coat. I really don't think it is the primary cause of his illness. Yes, marine salt is fine to use. I would really suggest getting a standard pH test ki, you really need to be able to see the lower pH ranges because freshwater does not have the same buffering capacity as salt water, any little bit of imbalance can cause it to dip down really low. We're trying to get this guy's home to somewhere between 6.5 and 7.2, and we have no way to tell if he's swimming in water of a pH of 4 or 7. The good news is that he doesn't look peaked along his nuchal area,which means his muscles haven't started wasting from starvation. You still have time. Fusillade fucked around with this message at 03:37 on Jan 22, 2015 |
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Jan 22, 2015 03:17
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Aww, yay :3 I am glad you had the marine salt, it has some minerals in it (mostly calcium) that may have helped bump up the pH (if it was an issue. He's looking a lot better, the flashing is probably from skin irritation from the broken slime coat. I would not mess aound with antibiotics at this point, because they will wreck your biological filtration. Give him a few days first to heal up, the salt encourages slime coat recovery. Antibiotics may not be necessary.
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Jan 22, 2015 04:21
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Water hardness is caused by minerals in water, particularly bicarbonate. It may be worth checking KH to see if there is any calcium in there as well (my guess is that calcium is there,but it's worth checking out). Crustraceans need both calcium and trace amounts of iodine as a moulting aid. I use iodized table salt in the tanks for my inverts at the rate of 1 teaspoon per five gallons (note this is less than the standard suggested 1 tablespoon per 5 gallons for aquarium salt). Be mindful that iodized salt will often have anti-caking agents in it -- it's up to you to determine if you have specialized needs that would make this a problem (it isn't an issue for most hobbyists keeping community tanks). Speaking of, here's a pic of a self-cloning marbled crayfish with her current parthenogenic brood! 
Fusillade fucked around with this message at 00:00 on Apr 15, 2015 |
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Apr 14, 2015 23:57
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Desert Bus posted:Cat friends: Oooh, how big is that raphael currently? They make great cleanup crew for aggro tanks.
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May 15, 2015 01:25
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Not much has changed with my stock. Currently all the tanks are as (under)stocked as I would like, and the fish are grown. My posts will become more interesting once my own spawn doesn't require quite as much attention. Here's my same damned old boring fish that I've been posting pics of. She's about 15 inches now. I expect her to stop at about 18, maybe 20 if I am a good girl and keep up with my water changes.   
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Jun 13, 2015 02:34
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r0ck0 posted:^ Peacock bass? Yes, she is an orino, so she won't be a tankbuster the same way a temensis would be. Congrats on getting your troubleshooting sorted out.
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Jun 13, 2015 18:48
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McStephenson posted:Thoughts? I'm kind of reeling/upset about seemly messing this up but I feel like I'm doing what I am supposed to, it just seems like a lot is going wrong all at once... Tell me more about your source water. Is it chlorinated? What is the pH out of the tap? What is the pH in the tank? (beneficial bacteria don't do so well below a pH of 6). Does your water have lots of dissolved minerals in it (hard, helps buffer pH), or does it have very little (soft, pH is vulnerable to large swings)? I agree with what others have said about small water changes. And Len, for that 10 gallon tank, I'd put the fish in a small tupperware container, siphon the water and discard it. Leave just enough to keep your substrate (soil, gravel, etc.) wet.
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Jun 17, 2015 01:23
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republicant posted:When you guys were first starting out did you have any fish or inverts die directly because of your inexperience/lack of knowledge? And do you ever feel guilty about it or just chalk it up to learning and not making the same mistake? Yes, even after 20 years in the hobby, I have done something as stupid as 'be too distracted and forgot to dechlorinate the water'. I lost all my hatchetfish and discus once because of that. Absolutely no excuse. :<
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Aug 18, 2015 00:35
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Argh, what a bummer the past few pages have been! Thank you for sharing though, the process of rehabilitating very sick animals regrettably is not always successful. Now, for something a bit different.... "WHAT'S IN THE BOX?!?!?!"  I won't let the suspense build, so.... There's water, bags, styrofoam, newspaper, rubberbands in this box...  And fish!  One of the interesting things about shipping large fish is that you really should not drip acclimate them. They excrete a lot of ammonia (and uric acid) during overnight shipping. The pH drops from the uric acid and the CO2 they exhale, which makes the ammonia (relatively) non-toxic. As soon as the bag is opened up, the CO2 is flushed, and this raises the pH back to levels where the ammonia can begin burning fish. This process is accelerated by dripping, as well, since the pH would be raised by the water you're adding in. So, drip acclimation for bigger fish is a bad idea. These kiddos are rarely imported -- Brazil has pretty good conservation laws for the rivers that they don't dam up, which means the importer I got them from is properly licensed. They also immediately deworm and QT the fish for at least a week prior to offering them for sale. My husband knows how much they cost (I will not speak of it to my coworkers or family), and the saving grace for me is that 1.) I'm the breadwinner, and 2.) I have been wanting these for years. These are wild juvenile Cichla kelberi from the Rio Araguaia. They will be beautiful once they get a bit older! 
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Sep 5, 2015 12:33
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Tahirovic posted:I envy you people with so much space, I guess that is a 100+ gal tank ? I would have trouble fitting a 40gal in my current apartment. This is their growout tank. It's a bit cramped at 55 gallons, but once they start eating regularly and get closer to 8 inches, it's off to the 300 gallon (which I have on a concrete slab foundation). Pbass aren't that difficult if you have the space and and the filtration and the water change schedule for them. Once you can get them past that baby stage of 1-3 inches, they are rock solid against parasites and disease, smart as the dickens, and a lot of fun.
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Sep 7, 2015 17:50
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No problem. I name each of my fish and tend to understock the tank though, so it's not as impressive as most 300 gallon setups I've seen before. I credit the understocking to my creatures' size, longevity, and in the case of the jags, lack of other fish murder when they're spawning. There's all of 8 fish in this picture. 2 peacock bass (one hybrid, one orinocensis), 2 severums (one gold, one green), 2 jags, 1 ginormous raphael cat, and 1 saddleback bichir. The male jag (closer to the center) is about a foot long. As far as filtration goes, I don't have anything particularly fancy. Two Fluval FX5s running in parallel (one for each corner overflow). Two titanium rod heaters attached to an external thermostat, one 1000 watt, one 300 watt. 1 of the FX5s, the 300 watt heater, and a pump with airstone are attached to a UPS that will last the tank for about an hour and a half, which is enough time for me to get the house switched over to gas generator power if it should go out (this has happened for longer than two days, twice in the past five years during ice storms). Once the tank gets replaced (it is used, and won't last forever), I will likely switch to black sand substrate, and find some way to plumb either a wet/dry sump, or a sand bed pool filter to improve the biofiltration. Fusillade fucked around with this message at 21:19 on Sep 7, 2015 |
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Sep 7, 2015 20:31
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Stoca Zola posted:Regarding the koi with the missing scales, I found info that koi carp were crossed with leather or mirror carp in order to get different patterns of scales/no scales. I don't think that koi is actually sick after all, I think it could be a doitsu koi but perhaps not one that came out the way the breeder wanted. So don't worry you probably don't have a manky sick fish after all. I agree with this assessment, the scales on that particular fish is a result of line breeding, not disease. You'll see similar patterns if you do an image search for 'mirror koi'.
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Sep 23, 2015 00:13
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Whoa, lots of stuff to catch up on! Enos, happy to see your progress on giving those frontosas a bigger home! Congrats on the fry, it's pretty cool when you have large fish doing well enough to breed when you're not expecting it. ShaneB, my experience with swordtails is that they will cannibalize some of their fry, so you really won't have to worry about getting overrun. Granted, the tank I had them in was pretty lightly planted, but the other fish you mentioned will also help keep their numbers in check. Desert Bus, how big is Tank right now? I would love pics, I love raphaels, they've got these fantastic serrated spears for pectoral and dorsal fins, and spikes on the apex of each segment of their armor, they're a pretty hard fish. I have had my striped raphael for about 5 years now. Orson Wells is part of the clean-up crew for my 300 gallon tank, and has prospered -- He's somewhere between 8 and 9 inches, looking forward to your guy getting up to that size. Update time: I have had the Rio Araguia kelberi for a month now, and they've gotten some size on them. The largest is 6" now, so he's put on about an inch. They are starting to get their yellow spangles around their black bars. They are all on pellet food, with occasional treats, so they will really start putting on size now. Here's a shot of the trio.  Also, Nessie (as in the Loch Ness Monster) says hi. If you ever wanted to know what "the lights are on but no one's home" looks like, this is it. Nessie is a 16" saddleback bichir (Polypterus endlicheri). Enlarge for best effect. 
Fusillade fucked around with this message at 03:09 on Oct 4, 2015 |
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Oct 4, 2015 02:59
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Coolwhoami posted:<<small fish Columnaris ordeal>> Columnaris is hard to diagnose in smaller fish. For whatever reason, I only see good pictures of it on large aquacultured fish (farmed salmon, catfish, etc). And then, it looks very different -- open sores and ulcers the size of a nickel or quarter. As you can imagine, an open sore the size of a nickel or quarter will have consumed the entirety of a guppy. The best pictures I have found for columnaris in small aquarium fish have been using a google search for 'saddleback disease'. I don't know of any concentration of salt that is actually therapeutic for columnaris (ie, that 'kills' it), but dosing the tank at about a tablespoon for every five gallons is a good tonic for fish and will help with mucosal recovery and electrolyte transfer across gills. Keep up with the antibiotics for Gram-negative bacteria. The advice about keeping the temperature low is good, this will keep the bacteria from dividing as quickly (ensure that it is below 75*F, and as close as possible to the lower end of your creature's normal temperature range). Did you pull out your biological media?
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Oct 10, 2015 01:27
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Excellent description, haha. That's about the right amount of shaking needed for nitrate test reagents.
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Oct 25, 2015 03:49
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Looks good for a nursery tank. Not every tank in a house is going to be a show tank. Here's Bloop chowing down on a fistful of Massivore. 
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Nov 8, 2015 03:32
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| # ¿ May 12, 2024 18:27 |
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Desert Bus posted:Holy wow, you people have been through some poo poo while I wasn't paying attention again, but I'm finally all caught up. Since my last update forever ago I lost my Festivum. It just really really wanted to gently caress my F Opaline Gourami and she was not into it. My Green Myrio and Red Cobamba are still growing like crazy, and my Madagascar Lace went from "pretty sure this is dead" to "this is HUGE and flowering a second time in a row? Neat!" I finally gave my M/F Kribensis caves to encourage them to make babies, nothing yet, but it's only been a couple of days. Yessssssssssssss. I love striped raphaels. Still have my big fattie, he's been poaching the jaguar's (yet another batch of) babies. And I am glad to see that things are turning around in this thread, things were mighty bleak for a while. Saw someone ask about UV killing protozoa -- it can, but it has to have a long dwell time with a high wattage, and will only kill the things in your water column! The recommended UV doses vary depending on what you are trying to kill, generally algaicidal doses will also kill bacteria. Protozoa and external parasites are tougher (provided that they are in their free-swimming state). It is not a catch-all for killing ich, though, since it can fall down into the substrate and hang out for a while. Over time, yes, UV is fantastic as a tool for reducing the burden of undesirable microbes in water, but it should not be depended upon as a sole source of treatment for an acute ich infestation. Here's a page with a bit more info about the dosing: http://www.peteducation.com/article.cfm?c=16+2148&aid=2855 Things are pretty dull in my tanks (but on the bright side, this continues the streak of non-horror stories!), the kelberis are growing a bit larger, and the biggest tank still has the same eight fish as forever ago. No new projects planned for myself this up coming year, but I'd love to hear what others have got planned.
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Dec 22, 2015 02:30
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