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Fluidized Bed Filters

Saturday, August 27th, 2005

On a happier note, I’ve finally managed to purchase a powerhead Aquarium Systems Maxijet PH600 to drive my Lifegard FB300 Fluidized Bed Filters, the Hagen 201 powerheard I’ve had for about 100 years finally died, by welding the impellar housing into the body of the powerhead. Sand or Fluidized Bed Filters are extremely efficient high capacity filters, just make sure your oxygenate the tank well, as oyxgen in the water decreases! Ideal for overstocked tanks of fish, but this is not an axcuse for regular water changes and regular testing of water for ammonia, nitrite and nitrate. They are also fascinating to watch, remember those Sand Pictures in the 80s! TIP Before installing in the tank run for several days after filling to remove all the dust from the filter media, or you’ll end up with a very cloudy tank.


Lifegard FB300 Fluidized Bed Filter on test in the garden before installing into aquarium.

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An era comes to and end! Goodbye Animal-House!

Saturday, August 27th, 2005


In search of Hikari Algae Wafers I travelled to one of my favourite Tropical Fish Outlets in Bately near Leeds in West Yorkshire. I often visit Animal House every few months to purchase some dry goods and have a look at the Tropical Fish section. I’ve been purchasing dry goods from Animal House for 25 years and they always used to advertise in Practical Fish Keeping. Something was odd, I noticed that their website had a statement stating the following

The Animal House website is currently suspended as at 20th August 2005. Customers with outstanding orders will receive letters within the next few days.

I thought this was very strange and may they had technical difficulties with the website or had a securirty breach. I telephone on Friday 26 August 2005, the answering machine message stated they were stocking taking but the store was still open.

On arriving at the store today, it was clearly obvious by the lack of cars the store was closed. Animal House has CLOSED DOWN. The store always seemed very busy at weekends, especially Bank Holiday Weekends, I never understood why they stopped advertising in Practical Fishkeeping.

Many rumours are circulating as to why they have closed, we will probably never know. What’s happening my local Garden Centre has closed their Tropical Fish Section trading; Maybe eBay Traders are to blame with their low overheads operating from bedrooms and garages across the country. Why not visit a local tropical fish shop this Bank Holiday Weekend and put some of your hard earned coppers in their pockets, If we lose all the high street tropical fish outlets, will we have to result to purchasing Online! I hope not!

Goodbye Animal House and thanks for all the dry goods I’ve purchased from you in the last 25 years.

P.S. Where do I cash in my Privilege Gold card points?

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Photographs of fish

Friday, August 26th, 2005

I’ll add some more photographs of the fish in the fish house over the weekend time permitting, I’m on the search for the elusive Hikari Algae Wafers, and I’ve got to fit time in to collect more fish, but more on that when I’ve got the fish. I’ve spent a little time this morning re-coding the blog, and adding some more fun stuff.

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Bristlenose catfish continued..

Thursday, August 25th, 2005

..and the Bristlenose catfish are settling in fine, overnight the 20 small catfish have removed all the algae from their quarantine tanks. I use Triton and PowerGlo tubes in the fish house to encourage maxiumum algae growth to feed L’s and other algae eating catfish. If you look at Angelfishcam1 the tank is covered in algae which also helps feed the fry, but the last time I introduced a young Bristlenose catfish the pair of Angelfish thought it was live food and ate it!

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Autumn approaches..

Thursday, August 25th, 2005

The nights are getting shorter and colder, the minimum fish house temperature has dropped to 20 degrees C during the night, I’ve now started to unwrap my “curtain” which is an old pink blanket, I use over the fish house external door to keep the cold draught out, and I’ve blocked the fish house entrance with a spare off-cut of jablite, I had to remove these during the summer because the fish house temperature rose to a staggering 40 degrees C. NOTE to self start to move items under the metal roof beams before condensation starts in the Winter and drips over items outside the fish house! Coming soon real-time temperatures of aquariums in fish house displayed via the web.

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Female Angelfish spawning

Wednesday, August 24th, 2005

This was photographed with a very old floppy based Sony FDMavica MVC-FD200 2.0 Mega-pixel digital camera.

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Hagen Nutrafin Cycle 236ml (8oz)

Wednesday, August 24th, 2005

I’ve just obtained some bulk quantities of Hagen Nutrafin Cycle, 236ml (8oz) bottles, Expiry Date 04/2006. I use it in the fish house all the time for maturing breeding tanks, and filters. TIP Pour a little Cycle on new filter media

A bargain at 5.00 GBP a bottle, a little less than RRP 7.49 GBP including p&p.

Nutrafin Cycle can be used to mature new aquaria and as a general filter booster.

Hagen claims that its bacterial cultures can remain viable for up to two years in unopened bottles, and for up to six months in opened bottles stored at room temperature.

Hagen also claims that it provides the highest bacterial dose on the market at around 500 billion live bacteria a time.
For maturing new tanks, you need to add 10ml per 35 l./8 gal. once a week during the first month and then switch to a regular maintenance dose.

Visit Hagen Website

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Bristlenose catfish Ancistrus sp.

Wednesday, August 24th, 2005

I’ve just collected another 20 1″-2″ Bristlenose catfish Ancistrus sp. from a local breeder, that’s a total of approx 40 I have now, these are ideal fish to keep the algae down in the fish house tanks, what I call biological control, no chemicals, no UV! I hope when they are larger, that I’ll at least obtain a pair of fish, I’ve got albino and the more common brown variety.

When I can figure out the blog code to add pictures, I’ll upload some pictures here also. I’ll also try and sort out the time stamps.

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Hikari Products

Wednesday, August 24th, 2005

After hearing rumours about import restrictions on Hikari Products, and the lack of availability of Hikari Algae Wafers that I feed my L’numbers and Ancistrus, I contacted the Sole UK Importer, and this was the statement they released

Hikari Stopped By EU Red Tape

PRESS RELEASE FROM PPI (sole UK Hikari distributor)

As you may already be aware, we have been experiencing difficulties with the import of Japanese fish foods which is affecting the supply of Hikari Fish Food in the UK and Europe

Many retailers are now out of stock of some of the varieties of Hikari while remaining stocks of other Hikari lines are now getting very low

This is due to import regulations laid down by the EU that have not yet been fully recognised by Japan. Kamihata Fish Industries (KFI), the suppliers of Hikari, have been working tirelessly with the Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries in Japan and Europe to ensure they are able to approve KFI’s production facility so that imports can be resumed

In terms of compliance there is absolutely no problem with regards to the standards of manufacture of Hikari Fish Food, it is just a matter of getting the correct paperwork in place. We anticipate that we will be able to start importing again within the next few weeks and hope that we can minimise any disruption to supply

We are planning to fly in our first shipments from Japan and we will be contacting stockists as soon as we have an arrival date so that we can ensure stocks are back in the shops as soon as possible

We sincerely apologise for any inconvenience this may cause and can assure you that we are doing everything possible to ensure Japan’s leading fish food will soon be available to its thousands of loyal customers in the UK

So cucumber and lettuce it is, until the situation is resolved.

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Welcome to my Fish House Blog.

Tuesday, August 23rd, 2005

Welcome, I’ll try my best to keep this blog updated daily on fish house events.

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