Esther on Alfred!
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Esther on Alfred!
Monday, April 9th, 2007Genetically Modified Tropical Fish
Tuesday, April 3rd, 2007You may have noticed the banner advert at the footer of the blog Campaigning for the Ban on Dyed Tropical Fish led by PraticalFishkeeping.
I’ve been seeing quite a few Pink/Red Zebra Danios of late in the local tropical fish shops, and thought these were colour endhanced, but they could be possibly genetically modified. If these fish are GMed, they are illegal in the UK, as a license from DEFRA to keep and import is requried.
Last night a program called Animal Farm stated that GMed fish could be on-sale across the world.
The following four minute clipped was aired on Channel 4’s Animal Farm last night (2 April 2007).
Mystery Tree in the front garden.
Sunday, April 1st, 2007We’ve finally worked out what one of the trees in our front garden is.
It’s a Magnolia Tree!
A very special fish – Nannacara adoketa
Friday, March 30th, 2007I saw these fanastic, stunning, excellent South American Dwarf Cichlids two weeks ago in a local tropical fish shop in York. Unfortunately, I didn’t have the quarantine space to purchase these fish at the time, and was tempted to purchase them, and ask the shop to keep them a few weeks for me. (All fish into the fish house is quarantined, before moving to different holding/breeding/display tanks)
I didn’t purchase them two weeks ago, and I didn’t post a blog entry either, just in case any other readers snapped them up! (crafty eh!). I’ve only ever seen Nannacara anomala, which I had a pair of many years ago, and successfully bred – another lovely South American Dwarf Cichlid, until 12 months ago, when a local fishkeeper, which specialises in Rare South American Cichlids, show me he/she had managed to breed successfully Nannacara adoketa – but he/she wasn’t selling any young, despite how much money I offered! It is possible that these are the young fish sold to a local shop, because I know he/she visits the same shop.
But I did purchase them today. Five Nannacara adoketa in total, three large fish, and two smaller fish. (Well it was payday!)
Four Nannacara adoketa photographed from above, in Fintro.
Single Nannacara adoketa, poor picture, try and get some better pictures.
I’ll quarantine the fish, feed them up for a few months, and later get a breeding tank ready.
Corydoras julii or Corydoras sterbai?
Friday, March 23rd, 2007I visited a local Pet Shop in York on Tuesday, that sells a few “bread and butter” tropical fish, looking for Algarde right-angled airline elbows to finish off my centralised air reservoir. Tuesday was the day, that they had just received their new stock of tropical fish for the week, the fish were not currently for sale, because they wait for 24 hours before selling any fish (good to see!). After looking around the tanks, I noticed two large Corys in one tank and I was 99 percent sure, I knew what they were, so I asked the Pet Shop Owner, how much they were, without trying to readily indentify them, (so he could look them up on his invoice!). He told me they were labelled and pointed to a label stating “Corydoras julii 4.25 GBP”. I immediately paid the man, and said I would collect in Wednesday, unfortunately, I was unable to collect until this evening, and I did think, that they might had sold them to someone else, or identified them correctly.
On returning this evening they were still there, quickly netted and handed over to me, but he did say I don’t think there julii’s, and then told me it would be the suppliers loss, because if the supplier doesn’t have the number of Julii’s he asks for, they just drop any other Cory in at the same price! I feel better now! Pet Shop doesn’t lose any money, just the distributor!
Anyway it was a chance to try out the Fintro…
Here’s the pictures..What do you think Corydoras julii or Corydoras sterbai?
Introduced using the Fintro
Corydoras julii or Corydoras sterbai?
Corydoras julii or Corydoras sterbai?
The Fintro by Maidenhead Aquatics
Friday, March 23rd, 2007The Fintro – Fish Acclimatisation Unit or Fish Introduction Unit call it what you like, I’ve been trying to make one of these for years, using plastic yoghurt cartons, plastic fruit boxes, the best method I found was to use Ferrero Rocher plastic boxes, with holes drilled in the bottom, the only problem, I could never get the water fill/flow rate correct, or the stability of the plastic box in the water.
Now these problems, have been solved with the The Fintro by Maidenhead Aquatics. I know this device has just been reviewed in the March 2007 Issue of PracticalFishkeeping Magazine, but I was keen to purchase a two units, and test it for myself. I purchase many fish for the fish house (too many sometimes!), and the older method of just floating the tropical fish in the bag from the tropical fish shop fvor 30 minutes has long been proved in-correct. I usually introduce fish into my quarantine tanks, by floating the bag to equalize temperatures, but I also remove water from the bag, and throw away, and slowly over a period of 30-45 minutes, replace the water in the bag with tank water. This lessens the stress on the fish, by gradually introducing the fish to your aquariums water chemistry, rather than causing toxic shock due to vast pH changes.
- Float the Fintro in your aquarium.
- Transfer the fish from bag to Fintro, making sure the fish are in the bottom chamber, and there is at least 1cm of water in the upper chamber. (make sure this is over the tank, because although there is a one-way valve,if you fill the Fintro, not over a tank, water will go on the floor!)
- The Fintro has a valve which permits a very slow trickle of water to gradually fill it, giving time for your new fish to adjust to the aquarium water conditions.
- After approximately 45 minutes the Fintro will be completely full and sink to the bottom of the tank, releasing the fish.
The Fintro by Maidenhead Aquatics
Python Syphon Drain Adaptor
Thursday, March 22nd, 2007My fish house already has a 40mm/1.5 inch ABS waste pipe to drain so I can syphon water direct from tanks to a drain outside the fish house, without using buckets or a house pipe. After I purchased the Python Syphon which connects to a standard tap, there needs to be a drain immediately underneath the tap to catch the waste water, most people probably connect to a tap above a sink, or an outside tap. I could have connected it to an outside tap, but neither of my outside taps, have a drain underneath, and I would have to go in and out fo the fish house, to control draining and filling the tanks.
Here’s a simple solution. 5 inches of 30mm ABS waste pipe, 30mm-40mm reducer, 30-50mm reducer, 3 inches of 50mm ABS waste pipe, cut to shape.
Python Syphon drain adaptor
The Python Syphon
Sunday, March 18th, 2007Let me introduce you to the The Python Syphon. It’s a clever device that connects to your household or outside tap, a 25 foot length of clear UV stabilized, non-porous tubing connects to a fast disconnection snap device, which connects to a conventional 10 inch gravel tubes. Extended length gravel tubes are available for deeper tanks. (I’ve also got a 30 inches one as well!), but the largest is a massive 72 inches, handy for those acryllic hexagonal tanks. There is also an on/off tap which allows you to stop syhphoning or filling up with water.
This is the brains of the Python Syphon. This is connected to the tap, the tap is turned-on fully, and the Faucet Pump as it is called, has a oulet on the end which is pulled down into the “Drain” position, this has the effect of water passing through the device causing a venturi action.
Venturi Action – The vacuum created by manipulating the speed of a stream of water. The incoming water stream is restricted by a nozzle, while the speed of the outgoing water is decreased by the inverted funnel shape at the bottom of the venturi. The result is a vacuum in the middle, where the waste-water from the tank is sucked into the water stream.
This venturi action is a well known principle used in filters, to bleed air into tanks e.g. Eheim Diffusors use the same principle to suck air into tanks to aertate the returned water.
To fill a tank, the outlet nozzle is pushed up into the Fill postion, water is then diverted up the syphon tube into the tank.
The only issues, I’ve had is in my fish house, I have a internal water supply, but the drain I use for syphoning water away, uses conventional 40mm waste pipe, near each tank for ease. I didn’t want to connect to an external tape outside the fish house, because when working in the fish house, I don’t want to be opening and closing the door, and going in and out, to turn on and off the tape etc
I have finally “designed” and “implemented” “an adaptor” to allow me to use my Python Syphon with ease in the fish house.
If you are still filling and emptying tanks with buckets and a conventional syphon tubes, STOP and purchase The Python Syphon today. One of the Best Inventions Ever for the Aquatic Market.
The correct name is “Clean and Fill No Spill Aquarium Maintenance System” The original and patented
If you’ve got a few minutes, click the above links to view and read the Patents on the No Spill system and if you dig deep enough into the Patent Archives, you’ll quickly see, that Python, didn’t originally design this! A Patent was filed at the US Patents office in 1931 for a similiar device called the Filling and Draining device. Later syphons, were associated with aquariums in the 1950s.
Interesting stuff …
A Bit of Car Loving!
Saturday, March 10th, 2007Most of you probably know we drive a Peugeot Talbot 205 Rallye Sport Special.
Yes : We still have it!
We’ve had the Yellow Peril for many years, and despite 157,900 miles on the clock, it’s still going, unlike many other 205s which have since gone to the Great Scrapyard in the Sky.
This isn’t anything to do with the house, but what the heck, it’s my blog, and the site is about Andysworld.
The Solex carburetor has been playing up for many years due to possibly a worn throttle linkage or ice in the carburetor on cold mornings, in the winter it can sometimes be a pregnant dog, and in the summer also or it just needs a knew carb, or someone that understands them that can strip it down and clean it!
Today, I thought it was time to give the car some luvvving…So I’ve cleaned the leather seats ready for some leather nourishment cream, fixed a hole in the boot with Isopan P40/aluminium mesh and cleaned the carburetor with Redex.
Here is the video of The Redex Experiment hosted on You Tube.
After test driving the car, it certainly has more poke than before, and the throttle seems more responsive! We will see what those damp/cold mornings are like next week.
Mission to Leeds
Friday, March 9th, 2007I was hoping to go to Leeds this evening to collect a pair of Yellow Longfin Quad CrownTail Betta Splendens but I’ve just had a text message from the breeder that has informed me that the male has died! So it doesn’t look as if I’m going now!
The breeder came home to find his landlord had moved tables and shelves whilst fixing the central heating system. Having done this, it knocked all the cards away from inbetween the containers and left all the males able to see each other!
Male Yellow Longfin Quad CrownTail Betta Splendens, I was hoping to collect!
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