Posts Tagged ‘fish’

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Tropical Fish Update

Tuesday, November 22nd, 2005

Female Platinum Angelfish
Recovering well, after a week of MelaFix, I’ve completed a 50% partial water change this evening with my new toy, more on that another day, on the tank, and added two Bristlenose catfish Ancistrus to eat the algae that the MelaFix has encouraged to grow in the last week.

Sturisoma Aureum
All the fry have hatched in the second batch, and are hanging around the tank, they are not free swimming yet, More have hatched in this latest batch. The first batch are ferocious eaters, and are eating well, on spinach. More have hatched in this latest batch. There is some doubt at present as too whether these are Sturisoma Aureum, need to take some better photographs to have them correctly identified.

Royal Pleco, Royal Parnague, Panaque sp. nigrolineatus L190
I forgot to mention a few weeks ago I purchased two small L190s from Tropica in Knaresborough (and if you’ve never been there your missing out!), when I purchased them, they were in individual tanks, the reason I was attracted to them, is they have different colourations to the existing L190 I have and have usually seen, these are a grey/blue slate colour. They were going to go into different quarantine tanks, but…due to fish moves, they went into the same quarantine tank. For the first 24 hours, they were fine, but then they started fighting like cats and dogs, and almost tore each other apart, so they were isolated, and have been doing very well since, on algae wafers and Sera Crisps, and Bogwood.

PFK has an article this month on L190s, and it’s featured on the front cover, so if you don’t know what one looks like, it’s on the December 2005 Issue, (scroll down the page – it’s on the right!)

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#&%@!?*$ Condensation!

Tuesday, November 22nd, 2005

No ceiling lights in the fish house this evening because condensation has dripped onto the electrics in flourescent lights and shorted them out. So that’s this weekends job.

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Second batch of Sturisoma Aureum Fry start to hatch

Sunday, November 20th, 2005

The second batch of Sturisoma Aureum fry start to hatch this evening. I’ve added some magical Polyfilter to the aquarium this evening, I always use Polyfilter in many tanks, just as a safeguard to remove organics from the water, this is no substitute for regular partial changes, but just a two pronged attack against rise in ammonia and nitrite, when growing on young fish. When the young Sturisoma Aureum from the first hatching are a month old, they will be removed to a grow-out tank (which has yet to be sited!).

I’m currently trialing the use of a 3kW fan heater in the fish house set at 1kW, on an electric thermotstat set to 20 degreesC to take the evening chill off the fish house.

I’ve also been using vast quantities of silicon sealer and odd bits of polysterene to stop the condensation drips! In my lunch break tomorrow, I’ll be making another trip to Barnitts to purchase some aquarium silicone sealer at bargain basement prices. Barnitts is an Hardware/Ironmonger/DIY store located in York. If they don’t stock it in Barnitts give up!

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Huey Hung Bio Sponge Filters

Friday, November 18th, 2005

No this isn’t an article about the cartoon character Hong Kong Phooey, but with a name like Huey Hung you might think so. Taiwan Huey Hung Aquarium Equipment Co was established in 1986, has been devoting all effort in aquaria equipments developing, producing and selling. They have the finest quality, most variety choices, such as fish food, technical filters, medical powder for discus, aquarium nurses medicines. They are not only successful in Taiwan but also in China, Hong Kong, Singapore and Malaysia. They have gained many high opinions and approvals from many countries. It is also well know around the world, but little is known of them in the United Kingdom, unless you are in the Discus breeding community, where their sponge filters and medications are well known.

I’ve been considering switching to the Huey Hung Bio Sponge Filters range, they have certain advantages over the more common, less expensive Algarde Bio-Foam Internal 200 Sponge filters.

  • Larger surface area.
  • Power-heads can be attached.
  • No need for airstone.
  • No need for suckers.

Huey Hung Sponge Filter
This is a photograph of a test Huey Hung Bio Sponge Filters in my grow-out tank. This sponge filter is the HH-02 Super leader sponge filter 200L model, I purchased this in an auction for a fiver, which is very cheap, RRP is about 8 GBP. The problems I’ve found with the Algarde sponge filters are

  • Airstones need regular replacement.
  • Suckers need regular replacement.

This costs time and money, the airstones shouldn’t be a problem, because I’ve got a box of 250, but the suckers keeping wearing out every few months, and I need to keep replacing them at a cost of approx 1 GBP per sucker. It’s getting expensive, replacing suckers.

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Silver Tri-bar/Pearlscale pair of Angelfish spawn

Thursday, November 17th, 2005

A Silver Tri-Bar/Pearlscale Pair of Angelfish spawn, must have been triggered by the partial water change, the male is guarding the eggs, which have been fertilised, there are a few that have fungus, but the male fish seems to be doing a good job.

This pair of Silver angels are have different markings to Standard silver angels, because they have three bars, rather than the usual two, on a pearscale pattern background.

The female Platinum seems to be recovering well at present, still treating the tank with 7ml MelaFix daily.

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Female Platinum Angelfish

Wednesday, November 16th, 2005

This picture shows the level of damage to one of the female’s eyes, the eye has been removed, the cornea can be seen attached, not a pleasant sight.

Platinum Female Angelfish Eye

I’m still treating the tank with 7ml of MelaFix, but she did not feed this evening, and I’m now concerned that she may be blinded in both eyes because of the attack by the male fish.

I’m consulting with my Vet next week on another animal matter, so I’m may talk to the Vet about the best possible treatment or euthanasia for this fish.

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Another violent male angelfish

Monday, November 14th, 2005

This tale is a rather gruesome, so stop reading now you’ve been warned, and is the worst violence committed by a Male Angelfish I have ever witnessed.

I noticed yesterday evening that the Male Platinum Angelfish was behaving very aggressively towards his Female partner, so I decided to separate them with a fish divider. I fed all the fish as normal this evening at 6.00pm, and carried out some partial water changes on breeding and grow-out tanks.

Before I left the fish house at 8.45pm this evening I noticed the Male Platinum Angelfish had jumped the divider and had been attacking the Female, the result of which has left the Female with damaged eyes, it is possible the female will lose at least one eye. I immediately removed the Male Platinum Angelfish.

To my knowledge, this pair has only spawned three times, one successfully, two failures. I do not know why the Male Platinum Angelfish, has started to behave this way.

I have now treated the tank with 7ml of MelaFix, which I will repeat daily for a week, in the hope I can save the Female Platinum Angelfish, as for re-introduction with the Male Platinum Angelfish, I’m uncertain.

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Spam Spam Spam and more Spam

Sunday, November 13th, 2005

Working the late shift last week and dealing with the spam attacks on this blog, I’ve not had chance to update my fish blog daily. Hopefully the spam attack will now stop, since I’ve changed some of the blog code, sorry if you spotted any stupid comments on this blog.

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Condensation

Wednesday, November 9th, 2005

As you’ve already probably felt today, the temperature has suddenly dropped across the country in the UK. The temperature outside the fish house, was just above freezing last night.

Because the roof of my garage is made of a single sheet of corrugated asbestos material, condensation occurs very easily, when the warm humid air hits the cold surface. Lots of condendsation must occur, above the insulation of jablite material, I’ve used to insulate the ceiling. The problem is eventually the condendation falls to earth, at the lowest point. I’ve been repairing some areas this evening, but the problem is, the water just leaks somewhere else!

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Ancistrus sp. on an algae holiday

Tuesday, November 8th, 2005

I kept forgetting to upload these photographs after the Bristlenose catfish Ancistrus sp. had completed their little task.

Most of the catfish I keep and have mentioned before consume algae wholly or as part of their diet. I use various prepared manufactured foods that contain algae that I feed to my catfish, but I do prefer that they have a chance to eat the real mccoy. It’s quite a challenge to grow alage of the correct type and quantity to satisfy the vegetarian catfish.

I’ve found that using a Sunglow & PowerGlo tube in combination stimulates high algal growth on two shelves in my fish house. I harvest the algae produced and use it as a food source in other catfish tanks and on occasion my catfish have an algae holiday.

Before

Before the introduction of two albino Bristlenose catfish Ancistrus sp. into an 18x18x18 cube, heavily covered in algae.

After

After 72 Hours. You can see one Bristlenose catfish Ancistrus sp. in the picture. There is still algae on the floor on the tank, that they not yet consumed.

I have also found with experimentation, that Bristlenose catfish Ancistrus sp., “Plecos” and other L numbers, become lazy, at eating natural alage in the aquarium, if they are reguarly feed on algae wafers!

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