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I don't worry if my water change water is one or two degrees higher than the tankwater. Lower would concern me. But thermometers and heaters are notoriously inaccurate. I try as much as I can not to use heaters - they have killed too many fish here. In an old thread, I mentioned how I had once...

They'd rapidly become extinct, which would solve the demand problem...

‘What is a cynic? A man who knows the price of everything and the value of nothing.’ – Oscar Wilde

We're calling it an aquarium club. We've collected a couple of sponsors, and have had 2 good turnouts. We have 3 speakers who've volunteered so far, and hope for more. slowly but steadily. You start with 2, and get to 20. After that, you keep trying.

The music teaching thing is interesting. My experience with teaching adults could be discouraging. They don't show up. I think we become so used to putting the demands of others first that we become very inept at self care. Selfish people, no, but they rarely want to learn. They know it all...

She can't be pregnant, as she's an egg layer. They brood the eggs in their mouths, but her throat doesn't look distended. They usually spit out the eggs or larvae if they're netted for transfer.

I'm more inclined to be upset at fast food ads for places that DO exist here. That stuff ruins you. But we're used to it as we have some different chains than the US, and we get cross border channels. My beef is music recordings from the early CD period, when I assume they were having digital...

I think that as long as we keep the tankwater clean, etc, they can live well. The huge IF is shipping. I think they need oxygen, and they have a reputation for either dying or coming in very rough when shipped. If they survive that, then with a little attention and skill, they're good. If...

We used to get wild form lineatus in pet stores. The first of the mutant green ones got people excited. And now, the more beautiful wilds are pretty well out of the North American hobby, replaced by huge numbers of green mutants descended from maybe one male that first showed the colour...

You must be - it's a fish that I kept for over a year, but I never got the colours they can have. And when I say over a year - mot much over a year. They are an "advanced" fish. Keeping Discus is like keeping goldfish when it comes to some of these blackwater tetras. I would love to get them...

That, uh, fishroom is finished comment in another thread... They are beautiful swordplants. But as others have noted, they are pretty well untrimmable. They'll grow to the surface. Since it would be a shame to waste them, I would get a larger, taller tank set up for South American fish, and use...

Probably. If the filter is well cycled, you'd be fine. But algae always returns until you figure out why it's doing so well.

If the test strips are kept dry and properly stored, they're great. But they are expensive on a per test basis. The API master test kit isn't very good, as to get the info you get from a good test strip, you need extra testing kits. It's a very limited product. But if all you want to test for...

I've often said my fishroom was complete, or that the way it was set up was finally 'just right'. I've also finished meals and said I was full, said I would never get another dog, said ...

Billings is the name of a tough High School I went to. I'm a lousy tourist, in that I'm a frugal cheapskate wherever I go. I spend like a local, and I walk usually 10-15 km minimum a day. I walk and people watch, though I can't pass an art museum or a fish store. I like very old cities, just...

The clocks have changed, so I woke up at my old time, thought I could go back to sleep and then heard a raccoon attacking the compost bin. I lay there, thinking it was secured and the thing couldn't get in, and that I could turn off my inner dog and snooze. But alas, I had to get up and chase it...

I could get snotty about people spending too much on fish, but I'm not sure how I'd calculate the prices on the fish I went to Gabon for and brought back. There was a whole other experience tied into that though... I've never been into large fish. I find that create a too sharp focus on how...

Next we'll have ball games where a homer is 3 points, but a sac fly only 1. Or no more wooden bats, so tech can get in as it has in hockey. To me, the perfect ball game has great pitching, solid fielding, stolen bases and clutch hitting. Power is great, but watching a guy trot around is dull. A...

The salaries reflect an entertainment industry. Forget that it involves sports - it's a soap opera, game show, drama and sometimes tragedy all rolled up in one. Baseball, the two footballs, hockey, basketball - we discuss them like they matter as more than just keeping us amused. The money is...

When I first read the reports out of China about a new respiratory virus, before it arrived here, the historian in me recognized an age old problem. It looked like the then unnamed COVID was going kill as it did, so for once in my life I stocked up. On what? Dog food. I was prepared to go...

I would put an investigative team to follow the red tailed shark, especially at night when they're known to attack tankmates. They don't all do it, but a lot of them do. They're not fish I would have in the same tank as a Cory. They share the same niche, and so compete, and one of them is known...

Chickens tried to have a fish forum, but the level of conversation wasn't up to scratch. It wasn't a forum anyone would cross the road for.

Ouch. It appears he has been badly bitten by something, and the wound is well infected. Hopefully, someone from your region can check in a say what possible meds are available to you.

As much as I 'hate' the Yankees, they too have some homegrown talent. Judge, for a start. A well run team can develop some solid players. If they don't, they end up with a bunch of overpaid stars and a thin lineup. You can hold a team like Toronto up as contrast. They had a huge payroll last...

I'll respectfully say you're wrong. That's one of the old recurring myths of the aquarium world - a classic idea that returns because we want to hear it. It's getting a hard sell right now online, but so are all myths. The balanced aquarium, between plants , fish and water changes is never...

The hyporheic zone is a bit bigger than my aquaclear sponge. But it is going to be fantastic to learn about. My reading for the next few weeks is set.

Watch the weather reports for Orlando (to pick a habitat region at random). That will give you the temperature range for future outdoors keeping. I seem to remember you in California, right? Your location is pretty vague to comment on temperature ranges! As well what does 'heated' mean? I have...

Rescue fish from strangers are russian roulette. Sometimes you have to be hard hearted. Why are they alone? It could be they were bought by someone who didn't do their homework first. But it could also be that someone bought ten, which carried an infection that killed nine and may be dormant...

My Dad was a Brooklyn fan, and still half followed the team when it went to LA. I have a soft spot for them, as mercenary as many of them are. The players chase big money, the owners have big money, so you live with it. Congrats Dodgers fans. Anyone who beats the Yankees is okay with me. I like...

It's funny. I'm using UGFs again, after 30 years or so, tied into my central air system. I don't use the filter plate type, but the piping ones (a DIY type popular in the 1980s - there was one in an second hand tank I bought and it worked very well until I switched to HOBs). I grew plants in it...

In my eye, those are lovely discus. I tend to buy bug bites in flake, because I now keep such small fish. I do have a coffee grinder for pellets though.

I kept and bred them a number of years ago, and really liked them. After the first spawning grew up, I had them in 3 tanks, but stopped breeding them and eventually put them out in our fish club for others to enjoy. They were aggressive in defence of their young, but from an another angle...

When a Cichlid or other territorial fish is defeated in nature, it leaves. In a tank, there's nowhere to go. When they get themselves into a corner at the surface, it means they are going to die if you don't move them out. They are utterly defeated and can't do what's natural - run for it. It's...

The water flow doesn't need to slow down. The habitats for the pulcher are brooks, and thomasi can handle what an aquarium offers and more. As long as they can get out of the current somewhere, they're good. You are describing normal riverine aggression. If you had mbuna, it would be mayhem...

Back when Discus were sold a pompadour fish, there was a lot of innovation just to keep them alive with very little technology. Homemade food mixes were one, and even though I never intend to keep a Discus again, I'm beholden to the old fishkeepers who came up with the recipes. I'll now increase...

As aquarists, we work on a way smaller scale and couldn't do this, but it can make us think. https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/to-revive-a-river-restore-its-hidden-gut1/

I now know how fish feel when we suddenly add a bigger filter. Yesterday evening we had a wind burst, a sudden violent downdraft and swirl that walloped us with rain and sent everything flying. All the coloured leaves from the maple by the front window are gone - stripped off in seconds, and...

Fresh out of the store, you can make mistakes from photos, as they need some recovery time. I find them easy to sex 'live'. It's the belly shape I go by - slender males, heavier bellied females.

I have a blender, though a food processor would be better. I buy white fleshed fish (less oil in the water) and shrimp. I mince them up as fine as I can manage. I can then mince veggies, or buy pureed vegetable baby food. I use a lot of dulse, a red seaweed that's all along the coast here. The...

It's not nostalgia that makes me like wild form Discus. It's their beauty. A good wild discus is astonishing, although a good wild discus can cost between $500 and $1000. I've never seen a linebred discus that even got close. The linebreds have colours that punch you in the nose. You can't miss...