Alien Anna
Fish Gatherer
- Joined
- Jul 10, 2002
- Messages
- 2,087
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Hi Everyone,
since this topic came up I thought I'd look into it.
Here's the main Aqua Babies site.
As you can see, the theory sounds fine, particularly the stuff about "cycled gravel", however a quick look on their National Classroom Study site gives a different story - fatalities up to 24% over the 8 week duration of the study.
Not only that, but all but one Aqua Baby tank showed significant nitrite concentrations, and the one that didn't had the highest death rate (suggesting perhaps that the tank hadn't even got passed the ammonia stage of cycling?). It is quite clear, in my opinion, that the tanks were not actually cycled (a cycled tank has zero nitrite) and the deaths and nitrite levels over the 8 weeks are consistent with that. Cycling with fish typically takes 8-10 weeks.
Please note that even if the nitrite doesn't actually kill the fish, that doesn't mean to say they have got off scott-free - living in a poisoned environment causes significant suffering to fish (I believe) and may cause permenant damage to their internal organs, gills and immune system.
Incidently, how do you remove dead fish from the tank if it's an enclosed micro-environment? The instructions re. frog skins suggest you should leave it there as it's part of the mini eco-system!
As for species, several different species are used including white cloud mountain minnows, gold barbs, danios, rosy minnows, cherry barbs, guppies and endlers. Our new member with the Aqua Babies needs to figure out what species she has - presumably they're livebearers, as they've been breeding, so it's probably endlers or guppies of some kind. From her description, I'd suspect they were endlers or "Mosquito fish" (a wild kind of guppy).
Another part of the instructions suggests "Fish do not get lonely and one or two fish are fine in your little tank". This is despite the fact that the majority of species they use are schooling fish who are likely to be unhappy in groups lower than 6 (although in a community aquarium, so fish keepers might keep them in 3s). There also seems to be inadequate swimming space, especially for expert swimmers like danios, endlers and minnows.
Their tank cleaning instructions are, IMHO, likely to lead to the tank cycling every time it is cleaned out, and the recommendation to do a 25% water change once a month is way lower than it should be for such a small tank.
Most of all, I can't see why there is anything special about these Aqua Baby tanks that couldn't be said of an ordinary little tank you set up yourself?
since this topic came up I thought I'd look into it.
Here's the main Aqua Babies site.
As you can see, the theory sounds fine, particularly the stuff about "cycled gravel", however a quick look on their National Classroom Study site gives a different story - fatalities up to 24% over the 8 week duration of the study.
Not only that, but all but one Aqua Baby tank showed significant nitrite concentrations, and the one that didn't had the highest death rate (suggesting perhaps that the tank hadn't even got passed the ammonia stage of cycling?). It is quite clear, in my opinion, that the tanks were not actually cycled (a cycled tank has zero nitrite) and the deaths and nitrite levels over the 8 weeks are consistent with that. Cycling with fish typically takes 8-10 weeks.
Please note that even if the nitrite doesn't actually kill the fish, that doesn't mean to say they have got off scott-free - living in a poisoned environment causes significant suffering to fish (I believe) and may cause permenant damage to their internal organs, gills and immune system.
Incidently, how do you remove dead fish from the tank if it's an enclosed micro-environment? The instructions re. frog skins suggest you should leave it there as it's part of the mini eco-system!
As for species, several different species are used including white cloud mountain minnows, gold barbs, danios, rosy minnows, cherry barbs, guppies and endlers. Our new member with the Aqua Babies needs to figure out what species she has - presumably they're livebearers, as they've been breeding, so it's probably endlers or guppies of some kind. From her description, I'd suspect they were endlers or "Mosquito fish" (a wild kind of guppy).
Another part of the instructions suggests "Fish do not get lonely and one or two fish are fine in your little tank". This is despite the fact that the majority of species they use are schooling fish who are likely to be unhappy in groups lower than 6 (although in a community aquarium, so fish keepers might keep them in 3s). There also seems to be inadequate swimming space, especially for expert swimmers like danios, endlers and minnows.
Their tank cleaning instructions are, IMHO, likely to lead to the tank cycling every time it is cleaned out, and the recommendation to do a 25% water change once a month is way lower than it should be for such a small tank.
Most of all, I can't see why there is anything special about these Aqua Baby tanks that couldn't be said of an ordinary little tank you set up yourself?
/fish.orbust.net/forums/index.php?showtopic=9718
and should be stoppped. It is my opinion - I'm sure other's feel the same way?
now i see those poor fish being sold in stores that don't even have a pet department like the Bay.......just a new decoration....it's sick....just like the bettas in vases...one store is trying to sell them for $75+.....people see these things as an easy way to have a fish.....no cleaning or anything.....if they only knew the truth 
