Disturbing Over Heard Conversation At Lfs.

[LisaLQ]

Min tank size for a common is 4ft x 18" x 18" which works out at 75g. But I must say before anyone gets scared by the recent spate of "they get to 2ft" comments - they dont. Not in an aquarium. In the large breeding ponds in warm climates, and in the wild - yes. But in a tank, they rarely go over 18", more usually 12-18".

 

[xing]

Min tank size for a common is 4ft x 18" x 18" which works out at 75g. But I must say before anyone gets scared by the recent spate of "they get to 2ft" comments - they dont. Not in an aquarium. In the large breeding ponds in warm climates, and in the wild - yes. But in a tank, they rarely go over 18", more usually 12-18".

agreed. I had a sailfin in my 6' tank that grew to around 13"-14" before passing away after having him for nearly 10 years (why do I call all plecs "him"??)

 

[TSWisla]

You can not be too surprised, I have heard people in a shop tell customers to empty tanks and to wash them with a little soap and water! Top that one!

 

[kribensis12]

My teacher has a baby plec in her 5 gallon( I know too small) and it has been there for almost a year and hasent gotten any bigger. It is very cute! It is a blackish color and alot of golden teardrops on it. Anyone know what it is?

 

[Bloo]

It is very cute! It is a blackish color and alot of golden teardrops on it. Anyone know what it is?

Nigh impossible to guess.......

 

[doresy]

Oh dear, I forgot, again, how touchy some of your are

I'll try to set record straight

1. I do not have anything against Plecs or their keepers

2. I most certainly do not have anything against old people at all let alone those that keep fish and I take offence at the suggestion, LisaLQ It was very clear from their questions that they were in the dark about the most fundemental aspects of fishkeeping. I also got the impression they had a small tank so I was thinking why had they not been looked after a bit better.

3. My only 'crime' here folks is, mabe, not realising that when I was told by a LFS that a plec was very unsuitable for my previous tank as they grew so large that they had forgot to make me aware that there are smaller plecs. I subsequently have had this idea in my mind about them hence my misjudged horror in the image of a prospective 2 footer in a 10 gallon tank

4. Yes it is Dorsey (me) who has only just learnt (wasn't rocket science) to do water testing after years of not bothering (didn't know about it) but as only one fish died in all that time must, in part, be accredited to my fishkeeping (or luck )

5. Lastly....yet again I have learnt a bit more from this forum and regret starting this post and probably this reply too.......It's a shame some people can't put you straight without being nasty....give us a break,

End of my involvement with this thread

 

[LisaLQ]

Look, you said:

Clearly, by the questions they were asking, they were complete novices and although starting fish keeping at their age is great to see and really sweet, one has to ask, who the hell sold them a PLEC.

How patronising does that come across when you read it back? How "sweet" that old folks keep fish? "Who the hell sold them a PLEC"

It wasn't even as if you said "They were novices, and they said they had a 10g, and the bloke still sold them a common plec!". You made out like while we should think old people are sweet, they should not under any circumstances be offered a plec which may or may not have been anywhere from 3" to 12" for their unknown sized tank. And the way the word plec was in capital letters would suggest you had something against them.

Do you see why people wondered what your point was? Obviously you've cleared that up now - thank you

Heaven forbid anyone call me sweet when I'm older....although I'm sure there's no chance of that lol.

 

[pica_nuttalli]

to be fair, doresy, the initial post did sound rather ageist. (is that the right word?) then a bunch of other people jumped on the wagon of "all plecos grow too large; old people shouldn't keep fish." my point is that not everything critical that was said was completely unfounded. (however, bringing up the water testing was uncalled for and rather irrelevant.)

however, none of this makes you a bad person and i don't believe that anybody accused anyone of anything worse than jumping to conclusions.

(might i add, on the subject of water testing, there's no real reason to test your water on a regular basis unless you regularly fiddle with the chemistry--which is a bad habit in and of itself. you ought to know what the general pH and kH are, but that shouldn't take more than a couple of tests per year if even that often. you should also establish that the ammonia and nitrite levels are 0. the rest of the time just keep up with your maintenance and there's no reason to test unless your fish start acting funny. THAT's the time that you need to use every test in the kit to see what might be going wrong.)