Finally I Found Some

[Baccus]

I had been hunting for some wild semi local Pacific Blue Eyes for a while and kept coming up with no luck, plenty of rainbows and gudgeons, even dreaded gambusia and guppies even tilapia but alas no Pacific Blue Eyes. The reason I wanted to find a wild population was that my local pet shops almost NEVER get in Pacific Blue Eyes a lot barely even get in Rainbows, and the online site I trust to order fish from always appears to be sold out in the Pacific Blue Eye department.
So my sister the other day sent me a message from the town she lives in approx. 1hr away saying her daughter had caught some Pacific Blue Eyes. I was sceptical of them being Blue Eyes, simply because of where she claimed the fish where caught. I know the pond and very much doubted Pacific Blue Eyes would have got into it. So I asked for photos and was pleasantly surprised to be proven wrong.
That made up my mind, we would go down to the town and pond in question and hunt for some Pacific Blue Eyes for me to bring home.
In went my nets and a bucket with a hole through the lid where the airstone line from the battery pump can go through the lid into the bucket.
We got to the other town and collected my sister and her daughter and headed off under my nieces instructions. The first surprise was that my niece had not gone to where my sister thought she had to catch the fish, which as it turns out was just as well. The second surprise bordering on third was that the little land locked partially tidal pool surrounded by salt flats, some rather stunted mangroves, full of rubbish and seeming to only get water with extremely high tides and runoff from the surrounding towns roads was full salt water and had other marine fish in the pond. As well as the elusive Pacific Blue Eyes.
My niece had more luck netting the Pacific Blue Eyes than me so I then concentrated on finding nerite snails which where also to be found in the pool of water.
Once we had a few fish we decided to go to the other pond system that my sister thought her daughter had gone to, in order to see if any Pacific Blue Eyes where in fact there. Upon arriving the local dumped ducks and native ducks all thought we where there to feed them and mobbed us on our way down to the greatly reduced waters edge. There was also signs posted around the "duck ponds" stating to not touch the water due to toxic algae being present in the water. So we did not bother trying to scoop any fish even to identify what was there.
Upon getting home I immediately made up a tub of dechlorinated water and began the slow process of changing the full salt water the fish where in to pure fresh water. This took a few hours and it was only once the Pacific Blue Eyes where in clean water that you could see clearly that they where all being attacked by some form of fungus on their bodies. So the long suffering Pacific Blue Eyes are now going through a multicure treatment which hopefully in three days will see them nice and healthy and ready to join my existing Pacific Blue eyes and also stock my pond. Even with the multicure in the tank and the fish only having an airstone in the water (and some live plants that can be thrown away afterwards) the Pacific Blue Eyes appear much happier than when they where in the filthy/ polluted pure salt water.
Heres hoping that the treatment works and I finally will be able to keep a sustaining colony of Pacific Blue Eyes in one of my tanks and my 1000L pond.

 

[jag51186]

Awesome story! Keep us posted, and post some pics of your setup, if you would. I love these little fish as well!

 

[Baccus]

So far all is going well with the Pacific Blue Eyes, no deaths and all lively but not excessively freaking out about being in the tank. I am guessing the green water from the multicure would be adding to their feeling of safety.
The funny thing is they do not recognise fish food as food, but gladly will eat bread. I am not giving them bread simply because it will foul the water so quickly. But I have no doubt once the Pacific Blue Eyes are with other fish that do know all about fish food and that people invariably mean food they will soon cotton on.

 

[Baccus]

Well I got the Pacific Blue Eyes on Thursday, its now Saturday and they have already cottoned on to fish flakes as being food and are even beginning to do the telltale feed me dance at the front of the tank when they see me. It might help that they can see from where they are into one of my 4ft tanks housing rainbow fish and their morning antics of food begging.
I have been closely monitoring the Pacific Blue Eyes and can see no signs of the fungus they where exhibiting, their tail fins that where also looking ratty on the edges are also already looking in much better condition. I am sorely tempted to start sorting the Pacific Blue Eyes into their eventual homes namely a tank (possibly 2 tanks) and the pond, but know I should wait at least until Sunday when the Pacific Blue Eyes would then have had three days of treatment and would be due for a second dose if they where still showing signs of illness.
Yesterday after having a dig around in my fish equipment I dug out a spare internal filter, removed the carbon from the foam and added it to the hospital tank just for water movement and oxygenation rather than plow through lots of batteries for the airpump which is only really for backup in prolonged power outages.

 

[Chad]

We need photos!

 

[NickAu]

Yes Yes photos.
 

Harvey Creek Pacific Blue Eye 3.5cm
https/www.livefish.com.au/tropicals/natives/harvey-creek-pacific-blue-eye-3-5cm.html

 

[Baccus]

I will try and get some photos later, but be warned most of the pictures are most likely going to be blurry streaks of silver with a hint of yellow. They really are hyperactive fish.
Also the hospital tank currently is still quite green from the treatment so the Blue Eyes in there are not going to be very visible.

 

[Baccus]

Some not very good photos of the bulk of the Pacific Blue Eyes.
The first picture is the eventual tank some of them will go into. It currently houses 2 orange spot bristlenoses, 3 local rainbows that I need to move to another tank, 1 female whiptail and cherry shrimp, oh and one female endler.
 
 
 
And these are the wild caught Pacific Blue Eyes still in the hospital tank for now.

 

[Mark Z.]

I like them!
 
I would love to find some.
 
Thanks for sharing.
 
Mark

 

[Baccus]

Not the best pictures but does show their mesmerising blue eyes. The most dominate male is a real stunner with much longer fins then the other males, but alas the most beautiful boy is also the hardest to get an in focus picture of.
For now I am thinking of only adding 1 more confirmed male to this group and putting the rest in my pond to breed down there and keep mosquitos under control.

 

[Chad]

That's a really lovely fish. They are native to Australia?

 

[Baccus]

Yep they are one of our lovely little natives, there are quite a few species of Blue Eye and some are quite rare now, but Pacific Blue Eyes for now I think are pretty common in the wild just not the aquarium trade.

 

[Baccus]

Just a couple more happy snaps of the fish.
This was the remainder of them just before they went down to my pond. They should thrive in the pond with naturally occurring water life insects in there as well as aphids falling off the lillies. There is also shrimp, snails and endlers that they will be able to eat and gudgeons to avoid.
 
 
This one of the three nerites I also collected with the Pacific Blue Eyes, they seem to have converted across to fresh water without a hitch and are already making a meal of the algae on the glass.

 

[Chad]

Fun. Nerites don't mind fresh water at all. My understanding is they just can't breed in it. 

 

[Far_King]

The blue eyes are lovely!  I don't think I've ever seen them here.  I am properly jealous!