Introduction (sort of)

[Advanced Aquarist]

Where to begin?

Over 34 years fishkeeping experience, on and off experience with planted tanks. Freshwater for all of that but hoping to move onto marines.

Kept a common carp for 19 years - I still miss him. We bought him as a 99 pence fish and I wished he lived longer.

Have a 31 year old Synodontis Ocellifer still. When I mentioned this to the owner of my LFS his reply was "well you're bad for business aren't you"?

Reason for posting here: I hope to learn from some of you, and I might be able to impart some of what I know to those who are willing to listen.

 

[Circus]

Welcome to the forum!

 

[Back in the fold]

Thirty four years in ? You have some tales to tell. Any breeding or just specimen fish ?

 

[Advanced Aquarist]

I had some silver dollars pairing up and laid eggs and so, but the eggs were soooo small I just couldn't get them. The other fish followed them around and obviously ate the eggs.

Apart from that, no, I am mainly a synodontis/pleco/barb/characin keeper. Dabbled with corydoras and the smaller tetras from time to time. Going more advanced with planted tanks now and hopefully marines. But I confess, I really don't like some of the bristle worms that can come with reef aquariums, that was the one thing that always put me off aside from the cost.

But you all know how life goes, you get busy in your career and your tanks just tick over . . only when something serious happens or a silly mistake wakes you up!

Yes I do have some experiences to tell, not all of them good, but to be honest you learn more from bad experiences than good ones.

And I've had some really horrible experiences with certain people on some forums because I didn't knew how the ground laid. One particular person was rather nasty to me all those years ago and it took me a while to work out why: he was sponsored and paid by certain companies to promote their products, he also owned the forum and it was paid for by the company. I sort of made an offhand criticism of the company and he got really aggressive with me. It's stuff like that, that puts me off fishkeeping. I genuinely hate most Social Media influencers because you never know if they have an "agenda", it makes their warmth, smiles, interests seem faux and fake if you know what I mean. There are some lovely YouTube channels with very little views but good content because the people who make them just love the hobby. It takes the fun out of the hobby if people can't be honest with each other, or you silence people for speaking their minds. I don't believe in any form of censorship, I believe in Free Speech even if a person offends me I would still like to know why he holds the views he does.

 

[Retired Viking]

Hello and welcome to the forum If you get a chance please post a few pictures of your tanks and fish.

 

[jonny-5]

Welcome to the forums

 

[Advanced Aquarist]

Hello and welcome to the forum If you get a chance please post a few pictures of your tanks and fish.

I'll do my planted tank journal. I was suppose to do it in another forum but thought better of it. If you want to know the reason for that you need to PM me and I'll tell you at the appropriate time.

What happened was that we had lockdown starting around 14th April 2020. I was furloughed along with lots of other office workers.

I have a 6' x 2' x 2' acrylic aquarium with a double DLS trickle filter tower. I had 16 rummy nose tetras along with 13 or so cardinal tetras sharing this tank with Corydoras Robustus and Pantanalensis (which I'm very fond of), Brochis Multiradiatus, two silver dollars and eight denison barbs. The rummy and cardinals were originally from a shoal of 30 each but I suppose they fought each other or bullied one another so the numbers got reduced within a year. Anyway, it took me a while to realise that the rummys were fin nipping my corys!!! You cannot believe how pi$$ed I was at this. Strangely enough it was only the Robustus, the Pantanalensis and Brochis were fine, I suppose they were just fast fish!!

So, anyway, when the opportunity came to obtain a 4' x 2' x almost 2' high tank at half price, I took it. This was end of May, I plotted to make a filtration system for it from the scrap acrylic I had lying around (details will be in the journal), and I had a spare Abyzz A100 pump (as you do! . . . I know, I know they're very expensive) also lying around I've been meaning to use it, so things fell into place. Oh, and the fact that we were on furlough so we were in lockdown and couldn't really work at all, so it gave me ample time to plan things out carefully and put in all my know how (and the stuff I learnt from others) into this project. I mainly did it to move these fin nipping rummy nose tetras away from my expensive corys.

 

[Retired Viking]

I have a soft water tetra 55 gallon jungle tank where I have ember, neon and glow light tetras with albino cory. My tetras leave the cory alone but several of my neon tetras have had their fins nipped. I think they do it to each other or possibly the glow light tetra. I plan on replacing the neon with cardinal tetras as their numbers reduce.

 

[Advanced Aquarist]

I'm just getting acquainted with keeping the smaller tetras, but I would think that replacing with cardinals might be a bad idea since you're giving them a bigger target.

Even in the planted tank now, with 113 fish, some of my cardinals still get a bit fin nipped. I suspect this is what happens in the wild, it always seems to be the weaker or smaller individuals that suffer the most out of the group.

I managed to get 15 Tuncano tetras, rather expensive at £6:50 each, but they're delightful and really suit a planted tank. No fin nipping on them yet, but they do move fast.

 

[Retired Viking]

I'm just getting acquainted with keeping the smaller tetras, but I would think that replacing with cardinals might be a bad idea since you're giving them a bigger target.

Even in the planted tank now, with 113 fish, some of my cardinals still get a bit fin nipped. I suspect this is what happens in the wild, it always seems to be the weaker or smaller individuals that suffer the most out of the group.

I managed to get 15 Tuncano tetras, rather expensive at £6:50 each, but they're delightful and really suit a planted tank. No fin nipping on them yet, but they do move fast.

My smallest tetras are my embers and none of them have been fin nipped. They are a cool little fish that shoal together nicely. My glow lights are about the same size as cardinal tetra. I have not seen tuncano tetras. I had red eyed tetras, started out with 2 females and 3 males but in just a few months I had 17 red eyed tetra. I gave them to my bother-in-law. They are a little larger that the other tetras I have had.

 

[PheonixKingZ]

Hello and welcome to the forum!

 

[Gypsum]

Surprised that your rummys are fin nipping. Mine are very unassuming and don't even bother the longfin bristlenose pleco, much less the assorted cory species. Had some hassle with cherry barbs nipping the pleco when we first got her, and they quickly got evicted into another tank.

 

[Advanced Aquarist]

I didn't mention the context of how it came about.

Originally the corys and the brochis were with my synodontis ocellifer and angelicus. Now, as you probably all know (and to my great sadness) synodontis angelicus can be a vicious fish and it was. I suspected both of them fin nipping the corys, so I separated them. The rummy noses and maybe the cardinals got in on the act probably through acquired behaviour being around the two synos, so it was developmental.

Now that the trouble makers are in the planted tank they decide to nibble some of the plants and plant roots instead!! Can't win, can I?