Old Fishkeeping Techniques...

[jnms]

I remember my grandpa keeping tropical fish - but I was too young to pay much attention to what he did and how he did it. That was around 25 years ago. I know that fishkeeping has changed a lot over the decades, and would be really interested to hear just what has changed about the hobby.

So maybe the long time fishkeepers could post some old methods, techniques and even outdated beliefs \ scientific data. Or maybe there are some resources online which discuss this?

Eitherway I think this could be pretty interesting...

 

[gaz gun man]

only been in the hobby a few months myself, but I have read that in 'the olden days' water changes were considered a bad thing

 

[BigC]

I had angle iron tanks with glass held in with putty.
Ordinary light bulbs for illumination.

 

[gaz gun man]

anyone ever have irons sat infront of the open fire to act as heaters?

 

[sb_onefish]

Didn't use water conditioner. Just let the tap water sit for 24-48 hours to get rid of chlorine. Don't know if it was ignorance or there wasn't so much cr@p added to tap water back then - early 1980's.

In the 1960's (my childhood, geez I'm getting old), I remember my mom had a guppy tank. Couldn't have been more than 20 gallons and the guppies bred like crazy and the tank got really crowded. I mean REALLY crowded. She gave them away every chance she got but those must have been some tough fish, she had it going like that for years.

And also in the 1960's, I won a goldfish at a carnival and we tried to keep it in a fishbowl, maybe 2 gallons, it was a big bowl. The water was changed a lot because my grandma was "the world's cleanest person", but the poor fish only lived a short time.

Filters in the 60's were a little plastic box that you filled with carbon and some kind of wooly material and ran the air pump thru it.

 

[Sunny_Bee]

Even in the early 90's when I started keeping fish the most popular filters (around here at least) were the corner ones stuffed with filter floss and carbon. I had no test kits and when my mom cleaned the tank (I was a kid) she'd CLEAN it, I mean everything, scrubbed it. I have no idea how the fish survived, I don't know how it could have cycled.

 

[OldMan47]

A box filter is still a good idea for a fry tank if you don't need a sponge filter with a power head. A typical box filter then had a layer of carbon and a layer of filter floss. That filter box filled with floss only would be a decent biofilter even today if the tank bioload is small. A really big filter was one where you actually hung it on the back of the tank and used an air stone to move water into it the same way you would use an air stone today to power an undergravel filter. The best performing filters we had were the undergravels powered by a lift tube and an air stone.
Water changes were rare because we didn't really understand what happened when we changed a lot of water. People were concerned about too much new water all at once because we had all experienced large fish losses if we changed a lot of water in our tanks. It was old tank syndrome but nobody really understood that.
Tanks were mostly smaller with a really big one being a 55. Today a 55 is not unusual at all.
Almost all tanks had plants in them so that the water would be healthier for the fish by the plants removing impurities in the water. Mostly it was a way to improve survival of fish when we were not doing water changes. The plants were there in an attempt to renew the water without physically removing any. It worked OK as long as you kept your fish stocking very light and had lots of plants.
In the 50s we seldom used heaters. Maybe you can imagine an incandescent hood where you balance the heat of the bulbs with the heat in the room to try to regulate your tank's temperature. I don't need to imagine it because I lived it.

 

[Ludwig Venter]

I'm with Colin on this one.... The biggest breakthrough in fishkeeping technology was the invention of the "All glass tank".....

Those old angle ironed tanks we used to keep eventually rusted and every water change, you stood ready with the putty to seal the consequent leakages..... You just knew they were going to leak and it was an inherent peril of keeping fish that you just lived with if you wanted to enjoy the pleasures.

 

[BigC]

Not to mention that you sometimes got an electrical shock into the bargain.

 

[Ludwig Venter]

Not to mention that you sometimes got an electrical shock into the bargain.

Oh yes!... You're right.... Used to get one thermostat which you could connect up to 7/8 heaters.... always failed with shocking results... I think I'm now totally weaned and immune to electrical shock.

 

[invader]

How about under gravel filters? I remember when I first starting keeping fish, I had one and I was asked why I used old school techniques...

 

[Ludwig Venter]

How about under gravel filters? I remember when I first starting keeping fish, I had one and I was asked why I used old school techniques...

Now Now!!... Invader??.... Have those been phased out too, cause I'm still using 'em... You calling me old fashioned??

 

[Sunny_Bee]

I agree that tanks are generally larger today too. I recently got my first 55 gallon and thought it was so huge, but then I got to my friend's houses and it's common to see 75's and 100's, and even bigger. The pet stores sell these huge set ups all the time.....back in my day...we had to walk to school in snowstorms....I mean - all we could really get were 10gallon 'starter kits' with the most basic equipment.

 

[BigC]

Hey Lud you dont still have any of those hang-on stats (silk stats) controlling god knows how many small heaters do you.
Regards
BigC

 

[Ludwig Venter]

I agree that tanks are generally larger today too. I recently got my first 55 gallon and thought it was so huge, but then I got to my friend's houses and it's common to see 75's and 100's, and even bigger. The pet stores sell these huge set ups all the time.....back in my day...we had to walk to school in snowstorms....I mean - all we could really get were 10gallon 'starter kits' with the most basic equipment.

Don't really think size was an issue... I had a 3/4" angle iron tank with 1" glass and flatbar support which was about 3m long.... 1m wide and 1m high at the time.... with an asbestos sheet as bottom an background.... sealed with a black tar substance which we melted and cast all along the seams.... Worked very well for a very long time.... This is bigger than most the "all glass" I've seen nowadays.