Wow!

[NonstickRon]

So I found this place that specializes in Cichlids. He had a fire recently and lost about $40k in stock, so is now selling fish out of big concrete and giant plastic breeding ponds behind the burned out building. I talked to the guy, nice old guy, for about an hour today. I was really surprised to find that he had ZERO filtration on anything. All the vats were thickly overgrown with plants and algae and he had bubblers in all of them. He said the plants do the filtering and that he used zero salt in any of his vats. I'd mentioned I'd been into fish for about 3 weeks now and what he was doing was contrary to most of what I've read online in that time. He laughed and told me to steer clear of "forum-guys". He claimed that there was a lot of misconceptions about aquarium fish and most fish can be aclimated to very different water conditions than what is native for them and warned me to stay away from forums do to people just repeating misconceptions they read in books that don't know what they're talking about.

Now whether or not I buy into that, he seemed to be doing very well. He scooped up a giant netful of fish and grabbed a few out with his hands to show me how beautiful and healthy they are. Got me thinking about cichlids...the tap water here is perfect for them. I won't have an adequetely sized aquarium for them anytime soon but someday...

Anyway, here's his website. www.cichlidnet.com Looks like it hasn't been updated since his fire, so most of his listed fish are probably not available I'm guessing. The interesting part is that he said every wednesday he goes out to the "fish farms" and hand picks new stock.

If nothing else, it was a fun mid-afternoon adventure.

 

[dthoffsett]

Sounds like an interesting old guy. While it is true that you can have a massively planted tank that requires no filter, it's a fine balancing point to have the right amount of plants and stocking.

And yes it's true that fish can live outside of their ideal conditions, though the fish tend to thrive when you replicate them as best you can.

I find it interesting that he thinks us "forum guys" are only repeating what we've read in books, I would think the years of experience would carry some weight.

I'd be a little leary of stock that was "hand-picked from fish farms" since you know little of their background. Any serious cichlid breeder wants to keep the line as pure as possible, and will generally start with wild-caught or f1 stock.

All in all, he seems interesting, but I'd take his advice with a grain of salt, as I do any advice given.

 

[NonstickRon]

Sounds like an interesting old guy. While it is true that you can have a massively planted tank that requires no filter, it's a fine balancing point to have the right amount of plants and stocking.

And yes it's true that fish can live outside of their ideal conditions, though the fish tend to thrive when you replicate them as best you can.

I find it interesting that he thinks us "forum guys" are only repeating what we've read in books, I would think the years of experience would carry some weight.

I'd be a little leary of stock that was "hand-picked from fish farms" since you know little of their background. Any serious cichlid breeder wants to keep the line as pure as possible, and will generally start with wild-caught or f1 stock.

All in all, he seems interesting, but I'd take his advice with a grain of salt, as I do any advice given.

Yeah, his vats were crazy full of plantlife. As far as breeding lines, I have no idea how the breeding vats are organized at his place or the fish farm he goes to so they may very well be be organized into pure lines. Me mentioned several times hes had to make-do since his fire. He just mentioned hand picking because he was saying how you can never tell what you're going to get when you order fish online. I might go up and talk to him again today...he says hes been breeding cichlid's out in those vats behind his shop for 29 years, so he's got to be doing something right I think.

He was telling me a bit about fish importers and how they acclimate south american fish to local PH levels.

 

[tenohfive]

I suspect he's had a bad experience with someone who's been a forum user before and is making a fairly sweeping statement based upon that. Its well accepted on here that most fish can live well outside of their ideal pH range, though some species will only spawn in their ideal conditions. I'd say of the more experienced fishkeepers on here, all have kept fish outside of their ideal pH range.

And like dthoffset says, I'd take anything anyone says with a pinch of salt. This old boy has alot of experience of keeping fish on a big level - the home aquarium is a different environment entirely.

 

[NonstickRon]

I suspect he's had a bad experience with someone who's been a forum user before and is making a fairly sweeping statement based upon that. Its well accepted on here that most fish can live well outside of their ideal pH range, though some species will only spawn in their ideal conditions. I'd say of the more experienced fishkeepers on here, all have kept fish outside of their ideal pH range.

And like dthoffset says, I'd take anything anyone says with a pinch of salt. This old boy has alot of experience of keeping fish on a big level - the home aquarium is a different environment entirely.

Yeah, the PH in the local tap is actually very high here. I get 8.8, he said 8.0 where he was at. Actually very ideal for cichlids, and thats all he sells. So...

Brought a friend up there with me yesterday, got him wanting to do a cichlid pond after seeing the place. Nobody would want to keep a tank in the state those vats are in though...you can barely even tell theres fish in any of them by just looking in them due to all the plants and how murky the water is. Got a look at some of the guys custom tanks he's made though. One L shaped in-wall corner tank that survived his fire was especially impressive. Maybe I can get some tips from him in building my own tank. I'm guessing its a lot cheaper than buying one.

 

[fishlover500]

I'm actually not sure how much cheaper it is though. Once you buy the glass and cilicone it really adds up.
Plus you need to make it 100% waterproof, thats hard on large tanks.

 

[tenohfive]

I was under the impression it depends on what sort of size and shape tank. For most normal, common sizes I think its cheaper to buy a new tank. Though I have to admit, I've never bought a new tank in my life - I always get good condition second hand tanks for a fraction of the price.

 

[Soaup]

I'm actually not sure how much cheaper it is though. Once you buy the glass and cilicone it really adds up.
Plus you need to make it 100% waterproof, thats hard on large tanks.

True its not so much the tanks IMO that i find are incredibly expensive. I mean My 125 Gallon AGA was something like 230 USD. Now had i bought the glass silicon and all the tools needed to start this project, factoring in all of that as well as my time the 230 might seem like a better deal. Although, My whole set up now has put me back about 3,000-5,000 this is including everything from tank stand canopy filters fish etc etc. I think if you were to build the tank, stand, canopy, in the end you will end up saving yourself quite a bit but just the tank maybe not so much.