Aquariums.... (the ones in our homes)

i'm having a guess says most of have had/currently have or plant to have again, a fishtank. and figured they deserved a thread all of their own.

over the years i have had so many fishtanks its hard to remember them all...

however, my favorite were always my amphibian/fish combinations.

i kept green tree frogs in a four foot tank with various rainbow fish species in successfully for years. the frogs tend to make the water quite acidic however, so you had to constantly watch that. unfortunately the southern water skink who later joined them was oblivious to the frogs, and would scamper over them, scratching their skin. it also attempted to hunt the fish - though eventually it succumbed to what i am sure was a lung infection, that had i been more experienced would have known how to avoid..

easily the easiest tank i had to maintain was japanese fire bellied newts mixed with small oriental fish. any combination of barbs, danios, ricefish or whiteclouds seems to work fine.

the fish take a lot of the newts food but japanese newts are much more active than other species and if you have had them a long time i find they become very tame, and feed off the surface like fish.

anyhow, thats my favorites.....discuss

 

We had seahorses for a little while in my mums room but i guess that didn't approve of her clinique perfume and turned belly up. And once we had abay turtles that we found in our pond that survived so well that we made them a cage outside but they all escaped on the first night.

 

A mate moved into a new home unit and was told by the Body Corporate,"No pets." "What about my tropical fish ? he asked. After an anxious wait, he was told it would be OK. Fish tanks are not pets, they ruled. Apparently they are a "designer or decorator item."

I currently have 5 fish tanks going with African and South American cichlids and some Neotropical catfish. I'd like to try saltwater reef fish, but lack both the confidence and the cash.

Here in Australia the authorities frown on foreign fish species, but they are stuck with them - the industry is just too big to bring in blanket bans. Nevertheless there is a long list of species which are totally prohibited. Piranhas are a definite no-no, and fair enough too. The big catfish such as Red-tailed and Tiger Shovelnose are prohibited but those "in the know" can get them.

I do quite well from my Bristle-nose catfish. They breed well for me and the local aquarium shops will buy as many as I can sell them.

 

I keep africans. I currently have malawi eye biters and afra cowbe. The afra cobwe have spawned but I am having no luck with the eye biters.

P.S have you seen the electric yellows in with the fijian iguanas at Taronga?
They look good, if you can look past the fact they come from the opposite side of the world. I wish they would chuck some big oscars or similiar in with the sail fin lizard and the river cooters.

 

Give me South American Cichids any day

 

old school.

 

I keep a 3 footer with Various native fish rainbows, hardyhead, eeltails and gobies

Ay work i manage 20 marine tanks (including a 1000L Touch Tank) and 15 freshwater,

 

Yep , Great range of shapes, sizes and colours

 

Must admit, i love the geo's that are getting around at the moment.

 

Such as Boof

 

In SA Americans are getting much more popular, alot of them have been made legal so they are everywhere (not that they werent before) Red Devils, Dempseys, Chocolates, Convicts and the like are everywhere

 

i have a gold fish does that count?

 

only if you have a Murray cod to feed it too lol!

 

Do Murray Cod count if they're in a dam. We got it stocked a few years ago and now they're getting pretty big.

 

I have a Murray Cod, nothing survives in his tank long.

A bloke told me once that he knows someone with paranas, recons they put a few little ones in with another species being imported.

 

I actually teach a fishkeeping course to our animal care students, so we have an aquatics room with about 18 freshwater aquaria at college.
We mostly have 'bread and butter' species, my favourites are the Malabar dwarf puffers which we bred a couple of years ago. We also keep African dwarf frogs (which have spawned, but I couldn't rear the tadpoles) and we regularly breed bristlenosed cats and rainbow emperor tetras.

Alan

 

Part of the enjoyment of keeping any animal species, be it mammal, bird, reptile amphibian or fish, is in successfully breeding it. That's why I enjoy cichlids and bristle-nose cats.

I'm sure that it wouldn't be hard for experienced importers to bring small piranhas into this country mixed in with Silver Dollars, Red Hooks or some similar fish. Years ago when Taronga had an aquarium they had a group of large piranhas which had been confiscated by AQIS (Customs). The condition under which Taronga held them was that they be destroyed without question if Customs ever decided that it was necessary.

 

I realy did not believe the bloke who told me about the paranas, but as he said the species they were imported with were silver dollars and you have mentioned this species maybe he was not speaking ****.