Stella

Yeah, I hate them too, but the plane looks quite cool in that underwater jungle!

My dad's partner is a night-walk guide at Zealandia

Oh they are really well done!

A very very short video (13 seconds) of a koaro climbing the sides of a bucket - vertical walls are just so easy for these guys! (I can't figure out how to embed the video here) They climb using their large downturned pectoral and pelvic fins. The only thing that stops them is an overhang, they can't climb upside down. Which makes climbing things like this a breeze: but makes these common perched culverts like this impassable:

aw cute, sounds like a very dedicated dad It is somewhat temperature-dependent, and I can never remember how long it takes.... somewhere between 2 and 3 weeks. Certainly by now there should be shiny little eyes staring back at you

(BTW, nice to see you back! How are those bullies of yours?)

They can be very tricky in the initial phase. May roll over and die in your bucket as you catch them! I hear the trick is to keep them *cold* during transport and be as organised as possible - tank fully set up, all steps along the way pre-planned. It appears that if they survive the first night or two, they will keep on going. I know some DOC people who got a load of smelt (presumably for stocking somewhere) and a number died overnight, but the rest of the shipment survived being transported for many hours the next day. And what Supasi said

Do a search for Preacher's native pond - he has posted various thread of photos over time showing the gradual development of it. Not a raised pond, but all the plants around it look great which could give you some ideas And a while back someone had a raised pond with a wetland filtration system, that looked awesome! Search function is your friend 8)

Oh, thank you Supasi! I get it now. I miss mine too. I plan to get a small one next time I see one. Fascinating critters.

dude, you need to get out more Nice designs though My dream tank(s) are currently being built at the National Trout Centre near Turangi, courtesy of the Dept of Conservation, the Trout Centre Society, Genesis et al, and what's more: I don't have to maintain them! :lol: 8)

I heard of inanga grabbing moths by the abdomen the shooting down and dashing the head/thorax+wings off against a rock, then eating the abdomen. native fish are clever 8)

I knew this guy reminded me of someone but I couldn't find the photo earlier: http://www.niwa.co.nz/__data/assets/ima ... _large.jpg You can almost hear him going RAH!!! I think this was taken by a diver in a NZ lake. (sorry, not sure how to embed photos like this)

only to the moth. nom nom nom.

Actually, now I am really hoping that I get to see some on my trip down there in a month. I know about it but actually SEEING it would be a huge shock. I have the didymo bumper sticker on the back of my car to remind me to be really careful my gear if I am going to multiple waterways. Each time I go into the boot with waders/nets/lights etc I see it.

Actually freezing will kill didymo. Not a bad idea in the South Island, even if not in a known didymo area. Freezing would be the best way to kill it in driftwood. 8) I really wouldn't want to deal with that in a tank... though it would be interesting to see the result!

Hi Ron, I don't know if milking a live inanga would work (probably, may require anaesthetic...). Though maybe some light pressure may be enough to get her started. Might be hard to tell when they would need it though, then it requires catching them.... How did adding rocks increase the amount of cleaning? Did it increase the algae-cleaning needed? In my forest stream tank I only clean algae off the front glass, the rest of the tank is this wonderful earthy green with everything blending in and looking aged. Can go through some unappetising stages at the start with brown and blue-green 'algae' though. Whitespot can only ever be transported into the tank on fish or material from a waterway with fish. If everything gets quarantined before being added (which is compulsory anyway), the chances of having an outbreak is very low. Further if all fish are treated before entering the tank, whitespot will NEVER be a problem. It can hide in the gills but when the fish get stressed they can really get stuck in and a major outbreak occurs. This site is great for accurate info: www.skepticalaquarist.com/docs/health/ich.shtml Ponga fronds look awesome in a native tank - they make a really nice obvious NEW ZEALAND connection for the viewer, without actually looking out of place. They make a good backdrop and take up vertical space, which is really handy in a naturally plant-free native aquarium. Broken pieces littering up the place can provide a bit of cover for smaller fish, and help with a forest stream look. They last for many months, depending on how careful your maintenance around them is. They stay green the first two months and slowly brown off, staying like that for ages (I think they look best brown). Shrimps may last a while and look awesome (if anyone can spot them) but will likely become live food after a while, depending on the degree of habitat complexity. No idea how long they normally live. Latia limpets are pretty cool. I have mostly seen them under things too, may not be ideal. I tried them in my tanks and the redfin bullies ate them all within half an hour! I had carefully stuck each one down on a rock too, and they are HARD to get off! Mussels are sadly very difficult to keep in aquaria - they just slowly starve to death. Even keeping them in a mussel-only set-up with daily feedings of green water doesn't work. Actually it could be interesting trying to come up with a semi-captive mussel-bed in the Sanctuary wetland so people could see them. Or some kind of tank where there was a continual flow of wetland water. It must be frustrating having to deal with idiots like that :evil: More activity in front of the tank can make the fish more or less flighty, depending on species. Inanga and torries will always be flighty, but bullies tend to be more relaxed. BTW if you ever get the inspiration/money, mudfish are the most curious fish you will ever meet and their wetland aquarium is such a different look and the easiest ever to maintain

Yeah, I showed the pics to my freshwater ecology lecturer. He didn't know much about them but said that native ones are mostly non-blood-sucking, except for some random one on an island in Fiordland that seems to suck seabirds I think he was saying that they are not entirely quite what it is doing there. And yeah, apparently two mouthparts, and he thinks it is the mouth-end holding on to her hand, but unlikely to be sucking. Fun

If anyone if feeling super-geeky, I ran into this paper which looks relevant and interesting: .PDF avaliable free through the Royal Society for this month or so: http://www.informaworld.com/smpp/conten ... =titlelink

awwww it is co cute! Good photos too! And to Robyn for her dedication to biological investigation. Respect!

Hi Ron, I agree: welcome to the forum and thank you for adding to this thread It sounds like you have put a lot of work into the tank, but I do hear from many different people that the 'decor' of the tank is very disappointing and doesn't show the fish off as well as it could. Believe me, I really want this tank to look as awesome as possible - I am a firm believer that public native aquaria are a great way to go for education and raising public concern about the state of our waterways. A bit of background on me: I am currently advising on two large new public native aquaria in different parts of the country. I am just about to publish a book on keeping native fish. Also currently studying for a Masters in Ecology to become a freshwater ecologist. It is a problem these fish being nocturnal and secretive, but I find there are two important ways around that: food and shelter. If the fish (and koura) feel safe they will come out more - they know that cover is close to hand. Bullies especially are very active buzzing in and out of their rocky caves, especially the males defending their territories. Just having the back corners filled with rocks will put the fish at the back, caves throughout means fish will move throughout. It can be a difficult balancing act though, and that is where the high density stocking and species selection comes in. With food: the fish come out when they know they will get fed. Having a set feeding time and making a big public deal of it means the fish will be more active around that time and the public get a good educational show and tell. Over winter their metabolisms slow, particularly the kokopu, but certainly over summer, and with such a well-stocked tank, there will always be someone that is hungry. Just adjust the amounts of food accordingly and only drop in a little at a time. As you have found, inanga can't spawn in aquaria. Females may die from being eggbound. However those that survive can keep on going. I had one live for three years and I saw a huge 15cm one that was five years old! I am surprised that you are finding the inanga are nocturnal and like cover - they ought to be one of your more visible fish. It may be something to do with the numbers - they like to school, and the tank is big enough to allow that, are there enough of them? Alternatively, non-schooling midwater fish (mainly other galaxiids) get in the way of the schooling and break them up. Also look closely at other behaviours - koaro and kokopu especially can become quite aggressive, especially around the 2-3 year mark when they mature sexually. I heard of a guy who had an inanga die from being eggbound. He squeezed the eggs into the tank and food for the others - the next day the tank was full of eggs from the other inanga! Some pheromonal action going on. May be handy if you have that happen. Bluegill bullies are very timid and easily out-competed at meal times, thus rather difficult to successfully keep in a large community tank. They naturally live 'within' the substrate, moving between stones, although in a single-species tank with a reasonable current they can be extremely active and playful. Only small koura should be kept with fish, especially when ground-dwelling fish (ie bullies, torries) are kept. I find a cray over 7cm long is far too big, but a lot depends on the individual personality. If the cray is at the large end of the scale, the bullies should be large too. Small bullies = cray lunch. It would be wonderful to see the tank reflect the streams in the Sanctuary, so that as people walk through they can automatically associate what they see in the tank with the streams. Obviously restricted access due to the dams and perch has limited the species present, so it would be necessary to add other species that would likely have been present. Use gravel, rocks, leaf litter and fern fronds from the Sanctuary. Having a focus like that also makes it much easier to meet the needs of all the fish and design a cohesive and natural looking aquarium. I would be more than happy to meet and talk about this more if you want (written format can be so cumbersome!) and you would be more than welcome to visit my aquaria if you are coming up this way some time Otherwise happy to help here.

freshly shed and soft?

WOW

and/or they are complete slackers!

I thought the old trick was putting in a bit of copper metal - toxic enough for the fish to crawl out where they can be 'harvested' but not toxic enough for the fish. Google it though, I don't know the details.

:lol: My parents chose mine... I was going to be Alistair, but they made a last minute change when I turned out to be a girl.