Stella

!drool: !drool: !drool: !drool: !drool: !drool: !drool: Yes please! Will maybe see you in June :lol:

:facepalm: :lol: Actually a friend mentioned seeing bullies eating whitebait as long as themselves.... could be used in the book. Also other eater: birds have a field day. And an interesting thing with introduced fish: natives are nocturnal but the whitebait are active duing the day, possibly to avoid being eaten by other fish. The introduced fish are active during the day.... &c:ry Another idea that could be played with: koaro and shortjaw whitebait are identical (to humans, using a dissection microscope) but quit different when they grow up. And my sister is an AMAZING artist if you need an illustrator.

Excellent! There are already one or two childrens books on whitebait or eels, but the more the merrier! Different people like different styles. Look on trademe for the others. (oooh imagine a series - whitebait, eels, bullies, shrimp, koura, torries - they all have totally bizarre lifecycles.) Am happy to assist where needed :cofn: :lol: (BTW Sheepsnana, I am down to my last 25 books and it may be a while before I reprint) My dad read Great Expectations to me when I was 10. Special times

very cool! Clearly one can fit a lot of huhu grubs in one small eel. Impressed that you have raised him up from a little shoelace. Was he in the pond the whole time? Forgive me, I don't remember seeing photos of your pond, could you re-post some? Looks lovely and natural under water

Are you sure it is native? I thought most peg species were introduced. Though good to see that the koura are out-competing it for food. Do you give them veggies too? They need a combination, more protein for little guys and more veggies for the big ones. Crays have such different personalities! I do wonder to what extent their behaviour is related to the fish - is a cray alone more likely to be out all the time? Certainly the presence of eels has been shown to alter the behaviour of koura (and some other native fishies).

Fantastic names!! :slfg: I had Ronnie and Reggie Cray (historic: twins who set up a rather notorious protection racket) The tank is looking good. Interesting about the cray trying to get the moth on the surface! They do make great pets on their own

LOL thanks guys! :oops: What I love now is finding natives threads where there is little that I can add to the conversation because my well-educated minions have beaten me to it :cofn: :love: Thanks, am mostly recovered, just some minor neck pain at times. Just so lucky to be alive! I hope we didn't squash too many fish in the process.

!drool: uplands are my favourite. Others may have their own personal awesome of rarity or special skills, but you can't go past uplands as totally cute and entertaining aquarium fish.

but... but.... but..... WHO will be going in there?

oooooooooooOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOooooooooooooo!!!!!! That thar fish ain't no koaro. :sage: Well, it doesn't look like a classic koaro to me. :oops: It looks too stumpy, the head isn't pointed enough, the eye seems too big and the dorsal and anal fins look too erect. I don't have my books with my at the moment, but the species name for koaro is 'brevipinnis' which means 'short fin', which refers (IIRC) to the short/low dorsal fin. So yeah, short version is: probably some non-diadromous galaxiid. :smln: Canterbury galaxias is the most common therefore most likely one, but apart from that I don't know much about the non-diads. I need to learn them though, so this is exciting for me too Could you please give me a location and I will see if I can get a local fishy expert to identify it for you? (excellent photos!) :spop:

Good on you! The first time you do it is the hardest, then you know what to expect so it becomes easy. Really it doesn't hurt. If you expect it to hurt, then it will. If you relax and think of what an awesome thing you are doing for your community then it doesn't (much).

a recent headline suggestion on facebook: ‎"Woman driver destroys perfectly good ute". :rotf:

I just can't get over that my camera survived!! It was in my shoulder bag bouncing around in the back seat. First thing I did when I became lucid again was to get someone to take photos. SO freaking typical of me! The newspaper reports are getting weirder and weirder. Do NOT read the cover of the Wanganui Chronicle today! What part of 'I felt calm when we were rolling' and 'the crumpled ute looked hilarious in the beautiful stream' translates into "MY CRASH HORROR"?! I am so embarrassed. Had a rough night emotionally. The aches and exhaustion and banged up brain finally broke me.

i think the rental ute had less than 1000 kilometres on it!! and they got the canopy specially for us.... poor ute :digH:

thanks guys! am really achey today, sleepy. wish i had my glasses! slowly getting an appreciation of how lucky we were. when trapped i asked my fried what we were doing in the area. she said spotlighting for fish (or similar), i think i replied 'cooool!'

so I was working for DOC doing fish surveys in the wanganui national park. On our way out and I pulled over to let an oncoming car past. I think I was a little close to the edge and the edge gave way. We rolled 200ft into a gorge-y stream. Amazingly we both only got soft-tissue injuries and concussion! No glasses so not writing much now, but the pics are amazing! I came out of here somehow. I remember rolling and being out of the car, but I don't remember being trapped, apart from lying in water. believe it or not, but the flash actually washed out the bruising somewhat! And we made the paper, I didn't really realise how lucky we were. http://www.stuff.co.nz/dominion-post/news/6588519/Two-survive-100m-plummet-off-cliff To be honest I am not the sort that freaks out after something happens, I freak before. So I thought the whole thing was pretty funny

whoa, weird. is one of them gravid? A gravid torrie looks somewhat like a tadpole - nothing but a huge bulge and a tail.

What they said, plus you are playing with fire by putting fish directly from a stream into an established tank without a quarantine period. :sage: A 30cm giant is pretty massive... how did you not notice?

That tank is just so beautiful!! Probably the nicest-looking native tank I have seen :love: Yeah, the fishie looks kinda Cran's-y, second guess would be a common, but I think it looks a shade more Cran's. Just got back from spotlighting a stream in Egmont national park. Lovely big (20cm) koaro and small-medium longfin eels. I can't believe they are paying me to do this!

oooh very nice setup! I had one cray fall 140cm, wander through into the next room and then hold his own against a cat. Survivals outside the tank have a lot to do with the temperature and humidity (basically how long it takes for critical apparatus to dry out). Spotlighting last night I found a pile of what seemed to be shag vomit that consisted entirely of component parts of a couple of crayfish. Actually, thinking now, there was no soft material, only crunchiness, whereas the poop on the other side of the rock was very fresh (and we had been there the day before), I wonder if they throw up the indigestables a a normal thing?

Ah yes, I ought to make a separate sticky on that too. A bit further research and observations and I think 7ppt is better. 3ppt DOES work, but it works slower, giving the freeswimmers longer to find a fish to latch on to (at which point they are safe). 7ppt works faster, pretty killing freeswimmers before they have freely swum for very long, dramatically reducing the chances of them finding a fish in time. This means the spots you see on the fish when you start treatment are usually the last spots you will see, whereas with the 3ppt you will get several more cycles. I have used 7ppt treatments on bullies, all kokopu, smelt, inanga, dwarf galaxias. As always, this is based on my experience with a few individuals (er, well... 30+ bullies and 64 dwarf galaxias) (good spotting! It is so cool seeing how much you guys are retaining what I said in my book, I barely need to answer questions now, I have Knowledgable Minions!

whoops, thanks! I do appreciate comments.

I have finally finished and uploaded my guide to creating public native aquaria, 'Taking the Fish to the People'. It is intended as an 'add-on' to my book, focused on public displays. While not many here get to create public aquaria, it can also be used for planning your own awesome tanks http://massey.academia.edu/StellaMcQueen/Books/1469795/Taking_the_Fish_to_the_People_-_a_guide_to_creating_successful_public_native_aquaria

bullies can shoot straight up the sides and accidentally get out that way. They are unlikely to be able to get out if there is an inwards facing lip, unless you get a real stuntfish. Glad you enjoyed my book so much!

What a neat trip! Kahuterawa always has a good selection of fish. The 'releasing back into the wild' photos are a nice addition. I don't think we have had them here before. Interesting seeing the inanga, must have been quite a determined little migrant! So cool hearing that people are going to the museum for a study break. Have run into people there who were avoiding class too! I am trying to convince them that they need to keep a couple of ottomans in front of the tank. When you go make sure you pull those ones in the next 'wing' of the display and leave them by the big tank