Shilo

I would drop the salt as its not needed and your plants won't like it. Salt's good for treating sick fish or preventing some disease when introducing new fish but it does nothing as a long term addition. By the way if the pet store recommended using aquarium salt ($13 / kg) then take any further advise from them with...well.. a pinch of salt. It doesn't have to be aquarium salt and even table salt ( < $2 a kg) is fine since the iodine and anti-caking agents added to it is at such small amounts that it will never harm the fish.

Update Ok, its been going for 6 weeks now and there has been a few minor changes. Pump: I had a DCT4000 Jebao pump powering the system which worked OK but it was at full bore to get close to the flow I wanted (has to pump through a chiller) so figured a more powerful one would be better as I can turn it down to what I want and have more flexibility. Ended up buying a DCS7000. At full bore this is as much as the system can cope with so normally run it turned down slightly and up full when I want to flush the sand before cleaning or to give the fish a change. The Redfins like it turned up as it gives them a chance to do a bit of surfing (swimming into the current as much as possible then letting it blow them back) Background: This originally was just coated in grout and I expected PH to rise a bit but for the first few weeks it was only at 7.6 (tap water is 7.4) so was quite happy. But then it suddenly rose to 8.4! A few part water changes to bring it down didn't help as it was rising to 8.4 again over 24 hours. So I whipped it out and coated it with epoxy, taking the opportunity to sprinkle pool sand in the "valley's" and black sand on the "boulders". I was hesitant to do this at the beginning because the grout / epoxy coated water dish in my Blue Tongues enclosure eventually lifted. So it may not last forever but at least it looks better and the PH is a steady 7.4. Water Changer: As in the previous post the plan was to have 25ltr per day continuously flowing into the tank to avoid major water changes. Problem was the ball valve originally fitted was not accurate enough to give this amount so replaced it with a gate valve. It still takes a bit of fiddling to get it right but its an improvement. Eventually I will tee off from the main water line and fit a pressure reducer and irrigation drip attachment to it. But got to say filling and emptying the tank is a breeze with only turning a couple of valves on and off. Lights: The RBG strip light I had used worked OK until last week. The only problems it had was that it wasn't bright enough to see into the recesses of the tank and the camp kids discovered where I stashed the remote and kept flicking it to colour changing mode for a fish disco! Last week it stopped working so got a proper aquarium LED from Fish2Water - big improvement! Fish: The Giant Kokopu caused a fair amount of stress by not eating. It would go for the food but quickly spit it out again, tried feeding it everything I could think of to no avail. After a month I noticed its body was wasting away but the stomach was still fat so treated it for worms. Did the trick as now its simply a pig and has put on heaps of condition over the last couple of weeks. Even starting to teach it to feed from my hand. The tank is still very lightly stocked. Over the last few weeks I have added 2x female Redfin Bullies ( had forgotten how much personality they have), 3 Inanga's (2 adults and a whitebait size one which is growing). The Inanga's will probably be GK food eventually but since they only live for a few years I'm hoping they live out their life span before the GK is big enough to snack on them. Also got a very light brown Koura who is missing its claws when I got it so it must have been attacked by an eel or more likely a trout at some stage. Will continue to slowly add stock over the next month as I explore the streams around here.

I just got the 120cm Aquaclassic version last week (no plants). Very impressed how it penetrated 50cm of water and the build quality looks good. The Aqualover will be more then ample for crypts etc in my opinion. Running costs will also be less because the LED's are 40w whilst 2 T5's are 110w, plus the T5's will need to be replaced when they wear out.

Oh I agree habitat destruction & pollution are the main threats for our natives. And yes it would be a good step in the right direction because I believe a commercial ban can only help for the following reasons: 1. Will avoid some juvenile fish being killed off before they get to breed even if the amount is only a very small percentage of the population. Its a bit like the goverment saying "Kiwi's are endangered but the population are in their thousands so yes you can kill and sell as many kiwi chicks as you want just like the Shortjaw Kokopu." 2. The media will be all over a ban and thus increase public awareness of our natives. This means more support for the fish & thus more money and political pressure to protect their habitats. 3. Loath to say it on a public forum but it could be a step towards increased restrictions on recreational whitebaiting in the future. 4. Simple fairness. At the moment dairy farmers are required to spend a lot of money and time on fencing and planting up waterways plus the loss of potential return from the land used in the planting. Yet the increase in fish population that this brings about are increasing whitebatiers catches. Thus the increased profits of a commercial whitebaiter are being paid for by the farmers being forced into doing the right thing. If I was a farmer I would consider this extremely unfair. Please no more cats in this discussion, too much off topic.

I also doubt things will change in a hurry. BUT I'm seeing more and more news reports about the threat to native fish and more calls for commercial ban then I ever did previously & to me this means it is gaining momentum. If it continues then there is a good chance a ban may just happen and even if it doesn't happen for 3-4 years it will be better then never. The reason trout and domestic cats are considered "more important" then natives is simply the number of votes and how loud their "voice" is. The Fish & Game * is a well organised and funded organisation with a lot of political contacts and experience. Cat people are numerous and traditionally the media doesn't want to cross them (think Gareth Morgan & how his proposed cat controls changed to cat killing). Commercial whitebaiters don't have anywhere near that sort of clout. If recreational whitebaiting was the proposal for a ban then yes things would be different and it would have no chance but there would be public support for banning profiting (normally under the table) from the extinction of native species. * F&G - I'm also a trout fisherman so a member.

I don't think whitebaiting will ever be completely banned until the 5 species become extinct. But if a licence was needed for recreational whitebaiting then that money could be put back into habitat restoration. Despite it working for introduced species with the Fish & Game doing wonders on a lot of streams again it will never happen with native species though because licencing will open up a whole kettle of worms (traditional fisheries, cost of compliance, DOC syphoning the funds into birds...). I just think it weird that a kid can only catch up to 20 sprats off the wharf because of saltwater fishing regulations yet anybody can catch as many whitebait as they want during the season. If people were restricted to a kg per day it will go a long way of preventing this sort of thing: http://www.stuff.co.nz/business/73392726/whitebaiter-slams-greedy-online-market.html Banning commercial sale and people profiting from destroying endangered species is a good start.

Looks like things are starting to move on the banning of unrestricted sale of endangered native fish. Please read and sign if you agree: https://www.toko.org.nz/petitions/ban-commercial-fishing-of-whitebait?source=facebook-share-button&time=1445999856 If you are worried that this will mean no whitebait fritters from a cafe - don't be. Instead a ban will mean farming of whitebait will become feasible http://www.stuff.co.nz/business/69339042/Premium-Whitebait-Company-to-farm-whitebait which could protect the whitebait species even further. Went for a drive to Marakopa yesterday and counted over 30 cars parked alongside the river - all whitebaiters and this was a weekday. Not all will be selling of course but bet a lot are doing it for undeclared seasonal income.

One of these type of containers would be ideal so long as you have a trailer to either leave it on or a method getting it off (winch onto a trailer height platform etc). http://www.trademe.co.nz/business-farming-industry/other/auction-965610591.htm You should be able to do a few water changes before needing to refill. Alternatively hitch it to your house spouting to share the rain between your water tank and the container.

Suggest making that one Koura as 2 or more can fight unless its a large tank. Have a few places it can hide in available, caves, driftwood it can get under, or secure rock piles with gaps it can get into. It will choose its hiding place and sometimes shift home. If you have a large rock sitting on top of the sand or gravel then bury it until its base is on the bottom of the tank or put rocks under it as the Koura will most likely decide to excavate under it and there is a danger it could get crushed. If you have any plants in the tank - you won't once the Koura goes in, they make great gardeners and really really enjoy pruning! The tank must be escape proof else you will find it wandering around on the floor sometime, filter tubes etc will all be used for climbing. Feed it a mixture of protein (fish food, live food etc) and plant material. Keep the tank cool & preferably around 15C. Lastly like any invertebrates watch out when medicating the tank, anything with copper in it is to be avoided. You will rarely see it during the day until it is comfortable and looses its fear of you (few weeks), then you will find out how much of a character they are!

Only been a week so still early days. If I was you I would invest in a cheap heater, have read it can take 6 weeks or more in a unheated tank but half that time at 28C.

Although it is sometimes sold as an aquatic plant, its not and will slowly die off underwater. The stem and roots will eventually rot as well. I have never heard of it thriving or multiplying in an aquarium, when I tried it slowly died off after a few months and that is with strong lighting, ferts and CO2. Its a good plant for around pond margins etc so if you want it to survive then why not grow it at the top of the tank with only the roots submerged - a bit like Potho's?

I never really finished my cycle before putting a fish in but my thoughts are: 1, The largest population of bacteria in a cycled tank is in the filter system, there will be a good population in the tank itself but its the filter that you want the majority working away in so I wouldn't worry too much about the light in the tank. Your filter wouldn't have a light in it anyway. Advantage of having it on is to make sure your timers & lights work over the month or so cycling and of course its needed if there are plants. Disadvantage is that it can give algae a head start but different types of algae will naturally cycle in a new tank anyway (e.g. diatoms). 2. You need to keep the ammonia under 3-4ppm regardless on how much water is in the tank, any more and the cycling will stop. A full tank just means you have to top up more ammonia then a 1/2 full one but the parts per million will be the same. Bacteria live on a surfaces and there are very little in the water itself. So the glass of the tank, the gravel, any decorations & plants etc will have bacteria growing on it. Majority of course will be in the filter where your media has an extremely large surface area (inside the pores etc) The amount off water won't effect this much apart from the glass or decorations above the 1/2 way mark in the tank. Why not just set the tank up as you would if you had fish in it (full with lights on), this way you can suss out any problems before you stock it. Some things I've just gone through trying to cycle are: Patience, patience and more patience. It will happen but takes awhile. Heat is essential. I tried cycling at 15C (the temperature my tank will be with fish in) but nothing much happened until I threw in a couple of heaters and got it up to 28C. I tried Seachem Stability but that was over the cold period. Once I heated the tank I had both Nitrites and Nitrates showed up with the ammonia drop, normally the Nitrite is meant to spike before Nitrates appear. I have a feeling this was because I had introduced a large amount of Nitrate producing bacteria via Stability so it may have had some effect.

Thanks Mate, its great to have him. Depends on what I find in the area. Wish list are a couple of Redfins and Bluegill's, a Torrent (bottom left of the tank is an area of high current) and a Banded since the right of the tank has very little current. A school of Inanga would look great but they will just become fish food for the Giant & Banded Kokopu's. Of course a cray is a must since they have so much character. Won't be highly stocking it as reckon variety is better then numbers. Just one BK, Torrent & Koura and male female pair of each of the bullies.

Time for an update. Cycling Well this didn't go as planned. Things weren't happening at 14-15C so threw in a couple of heaters in the sump to kick the cycle off. 3 weeks later and I was topping up the ammonia every few days and recording some Nitrites and some Nitrates but I never experienced any of the spikes in the Nitrites nor the ammonia disappearing in a day that I had read about. Decided it wasn't a problem since the fishless cycling process is designed for a tank that is going to go from zero to 100% stocked whilst I would be adding the odd fish now and again over a few months and the testing verified there was at least some bacteria at work. Plants Can't have any submerged plants if I want a Koura but was really taken the idea of Potho's and other similar plants with just their roots in the water. Shelter for the fish plus Nitrate removal. Wanting to keep with the native theme I did a bit of googling both with the computer and my eyes in the bush and figured that a good plant to use is the native bergonia. It likes damp low light areas and is very common around here on stream banks. I put a trial piece in before I started cycling and it started to do well but got knocked back when I heated up the water. Despite this there are small leaves and rootlets appearing so now the temperatures dropped again I'm hoping it will continue to grow. Once its grown up to the top of the canopy I will remove one of the inserts I pre-made and let it grow out of the top. The canopy lights are strong enough that the leaves have lost their red colour and turned green. Also found some moss in a stream that was both above and below the water so transplanted some of that around the top of the main log. And off course because its a native tank I had to add the compulsory Ponga leaf. Fish Today I drove the 3 hours to Auckland and picked up Willyp123's Giant Kokopu. Well worth the trip as it not only saves months of wading in streams looking for one but since it is a captive bred GK it means I am not decreasing the wild population. He survived the trip well in a 50ltr plastic storage container with the top taped on tight. After a couple of hours in the container having the tank water added to acclimatise him he went into the tank and is now happily exploring his new home.

What's that white stuff hanging down? Looks like squid eggs???

I think only a 4yr old could take a knife to that cake. Anybody else would probably want to display it on a shelf!

As Livingart said - no pump built into the chiller. When working out your filter if you are going for a sump then of course you will need a pump for the whole system, but if going for a canister filter then the filter will have an inbuilt pump in it. Work out how powerful the filter or the pump needs to be for your sized tank, amount of flow you want, and the head (height it has to pump up to). Then because the chiller will add more friction to the flow of water I recommend getting at least the next size up pump or filter. For my tank I worked out that I wanted 3000 litres / hour circulating through the tank and sump so got a 4000 lph pump. Now I have it set up and cycling the tank I wish I had got a 6000 lph, 4000 is amble at full bore but wouldn't mind that little bit extra. If you go for a Jebao DCT or similar DC pump you can dial down or up the flow via the controller. I haven't looked at canister filters but assume the more $ ones would do the same?

I found a Hailea HC instruction manual on the net, have forgotten where it was but if you PM me an email address I can send it to you. Its for a 1/4 - 1/2 HP one but the instructions will be the same as yours. But operation is easy. Connect the outlet of your pump or canister filter to the chillers inlet and the chillers outlet to the return in your tank. Turn on the pump and then turn on the chiller. Press the SET button for 3 seconds and when flashing use the up or down buttons to set the temperature you want. Press the set button again to finish programming it. The display on the chiller will tell you what the current water temperature is and will automatically turn on or off to bring it down to the programmed temperature. Make sure that it is at least a foot away from any walls and if possible don't put it in a stand where there is no air movement. Like any fridge it chills things on the inside but heats up at the back of it. If there is no air circulation then it will have to work a lot harder then necessary. Only maintenance needed is to clean the air filters once every 6 months or so. Like any refrigeration unit I wouldn't recommend tipping it upside down. If you do tip it on an angle, then leave it a couple of hours for the coolant gas to settle before turning it on. Yes you need water in it before running, just connect to a pump or your filter with the outlet going into the tank. If you want to clear out any old water and potential gunk then a hose from a large container of water to your pump or filter through the chiller and back into the container. Run a hose in the container to flush out any old water. At least that's what I did when I got mine.

Perch are classified as a "Sports Fish" like trout and salmon rather then a pest fish. Because of this they come under the Freshwater Fisheries regulations and are under the control / management of Fish and Game. To catch them you need a licence and unfortunately like trout the regulations prohibit keeping them in captivity with out written permission form Fish and Game. You can contact them and see what they say, I think they would be more worried about somebody starting to sell the fish commercially then keeping them at home for your own consumption. Perch would be good - grow up to 2kg and I hear they are good eating!

I don't think I would use standard epoxy for that, it should be OK at 60C but don't know about the long term effects of the heat. Your best bet is to contact http://www.adhesivetechnologies.co.nz/ (I've had great service from them previously) and ask if Vinyl Ester Epoxy will do the job, I'm sure this is more heat resistant then normal epoxies.

If you are thinking of epoxy being effected by tropical tank temperatures - not a problem unless the fish enjoy temps above 70C. I striped the fibreglass of a kayak once and it had to reach temps much too hot to touch before it started to de-laminate. Unless the epoxy is a specialised one all makes will be the same. I just used Ados All Purpose from M10 in town. Not the cheapest way to go as it took 3 and a bit 625ml packs. In the end I ended up using one layer of cloth on each of the internal surfaces. But this means that the layers overlap on the corners making those areas 2 layers thick. An exception to this was the front left corner where there is no cloth, it's not needed as the glass is siliconed together there (like a normal tank). I used the cloth as protection rather then strength. Although it would make the tank stronger, the cloth helps avoid any cracking, scratching or pin prick holes that could develop in the resin over time.

Before it looks really natural I need more rocks (will still leave some sand areas) and some algae/bio film growth on the background. I will keep the prominent bumps on the background clean but the hollows "dirty". Hoping it will look like a stream bank which is slowly eroding away a bank made up from deposited rocks from its old course. Just a matter of time now.

Water: Today's effort was to add some pool filter sand, scrounge up some rocks to throw in and WATER! Nerve wrecking experience since I hadn't tested out the tank full of water before now. It was made even worse with some of the regular campers grabbing a beer and standing around watching it in full anticipation of seeing the whole tank and especially the tanks maker explode and fall to pieces. But it held and 6 hours later still no leaks with the filter system going full bore. :dnc1: Now I need to get a test kit and start fishless cycling which is going to take awhile. So no pics for a while as there will be no changes.

Redone background: Sorry about the reflections. Also completed glueing and testing the plumbing and have put one of those cheap RBG LED light strips in the canopy. I don't want too much light because there will be no plants and the natives prefer filtered light so think it should work out well. Can always dim it with the remote if too strong or add another strip if not enough.

Filtration: Overkill but better to have too much then not enough, its the same as in the DIY King video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YZJBm89MuzU but with a few minor changes. In the Wet/Dry the first draw has 3 layers of those green nylon pot scourers. I used them in my last tank and worked well for mechanical filtration and because they are cheap in bulk I figured why not again. Next draw is chock fill of bioballs which is above the sump water level and the bottom draw is full of sintered noodles and a few excess bioballs thrown in for good measure. To prevent the top draw overflowing if the scouring pads block I drilled some holes in the top of the draw. Although excess water would come out over the top of the draws it would splash everywhere - with the holes it will just drain back into the sump. I also drilled large holes in the front of the lower draw to direct the water into the sump and around the frame so there is some water movement under there to prevent any areas stagnating or filling up with mulm. Once the waters gone through the Wet/Dry there is additional filtration with some Poret foam. I just got a medium sump kit from fish2water and used the off cuts to separate the sponges. Because the Synfil doesn't self support I made a wooden frame (epoxy coated) and glued some gutter guard on it. Haven't tested the system out yet but can't see why it wouldn't work. If the water pressure is too much for the foam (which I doubt) then I can simply make up some more brackets to support it.