SpidersWeb

This is Jimmy, Helen's Oscar, still only young, coming up to 9 inches now, shares his tank with a red devil (whom he keeps in line). Soon to get a 300L tank of his own. Had 15 or so neons for lunch today. Planning on getting another pair next weekend if all goes to plan.

puddles (Helen, my fiance) thought she'd get Jimmy (her oscar) a treat, and we came home with 20 or so neons. Thought I'd video it for anyone who's interested. Camera ran out of batteries just as he got in to it though After the footage we had water splashing out of the tank. Took him about 10-15 minutes to learn technique, then the remaining fish were gone in seconds. First time they've had live food we think. http://s83.photobucket.com/albums/j307/ ... s_neon.flv In the video you can see our 8 inch red devil cichlid, and 9 inch oscar. We were playing with the lighting, which caused both of them to 'mini-sulk'. Normally they'd be keenly at the front. Hutt Pets has got in stock some baby oscars (super-cute), and we'll be setting up a lil' tank for them next weekend and getting a pair

Yeah, they're made by AquaOne, they're just frozen (not dried). Our local pet store stocks them, we just bought another 3 sheets an hour ago hah, the fish love them. Just pop them in the tank frozen, and the fish rip them apart. Good treat, but not recommended as a staple diet. For exercise neons work well, and we have a health mix Helen feeds him each night to make sure he gets all his vitamins etc

Hutt River has rocks, lots and lots of rocks. Although slate is my favourite, haven't found it down here yet Gravel can come from lots of places. Stores like Bunnings, Mitre10 etc stock some fancy gravels, and you'll find it in bags in the gardening sections (outdoors). I've got a black chip in my planted tank, cost about $60. In my other 4 footer I used a $40 (20kg I think) gravel bag (pebbles basically) from hutt pets, and in all the other tanks I used sand (which is a LOT cheaper). All up to your taste what you use tho.

300L it is then

Clearly, now that all the science is in, this is the only reasonable course of action. 8)

Do you have some pictures of your female? Great pics

Best thing to help this is some Java Moss or floating Indian Fern etc, a nice little area for babies to hide.

Our two main tanks are around 200L and we have Jebo 819's in both, plus internals. One tank has 2400L/hr circulation which has our oscar in it, and the other planted tank has 2000L/hr.

Pregancy takes 4-6 weeks. Her belly should not grow double in size overnight. If thats the case I'd be more worried about bloat or constipation. Apparently feeding a small amount of cooked green pea can help the latter, not sure about bloat tho. Oh and I'd say she's definately pregnant, unless they grow up without a male insight, they're preggers lol! Female swords will drop like clockwork, I'm just not sure if your girl is ready to drop tomorrow as such. When she is ready to drop, she'll look like she is about to almost explode. Fry are very easy to care for, and they'll eat finely crushed flake from day one (altho I use that livebearer liquifry for the first few days). If you don't do anything at all, chances are over time you'll still have new Swords, they're strong lil' dudes.

You can, but probably more trouble than its worth, if you wanted to do that basically you'd drill holes (pay somebody) in each of the tanks (where you want the water level to be) and connect a pipe to the tank below. That way when the top tank overflows, it fills the next tank, and so on. You then get a pump or external filter (whatever you chose) to push the water from the bottom tank, back up to the top tank again. This also means you can use a single heater, or put them all in one tank etc. Downside is if you're using it for baby fish, you'll need to put some kind of wool over the overflow pipes (making sure they dont block tho), and all the tanks must be the same temp, and if one tank goes bad they all do. Essentially what you have is one tank, divided in three, as apposed to three tanks. Hope that made sense lol I've got a couple of 30L tanks for misc purposes, and have a HOB, internal, and one of those air powered filters, depending on whats needed.

hah yeah I just put some in the oscar tank, and the red devil just got rammed (hard) against the glass by the oscar for it :-? 750L wow, I'd be jealous too haha. Biggest we have here is 225L, but planning on getting a 300 soon for the oscar (Jimmy). If you were interested in South American cichlids, I have some spare Firemouths that I could trade for neons if you wanted those. They grow to about 15cm, and look pretty rad when they flare up. Also hutt pets has baby gold severums, although when they get to full adult size you'd eventually need a bigger tank. They're one of my favourite fish. Other option is africans, bright yellows and blues etc. Dunno, what kind were you after?

Welcome aboard I made this video earlier of some of my tanks. Might give you an idea or two I favour cichlids for their individual personalities and territorial behaviour, but have actually been having more fun with the platties and neons lately hah!

All depends on what you want to do You can get 200L 4ft tanks for $150 new, and they're my personal favourite, just because of value for money reasons. In my mind there is two types of cichlid tank, regular (fish that grow to 15cm) and huge (fish that grow to 30cm+). For 'regular' I'd suggest 3ft or 4ft aquariums, in the area of 130-250L. For huge 300L plus. Think you might need to get back to us on what fish ya like the sound of. I just fed bloodworms and took a camera with me, maybe it'll give you an idea or two. Click for Video In order of appearance: 4ft planted tank, Angel Cichlid, Firemouth Cichlid (little ugly ones), and platties neons etc 4ft tank, Oscar Cichlid, Red Devil cichlid, and a huge pleco* 3ft tank, Kissing Gourami, Gold Severum Cichlids, Angel Cichlid, Firemouth Cichlid 3ft tank, Firemouth Cichlids + pretty pleco The gold sevs were being camera shy, plus they're sulking because I took their light away Unfortunately I dont have any African Cichlid tanks They definately have the brightest colours, but require (well not really 'require') higher pH than tap water and are generally a lot more aggressive. * temporary, Oscar and pleco are due for a 300L aquarium of their own. Also note you can't see the big Jebo 819 next to the tank, there is 2400L/hr flow in there.

haha good stuff! Congrats on the new room. I'm still semi-new to the hobby (2nd time around) so I'm still absorbing offers/freebies more than I can give unfortunately, but if you need a Firemouth Cichlid I got a lot of those, or maybe a Red Devil cichlid (super friendly, only bites what he can catch). Will swap a Firemouth or two for platties etc if you wanted them. They're bigger than you buy at the store but not adults. Also got some uglies that are up for free. I'm not sure exactly what happened, but one of them looks like Nicky from 'Little Nicky' with the spade-face thing going on. ooo and hutt pets has baby Gold Severums, just as an idea, they're so cute and a really cool fish. I've got a pair of teenage gold sevs in my 3ft with an angel and a Firemouth at the moment. They seem to go with almost anything cichlid. Unless you're going african cichlids, in which case I have no idea as I've never kept them.

Doesn't float to the surface, but its boyant enough to get pushed around if there is any current, or a fish knocks it.

Keep away from 'Duckweed'. Its like some kind of sicko virus. You think its a good idea putting it in the tank, then darn it, its everywhere. Its going to take me a long time to get it out of my java moss and indian fern :oops: I'd recommend Java Moss, its awesome, and great for eggs or baby fry. I have had some problems with Indian Fern rotting, and snails eating it, but where its had good light its been fantastic and looks great, Java fern is great too but you really just want to tie it to something like driftwood as it looks kind of funky when it floats past upside down. Be wary of filter inlets. I have Java Fern, Java Moss, and Indian Fern growing out of my Jebo 819 filter inlet. I'll get around to fixing that shortly.

*bump* Just wanted to keep this in the light as it were, even though I know there'll be a new post made, still. Me and puddles will be there, finally had our first baby fishes woo! (granted, livebearers, but still). Quite sweet actually, 40 of them in the grow out tank and only 5 or so are orange. Hopefully I'll have some good looking freebies to offer in future meetings. Oh and we got engaged too Looking forward to catching up with everyone again.

Olive is a boy. The silver striped strain is 'stronger' than the fancy variants, so while the spawn is likely to be 50/50, I've been told the weaker fancy strains are more likely to die off, so you'll probably get mostly angels that look like 'Olive' hehe I'll try and find the page I'm referring to and get back to you. I've only got one silver angel, and he has grown much faster, with bigger taller finnage, than any of my others (pearlscale white, koi, marbles, and koi/marb crosses), and he had to be housed seperately with my severums as he'd hound any other angel. My black veiltail is still growing fins back

Sounds like he sold you Furan2. It's good and works well (better than any other medication I found). Its about $18/sheet if you buy it off the shelf, so I only use it for emergencies. If you find you're needing it a lot, or losing fish, make sure to investigate the cause. Often poor water quality / stress / overfeeding etc lead to a weakend immune system. Not saying you had any of those, just gotta mention it.

I'm quite liking having platties in my planted tank, lots of bright colours, friendly and breed easily.

Sorry came up a total blank on that one, however I did find the Snowball pleco? Not sure. L102 Snowball Pleco http://www.planetcatfish.com/catelog/species.php?species_id=204 I've heard snowflake mentioned before though hmm :-?

L168 Butterfly Pleco http://www.planetcatfish.com/catelog/species.php?species_id=706 L052 Butterfly Pleco http://www.planetcatfish.com/catelog/species.php?species_id=983

Absolutely gorgeous 8)

I personally beleive that kind of defeats the purpose of being asked though, this isn't an advert for shops. Its a far cry from slander, which would be a big prob I imagine.