paul_r

I have had a large angel in with neons before, wasnt a very big tank, only about 350lx350wx700h. They all seemed to get along fine, never had any nipped fins or missing fish etc I now have the large angel in with plattys and corys and some young dwarf gouramis and they all get along fine, the tank is only 600x300x300. But that is only my experience, have heard of angels being very agressive towards smaller fish

Any chance of posting up a photo or 2 of how your tanks are set up? Im just curious as to what everyones killi breeding setups are looking like. Might be able to get a few ideas to make mine more efficent.

I have just started building a killi cupboard, have got all the wood cut to shape/size today. I am now looking foreward and planning ahead. Will be putting together, waterproof painting and insulating in next couple of days. I have worked out that i will be able to fit 5x 300x200x200 and 4 450x250x250 tanks. And i will be useing a sponge filter in each tank. Can anyone recomend an air pump to use? I only want to use one pump for the 9 tanks, so i would need something that is strong enough yet not too strong for the job. Anyone got any ideas on what sort of pump to use? Ive been looking on trademe yet all i see is names and numbers and flow rates, doesnt really make any sense to me. Also there is no LFS in whakatane. I am also looking for a thermostat as i will be having a lightbulb or 2 to heat the whole cupboard. Anyone got any suggestions on what sort of thermostat to use and where to get one for, it will be set at about 22 degrees. Thanks in advance

I was trying to find the egg in the container and was having a bit of trouble, i placed container on top of one of my lights for my comunity tank, and could see eyes in the egg, very tiny but was able to see them

haha yea im definatly hopeing, i realise that one egg isnt going to do anything major in terms of fish stocks, however will give me the chance to learn, and ive only had these killis for 5 days now so cant wait to see what happens in the future.

Oh okay thanks for that, will keep it in mind, i just thought that using some more of the blue stuff would make the egg easier to see. Its in a clear chinese container floating at top of tank, it also has some air bubbles under it making it even harder to see. Is there anything i can do to help eggs chances of survival? or is it basically a leave and hope for the best in my situation?

we dont have any fish shops in whakatane. The closest thing is the vet centre which has a bit of fish food, heaters and a few comets and fantails....and they dont have any methylene blue Ill find some somehow....hopefully, as its a while until il be going to Tauranga

Just thought id let you all know that when i got home from lunch i found that my Australe golds had been "busy". I checked the mops and wasnt really expecting to find anything as the killis that i have are still rather small. However i got a nice suprise when there was 1 egg on the golds mop. Im off to the vet centre to see if they have any of the Methy... blue (cant spell it). Have got the egg in a chinese food container floating on top of tank. It might only be one egg, but it sure is a start. Since i want this egg to survive, sounds silly over only one egg, but like aquanut told me , "you have got to make every egg count" Anyone got any suggestions on how i can help this eggs chances of surviving? Thanks

yeah i sent Tim an email this morning to let him know that im avialable if he needs an extra pair of hands. Just thought id let everyone know in case they had something they needed a hand with. Doesnt have to be fish related

Yeah i can imagine there would be alot of work involved to get each newsletter out. Hopefully one day ill be ablt to add something to the newsletter. Also im not too sure who to tell or where to post, but i thought it would be a neat idea, im willing to donate some of my time evry now and then to help out the NZKA, as it has helped me out so much. So if anyone needs a hand with anything you can PM me, and so long as im not too overworked with my studies it should be fine. I live in Whakatane and dont mind a bit of travel.

Just took my container of micro worms out of the hot water cupboard and could see that there were all four sides of the container with worms about 2cm from the bottom, i took the lid off and placed on the table ready to feed fish and stopped to check my tanks as i tend to do.....alot. 30 seconds later i went back to the container that there was almost no micro worms on the sides of the container. Anyone know a reason for this?.....i guessed maybe sensative to light, or saw some hungry killis and went back into the food to hide Thanks

Would just like to say a quick thanks to another great monthly newsletter by the NZKA. Im very new to killis and have received two newsletters so far as well as tons of priceless advice from other members. And keep up the great work. If your not a member of NZKA i really recomend it, a lot of real nice people and a ton of information that no ammount of money can buy Paul

haha its very hard to not check on them evry now any then, too excited with the new fish . But i will keep that in mind and in the future will not keep checking up on them. Just put them in the tank, put the cover on and leave them till the morning. And ive been feeding them a little bit of flake, they seem to like the micro worms alot better though

Thanks for that alan, i will keep that in mind for next time i get/move fish. Makes sense as i guess would stop the spread of any diseases in water etc. (not hinting that there was anything with where they came from) Unless the albinos have mean looks they cant have killed the dageti as they were split with the tank lid acting as a divider. There was no redness of the gills etc, they looked the same as the other killis in other tanks, just relaxing in the water, swimming occasionally.

haha okay that is good, dont want to be getting stressed about loosing more fish. Will have more tanks in a couple of weeks with lids so they can jump all they like with no concequences. At the moment tanks are split in half with their lids, and tea towels on the top. A little rugged, but is only temporary and does the trick.

Ok ill start with Getting home with polystyrene box full of bags with fish in them. Take bags out, place bags in their respective tanks, which has water aerated and at correct temperature. Play xbox 360 for half an hour or so, stopping occasionally to see if i can notice any abnormalities. Add about a cup of tank water into bag with fish, leave for another 15 mins or so, check temperatures are consistant in tank & bag(s). Let fish go into tank.... Drop top of bag into water, place on an angle so fish can swim out on their own, slowly tip water & fish out of bag.

I got some more killis in the weekend, now have 3 tanks divided with killis only. The striatum seem to be most active, smimming around investigating everything. However the australe golds seem to maily lie on the bottom, swimming around occasionally, sometimes jumping over the tank dividers into other half of the tank. The P82's all seem to be hiding in my breeding mop...maybe not hiding, just getting a bit of privacy (hoping ), and the albinos seem to sit near the top of tank, swimming around every now and then, sometimes investigating left over food scraps at the bottom etc It is the australe golds that worry me the most as they hardly move, and seem to be on the bottom lots, could this be an indication that there are problems, or is that just their behaviour? Thanks heaps guys

Just curious as i got 5 Species of Killi in the weekend, Striatum, Australe Gold, P82's Albinos and Dageti, For all species except the Striatum they are in tanks approx 450*250*250 split in half. The first 2 days were fine, everyone eating, behaving normally etc. Evening of day 2 and all 4 Dageti having trouble swimming and all ending up dead. However the 3 Albinos in the exact same tank, same water, temperature etc are all doing fine. The tanks were cleaned with salt before use, the filters had been in an established tank for about 2 weeks now, in an attempt for them to build up some of the nessecary bacteria. Im new to keeping killis, and dont know all that much about fish keeping (yet), it just seems strange to me that only one species is having trouble (all dead now), while the rest are doing fine

This probably sounds like a stupid heading, but hey just thought id ask to see if i could gain a bit of knowledge for future references. Can anyone tell me if there are signs that are a fish is dieing (cant spell) and what it is caused by. For example what causes a fish to loose its balance, spinning upside down etc and eventually dieing Or what are signs that a fish is dieing of too much ammonia etc. Any help would be much appreciated

I have a question, would anyone be able to tell me whether any species of Killie are more prone to stress or dying than any other specie. For example has anyone experienced more losses than another specie after purchasing a large quantity of fish of different species. Or has the power gone off for a while and tank got too cold for a while and a few have died etc. Am just curious. Also has anyone experienced more trouble with one breed of killie than any other etc Paul

For the time being i am planning on useing several small air pumps ive got lying around at home plus a sponge filter in each tank. If i placed the pumps on top shelf it would suck in the warmest air and circulate it to all the tanks, so would have some effect on keeping the heat constant throughout the cabinet, however i am not sure how effective it would be. Anyone done this before that could confirm its effectiveness? I am planning to use some MDF to make the cupboard, all bookshelves ive seen are the wrong dimensions so this is going to be totally custom. May be a bit expensive but would definatly be worth it.

hahahahahahahahha there are so many things in my mind id love to add to that, not very appropriate though. I think it be best if i keep it to myself haha

Im undecided on how to filter, am thinking of a sponge filter per tank as i have a few air pumps, am not sure of how i could run an external filter. Any ideas for other ways of filtering?

Ill have a play round with some hoses and see if i can get it to keep the warm air circulating, want to be useing as little power as possible and im not too worried on what it looks like, so long as it does its job im happy

hahahaha i see, i grew up in a place called waimana and have had plenty of experience with that sort of thing. Will keep an eye out and make sure nothing happens and not take any rubbish from anyone