Simian

Yes very sick of the high phosphates, thats what we get for living in a cow town :roll:

I often will leave my established tanks for up to 10 days without a feed if I'm going away. I wouldnt worry too much about daily feeding. If you do get someone else to feed your fish make up little baggies with exact portions, otherwise you are asking for trouble.

And we have prizes! courtesy of Mannie (malawi man)

Especially prevalent with Highfin & Lyre tail Genes. Think of it as a Jewish Fish from now on

*sigh* Here we go opening another can of worms The Efficacy (lumens per Watt (lm/W)) of a metal halide varies considerably but typical figures are around 80-90 lm/W High efficiency T5 lamps are up to 104 lm/W High Output (HO) T5's are much less than that (sorry no data sheets on hand) If you are concerned with operational costs, most metal halides still run with electromagnetic ballasts which are v inefficient. The lumen Maintenance of a T5 tube is better than a metal halide with output dropping down to an impressive 90% at 15,000 hrs. The lumen maintenance of a MH lamp will drop off more but life expectancy is very variable depending on type of lamp, supply voltage etc

Is on Sunday, 3.00 pm start at the Zoo education room Come have your say, on what you'd like changed next year. Basic agenda. Election of major officers: President Treasurer Secretary Editor Discussion on the following: Next years meeting dates and times Next years meeting location Next years meeting format Setting of subscription levels Events for the year Things you want to see changed Things you want to stay the same And anything else you deem important Dont just grumble, do something about it.

Top fish mate! good luck with tracking down some more, I'll keep my eyes open.

Damm that's a big list of can't haves Again tho that's why the efforts of mr pleco and others is so vital keep up the good work. a note to those of you with fancy plecs, if you need to sell please make sure you let the very few pleco breeders on here get a good shot at them before you chuck em on TM. it may be the last we see off some of them.

If they are L138's, it would be tempting to give em another 2 years to grow and chuck em all in a well lined pond in a secret location over summer, cross fingers and play some Barry White. Apparently they have been successfully pond spawned in Aussie. I think they are from Brazil so we may not see anymore wildcaught coming in:(

They were in World of water for ages (about 6 months or more) so I got them both for a really good deal. Next trick will be getting them sexed :roll: and if I'm lucky breeding, if they really are L137 Soniae they grow relatively big so that may be hard. The real puzzle is the black spots (very noticeable in the lighter fish) Like L138 L137 are called blue eyed red fin pleco but their eyes dont look blue to me (unlike the real Blue eyed pleco: Panaque Cochliodon which very clearly have blue eyes) they also look a bit like L310 Im not convinced all the pics on PC are authenticated Next stop will be posting them on PC and see what the gurus come up with. I need a good vent shot and one of the mouth to really get down to the nitty gritty.

I got both of these guys as Panaque Bruno's. Anyone confirm my ID? http://s259.photobucket.com/albums/hh29 ... =slideshow

regular change will stabilise the parameters. Do you have wood in the tank? if you do its prob that which is bringing the PH down. Try adding a few sea shells to the tank, I have found it stabilises the PH in my tanks with wood in. Avoid messing around with chemicals as these are IMO a short term fix.

Thanks dude

Apparently its all to do with the Ph of the water keep the ph at exactly 7 and you should get a 50/50 split.

IME they like some flow through the cave so make sure its not a dead ended one, the female will jiggle in front of him to get him interested. They are cool to watch and mine have all been very good parents. watch that one doesn't get too defensive and beat up its partner when the young are hatched, you may need to seperate them for a while. If they don't pair up for you I can hook you up with some more females, I'll pick the 3 best out before I sell my next batch and if you are serious about breeding them you can have them for nothing. If they do pair up you will soon be swamped with babies, so get a microworm culture ready. P.S. give em a feed of white or blood worms that gets mine in the mood for lovin Good luck Cam Owen

As do I. I have probably gone way off track on this one, and it would appear I have upset at least one member here but before you get all defensive think on the following. Many people seem to think that they are limited by their financial position, this is not the case, they are limited by their vision. I don't have wads of cash to splash around, like most of us here I have a very limited budget (less than $40 per week disposable income. That is for all my discretional spending not just fish), but I have started on a path which will see me in another 1-2 years producing some jolly hard to get fish. I started breeding less than 12 months ago, with 1 pair of Platies. and a pair of common bristle nose. From this start I now have funded the following: 4 trios of Bn 1 Pair GBA 1 pair red whips 2 pairs of Kribs a community of sunset platies (no longer bothering with) I have lost a number of expensive breeding stock in the process. I have given away hundreds of dollars in fish and other associated kit to club members to get people on their feet. I am currently building a very small fish room in my garage, which will take approximately 4 months to pay off but will save me that amount in electricity this winter alone. All things being equal and when I can get my first batch of whips raised to saleable size I will be able to purchase some more higher grade fish and continue my steps up the chain of producing even better fish. This is not supposition it will happen! This is the same path many of the quality breeders in NZ have followed,it works and will continue to work. So don't be defeatist, accept we will never have the same options as a bigger community, wailing wont change a thing only doing will make any difference at all. I reiterate We the end user hold the solution to our problems of variety and cost, if all of us in this community bred only one "rare" fish there would be plenty of choice and the costs would be more reasonable for the entry level aquarist I discuss the sell price of my fish with the retailer when I sell, to ensure they will sell at a price that is fair. Owen

IMO we will never be satisfied with the fish we can get, the same way Aussies arent satisfied Americans etc. as long as there are fish we cant get we will want them. Its great to see another breeder getting himself set up properly in NZ Well done DAuckland and others who are clearly putting the effort into getting good quality fish onto our market. The production of good quality fish in NZ is I'm afraid solely in our hands as the end user. We have to accept that we will have to pay more for fish, we live in an isolated country with a temperate climate and strict import restrictions, all the crying about how much markup is put on a fish is pointless. Everyone is entitled to make a living and I dont know any fish retailers who are loaded so quit crying about it. I take my hat off to those of you who are producing decent fish within their speciality, Mr Pleco and Ryan and Johannes spring to mind,they have invested mega bucks into their stock and thousands of hours into breeding some edit:suphew hard/rare fish. The best way to get better fish and more variety is to help them carry on the good work. Support them, pay a decent amount for the special fish they produce, so they can improve their range and stocks. I have started down the breeding path and it will take me many years and more money than I care to think about to get you folks some of the fish I'm targeting, What will happen is I will offer a first generation on this forum for 1/2 the price you can get in the shop, they wont sell, I will get ripped off and end up having to sell them at 1/5 of the retail price to a middle man who has to mark them up 3-400%to pay his costs and people will grizzle about the cost of fish in the shop. Buy locally bred fish and at least we stand a chance. Rant ends.

Well done Shannon :bounce: that was quick

2 weeks on from free swimming. They still appear to be doing well (hard to see through the green water) but pics will be hard. I have anchored a piece of silverbeet which I am unsure if they are munching on and replaced the decap with microworms. 20% water change daily. they are about 10mm long now but still pretty much all tail.I leave the light on 24/7 to keep the algae going strong, I will reduce the on hours to 12 after this week as they should be moving off algae onto more solid food over the next few days. I'm trying to get a good daphnia culture going in a spare tank with the excess green water from my water changes, I have never had much luck keeping daphnia inside so fingers crossed. the more reading i do on these guys the more i find that they appear to prefer a meaty almost Hypan diet, I am worried about constipation tho. do you think a very small dose of epsom salts once per week would be an idea?

I assume its a in line uv steriliser? I say if you have it run it, it will kill waterborne parasites and algae. I run UV on my planted tank and if I could afford it I would put one on all my tanks. It will tend to clarify the water to a lesser extent by blasting small organic particles in the water as well. I say yes as an extra insurance policy against white spot if nothing else.

Aholes :evil:

Best to over feed them initially. Just make sure you remove it before it goes too mushy They may take a few days or a week to get used to feeding on the zucchini, then just feed them enough so there is only a small amount of leftovers night and morning. once they are bigger you don't need to cook the Zucchini quite as much, (this will help keep the water cleaner)

Others may disagree but here's my experience with the same behavior. I too have seen this, often a few days before a mass die off (havent had it for ages thank god). Feed em up and fast, The 30 day mark is most critical for BN babies, feed em zucchini slices that have been cooked until they are soft, change the food twice a day before it dissolves into mush.Increase aeration. and if you can separate from the parents. Good luck Owen

Thanks Melrick, They just needed the right temp and some privacy to get jiggy. They are still alive, after a week, tiny still but active, I have them in green water with some really manky Java moss and other plant trimmings. daily 20% waterchanges, leaving sludge etc in the tank for them. I'm adding a small amount of decap BS eggs, but am unsure if they are feeding on them. Fingers crossed.

Apparently the Indians smear it on fences to keep elephants at bay! One seed is reported to cause intense pain for 30 minutes after eating it! Dont go for a pee after planting the seeds bro!