David R

Nice tank, shame we don't get gars... I had three silver dollars with my black aro in a 5x2x2' tank, they're not as bad as some fish for eating plants, but if you've got your heard set on a nicely planted tank I'd say forget about them.

How big is the knife?

Most of the fish you listed can work, its just a matter of having the sizing right and a bit of trial and error. I'd also suggest you stay away from the gourami and the oscars, and it would be a good idea to have enough tank space to seperate the fish if something goes wrong and they don't get along. I'd suggest getting another tank and growing out 3-4 ornate bichirs to go with it, I've seen pics of tanks with a large asian aro and a few big fat bichirs on the bottom and it looks great! *edit* the URL for the pic needs to end in .jpg if you want to post it using the tags. Forget snapfish and use photobucket!

Nice, that aro looks chunky!!!

Barrie, the only time I've seen glass drilled was using what looked like a router with a hole-saw type thing. Is that not normally how its done? I'm not really keen on the idea of a PVC overflow like that, seems like a hard way of doing things, and much more potential for disaster if the syphon is broken. I think I'd rather go for a new tank than try set that system up on an existing one.

As the title says, 6'x2'x2' 10mm glass tank, age unknown, how easy would it be to drill and is it worth the risk?

Just thought I'd let you all know the results of this... In the week leading up to the holiday I could only find lots of 3-400 goldfish fry around 1-2cm, too small for what I wanted. I went to Jansens when they were doing their 'buy two get one free' thing and picked up 30 neons and 30 lemon tetras (they were the best value for money in terms of size, thier small goldfish were around $6 each! The guy gave me a bit of a discount too). On friday night I did water changes on both tanks, and gave the fish a big feed. Saturday morning I dumped the 30 neons in the 3' tank with the small ornates and dats, and the 30 lemon tetras in the 4' with the big dat and big ornate. The big dat got about 4 in one mouthful as soon as they hit the water, then looked content and ignored them, as did the ornate who had a bulging stomach full of beef heart from the night before. The two small ornates were also fat and well-fed, but still went crazy chasing the neons around. My sisters BF came around the next morning, and phoned me to say the two ornates looked MASSIVE and all the neons were gone!! There were still a few lemon tetras left, but most of them had gone too. I returned today to find the smallest clown loach in the 4' tank missing, and two others with scrapes on their heads, most likely from the big ornate. Conclusion: Fail. Needed more and larger feeders for the big fish (someone really needs to start mass-breeding cheap plain goldfish!!) and the smaller fish could probably have done with larger feeders too. I'll post a pic of the bloated ornates later.

Thats a nice size tank! Good for the aro, and other long fish.

Add another 0 to the litres then start thinking of getting a pacu.... :lol:

Yup. And by "these guys" I hope you mean 4-5+, as when you have a small group one often gets picked on. I've found they can take a dislike to certain fish and harass them, but they can make good dithers in tanks of large, aggressive fish.

So vampyres etc are cool [sucking blood etc] but chopping the head off a fish is gross? :-? :lol: I seriously hope you didn't eat it if it died of unknown causes, IMO thats asking for trouble! Would you eat a sheep if you found it dead in a paddock? If you actually killed and ate it then thats fine. I know some hippie germans who live on a farm, one of their horses broke its leg and had to be shot, so he butchered it and smoked it and made some of the best jerkey I have tasted! It seemed [to him] like a big waste to throw all that good meet away, and I agree.

The exact same argurements used to ban party pills can be applied to alcohol and tobacco, but I don't see anyone trying to ban them. I blame the media for creating the hysteria about them and the the deaths related to it. I also blame them for the boy-racer thing and the urawera terrorists....

No pics yet, I'm up in whangarei, he's in a tank full of neons :lol: I'm not sure how many ate left, my two smaller ornates have pigged out and look like they're going to explode! :lol:

I'm doubtful, the ones at jansens looked really unstable anyway. Given that they're hard to get in the US and usually way more expensive I can't see us getting them for the same price

http://www.monsterfishkeepers.com/forum ... p?t=110282 They're pretty bad pics... :oops: Will try to get some better ones when he gets a bit more confident.

Either youtube of photobucket for the videos.

lulz! I found myself putting on a borat accent when reading it... Mind you, some of the girls look a bit better than the average kiwi car-skanks albeit probably jailbait.... :lol: BTW paul_r, your sig gives me a little giggle every time I see it, thanks for brightening my day.

Cool! When do we get to see some pics!??!?!

Last night I just picked up an American Tiger (D. polata) from Jansens Mt Eden. It was the same price as the other 'normal' dats, but apparantly on the suppliers list they were called "Borneo Tiger four bar". I'm guessing there's a few more of them floating around LFS's, so keep an eye out if you're after a rare species of dat that is not commonly seen here (I've never seen anything other than D. microlepis for sale). The easiest way to spot them is by their more silverish colour, thinner bars, and two spots at the base of the tail. Info I'll try to get a couple of pics after work today. 8)

They're fairly common, so I'm sure some people here have them or have kept them at some time.

I paid $50 for an 18"er. 8) It would also depend on colours, and the luck of the draw. When selling a big fish you can either sell it cheap and quick, or put a high price on it and wait for the perfect buyer to come along. Also, how can you be so sure the 5' tank is too small? It could be 3' wide. Have you even seen a big fire eel? Mine at 20" was perfectly happy in a 4'x20" tank, they don't need a huge tank because of their shape and flexibility, unlike something bulky like a catfish of equal length. That said, if its a standard 5'x2'x2' then its probably bordering on the small side, and should be upgraded soon, but I guess thats why he's selling... Bjorn I'd love to see these fish in person, and may even consider buying one depending on price (and I'd need to set up a bigger tank first).

WHERE ARE THE PICS!!!??!?!?!?!?!!!!!! I doubt if anyone would pay $1k for one, but could be worth a couple of hundred. Where are they? I'd love to see them in person.

I'm not sure about 'better', but its not worse. Looks cleaner, heater isn't able to be damaged by big fish or rocks/wood etc. I actually run two heaters in the sump, one set to about 1C lower than the other so it only comes on when I do a big water change. Its also nice to have it as a back-up incase something happens to the main heater.

Go into either of the Hollywoods and look at their sumps, much better than trying to describe it over teh interweb. Here's how mine is set up:

I'll take one of each thanks! And TTIWWOP!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!