David R

I put about 20 neons in my old 5' tank with an 18" black aro when I broke down a small planted tank, it took him over 2 weeks to eat them all! The first night about 5-8 were gone, then 2-3 a night after that. The last 3 took a long time to dissapear!

I'm not really worried if that does happen, at least it will keep them full enough to stop them eyeing up the loaches. My dat doesn't seem to be such a guts, I added some tetras from a friends planted tank after he had been fed one morning and he ignored them for about 24 hours. The ornate will eat til his stomach bulges, but thats just normal bichir behavior... And thanks for the offer David, I'm sure you're a great, trustworthy person who has nothing but good intentions and I really appreciate the offer, but I don't know you from adam, and therefor feel slightly reluctant to give you the keys to our house. I hope you understand where I'm coming from, and don't take any offense to this, but essentially you are a complete stranger.

It'll be over xmas/new year. I'm not really that worried about them, I've left fish for longer, I just don't want the big bichir to start getting starving and have a go at the other smaller fish. Thanks for the offer tho!

The 4' tank has a dat thats around 9-10", and an ornate thats around 14". The loaches are probably small enough for the ornate to take [only just] if he really wanted to, but he's usually too well-fed to bother them. The 3' tank has 3 dats 2-3", and two ornates ~4". Last year the water was fine after two weeks without a water change, I guess less food means less waste. I don't think 7-10 days without a water change will be long enough to cause a problem.

Would be pretty funny watching a pair of convicts having a go at a full grown GG, would be like misquitos vs. the Hindenburg....

I'm not planning on breeding them myself, just want a bulk lot of something cheap I can dump in there. Someone is selling big lots of WCMM on trademe, so I'll probably go for those. Does anyone know a goldfish breeder who would sell a decent quantity of smallish plain old bronze/gold commits?

Nice!! Are they the ones that were on trademe??

I'm thinking about buying a heap of feeder goldfish to dump into my tank so my big ornate and dat have something to eat while I'm away (around 7-10 days) over xmas. Last year they were fine for two weeks without food, but this time around I'm worried that when they get hungry enough they'll start looking at the loaches as dinner. I'll get the feeders a few weeks in advance so I can make sure they're healthy and feed them up on some decent food. I'm also thinking of doing the same in my 3' tank with my small dats and ornates, so if anyone has a heap of WCMM they want to get rid of.... Normally I don't give my fish feeders, but its a bit hard to use an automatic feeder when all they eat is frozen shrimp and beef heart!

Nah my pics turned out crap, but here's a pic of a big old silver in a public aquarium somewhere (can't remember, was posted on a forum I used to read years ago). Its nearly as thick as that guys head!!!

How huge is huge?? Chuck one in the post for me Phil, pleeeeeaaaase!!! :lol:

Not as big as the ones I saw at the London Aquarium, they were HUGE!! At least a metre long and 6"+ from top to bottom at the head. They were in an enormous (think several hundred thousand litres, at a guess) tank with other big fish, red tailed catfish, giant gourami's, asian aro's, pacus etc.

This is where it's handy to proof-read your posts and think about what you are trying to say/ask. Your original post says: Nowhere in that post did you mention anything about the 4' tank being a grow-out until you can get a 6', so conch, myself, and I'm sure most other people presumed that you were asking if you could keep those fish in that tank for life. Now if your post read something like this: (Note the full stops, capital letters, sentences etc. There isn't a character limit on your posts.) Then my answer (and probably conch and others) would have been something like: Hi. I recently purchased a silver aro at around 12-15cm. and fed on a diet of pellets and shrimp he had doubled in length in only a few months. They grow very quickly when small, and I think you would need to have the big tank ready in 2-4 months, depending on the size of the aro when you buy it. Remember they are more likely to get stressed and jump when they feel confined in a small tank. When researching anything, the answers you get are only as good as the questions you ask. As for the ultimate size, I think 8' long, 3' wide and 30" high would be the absolute minimum. Anyone who has seen a big silver (like 3'+) in public aquariums will agree, they really are big! Not just long either, they can get quite thick from top to bottom. However, a 6'x2'x2' will be alright for several years, and a 6'x3'x2' would be even better.

And despite what the post at the top of the page says, links to trademe auctions, or other auction sites, are not allowed. Thats why people have their user names in their sigs....

Welcome! This is where people advertise aquarium-related items for sale. Can be pick up only, shippable or both, doesn't matter, its up to the seller to decide.

Do you want a money-back guarantee? :lol: What are the other dimensions of the tank? If its 5'x1'x1' or 5'x3'x2' the answer will be very different! Also some info about the filtration would help. At the end of the day those fish should all be compatible in a decent sized tank, but you can never be sure about the temperament of individual fish. My biggest concern would be the hungry oscars out-competing the bgk for food. see, I can be helpful sometimes!! :lol:

Yeah that sucks that you cant do a more specific forum search, however you can still use google to search FNZAS. 8)

Why would you want to put it in a community tank anyway? :-?

Yes this is a forum for everyone, beginners included, but that doesnt mean they need to ask everything and expect to be spoon-fed information and have their hand held. There are websites like aquaria central that have species profiles with size, diet, water parameters etc, or the arowana forum on monsterfishkeepers.com that has profiles of all the different bonytongue species. Why do we have those? If oscarboy had have looked at such a site (or a book even!) and seen the max size of a silver arowana then it would have been obvious that the tank he's wanting to keep it in is far too small. Who knows, he may also have learned some other interesting, useful information along the way instead of relying on others to answer his every question. The reason we have FNZAS (and other discussion forums) is to share knowlege and discus fish. But how many times has there been discussions about curing whitespot or cycling a new tank? Basic topics like those (and will X fish be alright in Y tank) have been covered so many times that there is no need to go over it again and again. That is why the forums have a search function, otherwise we would sound like a stuck record repeating the same things over and over. I'm sorry if you feel threatened or upset by my suggesting people be responsible for their own learning [to a degree] instead of just 'asking the forum' everything, and that you have mistaken it for a big ego. When I started keeping fish we didn't have the internet and the only way to learn things was by reading books, or trial and error.

A friend in the US has been stung by one of his rays before during a water change. The barb didn't detach like they normally do. OUCH!

You're right, to a certain extent. A question like 'can I fit an oscar/arowana in X tank' is pretty basic stuff that anyone with a few braincells should be able to answer in five minutes with a Google search. The 'basics' have been covered so many times that people shouldn't need to waste their bandwidth answering them for the 20th time, you can't constantly spoon-feed information to people.

But just think if you were the only person with a breeding pair of motoro's in NZ, $10 could be made back by selling 10 pups, maybe even less. If the zoo did manage to import some and then bred them, what would happen to the offspring if they aren't allowed to be sold? Do they have to distribute them to other zoos?

do fish live in water? :roll:

Buy a book or two, or as Varanophile suggested try google as there's plenty of information out there. There's plenty of people here experienced with keeping beardies if you have any more specific questions.

LOL! Google FTW! Silver Arowana, max size: 100cm. So yes, technically you could fit an arowana in there. Heck you could probably get 20 in there if you used a blender first.... :lol:

"its changed, maybe you should find something better to do with your time" LOL what a douchebag!! Henward maybe you should find something better to do than try to help an ignorant sod who's just wasted you time advertising mislabeled fish. Some people...... :roll: Perhaps he's never seen one grow to over 50cm in captivity because up until very recently they were very rare in NZ and it takes 4-6 years (maybe more?) to get that big. :roll: :roll: :roll: