David R

I'd stay away from spicy foods and alcoholic beverages. :lol:

I see where you're coming from but I doubt that feeding natural foods would add much of anything essential that isn't already found in a quality pellet/flake food like NLS. Quality processed fish food and processed human foods are two totally different things, the human stuff is usually designed for taste and price with little consideration given to nutrition, where as fish food is designed to be a nutritionally complete food. The thing with natural foods is that you really would need to feed a good variety of the right kinds of things to cover the different foods most fish would eat in the wild (and all the vitamins/minerals they would intake as such). I don't think there is anything wrong with feeding natural type foods, I still feed my plecs courgette and my eartheaters brineshrimp, and will almost certainly feed my aro prawn once it gets a bit bigger, but as much for stimulation as anything. Their staple diet will always remain quality processed foods.

Cooked then processed so it is easily digestable, quite different to feeding cooked meaty foods. I certainly wouldn't feed anything like cooked fish/prawn/etc, there simply isn't any benefit for it, and I know of people (myself included) who have had fatalities that [on the surface of it] can't seem to be attributed to anything else. TBH I don't know why people feed all sorts of "stuff" to their fish in the name of variety. A mix of quality foods will provide all the variety and nutrients they need, so unless you have an obligate piscavore that won't touch processed food I see no need for it. If you're doing it because its cheaper than buying quality pellet foods then thats a different story all together, but I don't believe for a second that there is any nutritional benefit to it.

I'm guessing HFF stick to what the wholesalers call the fish 99% of the time to try avoid situations like this where the identity of the fish is unknown. (Would also help them plead ignorance if the importers should happen to get something in that has been misnamed at the farm in asia and isn't actually on the list). There are other members of the red devil complex than midas and red devil (citrinellus and labiatus), have a look at this pic of A. zaliosus, I think it has a fairly similar shape; I still think its either a mixed Amphilophus or a species we aren't familiar with, don't think there's any flowerhors (or trimac) in there.

Looks like the things HFF albany had as "flowerhorns" a while back. Back then, to me they looked more like a midas/devil that hadn't peeled yet but more laterally compressed and with a pinkish throat. I bought one and found it peeled mush later than the locally bred mi-devils I got from Jack, and was a far more uniform orange colour but still with the pink throat when larger, and also still more compressed looking with a pointier head and no sign of a nuchal hump forming. I posted something on MFK but didn't have good pics and couldn't really get a positive ID anyway (so hard to do with Amphilophus of the midas/devil complex!), so at best I'd say Amphilophus Sp. That one appears a bit more yellow than mine, but given the variance with colour in that group of fish it still seems likely that they're the same thing.

I'm just waiting to have my details approved, I do have a soft spot for tangs and I'm really interesting to see how he sets the sump up given that I'll be setting up a fairly similar sized tank soon (just need to try talk Richard into building it on-site!).

You probably want to be more specific than "african cichlids", what is staple diet for one species may be a no-no for others...

Nice looking fish! Don't like the look of the pipe coming out the end about 2/3 of the way up tho, could be trouble if your plumbing fails.

Bah, stupid forums that require people to register to view threads...

Got a link to the build? Always interested in reading that sorta thing to see how other people do things. Will be nice to see it stocked too. Sump looks rather, err, basic tho?

Agree with Chris, 26C is ok but a little on the cool side for clowns, 28-30C is ideal so long as you have enough flow/oxygen and your other fish can handle it. And I'll also second that your current tank will be too small for the clowns before you even realise it, they really do need something 4'+ in length at the absolute minimum even when small as they are very active fish. Six weeks isn't a very old tank, yes it should be well thru the cycling period by then, but is still nowhere near "mature" or "established" as is usually recommended for more delicate fish like CLs, so keep an eye on the water if you notice anything else unusual with them.

What are the other dimensions? I've been comtemplating with my next big set up if I should pretty much fill up the available width like that one (have 2.9M gap, was thinking of going up to 2.8M long) or go a bit shorter and wider so I can squeeze down one end to access overflows etc. Thats a pretty good size for a glass tank tho! Have seen bigger (8x6x3') but that is pretty damn cool, stand looks nice too.

Posting things like tank size, water parameters (temp/pH/GH/KH etc), decor, tankmates, etc etc etc will be helpful, and pics of the fish if possible would help with a diagnosis too. Could be anything from parasites to "greying out", which is perfectly normal behaviour, maybe google it to get some pics to see if thats what yours is doing.

Was looking at them the other day contemplating the neck chops you could get off one...

Horse; good, would certainly eat it again Rabbit; ok, depends how its cooked. Phesant; lovely, just like a slightly "gamier" chicken. Veal; lovely! Venison; lovely! Would really like to try wood pigeon, but mum would never let me when they flew into the windows when I was younger. I'd also like to try dog some time (probably in China!), actually I'd try just about anything once. Random tidbit of info; Charles Darwin, as well as doing the Natural Selection thing, also founded a society for the tasting of animals unknown to the human palate...

No but you could probably get them posted.

I'm still lost on Instagram, is it just something that makes good photos look old and crappy? That actually looks pretty good, the scales look like a tattoo

Worth reading on this subject; http://www.tfhmagazine.com/aquarium-bas ... nation.htm

I'll vouch for Laguna too. I wouldn't skimp on something critical like a pump for any tank, let alone a salt water one. You usually get what you pay for...

Choice! Glad we can get this stuff here finally, I looked at trying to get dad to bring some back from the states a couple of years back but couldn't get it shipped in time. Is 50*50 the standard size? I'll try design my next sump around that!

Neither do fish.

Part doses of any medication isn't advisable any time unless you're trying to increase the diseases resistance to it. Well oxygenated water of at least 28c should be all the preventative measures healthy clowns should need against white spot. Quarantining new arrivals is highly advisable too.

Yeah its flexi hose, and is the right size to fit onto the compact5000, just need a hose clamp to hold it on.

Bunnings have flexible clear tubing available in various sizes, make sure you use hose clamps though as it does get old and hard and loses its grip even when pushed on tight to the pvc. I'm running an FX5 return hose and nozzles on my Eheim Compact5000 and it seems to be ok, I've padded it up where the hose sits on the sump with filter wool and placed sponge under the pump and that seems to have made it a bit quieter. TBH I'm not that impressed with it, going to go with Laguna next time.....

I think you're right, and the cost of what the LFS sells it for is probably more indicative of what they buy it for, and it is there that both we the consumer and the retailers are getting screwed. When I can buy the same Eheim pump from a German website for nearly 1/4 of the retail price at HFF there is something not right. The suppliers are making it almost impossible for LFS-type retailers to compete with online stores, which is IMO a very bad thing for the hobby in a small country like this.