David R

How about a DIY chiller made from an old fridge? Should be far cheaper than an off the shelf unit, not too difficult to set up, more consistent and reliable when running, only downside is it would use a bit more power.

I posted something, then thought better of it, but I agree with Chris and will try reiterate my basic points again. Please don't resort to personal attacks like claiming people are lacking in education simply because you disagree with their ideas... Point A; your fish are thriving now, but that does not mean they will thrive their entire lives. All animals become more susceptible to disease and illness as they get older, just look at how easily old people get sick and often struggle to recover. Fish are no different. I have experienced it myself with a group of older Geophagus that were suffering from HITH when kept in harder water, which has now 98% cleared up once moved to a tank with soft acidic water. Same diet, same water change regime, even the same water out of the tap. I have also watched clown loaches thrive and then gradually decline in health over a period of around ten years from being kept in a 4' tank. Your fish may initially thrive in unusual conditions, but I think they may suffer in the long run. Point B; There is more to it than pH. African cichlids come from hard and alkaline lake waters with little flow, high aeration and a temperature around 25C. Aside from the difference in pH, there will be a difference in hardness and TDS, and these differences are every bit as important (or even more-so) than the difference in pH. Clown Loaches come from fast flowing rivers and streams with very soft and acidic, water often high in tannins, and also highly aerated but around 29-30C. Keeping cichlids that warm can speed up their metabolism and even shorten their lifespan (again, I have experienced this first hand, not just guessing here) while keeping loaches at 25C will make them a lot more susceptible to disease, especially whitespot (and also make it harder to treat). I have no experience with how african cichlids would deal with a high-flow environment as preferred by the loaches so won't comment, but if the clowns don't have the strong current to swim against you'd better have a long tank (at least 6') for them to stretch their legs in. These are not opinions, just plain simple facts... Point C; Its no great secret that most fish will tolerate some difference in water conditions to those they naturally occur in, so if you insist on keeping fish from completely different conditions together, then why not compromise half way between the desired conditions for each species? I have seen tanks housing a real mixture of fish like african cichlids and south american catfish work successfully for many years by keeping the water fairly neutral. You could quite easily drop your pH down to about 7.0-7.2 (along with the other corresponding values) with very little, if any, detriment to your cichlids and give your loaches a much better shot and reaching old age in good health. To me it seems foolish to expect one species to "get used to" totally different water parameters while providing another with exactly what they need, and would love to hear the justification for it. I will leave it at that, if you choose to fly in the face of common sense and good science then so be it. I'll take my underlying issues and lack of comprehension back to the american forums now where I can criticise others who also have too much time on their hands...

:thup:

I think plunket would have fairly good data to compare it to, I'm not sure what the expected growth for young clowns would be! Probably faster than most people think if housed properly though (4' tank at the bare minimum, moved into a 6' before they reach 10cm, plenty of flow, soft water and a good diet). I know the small ones I bought and raised like that were fast catching the older ones I'd bought from other people where they [may have] spent their lives in less than ideal conditions. Henward can share similar results of good growth from young ones housed in a large tank from a small size. I'm still not sure on what the long-term effects of stunting would be though [other than the obvious smaller size], would it also equate to a shortened lifespan or can you essentially bonsai a fish by keeping it in a smaller tank..... Ryan, you'd be the right person to do some experiments with this, it would be interesting to see the results if you split a batch of fry and keep one lot in hard water and the other half in neutral then document and compare their growth. I'm guessing if you avoid the opposite extremes the difference will be negligible with most common fish we get here, especially when young (although I did have problems with my old altifrons getting HITH in water around 7.4, which seems to have been fixed by moving them to a tank with a pH closer to 6). I think most fish would do fine with middle-of-the-road parameters (temp, pH etc), which is why I find it a bit strange that cichlid keepers who also keep clowns seem so reluctant to compromise on the water conditions, but I'm sure rift lake cichlids wouldn't do well in really soft water with a pH of 6.0, high flow and 30C temps, which is what the clowns will thrive in.

Interestingly enough in another article written by the same author she stresses that "simulating the precise chemistry for the fish you're keeping" as one of the three fundamentals of maintaining water quality. (link). I wouldn't go to a BMW website to ask advice on my Mercedes, and likewise I think the article I posted from loaches.com carries far more weight. The cichlidforum one (don't get me wrong, its a great website ... for cichlids!) seems to have been written from the angle of justifying keeping loaches in far-from-ideal water conditions. There are other things that don't really stack up, like suggesting that they be kept in a minimum group of three (in reality three fish hardly makes a school), no mention of water flow, temperature, and favoured water conditions, etc etc. I don't think anyone is accusing you of mis-treating your fish, or saying that they are "suffering". But as I said before, how long have you been keeping them? They probably look fine on a day to day basis, but have you been keeping them long enough to see the effects of things like reduced lifespan, stunted growth, decreased resistance to disease, bearing in mind you're talking about a species that SHOULD live for well over 20 years and grow close to 12" if kept properly. How much reading have you done on osmoregulation and osmotic shock? They may appear to be happy and healthy this very minute, but that is not necessarily the sole factor in determining the overall health of a fish. You do know that pH is measured on a logarithmic scale, so a pH of 6.0 is 10 times more acaid than a pH of 7.0, and 100 times more acidic than a pH of 8.0 right? 0.6 difference may sound like "nothing major", but if you're already keeping them on the high side of normal it could represent a big jump. Also the hardness of the water is just as important [if not more so] to consider in this case than the pH. As for "I know someone who's been doing it for years and its fine", you could use this kind of justification for almost everything from keeping fish to driving drunk, but that doesn't alter the science behind it. I've seen people keeping groups of frontosa (the fancy blue ones even) in big mixed tanks with barbs, datnoids and all kinds of other fish in water thats way off what they'd usually be found in. Heck people have even had reasonable success acclimatising fish like bumblebee groupers to fresh water (or very light brackish). Some people feel that if the fish is alive thats all that matters, while others feel obliged to do their best to replicate the natural environment of the fish. The thing that vexes me here is not so much the keeping of clowns in hard water, but the attitude that it is essential to keep the cichlids in perfect rift-lake-spec water but fine to keep the loaches in considerably different chemistry. Surely if you insist on mixing fish from two different environments the sensible thing to do would be to compromise? I'm certain you could gradually drop your pH closer to neutral (along with the hardness) and not notice any ill effects on the cichlids. Caryl certainly isn't the only person I've seen keeping rift lake cichlids in neutral water with great success. Chemistry aside, I used to feed my 30 loaches on a staple diet of Hikari sinking cichlid gold, with a mixture of prawn, bloodworms, zucchini, NLS TheraA and other bits and pieces offered on an irregular basis.

Really? Given the recent thread of a members CL passing away age 27 I doubt you've been keeping them long enough to draw any conclusions as to the effects of pH on them. I'm interested to hear why you think the loaches are more adaptable to different pH levels than the cichlids too, when this article written by a very experienced loach keeper would suggest otherwise.

I doubt your clown loach will be troubled by high temperatures, in fact its beneficial to keep them around 29-30C. If anything it will be problems associated with the high temperature like lower oxygen saturation, or perhaps just old age...

See, you've got him going now, he can't even type straight! 6M long, 2M wide, 1M high would be 12k litres, would need some super pumps to get the flow going for the clowns, but would be an epic river tank. Poured concrete or ply and fibreglass? How many windows and how big? Nautral lighting or artificial? Hope you've been reading the DIY forum on monsterfishkeepers, there's some fantastic mega-tank builds on there..

Its Hannah_21, I doubt you bought any of mine unless you picked them up from Auckland. About a dozen of them were sold thru HFF Mt Roskill, the rest went to friends who I knew were keen on them. Sounds like an epic build! What are the dimensions? Make sure you post up a thread somewhere, I know Henward and I have spent plenty of time planning [all in theory, unfortunately] 'mega tanks' like this, would really be interested to seeing you plans and maybe even make some suggestions.

If thats not a typo, I agree that you may be better off buying small and growing them out, but if you've already got big fish in that tank it may not be an option. In a tank of that size I'd expect them to grow fairly quickly up to about 6", and then slowly but surely from there. If you'd started with some 2"ers from the pet shop 'one and a bit' years ago they'd be getting to a good size by now. It was less than a year ago I sold my big group, and as I mentioned it was only the last ~6 or so that made it to TradeMe. Henward now has half a dozen of the biggest, the two largest were 20cm+. Problem is not many people will be willing to ship them, so you'll have to be prepared to travel. I'm yet to see a pic of a 12"+ clown loach with a tape measure or ruler to remove the guesswork of the size. Seen so many claims of 14" clowns, but not one pic to back it up. I even made a thread on MFK a while back, got some pics of decent sized ones, but nothing over a foot long. Squirt; here's a good link if you're going to Singapore; http://www.monsterfishkeepers.com/forums/showthread.php?339744-List-of-LFS-in-Singapore I visited Clementi Aquarium and Florist and AquaHobby as they were both walking distance from the MRT. Both worth visiting if you're interested in seeing some unusual fish and being made insanely jealous...

Might be of interest... http://www.reefreflections.co.nz/aquaworld-wairau-valley/1357-water-chillers-sale.htm http://www.reefreflections.co.nz/private-sales/1362-1-2-hp-hailea-chiller-%24300.htm (no idea if its grunty enough for your application)

Big clowns aren't just something you can get the LFS to order it (at least not in NZ anyway). You'll have to keep a close eye on trademe and the For Sale forums, get to know your local shops so they contact you if they get some traded in or hear of anyone selling them, and get to know people keeping them and make sure they know you're keep if they ever decide to sell. I didn't even have to advertise the biggest 10 or so of my group as I had buyers lining up before I'd even decided to sell them. And most importantly, don't be a tyre kicker or a tight-wad, big healthy clowns are worth big $$$ and most people know it...

Would be a cool project, I often think about it while walking the dogs at the beach. I'm sure you could use an old bar fridge to make a chiller of some sorts, the hard part would be controlling it so it keeps the tank at a constant temperature. Given the critical nature of it (in terms of life support) it may be better not to skimp on it?

Hello, pot? This is kettle calling..... Or you can keep platies you can keep cichlids, at least some of them anyway, its a fairly broad term...

Amazing the differences the lights make!

Been for sale for a while, should be negotiable on price by now.... TBH if I had $40k to blow on a breeding set up I'd want to do a few things differently.

Maybe they're not so barred, I noticed mine is showing signs of orange around the lips, eyes and cheeks. I'm picking it will peal to an orange-ish colour over the next few weeks.

Nope. I'm venturing into the world of reefkeepking, certainly not on a "monster" scale though! And nope. Glad to hear the fish survived and the holiday was good, looking forward to seeing some pics!!

I bet half of those buttons wouldn't have been pushed if trains were actually moving. If the normally 50-minute trip to town from Papakura had taken me triple that and we then sat stationary at Auckland Port for half an hour with little or no communication I think I would have been ready to abandon ship too! People were actually collapsing from heat exhaustion on some of the crowded trains, it was really that bad. Yes there was an element of human stupidity [letting off fire extinguishers etc] but even before that started things had already gone belly up. From what I saw, once things deviated from the planned schedule the running of the operation was taken over by headless chickens with little or no ability to think and act swiftly and decisively. Empty services were running past packed platforms without picking up people (despite stopping there for red signals), packed services were told they still must still stop at all stations instead of running directly to town despite already being full to capacity, trains taking far too long to be turned around at Britomart, the strand [and port sidings and other options] were not being fully utilised to clear congestion, etc etc. Yes there were larger-than-expected crowds, but really all this should have done was fill the trains up more, not cause the schedule to go completely out the window. The funny thing is that at the start of my shift we were taking bets as to how long it would take for the schedule to go out the window. Almost any driver will say "I told you so..."

Good stuff!! An important part of their upbringing at that age is socialisation with other dogs. I'm not sure where the good areas in whangarei are, but see if you can find somewhere to take him where he can interact with various other dogs. Its good for them, and guaranteed to wear them out too!!

The two species I recommended (L002 and L204) are both wood eaters so will rasp at the wood and keep it clean, not sure about the plants or other decor though. I don't have any problems with algae in my SA tank though. My L128s rasp at the concrete background!

Maybe we need to organise an east-side tank crawl?!

Try a smaller panaque species like L204 or L002, both are nice fish and don't get huge, although if you've still got your ornate maybe you'll want something a little bigger?

They also say they same thing about flagtails... Can but try I reckon, I never had a problem with my royal or clown and my bichirs, and look at Henwards tank. I think its more of an unusual occurrence than a common problem.

Elegant design and HOB skimmer is a bit of an oxymoron IMO. I'd seriously reconsider going for a Juwel tank, the options with glass are unlimited and having a sump is almost essential if you're going reef (again, IMO).