ally07

Hehehe - the spiders must've really scared you silly! :lol:

I'd say give him a little while. When I first got mine, he would just hide by the filter intake pipe. Only bloodworms could lure him out. I haven't fed him any bloodworms in about 3 weeks now and he's always out and about now, presumably grazing on leftover pellets from the rest of the fish. I would say that it's pretty rare for a fish to starve itself to death instead of eating a pellet that smells really good, although there are exceptions to the rule. I wouldn't worry about yours haha, he's got a nice bit of 'reserve' on him, should last him a while before he's in any real danger of starving.

It's like my ornate bichir haha. He will just be sitting there quietly... a feeder goldfish will swim nearby... *NEK MILLISECOND* the ornate is sitting there innocently with a fish tail hanging out of his mouth. !drool:

Heated indoor swimming pool.. Bath tub.. Dig a hole in the garden.. When there's a will there's a way (..to fit more fish in!) lol :thup:

Holy shamoly! That's a huge furry spider lol. *Shudder* I think I need to fumigate my room before going to bed tonight haha. But on the other hand, that's pretty cool how they dig into the substrate. Must be fun to watch them take down mealworms.

Yeah, he's a pretty well-fed fella so he can go without food for a little while. I do know for a fact that he's been raised from young on bloodworms by the original owner, so it will be an uphill struggle to convert him to anything else. Bird Barn used to stick frozen bloodworms under the gravel and he would graze from there, so you can try that if you feel that he's starving to death (though it's unlikely) lol. Maybe try starving him for a few days. Contrary to what Henward said, I reckon it's better to completely stop feeding for a few days. What I've found is that when fish see a regular supply of food, they don't fret. But when there's NO food at all for a few days, they start to panic (I asked them myself ) and are more likely to chow down on whatever food is introduced. Try using some garlicguard soaked prawn pieces after a fasting period. Alternatively, try something in-between, like mealworms just to get him to TRY something, anything, other than bloodworms. Good luck!

Not that there's a formal vote going... but +1 all the same. :spop:

I've never attempted what you are hoping to do, but in my experience, I've never seen my bichirs fight. I have an ornate that COULD literally swallow my delhezi and my albino in one sitting but doesn't. Very weird, but they rest on each other and hang out like mates. The ornate has no problem taking down other smaller fish though, just not its own kind. :nfs:

lol! I went through both my posts looking for the word "stuff" before I got the joke. Not so smart after all! :smln: But yeah I get what you mean about the variety. I give my fish pellets as a staple so that they get their basics and treat them with extras like bloodworm, prawn mince, mealworms, tadpoles, feeder goldfish...

Even with fish flesh, there are differences based on species of fish and the amount of workout that particular muscle group gets. With tuna, it's basically a torpedo in water; it uses all the muscles to propel it through the water at high speed, so the flesh tends to be very red (due to the blood being pumped through it). Compare this with a slower species of fish with paler flesh, the look/ texture is different because the muscles aren't being worked out as much. So I imagine that there would be chemical differences within different fish as well, but as you said, digestion will take the useful parts and discard the useless. Read about this in a sushi book lol!

I guess it's just one of those things. If you go on various forums, people post beautiful fish which have great development and look really healthy and they say that the staple diet is pellets only OR live feeders only OR prawns only OR mealworms only. So many different people feeding different foods as staples yet producing really good results. Maybe those fish just have really good genetics, or they look healthy even though their guts are loaded with fat lol. I think at the end of the day, I know that I won't go wrong with pellets. No risk of infection, no mess, loaded with protein/ vitamins and my fish love it haha. Complete bite-sized meals. If you do your research on beef heart and can see that it's got a good balance of protein and vitamins without excessive fat, by all means use it as a staple - you could very well produce very good looking fish as well.

Personally, I'm not really sure if there is much truth to the difference between fish flesh and mammalian flesh in digestion. Yes, ox heart is quite fatty, but fish can also be quite fatty. Of course, they are different types of fat, but I imagine that they would be digested in the same way and used up as energy. I reckon everything in moderation. One can't just feed live feeders all the time because the fat content in the feeders will also cause fatty liver in the predatory fish, just as ox heart is likely to do if it's a staple diet. For me, ox heart/ bloodworms/ prawns are more of a treat than anything else. Pound for pound, pellets or gutloaded insects pack more of a protein punch, so it's a more viable option. Furthermore, good quality pellets and insects tend to be eaten more cleanly than prawn/ ox heart - so it's better for the water quality. $0.02 :sage:

lol, 3 square meals with time for outdoor activities.. What's not to like?? :slfg:

+1, but you also have to be careful with your feedings. 20L does not offer a lot of buffer for water quality - it can deteriorate very very quickly and leave a lot of dead fish.

LoL! I'm pretty sure that if you get ANY Canon L-series lens, your shots will come out pretty sweet. Some deep pockets you got in your coat! :lol:

Henward... If these guys are using your thread to facilitate the illegal import of rays, MAF will hunt you down lol.

Robin Hood!

My hobby has suddenly become a lot less fun. :facepalm:

Brave man... :thup:

*rests hand on Bible* Yes, Brutus is as red as Henward claims it to be.

Well.. If one or two kind people are willing to (possibly) go to jail to bring in a mating pair of rays, the rest of us would benefit. Any volunteers? Take one for the team? For the greater good? :spop:

OK.. So I put the stand where I want it, and give it a little jiggle? If there are any gaps/ movement, I'll know that it's very uneven. What if there is no movement, but somehow the level shows that the ground is on a SLIGHT tilt (for the sake of argument, the bubble is halfway past one of the middle lines), would that require any packing? Thanks for all the replies, btw. I'm a complete engineering/ DIY noob, but I do know that I don't want my tank to crack lol!

lol.. Not very handy. The tank is a wooden cabinet on caster wheels, I think there are about 8 of them if memory serves. I don't think that the unevenness is so bad that I would need timber packers.. (or do I? lol) To be honest, I will need to go back and have a second look (which will be this Sat), to fully determine how even/ uneven the concrete is. I'm just thinking worst case scenario here whereby the builder who built the shed just couldn't be bothered with a level lol. I HOPE that's not the case, but I'd prefer to have some solutions floating around in my head before facing the scenario haha. What would be the best way to measure the evenness of the ground? I'm planning to use a level, but that might not be able to tell me if there are little "dips" here and there, which will ultimately affect the way the tank sits.

Naw.. We all know Henward is an honest chap, eh Henward?

Convict cichlids: the gremlins of the aquatic world.