Binkles

Good answers there. We've named our male guppy Hugh. It seems he's a bit of a ladies man with the female of the species. And most of the others have names of some description as well

Wifey wanted to know if people here name thier fish. Whether it's individual fish or schools.

I've put one of the 4 into the container but the two babies that were born I'm assuming last week are still doing well.

Who made up the name guppies - does it mean underwater rabbit or something? We're trying to decide which of the girls to put in the cage - or maternity hospital The two babies we do have are doing well though I'm going to try and set up my video camera on the fishies this week

Chris - I so hope you're wrong, otherwise we've got 4 more girls ready to drop. We've renamed the boy to Hugh

http://www.nzdragons.com/fish.jpg Do I look pregnant to you? Trying to find out if this guppy is preggers

How old are those guppies? We've got 2 running wild around tank (about 7mm in length)

Got up this morning and did my usual thing (hey fishie fishie fishie) and turned on their light - now most of them looked embarressed, and after todays events I can understand why. Our tank is doing well with good results and we decided it was time to get some bloody suckers - well I mean the vegetarian version (algae eaters). So we wander on down to Organisms (have to type that carefully) and walk away with two lovely looking suckers Introduce them to the tank in the usual way, and just turned on the light again - now if they looked embarressed before that's nothing compared to the shock I got. Peppered around the tank our Albino catfish had stuck eggs over everything - basically if it wasn't nailed down - it had egss. But not only that - knock me over with a sledgehammer, I spy two little bittie guppies!!!!! They're about 7mm long and gosh I'm stuffed if I know how they got there (well I do know but wow). Will they likely be eaten (guppies, Glass fish, albino catfish, and algae eaters) or should I look for some fry food, or will they find morsels for themselves?

Is that with - or without the other fishies?

Hi all, wifey and I are wanting to move our 2 foot tank downstairs (3 story townhouse) from our bedroom, as well as get rid of the snails that happen to be in the tank after being introduced by some plants we had purchased. We came up with a couple of scenarios that we thought may work - and the pitfalls, and thought we would pass these questions on, and see what people think. First option - empty the tank into holding area use hot water on the wood, and give the stones a scrub, move the then empty tank and stand and stuff down to the office, partial fill the water from the hold - place in new plants etc, then complete the fill from the hold - this is using an external filter. This way we have moved the fishies, kept the water, and hopefully got rid of the snails. Option Two Same as option 1, but don't scrub anything - place 2 clown loaches - which everyone seems to recommend to eat the snails, and then relocate them once the big tank has cycled enough with some 3 more clowns? But they probably will want more water than we can give them in the 2ft with 6 neon, 6 glass cat, and two albinos. plenty of hiding in that tank though. Option 3 - Use our empty 3ft tank for a couple of weeks to hold the neons, and the cats and let the 2ft hold the clowns. What do people suggest, we want to avoid chemicals in the 2ft tank for obvious reasons. The 2ft has been consistent for the last 8 days, with ph sitting about 6.75, ammonia 0, nitrate 0 and nitrite 0 (I can't see any colour from the tests). The 240l tank (measured how much water we placed in it - is not suited to the clowns at this stage with the ammonia very trace, but the two N's not stable. Good thing is the ph has stabilised in the 240l with it sitting about 7.25 Any ideas on the snails - they just seem to sprout faster than we can scoop, kill them all.

By breeding I'm assuming you mean breeding catfish Welcome along catfish_dude - it's a good bunch of people here, with tons of knowledge

Just a quick update since the water change the water is sitting at 7.5pH So I'm feeling happier.

Well we pulled the rock out and covered it in vinegar - apart from it smelling nice nothing happened. So I don't think it's limestone. The water is certainly clearer today than it was yesterday, and that's even taking into account the water change. We're going to get a test on it soon to see if it lowered it or not. It was slightly darker than a light green at the shop yesterday (contradiction in terms I know)

In the shop they said it was lime stone, as well as the one on the right - the far left is slate. Heres a close up of the rock Anyway to test if it is limestone?

I've posted a pic of our 4 footer (have to find the url - bear with me) There it is As you can see there are 3 rocks, and a decent piece of wood in there. The "dust" from the plant food has landed on most of the rocks (we've slightly cleaned that off everything now) and is really the only thing I can think of that would of contributed to the high pH. Ammonia etc may of been introduced via Cycle??? We're looking at possibly putting our neons and catfish in there for a couple of weeks while we clean out their tank - We're going to get rid of the plants - and put proper plants in there - we were sold cold water ones and they're not doing terribly well and introduced snails - which are starting to take over the tank. By that time we may be able to afford some of the fish we want to put in the big tank.

I have no idea how it got to 9, Has to be either the stones - or the plant food that we put in. Otherwise it's just h2o Does have me a little concerned though - will retest it on Monday (just done a 50% water change.

Hello and welcome to todays' water test. Tina and I approached Animates with the knowledge that we had two bottles of water - one from the old tank, and one from the new tank. I thought I would let the minds that be have a nosey - the old tank is a week since last change, and the new one we did a partial, but with the pH being so high, I'm a tad worried. But here are the results Small Tank (Old) 2footer 6 Neons 6 Glass 2 Albino Cat fish pH 6.75 Ammonia 0.8 Nitrite 3 Nitrate 0.1 New tank 4footer Empty pH 9.0 Ammonia 0.6 Nitrate 4 Nitrite 0.1 Apart from the ph of the second one, I'm rather happy. Just need to find out what may be causing the pH to be so high.

Our Glassies generally sit lower in the water - but they are certainly not getting cloudy - if anything more transparent - you ever tried to count the bloody things? We do have them in a group of six and they use to a lot of time swimming around - but after the siamese episode they've started staying at the bottom hiding behind things. Do you think that's it because they are stressed? They haven't changed colour or anything.

According to wifey (I forgot to introduce her btw - her real name is Tina) it's a Ornate bichir - and Caryl was correct in where we saw the wee blighters We just got back from getting our water tested to and we have too high a pH to be introduce any fishies into the swimming pool. I never realised how beautiful guppies were - we went to Animates in Moorhouse (we have had awesome service from both them and Papanui - one person from each shop is really really good) and had a perusal and realised to fit everything we want - we're going to have to line our entire garage, bedrooms, lounge and possibly the toilet. Are glass catfish (easily broken - hehhehehe) night timers? I turned on the light and they were all out partying on a rock, but once the light came on they crawled under it

As a fellow newbie I would like to say hi, and welcome along as well. From what I can tell from the short time, and the replies that I've had from questions they're a lovely bunch - and very knowledgeable. Congrats on your fish - and of course your yet to be named daughter - Fun times ahead I can guess

Bob was asking is that Harry Neon, or Harry Tetra. Apparently through some terrible tragedy they got seperated at birth and Bob became a drunk on the street. We picked him out of the beer can he was swimming in, and brought him home to sober up. Amazing when we can come up with stories for our fish Thanks for the compliment about the photos, first time trying to photo the tanks

Shhh, never use the number 6 doh! There's one in every bunch that wants to be an individualist.

Ok, I've made a couple of posts in the forums and thought it was possibly a good time to say who I am, oh and who my wife is as well Tina (wifey) and I have been married for 2 years and I would have to say that we love animals. We have 3 cats Furball (aka Fat Cat), Sugarplum and Coke (male). If you want to see what these guys are like - well they are currently flying around the world (only done one leg so far) in flight simulator - a hobby of mine. They are at http://www.nzdragons.com/flight But I won't bother posting about them as this is a fish forum and Sugarplum just thinks fish are cat TV's. We also have two mice - and not the computer kind, but we're phasing them out - they're holding up a 3 foot tank that could easily be used to house our neons etc and then leave the 2 foot as a quarantine - breed, steer at kind of tank. Then we have a 2 foot tank which has 6 neon tetras - their names are neon 1, neon 2, neon 3, neon 4, neon 5 and bob. We also have in that tank 6 glass catfish - awesome wee things, can hide bloody well. Their names are glass 1, glass 2, glass 3, glass 4, glass 5, mary. We then have two albino catfish - they're crazy - if I did as much exercise as them I would be dead! Names Tom Hanks, and Meg Ryan We did have another 4 neons but they became lunch (not ours) to a siamese fighter - who must of found them rather distasteful as he bellied up - as well as his partner (love lost kind of thing - terribly sad). We then have a 4 foot tank that is home to 220 litres of water - and god knows how many organisms - I'm not even going to attempt to name them all. Well you're probably sick of this and going where are the pics! I have them My other hobbies are ice hockey - I even play from time to time, and also inline hockey

So guppies are a good cycling fishie. I just don't want to have sacraficial fishies, so not sure whether I should use them.

Does that include not using cycle as well? Would save lots of money if I don't use them - remember this is also a new tank, so I want to get some kind of cycle going (still waiting for the cloudy water to clear before testing) fairly soon. As an aside - Finding Nemo comes out tomorrow