Caryl

I bought LOTS of books :roll: (none of them aquatic related either!) Got a couple of light controllers on special for $5 - saved about $70 on each. 3 cheers for Animates' bargain bins! :bounce: At Organism I bought a male odessa barb to replace the ones cooked when the thermostat broke. My 3 female odessas have big grins on their faces this morning. And I also bought 3 dwarf loaches - Botia sidthimunki I think. The other thing we bought was lots and lots of food over the weekend. Shop crawls are hungry work! Got enthused about getting a 6ft tank again - Redwoods have a large shoal of torpedo barbs in a tank there. Must contact TM :roll:

Even though you have no pics, would someone please write something about the trip for the AW?

Home safe and sound. Fish still alive and released in the tank. I assume the others are happiy ensconced on the ferry. We had a great time and it was fun to meet so many fishroom members and put faces to names. :bounce:

Fair enough. Ferry was late so they are not here yet but only about 15 mins away. Lunch is ready and waiting. In case you're wondering, we will have soup (chicken or pumpkin), garlic bread, pizza, pizza bread stix, savouries plus some freshly baked bran muffins (or poo pellets, or fluffin muffins as my kids called them) :lol:

Will you? Don't forget the get together is SUNDAY night

To get picky if it will house only killies then it will not be a community tank. Most killies like 6.5 - 7.0pH but you don't have to be exact. What is it out of the tap? How do you plan to 'set' the pH? Don't use chemicals to do it. Peat will lower it.

We need more information fishylover. How big is the tank (dimensions please, not gallons)? How many fish and what sort? How long has the tank been running? What sort of filter does it have? What sort of lighting and how long are the lights on? Have you done any water tests? What are the ammonia, pH, nitrites and nitrates levels? What sort of algae is it?

Sexing mollies is easy and the same as for other live bearers. The male has a modified anal fin called a gonopodium. Mollies pretty much breed wth no help from you and will happily eat their fry too. They like a little salt in the water.

Then I am sure once Stu has bred heaps of them you will get some back in appreciation of your help

If you are so excited you are weeeing Loopy, it is a bit of a worry! Try doing more Keigel exercises

Will we see you at any of the shops scalare? Not sure where you are working these days.

Search your local beaches

Well you can still come to Loopy's on Sunday night. It isn't as if you haven't been to Organism before 8)

It does. I am sure the fronts wil be very happy.

Look at the fins too. Are they upright and perky or lying flat against the body? Clamped fins is a sign of something wrong, be it stress or disease. Is one shoaling fish not joining in with the rest?

We can queue (and kick wilson out of the way) :lol: No idea how many will join us. There are 8 coming to ChCh in our group but I don't know how many others will join us once we start the shop crawl or how many are coming to the knees-up at Loopy's on Sunday night. LOTS I hope. I love putting faces to names of people I talk to in here.

Depends on the size of the tank. many of the small shoaling fish will go with these but some need to be in groups of 6 or more to stop too much fin nipping. Harlequins, rummy nose tetras, pristellas, cardinals, lemon barbs, small tetras or rasboras. Got any bottom dwellers? Consider some corydoras or bristlenose catfish Ancistrus sp

If I remember correctly, it was a drop in water levels that started off the Dunedin ones spawning.

Thanks for that John I didn't realise. I assumed all opened 9am on Mondays. Will alter times accordingly.

microworms are a bit small for guppy fry really but they will eat them. Little bits and often is the key to feeding fry. As often as you can but not enough each time to leave any uneaten

Japanese rush is not a true aquatic and will rot. Java fern can withstand quite a bit and one of our members also has sprite in the tank with her silver dollars. She also feeds them lots of lettuce daily. This doesn't stop them eating the plants though :roll:

I have one here but found it took up too much space in the tank and I couldn't get it to fit tightly enough along the back to stop fish getting stuck behind it.

Fry will eat finely crushed flake.

Well worth it. I remember one of Dunedin's members breeding them many years ago and her whole family was fascinated in the process. They are a great fish.

Much easier to maintain a tank with real plants in it!