Caryl

Hi and welcome from a non betta fan

I usually recommend Java fern as a good beginner plant as it survives anything! Perhaps mine does so well as I rarely do water changes :-?

I suspect they are fine when smaller, and in a very large tank, but will get territorial as they get bigger. A lot will depend on the personalities of the sharks too.

I can copy and paste with the best of 'em Jude if Fay allows me to and sends a bit of added information on the background of the post.

The Ngatea Watergardens mentioned on the other site is brilliant too. Took lots of pics when we visited there http://smg.photobucket.com/albums/v144/ ... ergardens/

We kept 8 whitebait in a 2ft tank for almost 3 years with no problems. Just fed on flake food. If I remember correctly they just had an UGF and I can't remember what we did with them or if they just died. They belonged to my son who was about 7 at the time. he is now 24 They were called Pattie 1, Pattie 2, Pattie 3 etc :lol:

brilliant pics!

If someone takes pics b0i This isn't going to clash with the new club meeting is it scalare?

fishy_t you could write me an article complete with pictures of how it was done couldn't you???

Ceratopteris thalictroides. http://images.google.co.nz/images?hl=en ... a=N&tab=wi

When I say "I" I mean my dad divided up my plants while mum and I had a cuppa 8) Rinse the plant gently in cold water to remove excess mud etc. Don't let the plant dry out while you work on it. You can slice or break off the 'eyes' on the discarded rootstock to propagate more plants. Cut the rootstock with a sharp knife. This severs the new growth and creates a fresh palnt. Remove the long anchor roots from the new plant, making a clean cut close to the crown. Leave the smaller roots intatc. Removing the old roots encourages the plant to grow new, stronger, ones and will stop the old roots rotting and infecting the crown. Trim any leaves from the top of the plant. Carefully place the newly prepared crown on a perforated container with peat. Add a layer of small stones or gravel on top to stop the peat from floating free when the container is submerged.

water sprite will cope

Look for it soon on ebay! :lol:

I had 4 goldfish in a bath (left over from using them to cycle my African tank) and recently removed 50 fry from said bath No filter, no feeding them or anything. Quite a bit of oxygen weed in there and very green water. You can put a lot of barbs outside over summer. I bred rosy barbs in a paddling pool. Guppies will also cope outside in summer. Leopardfish will go outside but I find them not so good as they are hard to see.

All garden centres have them but it may be a little early yet. They sell them in spring. I have just divided mine up and planted them in the pond.

It is illegal and dangerous to run a cable from outside to inside in that manner.

If you don't feed white worms I suggest they are planaria. Harmless but get to plague proportions very quickly - due to overfeeding. Siphon the substrate well and cut back on the amount you are feeding.

I am a fan of the Jebo (have bought 3 819's so far and considering 2 more). Have no experience with the Aqua One but have heard a couple of complaints to do with bits breaking. Have had Fluval 403 and 404 and find they block quickly, are hard to pull apart to clean and very hard to get going again!

When I got up this morning at 8.30am it was already 17C. The fish are cruising at the surface a lot so I figured it was time to start feeding them. The green is the film on the bottom. The water is crystal clear. I am sure it will green up over summer though. My dad repotted lilies for me yesterday so they were added. 8 pots of them ought to cover the water surface pretty well! Littlest fish in the pic would be 4cm (not inc tail) and the biggest is about 10cm.

Water and electricty do not mix. You cannot just plug it all into an extension cord! I believe it is illegal to do so as well. We put in a proper ouside rated outlet for our electrical pond equipment.

You don't have greeblies in the UK Sirkus? It is a well known scientific term :lol:

Hi Sirkus and welcome. NZ has very strict quarantine so getting fish and plants here can be difficult. You cannot import your own. You might find it extremely frustrating since you are used to a much wider range. As to the best place in NZ to live, that would depend on what you had in mind job-wise, and what your interests and hobbies (apart from the tanks) are.

I have not noticed leopards being particularly keen to eat their fry but better safe than sorry.

peat lowers it and limestone or bird grit will raise it.

I would remove the betta.