fishplants

I have been feeding my Marble Hatchets moths for a number of years, apparently no ill effects and they live for a long time so seems ok. (must be amusing to see a grown man running around the back yard with the security light on, catching small moths by hand! - hopefully the neighbours haven't seen me.)

I get this in my discus tanks, I used to worry about it but don't anymore. As long as there is no major loss of tissue or redness underneath, it clears up by itself. My discus in one tank in particular are rather flighty (due to one of them having some insecurity issues ), they are often grazing themselves which sometimes leads to a small patch of fungus - it always heals up alright though. Other than that, aquarium salt at 1 x 20ml tbsp salt per 20 litres fixes it well.

I acclimatise my fish over an hour. Adding quarter cup of tank water at minute zero and then every 15 minutes until the hour is up. The only loss I had recently was one of two Angelicus loaches from Animates, the store person slightly squashed this one against the glass when trying to catch it and it died the next day. They happily replaced it.

Rexel do 3ft Osram Lumilux in most colours too - about $10 each. But Lamp Specialists do carry a greater range, including the Philips Aqua Relle.

Have you tried Rexel? The branch here in CHCH has magnetic ballast for T8 (last time I was in there a couple of months ago), and there are electronic ballast made by Osram that will do both T5 and T8 - the QTi series from memory. If you don't have any luck, let me know what you want and I will get it from Rexel and send it to you. I am pretty sure that Redwood Aquatics (CHCH) has some of the Interpet controllers too, these are the ballast/leads/endcaps - plug and play. cheers

Hi Dennis, not sure if someone has mentioned this, but what about replacing one or both of the tubes with the Juwel Blue tube? It has a very low amount (relatively) of visible light. Then add peat to your filter, hey presto, dark tank! But floating plants do a more natural job. HTH

The Juwels will not run a single tube on a double ballast, unfortunately. If one tube fails or is removed, the other one will start for less than a second and then the ECG will shut itself down. Double ballasts can be rigged (in parallel) to run two tubes individually.

You can buy ballast, waterproof (not really necessary in your case) endcaps, wire and plug from somewhere like Rexel, for a fraction of the cost of buying the entire light control units, and assemble them yourself. You can even go high-tech and get an ECG ballast (Electronic Control Gear), if you so desire.

Do you have any new photos? Keen to see how those plants look that I sent you!

Eight of my discus ended up on the floor due to the 'quake. Four of them developed disintegrating fins, cloudiness to the skin and eye - strangely enough it was only on one side of each of the fish. I added salt to the tanks at the rate of one 20ml tablespoon per 20 litres, and also Aqua Plus at the rate of 10ml per 40 litres. One of the fish died (it had been on the floor for about 20 minutes -I couldn't find it quickly as it was in the back of the wardrobe). The other three have almost fully recovered with rapid regrowth of the damaged fins. I didn't do any water changes for a week because of risk of sewage in our water. My large discus often bang themselves up a bit and develop fungus on the wound, I have given up worrying about it as it always comes right. Hope your fish are better now?

Really sorry to hear that Aquila.

Hi there, yes, Mitre 10 Mega, in Hornby, has a good range. Just be aware that your basic generators are no good for running computers /cell phone chargers, as the current is too variable. Filters and aquarium heaters are maybe not so sensitive? And the cheap ones are very noisy. The digital inverter ones, like Kipor, are the bees knees (although a lot more expensive), they are smaller, lighter, quieter, safer and cheaper to run. Cost me $60 per day to hire one after the 'quake.

That is pretty high nitrates! Don't know much (anything) about brackish water setups, but I would analyse my water change regime, the quality of my water going in, and my feeding regime. Too few of the first, too polluted of the second, and too much of the third can result in high nitrate levels. If your tap water is the culprit then ring the Ministry of Health, as the maximum allowable value (MAV) of nitrates in drinking water is 50ppm! :evil:

Sorry to hear that Alan. If you need a hand, just holler.

You're the man!! I am absolutely blown away by the support that is being offered in repsonse to this 'quake. During a very stressful time it is incredibly heartening to see people in Canterbury rallying around each other, and those from outside the region offering, and providing, help. This is exactly what it means to be a New Zealander.

Yep, a quiet night!!!! :bounce: :bounce: Managed to sleep right through for the first time in 5 nights :bounce: :bounce: Cleaned up my spare 130 l last night, will set that up in the weekend. The 14 Discus in the 35 litre tank currently will be happy once I have done that! The only problem is I will have to move it, and the other tanks, some time soon to get the walls repaired.

My house is built on a solid concrete pad. The three main tanks I have all face the same way, but in three different rooms. Tank 1, is a 180l tank on a recycled rimu stand with a solid lip around the base of the tank, and tank sits on a sheet of polystrene. Lost 8 litres out of the top. Tank 2 is a 220l with curved front corners, sitting on an MDF cabinet, the tank is heavily braced with rigid plastic around base and top. The tank just sits on the cabinet with no lip. This tank moved approximately 1.5" off the base. Lost approximately 13l out of the top. Tank 3 is a 96l tank (80cm wide) sitting on an MDF stand. The tank has no bracing of any description, there is a thin pad of high density foam between the cabinet and the bottom of the tank. This tank and stand fell over and smashed. Strangely, the high density foam was still firmly attached to the top of the stand, but had been partly cut by the edge of the tank. I think Tank 3 fell because it moved on the cabinet (like the 220l tank), causing it to tip both the stand and tank. I believe it would have moved less if the tank was fully braced at the top (less glass flexing), and if the pad the tank sat on wasn't so 'slick'. Also a lip to prevent too much movement would have helped. A wider stand footprint may have helped too. The replacement will have some, if not all, of the above issues addressed. Thanks to those who have provided information on strapping to the wall - I won't be doing that. cheers

That explains why that one felt so bad, our house is 24km south-east of Darfield

we are less than 20 km from the epicentre and we are feeling everything! Was in at work today talking to my wife at home on the phone. She had a big tremor which I didn't even feel on the 4th floor of the building I was in in Christchurch. While Simon Dallow was talking on the news at 1803 hrs, we had a thumper of a shock that sent water sloshing in the tanks again, oops just had another one as I am typing this. Yet the structural damage here is minimal - we are on old riverbed and there is more stone than dirt. Yet driving through Jennifers part of town (twice as far from the epicentre than us) the damage is far heavier, 'mole-hills' everywhere, new lakes, roads bulging and cracked - most of that area is reclaimed wetlands. Managed to get a carpet cleaner in this afternoon and has set up his drying equipment (the last of his 20 blowers) to clean up the 80litres of water in our spare bedroom. He said he has been rushed off his feet cleaning up aquarium water and booze. Take care Cantabs.

Make sure you bring plenty of drinking water, and hand sanitiser, if you do come up.

Thanks for all of your thoughts guys. We are 20km from the epicentre, south of CHCH. One grow-out tank on the floor, smashed. Managed to catch the 8 juvi discus and throw them into another tank, took 25 minutes to find the 8th one though, he/she died yesterday morning (the one with the most promise of course), three others looking a bit sad. 80 litres of water in the carpet and glass everywhere, I have multiple cuts. Lost 8 litres out of the top of another tank, 13 litres out of the top of another. No power until 1725 hrs Sat, had covered the remaining tanks with blankets and temp had only dropped two degrees, thankfully. Currently have 14 young discus in a 35 litre quarantine tank - nowhere else for them too go during the quake! Confirmed sewage in our water supply, so no water changes. Have reduced tank temp to 25 degrees (to slow down Discus metabolism), one small feed a day (to prevent waste buildup). I have a spare 130 litre tank but no clean water to go in it! Went to Animates yesterday to get nitrazorb for the QT (the other tanks have plants), also picked up the API Stress products. Added salt to the two tanks with the sick fish (fins disintegrating, cloudy eyes). Very sad, and very concerned for my fish. So hard to see those I am responsible for, dieing and sick. I am a grown man that fishes and hunts, but I have not cried so much since my grandfather died. cheers, and all those in Canterbury, take care.

Have you asked Alan if he has any chain swords? If he has, I could pick them up and bring them down with me? There was a guy selling some on TM recently too, E. quadricostatus it was.

Looking awesome! Hope you can find room for the plants I am bringing down! I haven't pruned them for a week (to try and make sure I have plenty for you) so the surface of my tank is almost covered, by Friday next week there isn't going to be a surface. :lol: :lol: I wonder how I am going to get food to the Discus , machete maybe? :lol: :lol: And my poor Hatchets have become mid-water fish!:lol: :lol:

Not necessarily talking just about wild caught, I mainly use the phrase 'wild type'. These fish can be bred, albeit with a greater degree of difficulty than the man-made breeds. Look at the market on TM, there is a huge number of 'bog standard' fish available for way less than the $100-200 you mention. Browns and Blues were available in NZ once remember, and I guess there were fewer fishkeepers then than there are now. And yes I do realise that we are 'small fry', that was the essence of my post. An importer does have the ability to ensure quality of his/her imports, BTW. cheers