KM

Yip Eric, that's my girl. Or was my girl I should say! she looks like a very proud mum :lol:

It is a toughy. I had my severums for years, and they were fine, then I lost all 3 to bloat in a short space of time. Perhaps they are only affected as older fish???? Maybe it is a bacterial infection of the gut, that is not helped by certain foods? Darn fish, if we knew how to help them, we would! Pity about your giraffe, they are some of the best africans ever!

Hi Polgara I lost all of my severums and one of my Oscars to bloat, which was very very upsetting! Turns out that it can be induced by the food. I only feed floating pellets, and this is not good for severums. I have not had a problem with my other oscar, so perhaps it is a weakness that only some fish have. Still, may pay to have a look at what you are feeding them.

It sounds like your goldfish had parasite problems to me. Clamping the fins, and the redness you described are all good symptoms. I kept goldfish for many years, and I found that a lot of them have terrible parasite problems, maybe it is because many are raised in outdoor ponds initially. I found an excellent book by a Japanese Professor who specialises in goldfish and koi, and his remedy works really well. What you want to do is buy some potassium permanganate - you can get this from any pharmacy. You mix some crystals with water out of the tank in a bucket. You want it to be a light clear purple/pink colour, you don't want it to be too strong, otherwise it will strip the scales right off the fish and kill them. You can leave the fish in this solution for a few hours. I have also added salt to this solution (which makes it go a more greeny/yellow colour, and left goldfish in it for a few days (no feeding) with just an air bubble. This has worked wonders for me, on both goldfish and tropicals. It is also really good for fungal infections! Good luck.

Hard to say, but they should be all right as long as there isn't a female to fight over, and as long as they have enough territory of their own. My jags live with an oscar, 2 convicts, a redhead, a flowerhorn, a pleco and a large leporanos - and they are all fine. I don't feed live food either, which helps a lot! I don't know about a 4 foot tank, depends how many litres it holds and how big your jags are. My tank is only 4 foot, but then it is deep and wide as well. Will be interested to knowhow you get on. I just love my jags! :lol:

Oscars are really intelligent fish, and you never can tell. I have had a few Oscars over the years, I have had to re-home two of them because he/she didn't like anyone, and the other because he/she was so placid that everyone kept picking on the poor thing. The one I have at the moment is happy with everyone else in the the tanks (a few convicts, a jaguar, a jack dempsey, large leporanos, redhead, small flowerhorn and a pleco) - but he attacks me! You will probably need to see how you go, and if things don't settle down, you may need to look at moving some of them. Good luck!

Hi everyone. Right, here is the deal. I am moving into my new home this weekend (first home actually!), and I'm now at the stage where I would like to try my hand at my first ever marine tank. I have been keeping cichlids (discus and large s.american fish) for over 5 years now. I have a lovely square tank, just over 200litres, and I want to turn this into a very simple marine tank, and I really want to start with a maroon clown. Could some of you with with lots of marine experience please give me advice on what I need (easy fish, equipment and so on) Now, I'm not a technical guru, so just go easy on me!! :lol: I will need to be running this tank with an external canister filter, so go ahead, tell me what I need to do next.....

Has anyone seen any golden nugget plecos in any LFS in the Auckland area recently??? Am on the look out for at least two Please let me know if you if you!

I have had glowlights before, they are awesome! Hollywood fishfarm in Mt Roskill have quite a few of them in stock at the moment Go crazy! :lol:

Discus are a lot easier to keep than most people think. They do require certain water conditions, which are easy enough to achieve. I only do weekly ater changes of about 15%, and my discus are happy enough to be laying eggs. So no problems there! My discus don't get RO water, they get water that has been sitting in a container for at least a week with some ph down...and that's about it.

Bird barn can be disappointing, but every once in a while they have a jewel or two! It's on the Western motorway, take the lincoln rd off-ramp, turn left at the top, and it's about 2 or 3 km further, at an intersection and it's on the right. Hope that helps!

Hey Alan That is really awesome of you. Have read Jack's book, and he keeps his fry food recipe in the dark! It seems that the eggs didn't have anough airflow, so they haven't hatched. Would be quite a time consuming exercise if they did hatch! May be one day though.

Thanks for that Luke I have never actually removed eggs from parents before, I agree it is best to follow the natural process. In this case, it just wasn't possible though. The parents will be in their own tank soon, so hopefully that will help!

I have had to seperate my discus eggs from their parents (they are in a community tank, and the parents are more interested in socialising than looking after the eggs! ) Does anyone know how to make up a suitable food for baby discus? I know that many breeders overseas remove the eggs and raise the fry completely independently of the parents. It certainly wasn't something I have been keen on doing, but you have to try I suppose! Any help this front would be most appreciated!

I have recently had to treat a tank for white spot, and I have two clown loaches in the tank, and they responded very well to the blue circle medication. Loaches seem to be one of the first fish in a tank to respond to any changes (consciousor not) and so they are often the first to get white spot and so they are good indicators of a potential problem in a tank.

Hi Everyone I'm looking for a bit of help. I'm in the market for a new digital camera, and I would really like one that takes good photos of my fish. I currently own a Canon Powershot A80, which iasn't bad, but isn't too good when it comes to taking photos of my fish. Ideally, I do not want to spend a fortune either! Any suggestions??? I'm not a technical wizz either, so I'm looking for one that is good for people just like to take a photo without years of fiddling!

That's pretty awesome. I wouldn't have clue as to what to feed them, maybe mushed up crab? I know that they love crab. I am very interested in having an octopus. If you would like a good home for one of the babies, let me know. I have done quite a bit of research on keeping octopi, as I think they are just amazing creatures. I would need a bit of help and advise on how to keep them though from someone who has done it. I believe that they generally only live for about 2 years...is that true???

Well, out of the 4 babies, I will only keep two. So if anyone is interested in taking on some jags at some stage, let me know via PM. These guys are really little, so they will probably stay with me until the end of the year or thereabouts. Actually Caryl, I haven't found the jags to be as destructive as they are made out to be! Maybe it is more a case of luck than anything else. I don't feed them live food, which may also contribute to my females placid nature.

Your little guy will probably turn the tables on his tank mates pretty soon. :lol: They are known to be pretty stroppy fish, and I believe that they have been known to take on oscars from time to time as well! I have been keep large cichlids for a good few years now, and the one thing that I have learnt, is that everyone has different experiences with them. It will really depend on the tank size, as well as what personality your little guy has, and how his tank mates interact with him. some of my cichlids were quite stroppy, but when I placed them in their 500l tank, they all found their own space. I also change their scenery every few weeks in order to make sure they don't get too territorial Keep an eye on how he reacts with the keyholes, as they are quite placid cichlids, and they may need seperating. Not sure if he will be a lovely fish, but you cvan bet he will be cheeky and you will love him!

For a long time now I have been looking for a male jaguar cichlid for my gorgeous 4 year old female. To date, I have had no sucess! Then yesterday, I popped into Hollywood, and they had a number of teeny baby jags in one of their plant tanks, but they weren't for sale! After a bit of convincing, I walked out of the store with 4 teeny babies (all smaller than a 5c piece), all given to me by lovely Rob. Hopefully I will be able to take some pics and upload then (when I can figure out how!) Now I just have to get the little things to grow. Very exciting, in my opinion, there is nothing quite as impressive as a full grown jag pair!

I have never seperated my male and female siamese fighters, and I haven't had any too many issues. The male and female either like each other, or they don't. They seems to be quite picky about their partners! :lol: I have successfully bred my fighters in a 165l community tank. At first, it seemed that my male was eating the fry, but he was in fact retrieving them and spitting them back into the bubble nest. Quite amazing to watch. It can be hard, but patience is the key here! Wait until your 2 foot tank is fully cycled before adding the two. Personally, I don't think I would be able to contain myself, I would be tempted to add the female to the males tank now to see how they react to each other. It takes a while for a male to learn how to build a good bubble nest. Mine must have tried about 4 times before he was happy with the end product. They really are such awesome fish, and breeding them is very rewarding!

Hehe, don't think you have realised it, but you have opened up a can of worms, as there is no right or wrong of doings things, and everyone has a different opinion! (as you will no doubt find!) I keep my discus at a temp of about 28 degrees C, and their water at about a pH of 6.6. I take water direct out of the tap, place it in large drums with pH down and water ager, and I leave it for a week before adding to the main tank. My fish are spawning in this water, so they must be ok! Jack Wattley, who is seen as the global expert on discus has said that discus can be kept at a variety of ph's, and he has seen them in tanks at 7.2pH, and he feels that younger discus grow better in a neutral pH, rather than water that is slightly more acidic...so there you have it! Is he right, I just don't know. Bog Wood should be ok, probably best to boil it if you can, or give it a really good soak/rinse to get rid of any nasties! Live food, personally I would never use wild caught live food for any of my fish...especially my discus! It's just too risky, you never know what diseases those lurgies will introduce. If you are set on live food, better to grow your own if you can. Discus are best fed on beefheart with generous amounts of fresh garlic. I use discus tucker, along with flake food and tetra colour bits to fed my discus. Hope that helps - no doubt others will have differing opinions though, which is all good!

the danios were actually used to cycle the tank initially, and most were removed. There were a few that I just couldn't catch, and so they stayed in the tank. i have some glowlight and neon tetras inthe tank as well. Seems the danios are all right, but the water conditions are not ideal. However, seems that they are pretty good indicators of when the water is ok, and when it isn't, so I think they will stay for now!

Last night I went to do my weekly discus tank clean, and discovered my female siamese fighter, and two of my danios had blown up and looked like pine-cones. Yip, you guessed it...Dropsy! I then discoverd that someone has moved my filter, and the outlet pipe of the filter had bent over, resulting in no outlet flow! Shock shock horror! Anyway, finally got it fixed (was still mopping up water at 10:30pm). What amazes me is the water quality must have deteriorated enough in 1 week as to result in 3 cases of dropsy. Touch wood, the discus are fine, and I even had one pair spawn during the week gone by. So, that leads me to believe that discus are far tougher than I had thought! Ironically, I had always been told that danios were tough little things, but it seems not in my case. Maybe too much inbreeding, I don't know. Lessons to be learnt, check your filter regularly! PS: I have the fish with dropsy in a containment area, and I'm treating with good doses of Melafix. I have lost one danio, the other doesn't look to hot, but the siamese fighter is looking better than she did this morning.

Discus are generally pretty laid back, although sometimes you will get one who likes being top dog (or fish) and gets a bit cheeky!