What did you do with your tank(s) today?

[DMD123]

Drained the 300 down just a little so I could put strainer back on the FX6 intake. These big fish will knock it off on occasion and it’s easier if a little water is removed before fixing this.

Watching the fish this morning it’s comical how my small midas now rules the tank. The larger creamsicle Petsmart devil lets himself get bullied by this little thing. The other midas has the swim bladder issue and is useless. It cant do anything. So the tank is basically in turmoil. Clove oil should be in today so I can euthanize the midas but there is no way the other two fish can live together.

There was some belief that with the two large dominant fish gone the little midas might grow. I just dont believe this will happen. It was the smallest fish in its batch and grew painfully slow just to get where it is. I truly think this is basically a runt and will likely stay a 10” fish. I just cant see letting this tiny guy have the 300 to itself… if it were 12”+ then I have no problem with it

Lots of ideas going on of what to do with new tank inhabitants but I dread another round of growouts. Im sick of this constant change. I like calm, stable, long term stocked tanks and right now the only one that fits that is my 46g community tank.

 

[sir_keith]

... Lots of ideas going on of what to do with new tank inhabitants but I dread another round of growouts. Im sick of this constant change. I like calm, stable, long term stocked tanks and right now the only one that fits that is my 46g community tank...

That's interesting. I really enjoy watching fishes grow from fry into adults, not only the individual fishes, but also the evolution of the social structure. At the moment I am growing up a batch of juvenile Tropheus moorii Mpulungu together with a young adult colony of T. annectens. I had a mixed colony of these fishes previously (T. moorii and T. annectens are only distantly related, so hybridization is not an issue), but the Mpulungu were a bit too aggressive for the annectens, so I separated them. This little experiment should test whether social cues, not genetic factors, play a dominant role in setting up the social hierarchy. This would not be all that surprising given that intraspecific aggression in these fishes is a learned behaviour. Once a scientist, always a scientist, I guess...

Tropheus moorii Mpulungu-



T. annectens Kalugunga; male in the foreground, females behind. This is one of the very few Tropheus forms that is sexually dimorphic; a dominant male will lose any hint of the stripes.

 

[DMD123]

I just hate the stage that they have to get to so they dont get ate in the 300, lol. Means I have to grow out to at least 5” or the endli gets them. So its 8-12 months of time in a 90 gallon before they can go into the big tank in most cases, starting with lets say a 1 inch fish.

 

[DMD123]

Im settling in now… got all the garage tanks cleaned this morning, nice and early. As I finished up I started to feel it getting warm in there. We tapped into our furnace line and I do get some AC in the garage but it does get hot compared to inside the house. The house hit 78 yesterday because the heat pump cant keep up with 100 degree weather. But it was still a noticeable difference between the outside and it was comfortable enough to get good sleep.

 

[DMD123]

Put the sick midas down this afternoon… the two other amphilophus are now left to figure it out

 

[fishguy1978]

Moved the 5 juvenile redheads to the grow rack to see if they will hit a growth spurt. Took nearly 30min to catch the last one in a nearly drained tank.

 

[DMD123]

Working at the office today. Glad I have AC there! Im also wearing shorts to work. Should be able to keep cool.

Today is supposed to be the worst one with the high temps!

 

[lloyd378]

Yesterday I went up to modest_mans place and picked up his Dovii culls for my puffer fish! Let me say he has a great setup up there, the red Dovii pair he has is exceptionally nice.
On a side note: he also has a great piece property too, I must admit I’m a bit jealous.
With that said, both puffers ate a cull yesterday so it’s really paying off!

 

[fishguy1978]

Maintenance account today. The main tank was at 90F, goldfish tank lost some members to the heat and the 55g was nearly 90F. I had to remove one of the Rotkeil sev's as it was beat pretty bad. Both eyes are injured.
55g partially drained.

 

[Madness]

Yesterday I went up to modest_mans place and picked up his Dovii culls for my puffer fish! Let me say he has a great setup up there, the red Dovii pair he has is exceptionally nice.
On a side note: he also has a great piece property too, I must admit I’m a bit jealous.
With that said, both puffers ate a cull yesterday so it’s really paying off!

It is a sweet piece of property, what i could do with that.

 

[sir_keith]

Certainly didn't go outdoors today...

​

... so I spent the day in the fish room, setting up two new 75's and listening to '60's R & B. I was surprised and pleased that my AC was able to hold the temperature at 75 degrees given how hot it was outside. Here are the fruits of my labors; each 75 has only one cycled AC110 filter at the moment; I'll finish installing the filtration tomorrow.

 

[DMD123]

Inside the house hit 80 today even with the heat pump and the 300 gallon got up to 83.3 but overall we did well. Looking forward to lower temps this week for sure.

@sir_keith did well too keeping cool with a steady 75, how did everyone else do?

 

[sir_keith]

...@sir_keith did well too keeping cool with a steady 75, how did everyone else do?...

I did have to close off part of the house, set up some fans to direct the air flow, and move into a guest room in order to keep the living space (including the fish room) at 75; otherwise, no way the system would have been able to keep up with 100+ degree heat. The closed-off part of the house was near 90. But how was your garage? Mine was as hot as outside!

 

[DMD123]

I did have to close off part of the house, set up some fans to direct the air flow, and move into a guest room in order to keep the living space (including the fish room) at 75; otherwise, no way the system would have been able to keep up with 100+ degree heat. The closed-off part of the house was near 90. But how was your garage? Mine was as hot as outside!

The garage and the fish tanks out there did surprisingly well. That side of the house does not really get the full heat of the day and with it being insulated and the AC, it was actually bearable to walk in there. Wife stepped in later in the day and said it felt cooler than the house. Before we had tapped into the furnace line the garage was unbearable in summer and freezing cold in winter. Now it is pretty comfortable in there for the fish and also that its our laundry room.

 

[Madness]

No work on tanks today because i am heading home from a week in Vegas. I did have my son who is watching the house and dogs too monitor the fish room while I was gone. And all was well. I set up a ring camera in the fish room to monitor everything while i was away and the temp in the room never exceeded 84, and tank temps stayed right around 78 depending on if they were on a shelf or on the floor. Tomorrow will be a busy water change day after work, not to mention i have more newbs arriving.

 

[Modest_Man]

Thanks for the compliments on the place, we're really enjoying it. Just hit 1 year last month. Managed to keep all the chickens and baby turkeys alive all weekend, but it was a lot of work.

My shop tanks hit the mid 80's over the weekend, all the fish were fine. I unplugged all lights and heaters and opened the bay doors at night.

Did a huge water change today on the 400 gallon and scooped out all the dovii fry now that I have space it the 40 breeder rack (thanks Lloyd). Sorted all the dovii faders from the non faders and moved the remaining 12 older fry to the large tank with some divided off other fish that will end up as sacrificial dithers for the dovii pair so the male won't kill the remaining female. Took 3 hours, was hot and miserable.

 

[John58Ford]

Set the grow lights back on their timed schedule, 3 days of twilight blues didn't seem to do anything good for the plants but the fish never got above 84f so the important part of the tanks benefit from the sacrifice. Of the plants I keep, I think the ludwigia was hit the hardest, shed a record amount of leaves that we were clearing out of the strainers a couple times daily. I'll see if I can stand to take some pictures later.

 

[lloyd378]

Took a video of the garage tanks this evening…. I need to do some water changes that I skipped last weekend tomorrow ( though I did drain and top off with hose water to keep them cool, I didn’t gravel vac any of them).

 

[DMD123]

@lloyd378, great video of the tanks and fish. Love the big trimac, he is very feisty and outgoing. Notice my old trimac is still a bit of a hider…

 

[lloyd378]

@lloyd378, great video of the tanks and fish. Love the big trimac, he is very feisty and outgoing. Notice my old trimac is still a bit of a hider…

Only when I bring out my camera