Before I start my story I would like to say that her name is 'Terror'. Such a creative name, eh?
I purchased Terror at my local fish store when I was in 7th grade, in fact I still have the receipt in my wallet. *goes and finds it* And it says (15:27:51 12/31/2007 Total: $16.94) Got the tank ( a 90 gallon) for Christmas and promptly overstocked, like a nub. My fish (bought over a period of roughly a month) included
3 oscars
1 red devil
1 green terror
1 red bellied pacu
1 catfish of some kind
1 angel fish (a REALLY big one mind you, prolly like 6 inches, my friend gave it to me)
and a bit later i got a common pleco.
Mind you these were all babies around 2-3 inches at the most. What was very soon apparent was that my red devil was a masochistic killer at heart, and didn't kill for food, but for fun. She promptly finished off the aging angel fish, and within the first month had killed my first wild oscar. But the fish that she really picked on was Terror, whom she would chase around the tank at blinding speeds at all hours, and while she could hurt my GT, (Terror) she was unable to catch her and finish her.
[February 2008] Eventually my red devil (named Dormy) grew tired of trying to chase down my (by now wounded) GT and killed my catfish. My second 2 oscars had become so stressed out that I had to move them to my 6 gallon Guppy tank; so Dormy doubled her efforts at catching and killing Terror. (for some reason she never really went for my Pacu) After some weeks of hide and go seek, Terror was practically starved as Dormy was hogging all the food and growing at a much faster rate. Dormy took advantage of her weakened state and in all literal terms "beat Terror to a pulp". I actually thought her to be dead and only noticed that she was breathing when i netted her. Terror was placed in a 5 gallon guppy tank where quickly she contracted bad fin rot and lost about every visible fin. Her tail rotted past the point of no return (and still hasn't grown back) and I wondered if i should just put her out of her misery as she was quite obviously dying. Lucky for her however, I didn't and just left her there while I went on vacation to Florida
I came back, and she was alive. The fin rot had miraculously stopped and she was able to swim again. Within a month, her tail stub was healed over and she was healthy again (aside from obvious facial scarring).
[July 2008] Terror is back in the 90 gallon and beginning to regrow her fin. However, only a bit ever came back much, and that disappeared within a few months. She went back to her passive role of evading Dormy but soon after laying her first batch of eggs, she became aggressive, and pretty much kicked the crap out of my red devil on a few occasions. I was able to record a short bit of one of the fights from that time period but unfortunately the camera was full so i only got like 40 seconds of it.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WRjzB6goMHg
[December 2008] My fish take another beating from Dormy, this one was particularly brutal. There were no casualties but she was moved to a 20 gallon tank my friend gave me where she remains today, in solitary confinement, keeping down the worlds population of feeder guppies.
[2009-mid 2011] Fish live peacefully and nothing notable happens. Pacu grows to 13 inches and Oscars grow to nearly a foot. Terror appears to have had her growth stunted from injuries and has not grown past the 4 inch mark.
[last week] My pacu snaps and kills both my oscars. Terror escapes with her life yet again, and is now recuperating in a 5 gallon tank where I may keep her due to my pacu's now enormous size. Dormy is as aggressive as ever and about once a year I release her into the 90 gallon to stir **** up.
I have trained her to attack my fingers and cleaning the tank is now a dangerous job.
TL;DR: My GT has survived 4 years in an aggressive environment without a tail fin and deserves some sort of merit badge or at least a cookie.
P.S, if you didn't notice my Pleco didn't get much fighting action, he just sat around and sucked stuff
Enclosed is a pic of Terror before she lost her tail, and after (like a week ago).
(**** i can't find the first pic, gimme a couple days to search old folders)
I purchased Terror at my local fish store when I was in 7th grade, in fact I still have the receipt in my wallet. *goes and finds it* And it says (15:27:51 12/31/2007 Total: $16.94) Got the tank ( a 90 gallon) for Christmas and promptly overstocked, like a nub. My fish (bought over a period of roughly a month) included
3 oscars
1 red devil
1 green terror
1 red bellied pacu
1 catfish of some kind
1 angel fish (a REALLY big one mind you, prolly like 6 inches, my friend gave it to me)
and a bit later i got a common pleco.
Mind you these were all babies around 2-3 inches at the most. What was very soon apparent was that my red devil was a masochistic killer at heart, and didn't kill for food, but for fun. She promptly finished off the aging angel fish, and within the first month had killed my first wild oscar. But the fish that she really picked on was Terror, whom she would chase around the tank at blinding speeds at all hours, and while she could hurt my GT, (Terror) she was unable to catch her and finish her.
[February 2008] Eventually my red devil (named Dormy) grew tired of trying to chase down my (by now wounded) GT and killed my catfish. My second 2 oscars had become so stressed out that I had to move them to my 6 gallon Guppy tank; so Dormy doubled her efforts at catching and killing Terror. (for some reason she never really went for my Pacu) After some weeks of hide and go seek, Terror was practically starved as Dormy was hogging all the food and growing at a much faster rate. Dormy took advantage of her weakened state and in all literal terms "beat Terror to a pulp". I actually thought her to be dead and only noticed that she was breathing when i netted her. Terror was placed in a 5 gallon guppy tank where quickly she contracted bad fin rot and lost about every visible fin. Her tail rotted past the point of no return (and still hasn't grown back) and I wondered if i should just put her out of her misery as she was quite obviously dying. Lucky for her however, I didn't and just left her there while I went on vacation to Florida
I came back, and she was alive. The fin rot had miraculously stopped and she was able to swim again. Within a month, her tail stub was healed over and she was healthy again (aside from obvious facial scarring). [July 2008] Terror is back in the 90 gallon and beginning to regrow her fin. However, only a bit ever came back much, and that disappeared within a few months. She went back to her passive role of evading Dormy but soon after laying her first batch of eggs, she became aggressive, and pretty much kicked the crap out of my red devil on a few occasions. I was able to record a short bit of one of the fights from that time period but unfortunately the camera was full so i only got like 40 seconds of it.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WRjzB6goMHg
[December 2008] My fish take another beating from Dormy, this one was particularly brutal. There were no casualties but she was moved to a 20 gallon tank my friend gave me where she remains today, in solitary confinement, keeping down the worlds population of feeder guppies.
[2009-mid 2011] Fish live peacefully and nothing notable happens. Pacu grows to 13 inches and Oscars grow to nearly a foot. Terror appears to have had her growth stunted from injuries and has not grown past the 4 inch mark.
[last week] My pacu snaps and kills both my oscars. Terror escapes with her life yet again, and is now recuperating in a 5 gallon tank where I may keep her due to my pacu's now enormous size. Dormy is as aggressive as ever and about once a year I release her into the 90 gallon to stir **** up.
I have trained her to attack my fingers and cleaning the tank is now a dangerous job. TL;DR: My GT has survived 4 years in an aggressive environment without a tail fin and deserves some sort of merit badge or at least a cookie.
P.S, if you didn't notice my Pleco didn't get much fighting action, he just sat around and sucked stuff
Enclosed is a pic of Terror before she lost her tail, and after (like a week ago).
(**** i can't find the first pic, gimme a couple days to search old folders)
