How far fishkeeping has come

  • We are currently upgrading MFK. thanks! -neo
When I started the zoo project in St Paul, there were four fish systems. All were glass with plywood. All were well water pumped up to the system, and then run down the drain. No real filtration. A few native fish.

When I left, it was acrlyic, RO water, state of the art life support, reclaimed backwash water (to be 'green'), ozone generation for sterilization and a supporting quarantine area.
 
When I started the zoo project in St Paul, there were four fish systems. All were glass with plywood. All were well water pumped up to the system, and then run down the drain. No real filtration. A few native fish.

When I left, it was acrlyic, RO water, state of the art life support, reclaimed backwash water (to be 'green'), ozone generation for sterilization and a supporting quarantine area.
...and the year you started working there was 19__ ?
 
My first tanks were in the early 60's. All were steel rimmed with a slate bottom. We didn't do water changes unless the water smelled (yes, we smelled the water to decide on a WC :wall:). They had internal corner filters (filled with carbon and floss and cleaned using the eye test...if they looked bad, they needed changing) driven by air stones pumped from a small air pump vibrating on my desk.

The only food I saw was flakes and most medicines had strange blue or green colors and seemed worse than the disease I was trying to cure.

Air stones would get clogged and tubes would get clogged (both of which I would inevitable have to unclog with my mouth.)

Good times, although in hind sight, I don't know how the hobby stayed afloat other than for the love of keeping fish.
 
When earth was cooling and dinosaurs roam the planet as one of my coworker likes to say...
I remember that!, sometimes. but details are getting foggy..
 
Back when I started keeping fish in the late 1950s, water changes were considered a bad thing, the under gravel filter was just invented, and we fed our oscars chicken and bologna. And then wondered why they all got hole in the head.
 
Back when I started keeping fish in the late 1950s, water changes were considered a bad thing, the under gravel filter was just invented, and we fed our oscars chicken and bologna. And then wondered why they all got hole in the head.

I just argued with someone a few weeks ago on here that claimed if you've been doing something one way for a long time, why change it. I don't know, maybe because of advances in technology and our education on fish keeping. Otherwise we'd still be feeding bologna, using aged water and undergravel filters and our fish would only grow to the size of the tank. Lol
 
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