Any tips on balancing fish keeping time, family time, and work?

  • We are currently upgrading MFK. thanks! -neo
I set up boundaries for my self. I revisit these boundaries often to see how I am keeping up with them.

Work - Work stays at work and does not interfere with family time ever. I make a commission so I could easily justify bringing work home with me but it just isn't worth it. If the kids are napping and my wife is doing something else then I may answer some emails on the weekends but not often.
Family time - We have breakfast together just me and the kids while my wife gets a little extra sleep. After work until the kids go to bed is family time with a little TV time. I sometimes bring them in to watch the fish with me and they help me with maintenance on the weekends. I try not to go and sit by myself because I can easily get lost in it and there goes an hour I could have spent with my family.
Fish time - This has greatly suffered my main tank is now in the bedroom and I watch it for 30 min before I fall asleep. My kids like to feed the fish and name the fish also so they enjoy watching them to.

Overall I think the sacrifice of extra work and fish time is worth it because I am constantly being told what polite and happy kids I have. My kids know they are loved and I think they will turn into adults who are happy and contributing members of society
 
Waiting for my kids(3) to become teens, when they no longer want to spend any time with me(and wife), to get more tanks(currently 5) LOL

For now family comes first, so I squeeze in about 2-3hrs per week for maintenances/feeding/gawking.

My only recommendation would be to cut way back on the number of tanks and fish and feed less often, like every other day and pellets/flakes most of the time............way, way too much time feeding IMHO

Be like most of us and wait for the kiddies to leave the nest then go crazy back into the hobby
GL
 
If you plan to keep the same number of tanks I can think of drip system for water changes, and a fluidized bed filter with filter sock- kind of like uaru joeys filter system, only thing he needs to do is switch the pre filter. As far as feeding, maybe set aside a day to pre stuff tilapia for future feedings, and maybe create some kind of PVC tube system from the top to the bottom of the tank that has a pipe on the bottom only the smaller fish can fit into, drop from the top and don't worry about the dats snatching? I was planning on doing that later on for my loaches because my bass tend to steal the pellets meant for them


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FishNCash said:
My question is how much time do you spend feeding all your tanks in a day?
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Maybe 5 minutes.. if that. Depends on what and how i am feeding. Sometimes its automated.

How much time do you spend a week doing water change and other tank maintainance?
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Less than 5 minutes

What tips can you offer me in this hobby to cut down feeding and maintainance time?
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I run drip systems on my tanks. Cuts water changes completely down. Depending on how well balanced your tank is, it can cut them out completely as well.

Put your tanks on timers, So that lights come on and off on their own.

When i am away, i have my tanks on auto feeders as well. Sometimes i run them all the time. However, i feed home made food that can not go in a feeder. If feeding took me as long as it takes you, i would put everything on auto feeders.

I also only run self cleaning fluidized bed filters. I only have to change the pre-filter. Which takes a few seconds.


I too was to a point where the hobby took most of my free time. All i did was figure out what took the longest to do, and came up with ways to automate it.


I can literally leave my tanks for up to a month without touching them.... When i return, nothing has changed or requires attention. Just a prefilter cleaning and top up the feeders is what is needed(5 minutes).
 
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