It's only Monday and, so far, today I've had to field a couple of interesting issues that caused major system problems yet, could have been avoided had the folks involved simply asked BEFORE making these problems for themselves.
First; I was asked if taking plants from the local creeks was OK. The plants were already placed into an aquarium before asking this important question. No pics or collection area info was included. I had to ask. Turns out the plants taken are arrowgrass. This plant, when stressed, produces a type of cyanide. Also, the roots were not cleaned nor were the plants placed in a quarantine tank. I guess time will tell whether or not any parasites were introduced into the aquarium.
Second; Someone asked if some colorful sunnies would be OK in their tropical aquarium. An accompanying pic showed some anomalies on the surface of all the fish. The keeper described these anomalies as probably being scales loosened during their capture. I hated having to inform him that he just introduced a half dozen fish heavily infested with argulus (lice) parasites into his tropical 240 gal tank.
I understand the draw of doing something novel to spark up our hobby interests. But, without some basic understanding of the environments being drawn from, the consequences can be disastrous. It's OK to not know. It's not OK to just dive in without any idea of what's possible without doing some basic research or asking questions before proceeding.
And, keep in mind that anything taken from the wild (animals and plants) must be quarantined before introducing it to an established closed system for the simple goal of keeping that system healthy. A lot of keepers drop out of the hobby due to simple mistakes, that could have been avoided, having disastrous effects.
First; I was asked if taking plants from the local creeks was OK. The plants were already placed into an aquarium before asking this important question. No pics or collection area info was included. I had to ask. Turns out the plants taken are arrowgrass. This plant, when stressed, produces a type of cyanide. Also, the roots were not cleaned nor were the plants placed in a quarantine tank. I guess time will tell whether or not any parasites were introduced into the aquarium.
Second; Someone asked if some colorful sunnies would be OK in their tropical aquarium. An accompanying pic showed some anomalies on the surface of all the fish. The keeper described these anomalies as probably being scales loosened during their capture. I hated having to inform him that he just introduced a half dozen fish heavily infested with argulus (lice) parasites into his tropical 240 gal tank.
I understand the draw of doing something novel to spark up our hobby interests. But, without some basic understanding of the environments being drawn from, the consequences can be disastrous. It's OK to not know. It's not OK to just dive in without any idea of what's possible without doing some basic research or asking questions before proceeding.
And, keep in mind that anything taken from the wild (animals and plants) must be quarantined before introducing it to an established closed system for the simple goal of keeping that system healthy. A lot of keepers drop out of the hobby due to simple mistakes, that could have been avoided, having disastrous effects.
