LOL motoro stingray, silver arowana, Florida gar, ornate bichir and delhezi in a 55g ??
Biggest mistakes you have made in aquarium keeping?
- Thread starter eon aquatics
- Start date
I have made hundreds if not thousands of mistakes over the years, so its hard to pin any one down.
Most have to do with "not" providing the proper tank size, and other conditions the species need .
One of the latest was trying to keep a group of Acarichthys in 150 gal tank.
After nursing them along for almost 3 years (at maturity just when they were at their peak) they started killing each other, in the 150 gal.
It was just too small, maybe a 300 gal.
Another that comes to mind, is keeping Gymnogeophagus. At first I tried to keep them at constant tropical temps.
But this genus comes from southern South America, which is not tropical.
It has seasons, and even snows.
My Gymnos did not fair well at tropical temps.
Not until I provided a cooling off period was my mistake rectified.
Below Gymnogeophagus sp Paso Pache from Uruguay where water temps may get as low as 50'F in winter.
Most have to do with "not" providing the proper tank size, and other conditions the species need .
One of the latest was trying to keep a group of Acarichthys in 150 gal tank.
After nursing them along for almost 3 years (at maturity just when they were at their peak) they started killing each other, in the 150 gal.
It was just too small, maybe a 300 gal.
Another that comes to mind, is keeping Gymnogeophagus. At first I tried to keep them at constant tropical temps.
But this genus comes from southern South America, which is not tropical.
It has seasons, and even snows.
My Gymnos did not fair well at tropical temps.
Not until I provided a cooling off period was my mistake rectified.
Below Gymnogeophagus sp Paso Pache from Uruguay where water temps may get as low as 50'F in winter.
I can say three things -
- Not quarentene, or not enough, even though I knew better
- Not checking twice that all aquaria lids are closed, before calling it for the night. When lights come on next next am, fish can freak and jump out
- not following my Mom’s advice 6 decades ago. “Never buy fish at night”. This is when most aquaria lights were primitive or not there. She was a great aquarist and much of what she taught is still fairly correct although many advances have occurred.
- Not quarentene, or not enough, even though I knew better
- Not checking twice that all aquaria lids are closed, before calling it for the night. When lights come on next next am, fish can freak and jump out
- not following my Mom’s advice 6 decades ago. “Never buy fish at night”. This is when most aquaria lights were primitive or not there. She was a great aquarist and much of what she taught is still fairly correct although many advances have occurred.
Early on in my evolution in the hobby, I wanted everything, all at the same time...and often all in the same tank! It didn't help that there was no internet to provide limitless information. Everything had to be learned from reading actual printed books, or, worse yet, by listening to the kindly but somewhat misinformed lady who sold fish at the local K-Mart. My tanks were crowded, poorly chosen mishmashes of various types of fishes, many of which were comletely imcompatible with each other. My early ideas of planning a tank consisted of calculating the absolute maximum number of "inches of fish" (one of the most stupid ideas in aquarium husbandry) I could jam into it and then breaking that down into the maximum number of species, allowing two of each species. Much bloodshed, many deaths...
Fast-forward a few decades, and I had definite preferences about what did and did not interest me, so my mistakes were a bit more refined; my big screw-up was insistently trying to keep fish that required different water than what was available to me. Life is better as an aquarist when you accept the water you have and choose fish accordingly, rather than stubbornly fighting nature.
A major goof-up, at least to my way of thinking, was buying my first "large" (100+ gallons) commercially-made all-glass aquarium, which suffered a catastrophic failure dumping almost its entire contents on the floor...in my 19th-floor condominium! Possibly over-reacting here, but now I simply don't trust tanks over about 50gallons that I haven't built myself.
And the single dumbest thing I ever did as a hobbyist was fooling myself into believing that I would limit myself to a couple of 20-gallon tanks after moving into my current and final house. Yeah, right...I currently have 850-ish gallons bubbling merrily away (yes, I still use a lot of air-powered filters...) and plan on spending this afternoon working on my next...AND LAST!...tank of a bit over 240 gallons...
Yes...I said "LAST"!
Fast-forward a few decades, and I had definite preferences about what did and did not interest me, so my mistakes were a bit more refined; my big screw-up was insistently trying to keep fish that required different water than what was available to me. Life is better as an aquarist when you accept the water you have and choose fish accordingly, rather than stubbornly fighting nature.
A major goof-up, at least to my way of thinking, was buying my first "large" (100+ gallons) commercially-made all-glass aquarium, which suffered a catastrophic failure dumping almost its entire contents on the floor...in my 19th-floor condominium! Possibly over-reacting here, but now I simply don't trust tanks over about 50gallons that I haven't built myself.
And the single dumbest thing I ever did as a hobbyist was fooling myself into believing that I would limit myself to a couple of 20-gallon tanks after moving into my current and final house. Yeah, right...I currently have 850-ish gallons bubbling merrily away (yes, I still use a lot of air-powered filters...) and plan on spending this afternoon working on my next...AND LAST!...tank of a bit over 240 gallons...
Yes...I said "LAST"!
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Great scape though!
And actually a very fun stocking for a much bigger tank. Do you still have any of them?
I have the bichirs. The silver arowana I donated it back to the aquarium, the Florida gar was the thread which broke its back ?. The motoro ray passed on (suspected internal parasites, not sure as it’s eyes became bloodshot/ bloody)
