Fish only grow to the size of their environment.

[Camphilophus]

Says Ma12cus504

I messaged him on this one trying to tell him not to give advice on something he knew nothing about.

"Forget about the riduclous rule about tank size and stuff. Whatever size tank you put him in, he will only max his size base on the tank size. So unless u want him to be huge, then buy a bigger tank. Otherwise it all good."

I told him to read a fish book so he said this..

"they will grow regardless, base on tank size. Stunt their growth like a bonsai stupid. Have you ever seen a fish grow in tank from fry to adult; that they over grew it. Hell NO. They stop where there no space.

Will an oscar stop growing if u put in a ten gallon....YES!! I made my point, you should keep ur attack to urself. I have my own opinion to give base on what i see and experience. I dont need a book to tell me what to do.

If a book tell you to jump off the bridge because u will not die. I bit you would do. You are nothing more but a follower."

I'm not trying to spam or cause trouble, I'm just going to link him to this thread so he knows that he is wrong. Supposedly he owns 2 fish stores which is really sad.

 

[akskirmish]

WOW-
Interesting to say the least...

 

[K626]

This guy can't be serious! If he tried to actually post that somewhere, someone on this forum would . As is well deserved. What a moron.
:WTF:

 

[the_deeb]

There is some truth to this, but I think the real issue is water quality rather than tank size.

Anyone who has tried growing out young fish will have recognized that growth rate is dependent on tank size. For example, following the most recent spawn of my Geophagus, I put some of the fry into a 20g and others into a 100g. The ones in the 100g are easily 4" now, whereas the ones in the 20 are only about 2". Importantly, the 100g is very well filtered and gets twice weekly W/C, whereas the 20g only has an AC on it and gets W/C every other week.

I've read that fish secrete/excrete products (possibly hormones) into the water that will inhibit growth. If that's the case, it makes sense that in a smaller tank these products will more quickly reach a concentration where they will inhibit growth. But if you do loads of W/C to maintain really good water quality these growth-inhibiting products won't accumulate. So the small tank will "seem" like it has a bigger water volume and fish will grow as if they were in a larger tank.

I think it's likely that people who keep large fish in tanks that are too small are likely to be the same kinds of people who don't really keep up on their water changes/tank maintenance. So it starts to appear that small tank = low growth of fish.

So it's probably true that you can stunt the growth of a fish with a small tank/poor water quality. But I think most of us object to this because we like to keep the health of our fish in mind, and don't believe that a stunted fish is a healthy fish, though I suppose this could be debated.

 

[Camphilophus]

Its a common fact with keeping fish that if you keep your water quality ****ty it will stunt your fishes growth, but if you kept up on waterchanges and actually took care of your fish it would still grow regardless of the tanks size. This guy is trying to tell me if I just put a oscar it in a 10gallon its never going to outgrow it, if this works for him he obviously keeps his fish in terrible conditions. He might as well havetold this guy, go buy as many fish as you want, put them in whatever size tank you want, and just make sure to never change the water on the tank or feed them and they will never grow.

p.s. this is the thread this genius was posting in. http://www.monsterfishkeepers.com/forums/showthread.php?p=1752957 the OP is quite a moron also.

 

[Oddball]

If all that was needed to stunt a fish's growth was a smaller tank then, there would be breeding pairs of pimas in 10 gal tanks. Or, healthy active RTCs in brandy snifters.

Hope this shop owner takes 5 minutes to read up on brown-blood disease (nitrite poisoning. He probably also swears up and down that oscars only live for 2-3 years but, are happy in a 10 gal.

 

[Lady G]

Wow, just sad IMO!! Another example of why NOT to listen to your LFS, they really just want to sell fish...not actually help someone to keep them healthy and able to live to their full life span.

I may be wrong, but I thought the fish may stop growing but it's inside will continue to grow, in the end causing the death of the fish, a painful one at that.

 

[Dan F]

As a kid I knew someone that had a 10" Oscar in a Ten Gallon. The poor thing was shaped like a brick. It may not have reached the length it would have in a bigger tank, but it certainly didn't stop growing!

 

[Ma12cus504]

finally someone agreeds. As long as ur water perimeter is good, clear water and healthy. They should do fine. The only draw back is stunted growth. Just like how i stated in my email. It not a "required" to buy a big tank. If u grow it from fry to large then it okay.

But if u buy it big big from lfs store, then that a different story. That all i am saying. They will grow base on living space. Do ur experientment and u see if i am wrong.

Example: small oscar in 10g, will not grow as big as an oscar in a 150?

best test subject is peco,

 

[MommyJulia]

I agree with lady G, this is sad.

It's sad how some ppl are just lazy to care about a living being. Too lazy to read up on facts. It's also called responsibility. Seems like certain ppl are too lazy to be responsible. I believe if one is going to take on "dependents" such as a dog, cat, or have a child, or keep fish. Be responsible, simple as that. And if you are too lazy to do that, then don't have anything at all. End of story.