Good day to all.
Lets see, I am getting back into the hobby after a hiatus of 12 years. My first tank ever was a 20 long I got when I was a teenager . Later on in life I have had a 40gal African cichlid tank(had it running for 3 years) a 55 Oscar tank (ran for 2 years till a heater incident boiled my two 12in Oscars, George and Gracie). This and dealing with my cancer made me take the break from fish keeping.
So the other day a friend asked me if i wanted a free tank, just have to scrub out the algea. It was an TruVu 55gal acrylic with a diy stand and hood.
Yes it has a couple of scratches but just fine otherwise. So I scrub out all the algea, and slowly over a few months get the rest of the stuff I need to get it up and running. You see the treatments for my cancer messed me up big time so now I am disabled, I cant ever work again due to the side effects of chemo and radiation therapy. That means I have to try and make it on just 1k a month from SSD.
Finally I got all the stuff needed to get it up and running. I set it up and ran it for two months with some Zebra danios in it to set the cycle. It has a Fluval 50 for filtration Fluval Aquasky LED light, a bubble bar to get the surface agitation for oxygenation.
Finally I head on over to The Wetspot fish store in Portland, Or. Not sure what I want to get into I grab a few different SA/CA cichlids a pleco and a couple pictus cats.
At first named Jack, later come to find out that its female so renamed Jill The Jack Dempsey
Wendy The Red Terror
Toni the albino tiger oscar
Jack the electric blue jack dempsey. Within 15min of getting in the tank this and the normal JD fell in love and have been inseparable ever since.
Austin the green texas cichlid
GT the green terror.
So there you go you have the full cast. All was doing great, Jack and Jill fell in love.
Everone was getting along as well as cichlids do. Then one day my area had a mini heat wave and caused a algea bloom in the local water supply that drove up the ph of the tap water. Normally it was a steady 7.8 all the time from the tap. Got lazy and didnt check it prior to doing a water change. I do 30% three times a week. So the ph shot up to 8.6....stressed all the fish out, an outbreak of ich happens. I treat the tank and raise the temps to 82deg f to burn it out of the water column as well. After its all said and done the pictus cats and the GT didnt make it.
Two months later I sell of my home built gaming PC and buy a second 55gal tank. You see I live in an apt and can not get tanks above 55gal.
I moved Toni in here and got her a husband.
Also in this tank is a blue phantom pleco, 2 spotted Raphael cats, and a group of roseline sharks as dithers
Almost forgot, when I went to get the ph down and Ich medicine I saw these two cute cichlids sitting all by themselves at Petsmart. So I figured that I lost 5 fish (4 pictus and a GT) I had room for the two new ones Introducing Rosco Peeco-Train the firemouth. I called him that cause he chases everyone in the tank around save the JDs.
And finally Rosalita the Flowerhorn
So there ya go you have meet the whole cast. At this point I think I have my mind set to what I am going to finally do. The Oscar tank is set. On payday I am getting a third 55 for the JDs and the first tank will be for Wendy the RT as a solo or maybe keep the flowerhorn as well. Maybe Wendy and the Ft can breed, or maybe get Wendy a RT male instead.
Here are current pics of the crew. I got them all as juveniles at about 1 to 1.5in. Now thay all are around 3in mark save Toni is four and Austin is closer to 2.5
This is Nemo, you can see he has a gimp fin the side clear one, still swims fine tho. Last time I ever do a mail order fish....
This is Toni now at 4in
This is Rosalita the flowerhorn, about 3in as well
This is Wendy, you can see her markings are just starting to show that shes female about 3in long
Jack and Jill the JDs that fell in love 5 min after meeting
Austin the Green Texas its about 2.5in now
And finally Rosco hes a bit over 3in now
If you live in the Vancouver,Wa. Portland,Or. area and are interested in Austin Rosco or Rosalita let me know I need to rehome those 3. PM me and we can figure things out.
Lets see, I am getting back into the hobby after a hiatus of 12 years. My first tank ever was a 20 long I got when I was a teenager . Later on in life I have had a 40gal African cichlid tank(had it running for 3 years) a 55 Oscar tank (ran for 2 years till a heater incident boiled my two 12in Oscars, George and Gracie). This and dealing with my cancer made me take the break from fish keeping.
So the other day a friend asked me if i wanted a free tank, just have to scrub out the algea. It was an TruVu 55gal acrylic with a diy stand and hood.
Yes it has a couple of scratches but just fine otherwise. So I scrub out all the algea, and slowly over a few months get the rest of the stuff I need to get it up and running. You see the treatments for my cancer messed me up big time so now I am disabled, I cant ever work again due to the side effects of chemo and radiation therapy. That means I have to try and make it on just 1k a month from SSD.
Finally I got all the stuff needed to get it up and running. I set it up and ran it for two months with some Zebra danios in it to set the cycle. It has a Fluval 50 for filtration Fluval Aquasky LED light, a bubble bar to get the surface agitation for oxygenation.
Finally I head on over to The Wetspot fish store in Portland, Or. Not sure what I want to get into I grab a few different SA/CA cichlids a pleco and a couple pictus cats.
At first named Jack, later come to find out that its female so renamed Jill The Jack Dempsey
Wendy The Red Terror
Toni the albino tiger oscar
Jack the electric blue jack dempsey. Within 15min of getting in the tank this and the normal JD fell in love and have been inseparable ever since.
Austin the green texas cichlid
GT the green terror.
So there you go you have the full cast. All was doing great, Jack and Jill fell in love.
Everone was getting along as well as cichlids do. Then one day my area had a mini heat wave and caused a algea bloom in the local water supply that drove up the ph of the tap water. Normally it was a steady 7.8 all the time from the tap. Got lazy and didnt check it prior to doing a water change. I do 30% three times a week. So the ph shot up to 8.6....stressed all the fish out, an outbreak of ich happens. I treat the tank and raise the temps to 82deg f to burn it out of the water column as well. After its all said and done the pictus cats and the GT didnt make it.
Two months later I sell of my home built gaming PC and buy a second 55gal tank. You see I live in an apt and can not get tanks above 55gal.
I moved Toni in here and got her a husband.
Also in this tank is a blue phantom pleco, 2 spotted Raphael cats, and a group of roseline sharks as dithers
Almost forgot, when I went to get the ph down and Ich medicine I saw these two cute cichlids sitting all by themselves at Petsmart. So I figured that I lost 5 fish (4 pictus and a GT) I had room for the two new ones Introducing Rosco Peeco-Train the firemouth. I called him that cause he chases everyone in the tank around save the JDs.
And finally Rosalita the Flowerhorn
So there ya go you have meet the whole cast. At this point I think I have my mind set to what I am going to finally do. The Oscar tank is set. On payday I am getting a third 55 for the JDs and the first tank will be for Wendy the RT as a solo or maybe keep the flowerhorn as well. Maybe Wendy and the Ft can breed, or maybe get Wendy a RT male instead.
Here are current pics of the crew. I got them all as juveniles at about 1 to 1.5in. Now thay all are around 3in mark save Toni is four and Austin is closer to 2.5
This is Nemo, you can see he has a gimp fin the side clear one, still swims fine tho. Last time I ever do a mail order fish....
This is Toni now at 4in
This is Rosalita the flowerhorn, about 3in as well
This is Wendy, you can see her markings are just starting to show that shes female about 3in long
Jack and Jill the JDs that fell in love 5 min after meeting
Austin the Green Texas its about 2.5in now
And finally Rosco hes a bit over 3in nowIf you live in the Vancouver,Wa. Portland,Or. area and are interested in Austin Rosco or Rosalita let me know I need to rehome those 3. PM me and we can figure things out.
