How much experience and knowledge do you have in fish keeping

[Red Devil]

ive been a fishkeeper since i was 18. that was 14 years ago lol. i started with oscars (i still love those guys and want to get another huge tank to have them again), jack dempseys, texas cichlids, etc. About 4 years ago i discovered African rift lake cichlids and fell in love again! now i have a 90 gallon with a male Venustus (my pride and joy), and a 180 gallon of mixed mbuna. We are currently finishing our basement, and eventually ill get another 180 gallon and stock it with south and central americans again--i miss them.
i still consider myself a noob, i am always reading info on fishcare and different species and finding that im also falling in love with severums.

Oscar was my first fish too.. and to me Oscars really have personality..so if you can only have one fish when your a beginner and Oscar will keep you entertained...i too love my pride and joy venustus male.. if you grow up a venustus your amazed at the ego in this fish.. not brutal or mean.. but handsome, charming and independent..

 

[navygirl76]

lol Liz. independent is a good word for Venustus. he reminds me so much of an oscar in some of his ways, and he is truly beautiful to look at. i wish i could have a tank full of just him lol. i love each and every one of my fish-i look at each of them everyday to make sure they arent getting beat up, and just sit and watch the tank for a while just to see how they interact with eachother, i love to just watch them be themselves lol. im so glad i have this hobby, and glad i have found some really great fish forums (this being my favorite) with alot of supportive people. its nice to know if you are fighting a disease in your tank, or dealing with death of a beloved fish that other people understand and can give good guidance..

 

[Red Devil]

lol Liz. independent is a good word for Venustus. he reminds me so much of an oscar in some of his ways, and he is truly beautiful to look at. i wish i could have a tank full of just him lol. i love each and every one of my fish-i look at each of them everyday to make sure they arent getting beat up, and just sit and watch the tank for a while just to see how they interact with eachother, i love to just watch them be themselves lol. im so glad i have this hobby, and glad i have found some really great fish forums (this being my favorite) with alot of supportive people. its nice to know if you are fighting a disease in your tank, or dealing with death of a beloved fish that other people understand and can give good guidance..

Melissa that is exactly how i feel too.. sharing with each other.. is so important... and speaking of the venustus again.. we had about 60 baby fry venustus.. we have sold alot but before they go i always take the net and grab up a couple more and add it to my 125gal.. now i have at least 10 in there.. i know someday they will take over ..haha but a tank ful of venustus is alright with me

 

[pacu mom]

Thanks for your kind words Liz. Fish forums are addicting. I've got three different fish forums in browser tabs and John PTC's web cam, so everytime the computer on, I can quickly check the forums and also view John's magnificent tank. I'm in total awe of his tank and his fish.
Susan

 

[SalmonAfrica]

I've been keeping fish for 4 years now. It began with goldfish (yup, going with the crowd), but our summer temps proved too warm for my Golides, and as I had no way to cool them off, they died.

So I moved on to tropicals, mollies, guppies, peppered cories the whole community story, and evetually got my 125 litre tank, the second in my collection. For me, that was massive. I moved all my old stock into this tank and made my smaller tank a hospital. My mom soon gave up her tank to me, so pretty soon I had three tanks to my name.

Then the snowballing happened, and within one year I went from 3 tanks to eight tanks, and all within that year I had turned nearly all of them over to oddball tanks. I even had a go at a 500 litre brackish tank, which broke out in disease, and lost all it's stock within a week.

And now here I am, going for monster fish, which was a goal started long ago, but back then a 'big' fish was 15cm, which is big compared to a neon...

So now I have 3 clown knifefish, 2 oscars, 3 senegal bichirs, an endli, an apollo shark, 2 bala sharks, a tinfoil barb, an Asian sun catfish and 3 black sharks.

I'm soon to build an external fish house, with a three metre tank buing built inside, at about 1600 litres. As well as that, most of my other tanks inside the house are moving there, and another largish tank, about 2 metres, will also be built there.

I'm becoming more and more of a fish expert (trying to anyway! ) and hope to have tanks by the likes of Arapaimag's one day. Thatsa my story!

 

[Red Devil]

I've been keeping fish for 4 years now. It began with goldfish (yup, going with the crowd), but our summer temps proved too warm for my Golides, and as I had no way to cool them off, they died.

So I moved on to tropicals, mollies, guppies, peppered cories the whole community story, and evetually got my 125 litre tank, the second in my collection. For me, that was massive. I moved all my old stock into this tank and made my smaller tank a hospital. My mom soon gave up her tank to me, so pretty soon I had three tanks to my name.

Then the snowballing happened, and within one year I went from 3 tanks to eight tanks, and all within that year I had turned nearly all of them over to oddball tanks. I even had a go at a 500 litre brackish tank, which broke out in disease, and lost all it's stock within a week.

And now here I am, going for monster fish, which was a goal started long ago, but back then a 'big' fish was 15cm, which is big compared to a neon...

So now I have 3 clown knifefish, 2 oscars, 3 senegal bichirs, an endli, an apollo shark, 2 bala sharks, a tinfoil barb, an Asian sun catfish and 3 black sharks.

I'm soon to build an external fish house, with a three metre tank buing built inside, at about 1600 litres. As well as that, most of my other tanks inside the house are moving there, and another largish tank, about 2 metres, will also be built there.

I'm becoming more and more of a fish expert (trying to anyway! ) and hope to have tanks by the likes of Arapaimag's one day. Thatsa my story!

That is one great story... how big are your clowns? you have alot of monsters now.... cannot wait to see your external fish house... your building it yourself... looking forward to it and keep up the monster collection!

 

[Red Devil]

Thanks for your kind words Liz. Fish forums are addicting. I've got three different fish forums in browser tabs and John PTC's web cam, so everytime the computer on, I can quickly check the forums and also view John's magnificent tank. I'm in total awe of his tank and his fish.
Susan

i will have to hook up to Johns tank myself.. i did not realize i could ..thanks !!!!

 

[twhittle]

23 years now for me. I got my first tank, a 10 gallon when I was 10 years old for Christmas. I have been hooked ever since. I started out with community fish and turned to an Oscar as my first cichlid. Now at age 33 I still am as addicted as ever. My students in my classroom love my tanks though!

 

[Mystix212]

I've only been keeping fish for around 20 months but have always been familiar with underwater biology.
Before I kept fish, I didn't know what my true calling was. It went from skateboarding, to building, to BMX, But I truely know now that fishkeeping will last forever with me.

 

[dirtyblacksocks]

Started with my first 10 gallon tank when I was 8, which got Ich about a month later due to having a pictus cat, puffer fish, several bubble face gold fish, and god knows what else I thought would fit in there.

Picked the hobby back up when I was 12 and started breeding convicts, which quickly escalated into an obsession with South American cichlids.

I'm now 26 and haven't ever really left the hobby, I definately took a hiatus while I was in the Army, but still had tanks being taken care of back home.

I specialize in discus, apistogramma, dwarf cichlids and other types of semi-peaceful SA's.

I've bred just about everything under the sun that's commonly available, including discus, zebra pleco's, angelfish, apistogramma, blue ram, bolivian ram, and so on and so on.

Still learning a lot, and glad I found this site as it's got some truely hardcore hobbyists in terms of dedication and monster tanks. Which I had not found before.