New Member... Intro

[Meekrakkin]

Hi all,
Name is Mike, I've recently returned to the hobby after a LONG hiatus. In the early 2000s I used to Mod/Own a large aggressive fish forum (Aquatiq Terrors... my handle was Groovehead if any remember that site).
Due to life events I ended up selling all my tanks and fish and moving around quite a bit. Now 15 years later I'm just getting started again... I feel like I have forgotten most of what I knew back then so I'm starting out kind of small and easy, I have a 55 with a couple of JDs and a couple of Convicts. Later on I plan on building a couple of tanks for some larger, more interesting inhabitants =)

Here's a couple of pics of what I have now... they're just babies =)

 

[Ihsnshaik]

Welcome to the forum! Nice fish and remember this hobby is addicting but before you know it you'll have multiple tanks and your wife yelling at you haha.

 

[tlindsey]

Welcome to MFK !

 

[ehh]

Wee little babies. I brought my convict home when he was about that size.

 

[ragin_cajun]

Welcome to MFK. I'll be interested to hear your perspective on things to see how much the thinking on things has changed in the last 10-15 years--like filtration, sump setup, what fish are/aren't "doable" in different size tanks. What species you see around here were weren't available 10-15 years ago.

 

[Meekrakkin]

Welcome to MFK. I'll be interested to hear your perspective on things to see how much the thinking on things has changed in the last 10-15 years--like filtration, sump setup, what fish are/aren't "doable" in different size tanks. What species you see around here were weren't available 10-15 years ago.

Like I said, I have forgotten a LOT but back then we were into slight overstocking to keep aggression down and from what I'm reading noone is really doing that anymore... at one time I remember having a 13" Trimac (flowerhorns were just becoming a thing and weren't exactly being embraced by the hobby), Two 12"+ Oscars, a 10" Jag, and a few smaller species (Texas, Con, Salvini, etc...) in a 125 gallon tank with no aggression issues... of course I was a water changing fool and it was more work than it was worth and I ended up separating them... I wouldn't recommend such a setup but it was interesting to see... lol

From what I'm reading, thinking these days tends more toward bigger tanks with less fish and to be honest I'm kind of relieved by that...

As far as filtration goes, most of us back then were using the standard Hang on Back filters and did as little with them as we could get by with... the thinking being that excessive cleaning was harmful to your bacteria levels... I did use some canister filtration... I never used sumps so I can't really comment on them.