RE: Don't Buy Oscar Fish - 6 Reasons Why

[skjl47]

If you were like me, there was no testing. I just changed water whenever it smelled funny or discolored. After awhile it was my habit on certain days to maintain the tanks all at once.

Hello; Other than pH the first water testing I knew much about was in the 1970's. I was taking a limnology class. We took water samples from various bodies of water. Back then for some tests I had to add a chemical immediately at the collection site to lock in the values. For other tests I just need samples in clean vials. Best I can recall it took well over an hour to run the tests back at a lab.

Also did not have a handy dandy website at my fingertips to get information from. Kinda funny in a way that even with all this new tech test kits, power filters, a wide variety of decent foods , the internet and so on there still seems to be about as many poorly run tanks as in the past. ( By that I mean most any day I find a thread about poor fish keeping on this site alone.)

 

[Ulu]

People that defend Oscars in 55 gallons are selfish ass holes or at best, clueless.
No one has a gun to the guy with a 55 . . .

The best laid schemes of mice and men gang aft agley...or something like that.

My fish all go from a small QT to bigger and bigger tanks as they grow. On Felix's way to bigger tanks life got in our way.
If the stock market keeps rising our fish will live large. If it fails, we may have to eat them.

. . . They chose that fish themselves. Not because their tank is the ideal size or the fish will have a nice life, but because they want it . . .

If you go to a good salesmanship school, they will teach you that almost every consumer purchase is ultimately made that way. Then, in our minds, as customers, we make whatever rationalizations are required to make it all seem logical.

This often happens well after one realizes they have purchased a POS product, or one too big/fancy/expensive.

We weld ourselves to some decision and cannot be pried loose.

Anyhow, if you do not buy stuff "because you want it" most of the time, you would be considered an odd duck in sales academia.

 

[Ulu]

I think the person who invented 55s had likely never kept fish in their life. . .

It's about the engineering of the glass. It's the tallest 48" tank you can build from (I believe) 6mm glass. Good for display, not for growout or breeding.

 

[jaws7777]

Your all putting fish in glass boxes.... please thats not restrictive?

 

[Stanzzzz7]

Your all putting fish in glass boxes.... please thats not restrictive?

Here you go again.
A big box is far less restrictive than a small one.
But yes, let's defend the idea of keeping Oscars in a small one, that's makes sense, educates and improves the hobby.

 

[Stanzzzz7]

The best laid schemes of mice and men gang aft agley...or something like that.

My fish all go from a small QT to bigger and bigger tanks as they grow. On Felix's way to bigger tanks life got in our way.
If the stock market keeps rising our fish will live large. If it fails, we may have to eat them.



If you go to a good salesmanship school, they will teach you that almost every consumer purchase is ultimately made that way. Then, in our minds, as customers, we make whatever rationalizations are required to make it all seem logical.

This often happens well after one realizes they have purchased a POS product, or one too big/fancy/expensive.

We weld ourselves to some decision and cannot be pried loose.

Anyhow, if you do not buy stuff "because you want it" most of the time, you would be considered an odd duck in sales academia.

Not so easily brainwashed, especially when the "product" being sold is a living creature.
It's not a new coat or car, it lives and breaths.

 

[Ulu]

Well, as I said, that makes you a very unusual person; because most pets are sold to people who are exactly the opposite.

 

[Fat Homer]

Anyhow, if you do not buy stuff "because you want it" most of the time, you would be considered an odd duck in sales academia.

I must be the odd duck then as well, coz i rarely buy things just because i want them... if i did, i couldnt imagine how much debt i would be in right now...

 

[Ogertron3000]

Not so easily brainwashed, especially when the "product" being sold is a living creature.
It's not a new coat or car, it lives and breaths.

Its not so much brainwashing as justifying it to yourself. A bit of rationalising in your head, the LFS guy saying it will be fine and 1 internet site saying yes when 200 say no and you can come up with a perfectly good reason to keep an Oscar in a 55G evEn though you know you really shouldn't.
I really want a jag for my 4x2x2 , I won't do it but I have come up with some reasons it will be cool that would no doubt cause outrage on this site.
There's not much excuse for being uninformed these days but humans being what they are will ensure this sort of thread will be popping up for years to come.

 

[Fat Homer]

Ogertron3000 it kind of is brainwashing in a way, brainwashing ones self to believe what they know is wrong to be right in their own mind...

However i see where you are coming from, coz i’ve always wanted a F/W ray and have gone through what you were talking about trying to justify it to myself, but at the end of the day i also knew i couldnt house one for life so would never put one through that kind of punishment...

Then again, that could be coz im the odd duck in the equation...