A few happy snappy snaps....

So, messing around and just taking some happy snaps with the old compact camera a week or 2 ago (and forgot to post these here)…..

I think I should clean the glass on a few tanks….but, hey, why not be a bit rebellious at times and just take a snap-shot.

Here’s a few of our fish..




























ian

Crackin shots esp, the Bettas!

Kev.

Unreal shots.Beautiful fishes!!!!


Gedas

Love the pics fish look really good. If you have any photos left or when you have the glass cleaned you should have a shot in the photo comp with photos like that you have a good chance.

Lovely shots Ian. Some cracking fish.

Cheers guys.

Who said clean my tanks?? I happen to like that murky tea coloured water with drip marks down the outside. So do the fish.

So many of my fish are in very peaty water that it makes getting a good shot difficult. The ones above would be ones I'd reject from entering in a photocomp.

@KenS......2 of the fish above were on the show bench at the weekend: the male plakat betta (pic 11); and the dwarf vietnamese mudskipper (Periophthalmodon septemradiatus). One of the Chocolate Gourami was also going to pop along for a visit to the show, but I decided that I wouldn't stress them.
For a 5 euro fish, the Chocolate Gourami grow into stunning fish with loads of character.

I should have given some names, so here they are:
Chocolate gourami;
Steatocranus casuarius;
Aphyosemion striatum;
Steatocranus casuarius with Aphyosemion sjoestedti in the background;
giant spotted hatchet fish (Gasteropelecus maculates);
Trichopsis schalleri (three line croaking gourami);
Chocolate Gourami;
Red Half Moon Fighter;
Lilac and blue veiltail Fighter (2 pics in a row);
Half Moon Plakat male and female Betta;
Red Half Moon Fighter (2 pics in a row);
Polypterus endlicheri with Uaru in background;
Polypterus endlicheri;
African Lungfish;
Scleropages jardinii (Australian Saratogo)..2 pics in a row;
Periophthalmodon septemradiatus;
Brown African Knife Fish;
Copper Half Moon Fighter (this camera angles shows his blue sheen, but he is a sttange green from above);
Periophthalmodon septemradiatus (2 pics in a row);
Nanochromis transvestites (and the water is so peaty that you can not possibly photograph the superb colours)

ian

Great variety of really healthy looking fish! Considering the variety shown you must have a shed load of fish tanks. Some really good quality pics also. Keep them coming

Beautiful pics and fish
Scleropages jardinii (Australian Saratogo)was my favourite i had one but he got killed by my oscars
beautiful they are.What size is it now ?

lookin good Ian, fish look in great health, they are a credit to you

Lovely fish and pics ian. Are your Chocolate gouramis hard to keep?

Wow; those are some cracking pics indeed Ian; 'old' compact camera you say? Wish i had one of them then!

regards;
andrew

@Andrewo....I normally use a Nikon DSLR, but I have a few compacts around. I guess I prefer to do water changes than to do glass cleaning. !!

@Fishhead.....I don't find Chocolate Gourami hard to keep, but they are one of the hardest freshwater fish to keep if they are not given what they demand:
Very high quality water;
very low conductivity, but very stable water;
zero ammonia; zero nitrites; and just above zero nitrates (it is dangerous to have zero nitrates especially in an amazon biotopic tank....even though these are not from the amazon);
high quality food that is varied;
do not overfeed in one go;
highish temperature (78 to 80 F);
and make sure that they have a very good oxygen supply (even though they are anabantoids).

I generally use tap water, well conditioned with peat as a substrate. The filtration in chocolare gourami tank is overhead, and in another it is a simple air-driven filter.
I do sometimes use RO water in water changes, but not all the time.

In my opinion, chocolate gourami are so cheap that that leaves you with loads of money to spend on decent filtration systems, water treatment products and good quality food (dried and frozen).
Gourami are generally a bit piggish....and that can lead to their downfall if over fed with crap.

The bottom with keeping the chocolate gouramis is that I could use the spent water from their tank for doing a water change on a wild-discus tank. If the water from a choc gourami tank is not good enough for wild-discus water changes, then it is not good enough for the chocs to live in.
I guess that that emphasises the need for excellent water. But it does not take too much to get that super water.

ian

Super looking fish Ian , I love the shots. If you decide spawning the killies keep me in mind, I haven't kept striatum for a long time and I found them to be a great peaceful little fish, wouldn't mind getting a few again in the future.

Alan.

Zoom wrote:

Super looking fish Ian , I love the shots. If you decide spawning the killies keep me in mind, I haven't kept striatum for a long time and I found them to be a great peaceful little fish, wouldn't mind getting a few again in the future.

Alan.

The females of the striatum were all pretty crap when I got them.....but the males happily pretend to spawn (yep....not fighting but the spawning motion). So you're out of luck with these killies producing babies. I do have somewhere after our house move the eggs....but like all of the killie eggs before we moved, they cannot be found (I doubt that they will have survived this long though).

Cheers man im still pretty new to the hobby. i havent lost a fish in a good while touch wood but dont think im ready for the choc ones just yet ha. some amazing looking fish all the same

fishhead88 wrote:

Cheers man im still pretty new to the hobby. i havent lost a fish in a good while touch wood but dont think im ready for the choc ones just yet ha. some amazing looking fish all the same

They are great little fish.....for 40 euro you could have a tank full of them and the tank doesn't need to be very large either. They can become very friendly.

I wouldn't say that they are 'beginners' fish. But, then that begs the question of when does someone stop being a beginner and starts being 'experienced'.

Someone with only limited experienced but who has rapidly developed the skills and care could possibly give these fish a superb home; someone with years of experience but unwilling to give these fish what they need will simply fail with them: I suppose the word 'beginner' might be best given to someone so new to the hobby that they haven't yet started asking or realising the need to ask the right questions.

Not many places sell these gems that often....what a pity.

ian

A very nice collection of species there,and great photography. My favourite water too,nice and stained.

can't wait to see the pictures, taken using nikon camera.. these are amazing

Beautiful pictures and fish Ian.

I love your bettas. Yourself and Justine will have to pop over soon for a cuppa

Cheers, Pete. We'll have to pop over at some stage.

I'll have some spare baby siamese fighters going somewhere at some stage soon....I have to pick some for the next step in the breeding line, and then what I don't need will a good home. They don't need much room really, and if someone has a fish house then housing them is never going to be a 350 litre extra weight.
Might be a nice addition to being in a tank near some American Flags fish.

If you're interested let me know. The first to being thinned out are from the betta in the 4th picture (who was at the show last week). Stunning little fish....he is an 'asymmetrical half-moon plakat butterfly', and there are some interesting colours in the babies.
The ones I don't need are not runts.....but soon it is going to cost me extra to keep them hanging around: so I want that cost in keeping to go to someone else.

If you happen to going to the ITFS meeting on Tuesday then I can simply dip a few randoms ones out for you, pop them in a bag and all it will cost you is their food for the future.

I've quickly attached a photo of the light coloured body batch at just over 3 weeks old. Stunners...and little monsters.

ian

you are certainly feeding those little bettas well ian, judging by their fat tums. what do you feed them with?

derek wrote:

you are certainly feeding those little bettas well ian, judging by their fat tums. what do you feed them with?

I tend not to feed adult bettas too much (I actually think that too many Bettas are overfed as aduls...and that is not a good state for adult bettas), and the adults wouldn't have such fat tums; but I do allow the young fish to get a full belly full.

In the breeding tank, the substrate is peat with mature water. That will encourage a good supply of rotifers, infusoria and micro-worms at birth.

From the second day of feeding I start feeding liquifry and newly hatch brine shrimp and a small pinch of JBl powdered fry food.
What that does is to give a rapid growth all around, but it also means that the biggest and strongest fry gets a flying start. Hence, the smaller fry in that picture are the normal size you'd expect from most batches at that age.

They also get frozen cyclops and frozen rotifers.

After about a week I start feeding frozen shrimp with spirulina and with the brine shrimp and crushed JBL NovoTab (the cheaper one).
The frozen shrimp help the fish 'exercise' (as well as give that addition to their nutrition).

(I believe fighters need excercise to stay strong and fit....often many fighters do not get the excercise they need).

At the 2 week onward stage, I use the frozen shrimp with spirulina, with JBL NovoTab and whole JBL Betta flakes. Basically.....they get their adult food quite early.

Feeding is often during these growth stages, and frequent water changes must follow.
When these reach about 8 weeks then food will be as per adult siamese fighters....slowed down quite a lot.

The bottom line is that the fighter breeding and raising tanks are manky to look at with so much peat flying around....but that does the trick. In fact the adult tanks don't look any better.

I bet you wished you hadn't asked the question now.

Now....as I happen to have some photos at hand..... this is one of the latest additions to the fighters:
a White Platinum Half-Moon Plakat (I have male and female). The breeding of these will produce some interesting results as these are not actually white but dark metallic green and blue (like the metallic blue guy in the first post here). There is an opaque layer over the body colour.




ian

Beautiful pics and fish too...

How do you make your fish stay still for the pic? "say worm?"

Luckyly for you I'm in galway... i'll be on your doorstep in a heartbit for photography lessons and fish handouts!!!!

Keep posting...

fair play ian all look great keep them coming thanks

sean

Very cool, love the jardini .

Jay

The jardini is a pet.....even tells us off if we don't feed on cue. It is a bit too aggressive for most fish that could be kept with other arowanas.....but that makes deciding a community tank easier.

@Fishmama.....but this thread of photos are just my happy snappy photos, there is nothing quality about these. I'm not really much of a fish photographer especially as I was used to doing some work and teaching fashion photography....way back in the day. It's not easy doing stylised photography of fish.

ian