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Retirement and forum shutdown (17 Jan 2022)

Hi,

John Howell who has managed the forum for years is getting on and wishes to retire from the role of managing it.
Over the years, he has managed the forum through good days and bad days and he has always been fair.
He has managed to bring his passion for fish keeping to the forum and keep it going for so long.

I wish to thank John for his hard work in keeping the forum going.

With John wishing to "retire" from the role of managing the forum and the forum receiving very little traffic, I think we must agree that forum has come to a natural conclusion and it's time to put it to rest.

I am proposing that the forum be made read-only from March 2022 onwards and that no new users or content be created. The website is still registered for several more years, so the content will still be accessible but no new topics or replies will be allowed.

If there is interest from the ITFS or other fish keeping clubs, we may redirect traffic to them or to a Facebook group but will not actively manage it.

I'd like to thank everyone over the years who helped with forum, posted a reply, started a new topic, ask a question and helped a newbie in fish keeping. And thank you to the sponsors who helped us along the away. Hopefully it made the hobby stronger.

I'd especially like to thank John Howell and Valerie Rousseau for all of their contributions, without them the forum would have never been has successful.

Thank you
Darragh Sherwin

What do ye do

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30 Aug 2012 22:51 #1 by louis (David Knowles)
What do ye do was created by louis (David Knowles)
Hi guys, what do ya do to keep your fish happy (1) do you gravel vac with every water change. (2) do you leave the air stone on 24/7 (3) do you leave a light on at night in ur fish room. How often do u do a water change. Some of the things I worry about.

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30 Aug 2012 23:26 - 30 Aug 2012 23:27 #2 by ck1 (chris)
Replied by ck1 (chris) on topic What do ye do
Im new to the hobby so still learning.i dont vac the bottom at all i have a lot of plants so they do the job.leave the light on for 8 and a half hours from 2 to half 10.i change 20-30% every thursday or friday
Last edit: 30 Aug 2012 23:27 by ck1 (chris).

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30 Aug 2012 23:31 #3 by JohnH (John)
Replied by JohnH (John) on topic What do ye do
Louis, you raise a few very salient questions there.
I, personally, do use the 'vac' with each water change - not altogether sure I need to, but it has just become the 'norm' now.
Most of my filtration was, and shortly shall be again, by air-driven filters, both sponge and undergravel so these are on all the time but just having an airstone could be a different issue - is it running for aesthetic reasons or out of necessity? If the former then it could be turned off, but the latter - well, the answer is there already.
Doubtless there are far more technical reasons why it should be on all the time (or not - as the case may be) but that's my view - but I'm perfectly open to being told I'm wrong.
Bear in mind, though, that if you turn off an air pump you can suffer a vacuum effect where the water will syphon back - replacing the air in the tube - and flood both your air pump (not good from a safety point of view) and subsequently your floor. The answer is either to use an anti-reverse valve in the airline or set the air pump higher than water level (although even that isn't foolproof - I can attest to that first hand!).
As to leaving on a light at night, I use one of those LED night lights (which switch on and off automatically with lower light levels) along each row of tanks. The thought behind this being that in the tropics (or even here in Ireland) it's never totally dark, but in our fish rooms with no natural lighting available it can be pitch black. Again, that's my theory, anyone else care to comment?
And lastly, I try to do at least a 15-20% water change each week, but this sometimes 'slips' a little.

John
Location:
N. Tipp

We're just two lost souls swimming in a fish bowl - year after year.


ITFS member.



It's a long way to Tipperary.

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30 Aug 2012 23:49 #4 by igmillichip (ian millichip)
Replied by igmillichip (ian millichip) on topic What do ye do
My fish seem to think that feeding them keeps them happy........but like us, they only see the short term rewards.

But all that giving them treats means that I (not they) must do the long-term treat of good water changes.

I only tend to vac the bottom if the tank has gravel and I have gravel grazers such as discus or uaru in the tank.

However, most of my tanks either have no substrate at all or, as in the majority of my tanks, the substrate is peat and mud........not the best for using a vac on.
There is a danger with the peat substrate in that needs regular churning up to prevent methane or sulphurous gas build-up.

As you may, then guess, quite a few of our fish are not that visible to us until I fish them out for shows :)

ian
Irish Tropical Fish Society (ITFS) Member.

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31 Aug 2012 00:20 #5 by sheag35 (Seamus Gillespie)
Replied by sheag35 (Seamus Gillespie) on topic What do ye do
on tanks i do have substrate in i only vac when doing water changes and then only a third of the substrate at a time so the beneficial bacteria in the substrate isnt wiped out everytime so its left third week one, middle third week two and right hand third of substrate week three and start the process all over again week four, find this method works well for me
Fishkeeping the Only way to get wet and wild

currently 25 tanks, and breeding is the aim of everything i keep
location:Limerick

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31 Aug 2012 03:25 #6 by m4r10 (m4r10)
Replied by m4r10 (m4r10) on topic What do ye do
Don't vac the substrate as the plants take care of any residuals getting trapped in there. I leave no lights over night, just the light they get from the TV while it's on, and as for the water change, I usually do 50% - that at least until the water charges will come into effect.

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31 Aug 2012 08:31 #7 by louis (David Knowles)
Replied by louis (David Knowles) on topic What do ye do
Thanks for the replies folks. I have black gravel substrate no live plants just silk plants.I have been doing a 25% water change every 2 weeks and full gravel vac but think I should change to partial vac as sheag35 advises.I think I will go for some night lights. I got some red moor root wood some time ago and one or two fish got some damage, I feel from grazing against some of the sharp bits of the root possibly when its pitch dark. I have since split up the root into individual branches and it looks much better and I got rid of the more dangerous bits.The other half tells me I worry more about my fish than my grand kids.Yeah well!!!!!!

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