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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

planning permission granted

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21 May 2016 16:28 #91 by robert (robert carter)
just installed a reef motion 3kdc pump into my cold water sump very controllable unit so now tank is running totally silent , will keep the pump Bart supplied as a spare ,no harm having a back up

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21 May 2016 20:27 #92 by nomad (pat murphy)
Nice job Robert,nothing worse than a noisy pump or filter,a spares deffinatly a must have too,good luck with the progress ...

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23 May 2016 23:18 #93 by robert (robert carter)
Came in from work tonight at 11.30 and found one of the koi had jumped out of the tank and was on the floor , it must have only just happened , put it back in the tank and it seems a little put out but upright and swimming ok . So i guess that means a rethink about the open top idea , koi are not known as jumpers. My first thought is glass tops , anyone any ideas ?. So tonight ithas three glass cutting boards covering most of it from the kitchen .

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24 May 2016 04:57 #94 by Sukahn (Shane Doorley)
Hey robert SH now do coverings for open top tanks, kinda a mesh type thing that sits under the top ledge of the tank but still only take 3% par off lighting and from what i hear it can take a pounding and stay put. you would probably need 2 panels for your tank and you just trim it to size. glass is nice but heavy and awkward to move from a height.

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24 May 2016 07:38 #95 by robert (robert carter)
Thanks , does it sit on the bracing bars that run along the side of the tank? And any idea of cost ? Will price out today the 3 glass panels i would need, would get 6 mm glass and get the edges polished so finger dont get cut hangling them . Very busy day her in the garage so may have to leave her cutting boards on until i get a bit of time

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24 May 2016 16:19 #96 by Jonlate (Jon Late)
Get a Perspex cover instead. My local diy shop does 4mm thick sheets, and it would be lighter and safer to move than glass.
That said the mesh stuff looks good as well. I think I saw Alex used it on his tank, or I may have imagined that. Someone here used it recently and it looked good .

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24 May 2016 16:28 #97 by robert (robert carter)
I got 3 pieces of 6mm glass cut with polished edges today for 20 euro . did a 25 % water change cleaned the bog wood with bleech and a good power wash off , all back in the new glass on so no one going anywhere tonight , ammonia zero ,nitrite .25 and ph has come up nicely to 7.5 since I added the pumise stone into the sump . so all in all very happy with it . now planning to go to bangor wed 8th june to buy stock for the tank , a bit earlier than we originally thought .

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26 May 2016 12:08 #98 by robert (robert carter)
Bart was over again today with the remade top plinth just perfect now . I have asked him to make me a top up tank it will be 30 litre and fit in the cabinet beside the sump , my question is does anyone do a kit that would have the required sensors and required pump needed to do this ? Reckon I am losing about one and half litres a day in evaporation even with glass on the main tank . Bart is also going to make up a lid for sump tank which should help decrease evaporation as well as reduce noise

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29 May 2016 22:56 #99 by robert (robert carter)
Just an update , moved around some electrics and plumbing in the cabinet today to make space for the 30 litre top up tank Bank is building for me . Have ordered the top up system from the uk so all being well should have it up and running by next weekend . Cant believe the evaporation loss off the coldwater tank . Off to Bangor on tuesday to pick out some high grade 3 inch koi , a 420km round trip so hope its worth the trip .

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31 May 2016 19:03 #100 by robert (robert carter)
well was up at 6am and on the road for 7am for the 210km drive to Bangor . All I am going to say is the trip was not what I hoped for . So you can draw your own conclusions from that

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02 Jun 2016 01:22 #101 by Sukahn (Shane Doorley)
That doesnt sound good at all, message GalwayLad, he has a guy up north that delivers down here. Has some cracking Koi.

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02 Jun 2016 12:36 #102 by robert (robert carter)
Certainly going to have to review a supply for future stock .could go to an online supply but lets be honest half the fun in fishkeeping is personally picking the fish . Now this journey is nearly at an end just one last question , koi need very well oxygenated water ,didnt really want air stones or any other equipment in the tank ,have been running a power head with a venturi in the sump but very noisy ,if I replaced this with a good air pump with air stones in the first and the last section of the sump together with good surface movement from the return into the tank would this give me enough oxygen level in the tank water? your views please thanks Robert

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03 Jun 2016 04:16 #103 by Sukahn (Shane Doorley)
I would say so, getting good oxygenation in a tank is fairly easy, you could go along and put a skimmer onto the tank and that then makes the levels rise dramaticaly. Your idea of air stones in the compartments is a good idea if you dont wanna run a skimmer, just get ones that have low noise levels, but i wouldnt put it in the last section if you dont want bubbles getting into the return pump and going back into the tank.

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03 Jun 2016 07:56 #104 by robert (robert carter)
thanks for your reply , I have a Chinese air that believe it or not is incredibly quiet so will give it a go over the weekend, your point about location of the air stone is very good so I think I will put the second one in with the biohome media . have a great weekend and don't buy too many fish :cool: :cool:

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06 Jun 2016 20:20 #105 by paulv (paul vickers)
Did you try Ian in aquatic village for high end koi.

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06 Jun 2016 22:35 #106 by robert (robert carter)
I have known Ian since he started aquaticvillage , yes i did try him but his koi are a bit on the expensive side and seeing that i wanted about 20 . I have brought some very nice koi from Ian over the years

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06 Jun 2016 23:05 #107 by robert (robert carter)
Pm d galway lad re the koi guy, hopefully he will get back to me

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07 Jun 2016 03:59 #108 by Sukahn (Shane Doorley)
Ill get him to send you a message when i see him later today robert :)

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07 Jun 2016 05:05 #109 by paulv (paul vickers)
I did say Ian had high end koi and even I admire them the price tag is way off my humble means. Hopefully you will find the kinda fish that gives you pride just watching them in your new tank.

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07 Jun 2016 18:52 #110 by robert (robert carter)
Bart called up today with the new top up tank so set it up the ato system I got seems good . now on a bad note have to date lost 5 of the koi I got in the north ,nitrites went high then whitespot so hopefully all is under control now . problem two many fish into the tank in one go ,I did think it might happen

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09 Jun 2016 23:19 #111 by robert (robert carter)
Things going badly in the new tank have now lost 7 koi in 9 days 2 of which jumped out, that problem was solved tonight with new better fitting glass covers . Reckon that two many fish went in two early even though i thought the biohome was pretty well cycled in the pond , added the organic aqua and still getting high reading of ammonia and nitrite . Have stopped feeding , but do i do a good water change as i thought the oa made it unnessersery. Also got a dose of whitespot in the tank so been treating that with ws3 for the last 4 days ,it appears to be gone but i will add one more treatment on saturday just to be sure . Am certainly not a happy camper

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10 Jun 2016 09:20 #112 by paulv (paul vickers)
Sad to read you lost more fish. The OA won't do much at this stage, it's meant to be added to fresh new water not a cure for a troubled tank. If it were me I'd remove the fish now, put them in a bucket with an air stone, totally empty the tank and start from scratch with new water and OA start up, keep your filter bio mass running and put in your fish, don't do a wc for a month by which time your filter should be able to handle the remaining fish. You need to act fast to save the remaining fish.

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10 Jun 2016 09:30 #113 by paulv (paul vickers)
Your fish got white spot because they are stressed from the water conditions. A tight fitting lid is not the best either as it does not allow for easy exchange of surface gasses especially when using OA, I'd suggest raising the cover and inch using even Lego blocks. Let's know what you do. We have all been in a worrying position with a toxic tank and its very stressful trying to solve it.

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10 Jun 2016 10:57 #114 by Q_Comets (Declan Chambers)
I know nothing about keeping koi so this may be a dumb question but could some of the fish go in the pond to reduce bio load in new tank and escape the high nitrites?

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10 Jun 2016 10:57 #115 by Jonlate (Jon Late)
So as not to hijack someone else thread, what the password for your webcam then Robert? How do we log in to see what's happening?
Let us know and we might forgive the lack of photos!

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10 Jun 2016 15:21 - 10 Jun 2016 15:23 #116 by robert (robert carter)
Just done a 50% water change after a headcount i have lost 11 koi in the last 2 weeks, feel like draining the tank and keeping hamsters in it , very very pixxxd off to say the least , after so much foward planning , have even removed the piece of bog wood just incase it was leeching out anything into the water .the glass tops are not air tight they have about a inch each side air space and the weir is not covered
Last edit: 10 Jun 2016 15:23 by robert (robert carter). Reason: added sentance

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11 Jun 2016 14:54 #117 by Bill (Bill Hunter)
I don't know if this is any good to you, Robert, perhaps you already know of them. I'm not sure how long it would take to get to them from Holyhead though. I came across them while surfing something else.
upvot.es/1U6z7cv
Bill

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11 Jun 2016 15:56 #118 by robert (robert carter)
Hi Bill thanks for the link ,i think what i am going to do is try a get through this season with koi sorced in ireland or ni then next year when the tank has matured will do a uk trip . The place you sent me looks a possible contender

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13 Jun 2016 12:06 #119 by robert (robert carter)
tested the new tank this morning ,ammonia .25 nitrites .25 . removed two dead fish have now lost 13 small koi of the 20 that came from Bangor 2 weeks ago .Just cant seam to get levels to zero . have halved the feeding and doing 15% water changes daily . one days water test are ok the next they are up . at my witts end with this project need help urgently ,any ideas lads ?

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13 Jun 2016 13:03 #120 by Jonlate (Jon Late)
What order do you have your sump media in? It seems that it migh not keeping up with your bio load.
What's in the tank plant wise now? Are you still running the co2 on this tank?

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