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
From Koi to Coraline
so I winged it for a few years managing to keep those first critters alive through various tanks. They came with me to my first house and with the house came the space for a pond, those Koi had been cooped up for long enough so I gave them a new home along with their other tag along companions.The pond story V1 and 2 is a story for another day..... With an empty tank came a new evolution to my hobby and I delved into Trop Freshwater with a new hunger. Made all the mistakes any newbie would make, overfeeding, incompatible fish, shopping in crappy fish stores. The best mistake was buying a couple of small Oscars cos they looked good and letting the 14 year old shop assistant bag them with the 10 Neons id also bought. When I got home I had two happy and full Oscars..
Over the next ten years I had great success with various tanks and setups both FO and heavily planted ending up with a lively community setup dominated by my 2 ten year old Angels.... then I visited Seahorse and saw that display tank and the midlife fish crisis began.....
I took the plunge and gave my angels to a mate who I knew would take care of them, bagged the rest up and dropped them into Seahorse, tore down my Vision 260 and readied it for the new challenge. Darren in seahorse gave me great advice on the best way to Cycle the new setup so off I went with Live sand, a small amount of Live rock and a bucket of salt in hand. I was starting on a budget so reused the canister filter with broken live rock and started the cycle, monitoring like a crazy chemist every day. The LR did its job and two weeks later I was ready for the cleanup crew. In they went and did their job with a frenzy.. always one for a bargain I found someone selling the contents of a small Marine setup so I bought his LR, 2 Clowns and some other critters that he couldn't give me names for...... Now I hear all you Marine encrusted folk shouting…. NOOOO!! Never buy a critter that you haven’t researched in advance, you are asking for trouble. And trouble I had, one of those critters was an interesting glassy brown anemone, its long flowing tentacles readily grasping the frozen food that I presented. Aptasia love frozen food by the way and they also love to reproduce (Enter 3 Peppermint shrimp who have yet to eradicate the buggers). The most impressive addition was a large green mushroom shaped anemone who migrated around the tank finally attaching itself to the bottom of the tank and laying itself out like a carpet… grabbing, crushing and spitting out the €50 brittle star that id bought that week. The Haddons carpet Anemone had to go so in a bag he went and found a new home in Seahorse, he was great but I want a peaceful tank. After a few more costly mistakes and realizing that my 260 and canister filter just weren’t big enough I decided to start again
Now: Clearseal 450, two power heads, lots of LR, Sump with LR, caulerpa (lit 24/7), Protein Skimmer, 2 reactors, One Rowaphos, one empty, UV Sterilizer. Man you need so much equipment for these salty buggers.
Critters: 2 Clown (Amphiprion ocellaris), 1 Cowfish (Lactoria cornuta), 3 Peppermint Shrimp, 1 Coral Branded Shrinmp, two turbo snails, 1 sand sifting star (haven't seen him for a while), Button Polyp colony, Mushroom coral, yellow flowerpot and last but not least as red and black cucumber. Letting these bed in for a while and reading up on the reef setup before buying any more.
The Plan: I want a small version of that reef display tank in Seahorse, I could look at that all day but I have a lot to learn before I can have something like that and hopefully this is the place to do it. So hello to all!!
By the way, 2 of those original Koi are still living happily in my pond, 20 years and growing
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welcome a long and definitely want to hear more details but especially picture of your koi and pond Please Log in to join the conversation.
Ger
What do you call a three legged Donkey?
A Wonkey....duh ha
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Fantastic story. I've never been to seahorse but I really want to make the trek up there now!Best of luck with it,
George
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Some of my favorite fish over the years.
Angels about 5 or 6 years ago
I had great success with breeding Kribs, from memory I only ever bought 3 but Ive had hundreds of them from that small investment. They are beautiful when they pair up, the females bellying up to one another saying my belly is bigger than yours
A breeding pair below:
Fat and Friendly barbs
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Will take some pics of the new setup and post but it is very bare at the moment as building up slowly!
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New setup, a bit bare for now and a bit covered in algae. Getting those Phosphate and Nitrate levels to Zero is a challenge. Tactic for now is the Algae in the sump and RowaPhos in the reactor. Water change, water change, water change.....
Best buy so far! Magnificent creature and even kills Aptasia
Button Polyp, Flowerpot (Sold as yellow but green under my lights), softie I got from someone, yet to identify so all help gratefully accepted...... and the good old Turbo on the prowl.
Star Polyp, hoping they will colonise quickly.
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Welcome along!
regards;
andrew
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