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A Newbie starting his first Aquarium
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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
A Newbie starting his first Aquarium
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31 Aug 2013 15:03 #1
by Jasonb (Jason Browne)
Hi all...
As the subject says, I'm new to Fishkeeping and hoping to start my first Aquarium over the next few weeks.
The original plan was for my Wife to get me a tank for my upcoming birthday. But once I started looking into it (I tend to research things!) I realised that you don't just go out and buy a tank and throw some fish into it. And I love animals far too much to mess around with their welfare.
So now the current plan is to get an Aquarium set up and then get the first fish on my birthday! I got lucky, a friend of ours gave me his setup as it was just sitting in his garage. So I got a 160L tank, lights, heater, filter and cabinet all for free.
I managed to crack the bottom of the tank while it was out in the back garden, and rather than try to fix it, my wife's paying for a new one, that will fit all the other stuff I got for free. I'm hoping to have that in the next week or so.
I've done a lot of reading about cycling the tank and I've also read a lot about the different fish that will go well together. I'm hoping to do a fairly basic Tropical Freshwater setup, with some easy plants to care for. Once I get the tank the next step will be deciding on substrate and which plants and hopfeully get that set up and the cycle started.
I've no pics yet but once I do I'll put some up. Looking forward to asking lots of questions!
J.
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31 Aug 2013 15:29 #2
by JohnH (John)
You're very welcome Jason that's a great introduction thanks for it.
Questions?: Ask away - we all started once so have made a lot of the mistakes newcomers might make (and we're - hopefully - the wiser for the experience).
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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31 Aug 2013 16:48 #3
by Gonefishy (Brian oneill)
Best of luck with it Jason and its very rewarding...btw, you can kick off your nitrogen cycle using hardy fish such as tetras but there's a great product called organic aqua on the market now which circumvents the need to wait at all to add your fish...just fill tank, add the product and add some fish...best of luck with it!!
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31 Aug 2013 22:34 #5
by jeff (Jeff Scully)
Welcome to the forum Jason great introduction and it sounds like you have a wife many of us on here would love most do not understand the under water world another good product to look into is Api quick start it allows you to add a few fish on day one once you use the dechlorinator first I always done this with fresh water for years as I have no patients and never had a problem, best of luck with your New journey and ask as many questions as you can think of loads of good lads On here that will be more than happy to help you out

eehem don't forget the pics so we can follow your progress
Where the tongue slips, it speaks the truth.
A life making mistakes is not only more honourable, but more useful than a life spent doing nothing at all.
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31 Aug 2013 23:04 #6
by Finn86 (Paul Finnegan)
Welcome along Jason, its a great forum and the guys are very good at answering any questions you may have

from my own experience I have used microbe-lift special blend, the stuff smells like a sewer but works great
Keep us updated with some photos once you get started
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01 Sep 2013 15:35 #7
by wylam (Stuart Sexton)
Hi Jason welcome to the hobby and the forum.
First things first , you need to get yourself a good water testing kit, it is essential! Some of the guys here recommend using additives to bypass the "cycling" process. I would advise against this for a first time fish keeper.Fish keeping is about patience and routine. In your first month or so, cycling your tank and being able to maintain and properly monitor water quality will provide you with a mountain of information and let you get into a routine of testing your water regularly . This is a big part of the hobby and in my opinion bypassing it is robbing you of half the fun.
Stuart.
Multi tasking: Screwing up more than one thing at a time.
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01 Sep 2013 19:32 #8
by Jasonb (Jason Browne)
Thanks for the welcome!
While I appreciate the advice for speeding up the cycle, I'm actually in no rush to put fish in yet, and my current plan is to have the tank up and running for at least a month to get it very stable before I put some fish in.
I've lots of questions so I'll do a thread in the Beginners Haven...
J.
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Forum
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Introduce yourself
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A Newbie starting his first Aquarium
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