Fish Fight In The Parking Lot!!!

The story of my life is I'm always trying to do the right thing, and it backfires on me.  Here's the latest incident.  I was browsing Craigslist (no, not that section.)  I was looking at the free section.  I saw an ad giving away a pair of mated angelfish.  I looked at the included photo, and saw they were pretty good size.  It seems they had outgrown their tank, and needed to be rehomed.

I thought, "perfect!"  Since I had two angelfish pass away a few months ago I could use two angelfish to restock the tank.  Long story short, I brought them home.

As you can probably guess, that's when the trouble began.  The big male (the marble colored one) and the male that was already in my tank decided to have a fish fight.

I mean, they really went at it.  I'd never seen anything like it.  They would actually bite each other's lips and hold on.  Then there was posturing and maneuvering.  Despite my attempts to break up the fight they went at it for a couple hours until they were both worn out.

Since it was near the beginning of the month I decided to so something I had heard about.  Generally fish like their own territory, so if I were to rearrange the tank with natural breaks in it, I believed they would leave each other alone.

So I gave the tank a great scrubbing, and performed my first of the month cleaning/water change.  Next, I moved my rocks and plants around to create natural barriers.  It ended up looking like this.

It seems to have worked.  They are somewhat passive aggressive and engaged in what I would call a "fin measuring" contest.  But at least they aren't attacking each other.  The two males have claimed their own parts of the tank.  However, the loaches have no idea what's going on.  But in all honesty, they don't care.  Neither do the giant danios.

The new fish (the male and female pair) hang out together.

While the three fish (one male and two females) I originally had hang out together.

But every now and then the two males give each other dirty glances.

So my plan has somewhat worked out.  It's strange because I never had any problems with angelfish before this.  They had always gotten along.  But now that I think about it, they tended to be very young when I brought them home.  Hopefully after a week they'll figure out some sort of rhythm to the fish tank.

Restocking the Fish Tank: Angelfish Sunday

Today was the day I finally put some angelfish in the fish tank.  There is an independent pet store called Pet City that had the smaller marble angelfish in stock.  So a few were purchased, namely five of them.  Also purchased was some specialty food, aquarium salt, and a new Marineland jet sprayer.  Let's take a look at the pictures.

For clarity, the funny looking white things are the air bubbles shooting from the sprayer.  The angelfish are still schooling together.  Since they are in a new environment, they don't like separating that far from one another. 

Here's a short video clip that I took of the tank.

I'm glad I was able to get the angelfish while they were small.  That will give them plenty of time to grow.  Since they are young and small, they are getting along well with the danios.  Everyone is getting along nicely. 

The old Marineland jet sprayer finally bit the dust last week.  But honestly, it hadn't worked well in years.  I should have replaced it back then.  But the good news is I assembled it correctly, and it's working just fine in the fish tank.  It looks pretty, and I'm sure the fish are yelling, "BUBBLES!!!!"

I could put more fish in the tank, but I'm not sure what kind.  I think some glo-light tetras would get along well with everyone.  I could add some clown loaches since my last one passed away.  I'll get on the internet, and see what fish get along with angelfish.  I'll try to pick something that I haven't had before. 

My Yoyo Loach Is About To Explode

I have written numerous blogs about my fishtank.  During the last 20 years of my life I have enjoyed having egg laying types of fish.  Namely, tetras, barbs, and gouramis.  But in the last year I have added a fun type of fish, yoyo and clown loaches. 

These are fun active bottom feeders that also get rid of any snails that wander into the tank.  They have really added a lot of movement into my fishtank.  They are also great community fish, and get along with all the other fish I have in there.

What's also nice is that they are egg-layers so I don't have to worry about babies in the tank.  I found out I didn't like live bearers in that, they would have 30 babies, and then die.  Then 28 of the babies would die.  It was too much dying for me.  So imagine my surprise when I look over into my fishtank ,and see this.

I mean, how can she even swim straight being shaped like that?  Honestly, it looks like I photoshopped that picture.  I can barely believe it is real.

But yes, that is one of my yoyo loaches.   Or should I say that is half a loach and half roe (fish eggs.)  I honestly have no idea why she is so filled with roe.  Usually in a tank setting they will not lay eggs. 

However, after reading on the web, the one way for them to lay eggs that will grow up to be baby loaches is to do a huge water change, and then lower the temperature in the fishtank by five degrees.  And then I have to hope that one of the other yoyo loaches in the tank is a male. 

But the thing that worries me is if she will live after laying all those eggs?  I'm worried it will be way too much stress on her. 

Welcome Mike Nugget to the Fishtank

So yesterday I welcomed Mike Nugget to the fishtank.  He's a Gold Nugget Plecostomus.  My Sister wants to dismantle the fishtank in her room, and Mike was the last fish in there.  Actually, she always called him Nugget.  But I thought he should have a first name.  To be honest, I was watching football, and Bengals kicker Mike Nugent (not to be confused with Nugget) was mentioned.  So I saw that as the perfect sign to name Nugget, Mike Nugget.

 

 

 

Despite Mike's small size, he is at least eight years old.  Since he has lived most of his life in a 20 gallon tank, he never grew that big.  But the tank he is in now is 46 gallon so he has plenty of room to grow.  Not to mention he will have plenty of friends.  He will have Big Joe the 6th, (he's a common Pleco,) and a number of Loaches. 

 

In his old tank Mike tended to hide quite a bit.  However, he has actually spent some time in the open while eating algae in the new tank.  That's how I got all these pictures of him.

 

Speaking of pictures, here are a few more of Mike.  I hope he likes his new home.

 



The Loach: Nature's Spaz

As I posted previously, I have had a snail problem in my fish tank.  Read this to catch up:

http://angjellockheart.blogspot.com/2015/01/std-snail-transmitted-disease.html

I tried to buy snail-b-gone from the pet store, but they don't sell it anymore.  The only way to naturally get rid of snails is to buy something that eats snails.  Namely, the loach.

So, I ended up buying two types of loaches, the very popular clown loach and the yoyo loach.  I bought them young so I will have them for a long time (hopefully.)  Here are the pictures.

The one thing I've noticed about having loaches, is that, they are total spazzes.  Maybe they are just young and energetic?  I could tell you more about it, but let me SHOW you through the power of moving pictures!

So they are a fun fish to have in the tank.  I think I already see a reduction in the number of snails crawling around the tank.  Since the loaches are high energy I have made sure to put shrimp pellets in the tank for them to eat.  Between regular fish food, shrimp pellets, and a multitude of snails, I think the loaches will start growing pretty fast.  Maybe I will post another video of them in a year or so when they have some size on them?