Banana Plants + Mosquito Fish

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unspoken930

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Just wondering if this would work. I live on a horse barn and have a 75 gallon or so empty water trough, never been used for anything but water for the horses and its never had any algae growing in it really, maybe a small bloom in the dead heat of summer. I live just north of Atlanta Georgia and i have read that banana plants come from the south east united states. well, you dont really get more southeast then georgia. Anyways i have also read that the pool infront of the lincoln memorial in Washington DC is filled with mosquito fish and they live in the pool even when it freezes. I was considering getting this water trough heavily planted with banana plants and sell them on ebay or something, becuase i became sucessfull in making new plants in my inside aquarium. The reason i want the mosquito fish in there is because we have SO many mosquitos in georgia... and i dont want to just be breeding mosquitos. Anyways, do any of yall think this will work? or maybe some other type of VERY hardy fish species that can tolerate not perfect water conditions? i cant put a filter out there really but i can do alot of water changes and if i maybe put some java fern/ java moss in there as well, i can keep most of the ammonia at bay, seeing as i wouldnt have to feed the fish that much becuase they would eat any algae or mosquito larva or any gnats that get stuck on the surface. Give any opinion/thought you want on this, as i dont want to be cruel to the fish or anything. And yes, id use dechlorinator ext. in the water.
 
trying not to hijack, do they have mosquito fish in atlanta georgia as im moving there in 2 years and i'd like some ?
 
Mosquito fish would work, but do not let them out! they may not be in your area already and introducing them will decimate the native fish populations and more often than not lead to an increse of mosquitos in the area (the gambusia would prewffer to eat baby fish to mosquito larve) also, the banana plants might get eaten by the horses, if its still used for watering them, just a thought.
 
I dont see why it wouldn't work, gambusia are incredibly hardy fish, very difficult to go wrong, just cant keep much of anything else with them as they are quite aggressive.

As for the horses and the banana plants. :lol: The banana plant leaves have an odd bitter taste to them and the horse will leave them alone after a nibble, my horses hate banana peels, they'll find em on the ground, take a taste and head for a drink :D
 
lol oh no i have like 6 spare water tanks becuase we downsized out barn and the water wasnt getting drank as fast so we downsized to a 50 gallon or so... so i mean the horses wouldnt have a single sip.... and id never let the fish loose. Also, are they very easy to sex? becuase i think id just like to have a ton of females so they wouldnt breed...
 
sounds good to me. I'd say go for it.
i was wondering if feeder goldfish would work just as well as mosquito fish. I'm not sure which would be more of a problem if they did manage to escape, but around here I think they even have some public or government programs to put mosquito fish into standing water that people don't want to deal with in other ways to reduce mosquito problems. I found a random plain little mosquito fish in a ditch when I was in highschool, along with some tadpoles and stuff. i've also heard that in some places they use guppies as mosquito fish. If you were worried about introducing non natives, it might even be possible to find some native fishes that could be used.
You said you can't do a filter, but you probably could at least get the water moving a little. My mom was telling me about a solar fountain she saw for sale. It just floats on top of any water you want to put it in and runs automatically on whatever energy it gets from the sun. the package even says you can put it in your kids' wading pool for fun. I told her I want at least a couple of those, especially since they were only about $20, but we forgot to look the last time we went back to that store.
 
Ugh.... I cant find them anywhere for only 20$... Cheapest ive found (this is all online, i have yet to check ebay though.... my mom hates it for some reason) is for 49.99$...which is way more then i want to spend.

Edit: Also i dont know if the goldies would like the tank too much... its more up and down then wide if you go to google and type in rubbermaid livestock water tank, its like the first and seccond picture. Now if goldies would be OKAY in that, id rather get those becuase I dont have to order offline, and im going to the LFS today.
 
Just thought you might be interested.... I was studying my North American fish guide from Audobon last night, and guess what. Mosquito fish should be natives in Georgia easily, according to the range they described. So escaping wouldn't be a problem.
I'm not sure how goldies would like your tank, but feeders are pretty cheep, and if you got the water moving it would help them.
(My parents are a litttle scared of ebay too, but my brother and his wife have had good experiences with them, and I've heard good things from others.) I'm not surprised that cheep fountains are hard to find. Until Mom told me about this floating 1, I expected to pay at least $50 for something I could use outside. The 1 she found was at the (air force) BX, and they often have different prices and sometimes mechandise you aren't as likely to find in most other places.
I'm a litttle surprised that you have to have to order Mosquitofish offline. I went to a place that specialises in ponds with a friend last spring, and they sold Mosqiuitofish as well as goldfish and Koi. I also see them in pet fish books, but don't remember if I've seen them in stores. It could be cheeper to order them though. I don't know.
 
lol... i just found one shaped like an alligator thats only 12 dollars... ill keep looking though... i dont really want an alligator in my tank...
 
lol... i just found one shaped like an alligator thats only 12 dollars... ill keep looking though... i dont really want an alligator in my tank...

Why not? I want an aligator in my tank. Maybe it would be different if I lived closer to where there could be real live ones. :hyper: :X :unsure:
Or I gues I could see if it takes valuable space or just isn't the decor you want. But I have thought about getting a little one to sit at the botom of my comunity or guppy tank and open and close its mouth with bubbles as fishies swim through.....SNAP!.....aaaaahhh!
Maybe it would scare the mosquitos away.
 
Ugh.... I cant find them anywhere for only 20$... Cheapest ive found (this is all online, i have yet to check ebay though.... my mom hates it for some reason) is for 49.99$...which is way more then i want to spend.

Edit: Also i dont know if the goldies would like the tank too much... its more up and down then wide if you go to google and type in rubbermaid livestock water tank, its like the first and seccond picture. Now if goldies would be OKAY in that, id rather get those becuase I dont have to order offline, and im going to the LFS today.

need gambusia?? I'll send ya some for 25 cents each. $5 shipping for any amount of fish as long as the weight is under 10 pounds.

I might not check back here so send me a pm if you want some.
 
It's been a while, but I finally got one of those $20 floating fountains. I guess it's not bad for $20, but it wouldn't be worth much more. In case you want to look it up, it's from Solaris Outdoor, "Model SO 80". It basically looks like a green disk with 2 recatangular solar pannels and a small spout in the middle. The pump is encased in a round box attached to the bottom. It is a neat design, but it isn't very powerful and stops completely if there isn't enough direct sunlight on it. I tested mine in a plastic storage tub that probably holds around 15 gallons. I couldn't put it in something much smaller because it is at least 12 inches diameter, and needs water at least 6 inches deep. I would not rely on it to make a significant difference in aerationg a fish pond by itself, but it is fun to watch and experiment to see how much light the solar cells need to function. At mid day it won't do anything if you cover more than half the total area of the 2 solar receptors, but it does pretty well if you just drop a few small leaves on them. It comes with some easy to change nozel attatchements that change the spray pattern a little and a short extension tube, which I decided not to use because by mid afternoon there isn't enough light to pump the water all the way up 2 inches of pipe. I have a lot of shade any way, and even low sun angles make a big difference, so where I have mine, it only functions for maybe a quarter of the daylight hours, and all I need to do to turn it off is cover 1 of the pannels with my hand or any shadow. I'm hoping it will attract birds to come for a drink and maybe I'll build a small pond for it or put it in a better container because the one it's in is old and the lid to it already cracked from being outside. If I end up with a big enough goldfish pond eventually, the fountain might go in, but I would need something better, so I might just play with it. 8)
 

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