Recent content by GaryE

I used to keep some. Nice fish for very large hardwater tanks. I wouldn't get them again unless I had several tanks for them, as the males dislike each other. And if they breed for you, you get a few males...

So many variables. What country you're in matters, as far as shipping efficacy. Where in that country are you? If you, like me, are slightly off the beaten track, shipping can be slower. I'm waiting for fish right now as I type (from Montreal to the east coast of Canada), and I know what can go...

I watched it three times, both versions and saw nothing moving. There aren't many parasites that would be small, black and mobile, so I think you're okay.

The sand versus gravel issue will never be resolved. I go with the idea that the Corydoras group are sifters. They sift fine particulate matter. That's anatomical. We can't have tank bottoms of mulm and mud mixed with sand or fine gravel, so that substrate is out. It may be natural, but our...

I cheat, since I prefer two filters per tank. About two/thirds of the substrate is a fine gravel, too coarse for sifting but not by much. The other third has no piping under it and is siftable sand. What I'm curious about is whether the filtration substrate is unhealthy for Corys, or if that's...

I've built a few undergravel filters over the past few months, in my quest to see what works from past aquarium keeping techniques. So far, they've been great. I understand the logic of saying that since a bottom dweller like a Cory is in contact with the substrate, and since the substrate is...

There are a number of "fructivores", fruit eaters in the hobby, but they tend to be larger. A lot of fish depend heavily on what falls into the water. I don't think it's an accident that when you pull a net up from the bottom under bushes, in with the small fish you have spiders galore, ants...

Sorry, I tend to use "guys" for all people, but 'old guys' only for aged ones built like me. I think you have to define why you breed fish. You can try to supply a store. I do that with bags of tetras for a young guy's store. We're out of the mainstream geographically and shipping is very...

I came out of a hobbyist scene where serious fishbreeders started in their 20s and ran into their 80s. I got into it when I was a kid, not seriously, and again after I became a Dad and started being home all the time after work. But that sort of scene is done, it seems. Now as a retired guy, I...

This reminds of a few years ago when construction in my onetime city uncovered an 18th century tannery. Apparently, even before the archaeologists went in, they knew what they had from the smell. It's an odd today for me. I have a 4 hour drive to the medium city to see a Bach recital - stealing...

Getting into live and homemade food seems essential to me if you wish to breed fish. I make my own frozen mixes, with ever adjusted recipes depending on my fish. I culture wingless fruit flies for my hatchets and Epiplatys. Tetras go for them to. The wingless flies take time and space, and in...

I spam hammered a delightful AI spammer today, in my role as a mod. The AI had latched onto an old thread about thinning hair algae and was trying to sell hair cutting supplies. Your hair algae, if thin, needs a proper tapered cut. Who would have thought?

I dislike pellets, but I like flake if I am going to use 'non live' food. A lot of my fish are surface feeders. Pellets are for the old Cory group. Otherwise, I don't use them. Flake, quickly crushed and dropped, in gets eaten. I've never seen fish turn away from them as you described unless I...

I like birdwatching in a casual way. They're just air fishes. There were some fantastic migrations of native species last week, and the starlings are in here this week. They arrive in the thousands and fill the big trees, yelling their heads off. What I love are the tiny migratory shore birds...

A lot of people engage with spammers and scammers, in that cat and mouse game. A lot of us have done it. I've been very broke in my life, and started out relatively poor. But I never chose crime to get ahead. I could have, and I knew the headhunters for the crime industry. I found a way to...