I always find it interesting - and incredibly funny - to watch fish and bugs interact. But last night topped the cake.
I can't use pesticides because I have a macaw, cockatoo, and eclectus that are sensitive to airborne chemicals. And I can't use fly tape because the eclectus ALWAYS tries to play with it and gets wrapped up in it. He always loses lots of feathers from me pulling the tape off.
So fly swatter it is!
I started by swatting flies and dropping their squished bodies into the guppy fry tank. I noticed they were ravages when it came to unlaid fly eggs that got squished out of the carapace. Then I noticed they got VICIOUS on those fly bodies by the third day! They would shread up a fly like pirahnas on raw meat!
So I started dropping some in the community tanks. Bettas, guppies, even the loaches, all wanted a piece.
Last night though, I found one of those big 2-inch "cockroaches" or "palmetto bugs" hiding behind a plastic sheet over my window. It's the large ones you only see during summer. A pest control guy once told me those are "American" cockroaches, where as the small ones associated with filthy houses are called "german" cockroaches. Usually these big ones are outside in trees, but aren't very nimble and tend to fall onto houses a lot where they get inside. So I hit it with the swatter, then grabbed some old scissors and cut it in half and dropped it in a community tank.
My super-shy black female betta, who always hides, got a taste, then attacked that thing like a starved kid in Africa (no offense to any africans who may happen to read this). She somehow managed to get the ENTIRE set of innards out of that half of the roach, so swallowed as much as she could (clearly not all of it) and then swam off. Other fish would come check out the part she hadn't swallowed and this little shy-ster would flare up and get ready to attack THEM over it! I finally reach in with a tiny set of sewing scissors to cut off the excess and...
THAT LITTLE PUNK BIT MY HAND!!
It didn't hurt at all. I was kinda lost at first, wondering what it was. It just felt like one of them bumped my hand, really. I saw her do it too, I just didn't believe it.
This betta girl almost never leaves her cave. Even when I feed the fish, she takes a lot of coaxing to get her out, and then she often gets stuck with scraps from the others. But she was so determined to have these roach innards that she attacked and bit me!
It was hilarious! She was ready to take down this big ol' human to make sure she kept that meal! I've never been bitten by a community fish - only cichlids. But I did get the excess cut off, and the others finished it up.
I can't use pesticides because I have a macaw, cockatoo, and eclectus that are sensitive to airborne chemicals. And I can't use fly tape because the eclectus ALWAYS tries to play with it and gets wrapped up in it. He always loses lots of feathers from me pulling the tape off.
So fly swatter it is!
I started by swatting flies and dropping their squished bodies into the guppy fry tank. I noticed they were ravages when it came to unlaid fly eggs that got squished out of the carapace. Then I noticed they got VICIOUS on those fly bodies by the third day! They would shread up a fly like pirahnas on raw meat!
So I started dropping some in the community tanks. Bettas, guppies, even the loaches, all wanted a piece.
Last night though, I found one of those big 2-inch "cockroaches" or "palmetto bugs" hiding behind a plastic sheet over my window. It's the large ones you only see during summer. A pest control guy once told me those are "American" cockroaches, where as the small ones associated with filthy houses are called "german" cockroaches. Usually these big ones are outside in trees, but aren't very nimble and tend to fall onto houses a lot where they get inside. So I hit it with the swatter, then grabbed some old scissors and cut it in half and dropped it in a community tank.
My super-shy black female betta, who always hides, got a taste, then attacked that thing like a starved kid in Africa (no offense to any africans who may happen to read this). She somehow managed to get the ENTIRE set of innards out of that half of the roach, so swallowed as much as she could (clearly not all of it) and then swam off. Other fish would come check out the part she hadn't swallowed and this little shy-ster would flare up and get ready to attack THEM over it! I finally reach in with a tiny set of sewing scissors to cut off the excess and...
THAT LITTLE PUNK BIT MY HAND!!
It didn't hurt at all. I was kinda lost at first, wondering what it was. It just felt like one of them bumped my hand, really. I saw her do it too, I just didn't believe it.
This betta girl almost never leaves her cave. Even when I feed the fish, she takes a lot of coaxing to get her out, and then she often gets stuck with scraps from the others. But she was so determined to have these roach innards that she attacked and bit me!
It was hilarious! She was ready to take down this big ol' human to make sure she kept that meal! I've never been bitten by a community fish - only cichlids. But I did get the excess cut off, and the others finished it up.
