Do You Remember Your First Ever Tank?

[Miss Wiggle]

no, i lost a whole lot of fish

 

[SJ2K]

Remembering my first tropical wasnt hard, i still have it! First ever cold water though, hmmm, long time ago, probably just an acrylic box or a glass bowl, cant remember which came first.

 

[Corleone]

Inherited my mother's house last year, and my grandfather came over with an old 29 gallon tank and a $150 gift certificate to Pet Smart. He puts a challenge to all the new homeowners in the family: take one of his old tanks, make it thrive for a year, and he'll give you one of his big tanks. No help, no advice - responsibility starts at home, not at the store, and not at his house.

So far, I'm not quite through the year, but I'm well on my way, and it'll take a disaster to keep me from it at this point. Nobody in the family has managed to make it a year, and everybody except my uncle gave up entirely before they met any success.

 

[Miss Wiggle]

ha ha that's cool Corleone

so whats the big tank that you get if you make it?

 

[Corleone]

Not sure. He had a lot of tanks at one point, but two stick in my head. He had a weird 8'x1'x2' that I think would make a nice upgrade for my community (too narrow for much else despite the size), and a 120 gallon tank he had native fish in, which should be perfect for some type of big cichlid. Possibly an oscar or frontosa, but I'll research that more in a few months.

 

[Miss Wiggle]

Not sure. He had a lot of tanks at one point, but two stick in my head. He had a weird 8'x1'x2' that I think would make a nice upgrade for my community (too narrow for much else despite the size), and a 120 gallon tank he had native fish in, which should be perfect for some type of big cichlid. Possibly an oscar or frontosa, but I'll research that more in a few months.

sweet, make sure you keep us updated!

 

[geo7x]

Here's my first tank during its cycle, was only 2 years ago. Still got it but quite heavily planted now.

 

[Sunny_Bee]

Mine was a 5 gallon my mom bought for me when I was a little kid. It had a basic corner filter, tacky neon ornaments and was stuffed with goldfish

 

[OldMan47]

I can't remember my fist tank but I' sure it was small, less than 20 gallons. They all were in my house back then. I do remember the place it sat next to a shaded window in the livingroom. It had a place of importance in our family's room. I kept some molly fry in it at first and went on to more small tanks with more fish in that house. Fast forward a decade to my first apartment and I had another tank along with lots of jars. I was breeding bettas then. Forward again to the first home I bought and I had a 20 long and a 25 by the front door to form sort of an entry. Those were stainless steel framed tanks made by metaframe. My next home is the one I am in today and it has had a myriad of tanks including several of the 4 ft long ones that have since gone to my children. This hobby has run through my family for 3 generations and continues to be a common bond today.

 

[Loony Fish]

of course i do!
i was a 12 gallon with 3 congo tetras and a rainbow shark.
the tank is pretty old ( and still going) and all of the fish are alive!
here is my present tanks:
40 gallon:
1 rainbow shark,
1 discus,
3 congo tetras
and one opaline gourami.
i'm hoping t get a leopard ctenapoma
20 gallon:
2 rainbow sharks that get along,
1 corie
1 feeder goldfish (a mistake, no idea how he got in there)
3 gambusia
and 3 black skirt tetras
12 gallon:
1 breeding pair of blue rams
and the 7 black skirt tetra babies (2 months old, and nearly 2 cm long )
2.5 gallon multy purpose, hospital, breeder, etc.
with one gambusia (curently having lots of babies )



What a good question idea!

 

[waterdrop]

I can clearly remember my first tank. It was in 1958 or 1959 and it was a 5.5 US gallon steel framed tank. The steel was painted black with very thin little white randomly swirled lines of raised white paint that stood out as a texture you could feel (can you sense my toddler point-of-view there?) There was a heavy flagstone tank bottom and the glass was set in black tar like stuff. It had natural colored gravel and tons of plants. We had a 25watt Supreme heater with an adjustment knob on top that I was very proud of. There was a little clear bubble filter in one corner with carbon and floss in it which I regularly replaced. There were all sorts of fish, so I can't remember any in particular but I'm sure I became familiar with gouramis, tetras and all the live-bearers during those years. Much later came a whole basement full of those stainless steel "MetaFrames" that oldman47 mentions above!! It nearly killed me years later when that "5 & a half" started leaking.

~~waterdrop~~

 

[aaronnorth]

my first one was a small 3gallon with 2 white cloud mountain minnows - when i was just 5years old! I stoppped after they died (no filtration) then i started again whn i was 10, this time i was sold a 5 gallon tank, with a blackmoor, oranda and a goldfish of some sort. No filter again although he did sell me some dechlor! I bought a filter of ebay as i was wise enough to realis they were gasping. After that i upgraded to a complte package for tropicals so this time everything was ok, then i got a biube 35l for coldwater, then a fluval vicenza 180 in place of the old fluval, and then a 3g nano. The nano went after 2 weeks and so did the biube to make place for a 60l fluval elite which was planted and now this is where i am today!

180l cichlid
60l planted

 

[orange shark]

my first tank was a 25 litre hexagon, decorated with horrible multicoloured gravel , stocked with 3 platys and then eventually 5 neon tetras

i did have it up to a week ago until i sold it to my brother for a tenner (but it didnt have any of the original fish in)

 

[corey01]

My first 20GL looked like this before I got the new tank.

I love that plant on the left.....what is it

i think i had a 7 gallon with 2 goldfish in

 

[Anguilla82]

My first was a tiny 12" tank with two ornamental goldfish in. no filter, no lights. (God how did they survive for so long!)
the water would turn brown, so much that you couldn't see the fish in the tank!
thankfully of course i saw sense and soon upgraded to a 2' tank with filter lights and small tropical fish.

forums like this didn't exist when i started, newbies are so lucky these days!!