My Aquarium, Present Day Plus Livstock

[LittleMick]

Hi all, thought I would post some images of my livestock, I already did some images of my aquarium in my intro post here.
I won't put all my images up as there are way too many so here's a select few which I think are the best ones.

FIRST FISH - 6 YELLOW TUXEDO PLATYS

SECOND FISH - 6 DALMATION/MARBLE MOLLIES

The male, a Marble Sailfin, one of the six.

THIRD FISH - 16 CARDINAL TETRA Unfortunately these died,

FOURTH FISH - 10 GLOWLIGHT TETRA. Down to 7. 3 unexplained deaths, and not all at the same time.

FIFTH FISH - 4 APPLE SNAILS. Obviously not fish, lol, but my 5th livestock. Randy little buggers as well. I sometimes find as many as 3 egg sacks on the side of the aquarium in one weekend. I actually find these fascinating to watch, they seem to just glide across the aquarium.

SIXTH & SEVENTH FISH - 2 BRISTLENOSE PLECS AND 1 TIGER PLEC. I bought the Bristlenoses as Bulldogs but were later identified as Bristlenoses, and they have had babies a couple of weeks ago. My Tiger is my pride and joy of the collection, and although nocturnal it does come out from time to time, so I did a couple of good shots.

EIGHTH FISH - 2 ARMOURED SHRIMP. Again, not fish but they were my eighth. I lost one due to an amonia problem I was having. Noimages unfortunately.
Apologies for the length, thats is just a selection of the images I have.

Regards
Mick

 

[typhoon]

i dont think that is a tiger as in L66 but i could be wrong

i liek those tuxedos they look cool

 

[LittleMick]

Hi Typhoon, L066 is a King Tiger Pleco, mine has been identified as a Tiger Peckolta L002 or L074. The L066 was one of my orginal choices for a plec, but I didn't like the idea of actaully ordering it, then when it arrived not liking the specimen. So I went for something that was there in store in front of me.

I love the Platys, in all honesty I thought they looked abit plain, but now they are one of my faves, they are really hardy, I have had NO deaths since set up and they were my first fish. They breed like rabbits though, I've had them for months now and I did have a batch of fry that didn't last long, I was unprepared for them. But probably aover the last month I have had over 20 fry, which I gave to the LFS, and more on the way. In hind sight I should have got 1 male to 5 females instead of 3 male to 3 females. Thats what I did with my Mollies. And they don't have half as many fry.


Mick

 

[typhoon]

okay kwl, ive never seen that particular line of platy in a shop

 

[LittleMick]

When I did a search for them the main colouration I found was red, going by the name of Sunset Platy, Tuxedo Platy or Gold Comet Tuxedo Platy, but I figured taking care of them wouldn't be any different to any other so I thought I would get them, they have them in our LFS all the time, I think they must sell well to the newcomers of the hobby. No doubt about it, they are hard as nails. I think one of my young Mollies was jealous for a time as she took a line from the Jungle Book, "I wanna be like you hoo oo", she was swimming around with the Platys all the time. lol.


Mick

 

[~T~]

Like the tiger peckoltia

 

[LittleMick]

Hi T, thanks for th ereply, and yeah I love it. Albeit a night time party animal, lol. I have to try and drop the wafer near to where it hides as the ohter fish like to have a nibble. Although my Bristlenose's tend to push the other fish out the way, lol. Nothing like taking care of your own.


Mick

 

[Sean W.]

why do so many people like mollies...

they look so plain and regular, nothing special lookin fish.

is there something im not seeing?

 

[~T~]

why do so many people like mollies...

they look so plain and regular, nothing special lookin fish.

is there something im not seeing?

Yep but its a special kind of "magic" that only molly keepers can see

 

[hodgeheg]

why do so many people like mollies...

they look so plain and regular, nothing special lookin fish.

is there something im not seeing?

Yeah! My balloon mollies have great personalities and (I think) look wonderful bobbing around my tank and bustling everybody else out of their way.

I love the tiger plec by the way! Beautiful!

 

[LittleMick]

why do so many people like mollies...

they look so plain and regular, nothing special lookin fish.

is there something im not seeing?

Yep but its a special kind of "magic" that only molly keepers can see

Yep

Well, as I am a beginner I looked up which fish would be decent first starters, so after my Platys, Mollies seemed like a good second choice, when I first viewed them I agreed with you that they looked plaiin, so I figured I would go with something that had a fascinating colour scheme, so I went with my Dalmation/Marbles. My male marble Sailfin looks wicked. I think it's the bottom jaw that makes for the main characteristic. He's like the Mollyzeneger of the aquarium, the Jaws of my tropics. He looks brill when he swims through the water as well. And the Dalmations just look nice, all white with black spots. I did also buy another Molly to replace a death that I think was a Dalmation/Black hybrid, she is all black with white pectoral and anal fins.

Yeah! My balloon mollies have great personalities and (I think) look wonderful bobbing around my tank and bustling everybody else out of their way.

I love the tiger plec by the way! Beautiful!

Thanks. I never heard of Balloon Mollies, so I checked them out, they look quite nice, what colourations are yours? The ones I saw were yellow and white.


Mick

 

[hodgeheg]

Mine are quite plain I suppose, one is all white (Jemima) and one is all black (June) but they make a good contrast with my other brightly coloured fish. And Jemima is the fish that everybody who sees my tank immeadiately points out because of her huge belly My little sister calls Jemima her fish, because she likes her that much.

 

[shahrezsyed]

nice fish!!.......healthy too

 

[LittleMick]

Hi shahrezsyed, I presume that was directed at my fish, if so, then I like to think they are healthy, thats not say I haven't had issus though. As a beginner to the hobby I've yet to see alot of the health issues that fish can get. My first deaths were 16 Cardinal Tetras. I have a funny feeling they MAY have been poorly straight frm the store, but also at th etime I had an amonia problem, well not so much a pronlem but it was high, in the yellow zone of my test charts. My mum had given me a lift to the store to collect them and when we got in the car to go home she said that one of the fish in the tank I got them from was dead. I was like #41####! Wish I had spotted that. Anyway, with 3 days they all died. So I am not sure what killed them. Shortly after that I lost a Molly, unknown death. Obviously after testing I eneded up doing a series of water changes to get the amonia down to 0.
The next Tetras I got were teh Glowlights, I have lost a couple but over a period of time and only ever one at a time, qater perameters were all acceptable. I was advised by the LFs that sometimes it is nothing to do with water quality and just like humans it could unknown, weak heart or any other number of reasons. So now if I only have one death I tend not too wory as much. I still do a water test but I tend not to panic.
The all Black Molly with white fins I mentioed earlier had swimbladder? (swimming in a vertical position) so I treated it and she recovered, but I did have another one after that, that didn't recover.
I did worry about a couple of my Dlamation Mollies, I thought they had dropsy, but after reading about it and getting adice and being shown pics of fish with dropsy I stopped worrying and I think the definition of their scales is natural, they don't protrude, you can just see the outline shapes. And apparently dropsy is supposed to be fatal, or at least unlikely to reover from.
I'd probably say the last month or two have been great, I don't tend to worry now that I am settle into it. And I have a pretty good routine going now, I know a few of the hidy spots so I can my livestock counts, checking for Snail eggs etc. So I am happier with it now.


Mick