No consistency in books

[rich]

Whenever I'm in town I usually pop into a book shop and consequently have ended up with a variety of books on tropical fish (including xmas presents). However there is not a lot of consistency between them, for example 'ease of keeping'. One book says a cardinal tetra one the hardest tropical fish to keep, where as another says it is one of the easiest and you should have no problems.

I guess people just give their own opinion.

Most say black widow tetra will fight, but one says how friendly they are.

 

[freddyk]

There was a thread here not too long ago on cardinals. Some people replied how they were tempermental, others (like myself) at how easy and hardy they are. When it comes to popular and inexpensive fish like most common ones in the hobby, there are a lot of variables on how well they will do.

Wild caught fish tend to be more tempermental then aquarium bred, in aquariums. Aquarium bred fish can range from high quality, selectively bred, to poor quality, mass produced. How they were handled on delivery to the store, during their time at the store, and how they were moved and introduced to your aquarium, will also impact the overall perception of them. If you bring home 12 cardinals and 6 die, can you really assume they're tempermental? Or perhaps there are other reasons why they failed, reasons that might out of your control, yet nothing to do with the hardiness of the fish. A well bred, properly treated cardinal is a very hardy fish. All cardinals are not.

Black widows don't fight, the way, say, cichlids or bettas do. They are more aggressive then many tetra's, and the fewer kept, the more aggressive they often appear to be. So someone who only keeps 2 of them may experience aggression that someone who keeps 8 of them may not.

My last comment is on the books. Many publishers hire writers to help fill their 'full line' of books. They are more often chosen based on their writing skills rather then their experience with fish. They base their books on research and hear-say, and are often inaccurate (or even dead wrong) because of it. If the book is inexpensive and on a rack with many other books that look similar (TFH), it's most likely one of these. The good books, written by experienced fish breeders and keepers, are generally more expensive and less likely to be found in the impulse section of the fish store.

 

[The Mohave Kid]

Perhaps it's because of the complexity of the biological world

I'm returning to the hobby kept a tank many years ago ... so i too have been coming accross seemingly contradictory information. Part of it I think is that many books and aquarium shops attempt to over simplify and / or simply do not understand the theory involved .... as a result the customer or reader ends up with rigid information that is only true in some situations ... but maybe not in all cases.

I've noticed this to be so in horticulture ... the profession I work in ... clients want simple answers ... there really are known sometimes ... where a tree for example may do well can depend on many factors ... yet simplicity is easier to sell it seems since it takes up less space on the printed page and leaves more room for pretty pictures while more complexity brought into the picture results in less readers willing to buy the book.

Comprehensive books are expensive and one can not simply "pop into it " they need to read and studied a bit.

Ofcourse books can become outdated and some are just ... well poorly researched or of trivial nature ... so in any field you need to know who is putting out the book and what audience the book was intended for ...

Reading up on general science and fish biology can also pay dividents ... allowing one to evaluate information .... and avoid snake oil type remidies that are more and more abundant these days.

In the end though ..."there is know substitute for experience" ... so you can't really avoid the school of hard knocks ... keep a log book ... and write your own book some day.

Good Day ... B)

 

[Bignose]

It is also important to remember that any selections from the fish store will represent only a sample of the population. So, while as a species, a certain fish may be calm and suitable for a community tank, certain individuals can be aggressive or bothersome. Similarly, a species may be hardy, but certain individuals from a sample of the population can be less hardy.

Secondly, the species themselves have been changing. The neon tetra, once considered tempramental like the cardinal, has now been coaxed into breeding in the hard, alkaline waters of Flordia. Consequently, most neons in the stores, mass produced as they are, are very tolerant of a wide range of water chemistry. A book with older info may not reflect this.

And lastly, even the experts themselves do not always agree on things. This kind of goes back to my first point, but more so that different scientists will study different parts of a populations, possibly in a different geographice location. And if you think that the differences should be simple to determine, just look at how often the scientific names of the species change, as scientists change their minds on which family etc. an individual species belongs to. So, even the full-time scientists do not agree.

Ultimately, this is why you have to be able to make up your own mind after wading through all the different expereinces by posters here, books, magazine articles, LFS employees, etc.

 

[BettaMomma]

I don't buy books on keeping animals, just because I never know how out of date they are, or if research has been done since then that will superscede the info that makes the book in print out of date.

I just use the web or places like this.

Just my opinion