Your Opinion

[daan]

Hi all,

Actually, I'm not a real fish-addict (except for two goldfish swimming around in a nice aquarium at my parent's place, but that's hardly an addiction). But the reason I'm here is that I'd like to get some information from you guys:
I'm working on a website where people can contribute sheets for all kinds of animals, and where everybody can rate these care sheets or leave comments. I'm hoping that one day, it will contain a wealth of information about keeping all kinds of pets, free for all to use.
Now, as I don't have any experience with fish, except for the goldfish, I would love to know your thoughts about such a project.

I'd like to add a *very* basic, two level taxonomy. The top level is Amphibians - Reptiles - Fish -... And the second level for Reptiles for example, is Snakes - Lizards - Turtles -...
I don't want a real taxonomy because I'd like to keep it simple. Now, what would be a good second level for fish? I was thinking about "Fresh water" and "Salt water", but maybe there are some better suggestions, maybe that's *too* simple?
A second thing I was wondering about is the "type" of information that one needs to convey when talking about fish. At the moment, people can add information about the "origin" of the animal, about "housing" (I'll need a more general term for that ), about "feeding", about "health" and about "breeding", besides general information and some "miscellaneuous" information. Any needs specifically for fish?

And maybe the most important: Is this kind of project worthwhile from a fishy point of view? Would people be interested in sharing their knowledge, or be looking for that kind of information?

I'd really like to hear what you guys thinks about this, so any comment/suggestion/criticism is welcome!

 

[Ace Of Spades]

Hi all,

Actually, I'm not a real fish-addict (except for two goldfish swimming around in a nice aquarium at my parent's place, but that's hardly an addiction). But the reason I'm here is that I'd like to get some information from you guys:
I'm working on a website where people can contribute sheets for all kinds of animals, and where everybody can rate these care sheets or leave comments. I'm hoping that one day, it will contain a wealth of information about keeping all kinds of pets, free for all to use.
Now, as I don't have any experience with fish, except for the goldfish, I would love to know your thoughts about such a project.

I'd like to add a *very* basic, two level taxonomy. The top level is Amphibians - Reptiles - Fish -... And the second level for Reptiles for example, is Snakes - Lizards - Turtles -...
I don't want a real taxonomy because I'd like to keep it simple. Now, what would be a good second level for fish? I was thinking about "Fresh water" and "Salt water", but maybe there are some better suggestions, maybe that's *too* simple?
A second thing I was wondering about is the "type" of information that one needs to convey when talking about fish. At the moment, people can add information about the "origin" of the animal, about "housing" (I'll need a more general term for that ), about "feeding", about "health" and about "breeding", besides general information and some "miscellaneuous" information. Any needs specifically for fish?

And maybe the most important: Is this kind of project worthwhile from a fishy point of view? Would people be interested in sharing their knowledge, or be looking for that kind of information?

I'd really like to hear what you guys thinks about this, so any comment/suggestion/criticism is welcome!

I think this has been done many a times. We ourselves have a database of Fish on here, So do Cichlid-Forums, So to Baddamanstropical w/e, and so do lots of other websites. I tbh think we should improve on the ones we have instead of making more.

 

[daan]

Something I've been wondering about as well.

I now that caresheets are to be found all over the net. There's not allways a clear "community aspect" though, where everybody can contribute or rate and comment, and things like that.

It's hard for me to assess the quality and availability of existing information, so that's why I'm here. Thanks.

 

[Miss Wiggle]

It's hard for me to assess the quality and availability of existing information, so that's why I'm here. Thanks.

aye if you look around you'll see that there's a vast amount of conflicting info around, some of it's got to be wrong so you can tell that the info out there is not entirely brilliant!

For basic fish taxonomy you'd be best dividing them into broad family groups, if you look at our fish species index it's divided into something like the following groups

Catfish, Characins, Cichlids - Old world, Cichlids - New world, Cyprinids, Labyrinth, Livebearers, Oddballs, Goldfish and Koi, Freshwater Inverts, Saltwater inverts then saltwater fish (clearly not all saltwater fish are in the same family, however this forum is mostly directed at freshwater fish not saltwater therefore the section her is much smaller, sure you can find a similar breakdown for saltwater elsewhere)

Now clearly you can't just copy our fish species profiles, the authors and mod's would not be impressed, but looking at some of them will give you an idea of the content that people need, as a minimum you need

adult size
min tank size (including specific requirements e.g. tall tank)
pH
origin
feeding
basic care
sexing and breeding

 

[daan]

aye if you look around you'll see that there's a vast amount of conflicting info around, some of it's got to be wrong so you can tell that the info out there is not entirely brilliant!

For basic fish taxonomy you'd be best dividing them into broad family groups, if you look at our fish species index it's divided into something like the following groups

Catfish, Characins, Cichlids - Old world, Cichlids - New world, Cyprinids, Labyrinth, Livebearers, Oddballs, Goldfish and Koi, Freshwater Inverts, Saltwater inverts then saltwater fish (clearly not all saltwater fish are in the same family, however this forum is mostly directed at freshwater fish not saltwater therefore the section her is much smaller, sure you can find a similar breakdown for saltwater elsewhere)

Now clearly you can't just copy our fish species profiles, the authors and mod's would not be impressed, but looking at some of them will give you an idea of the content that people need, as a minimum you need

adult size
min tank size (including specific requirements e.g. tall tank)
pH
origin
feeding
basic care
sexing and breeding

Great help, Miss Wiggle!

It's true of course that a lot of the information on keeping/caring for animals is rather a matter of opinion than a matter of knowledge. And sometimes different approaches can both yield satisfactory results. But indeed, a lot of it is rubbish as well.
I'm not planning on copying anything. If I can help it, I'm not gonna write any care sheets at all, I'd like to leave that to people who really know what they're saying.
The taxonomy you guys use looks pretty specific to me, but maybe that's the way to go.
I've been thinking of having the care sheets include ph, temperature and tank size in the "housing info". But adult size is a good one, as is sexing.

 

[Miss Wiggle]

adult size is essential in fishkeeping, it's used to calculate the amount of fish in the tank and stuff like that.

taxonomy is fairly specific, but there are thousands of species in the trade, you need to have a decent amount of categories or it won't be user friendly.