Any Breeders Out There?

[dwall174]

I’m planing to set up a fish room in my basement to start breeding Show Quality Fancy Guppies & I need some ideas as far as heating & filtration? I had originally figured on a central filter system that would also incorporate an UV Sterilizer to help prevent disease. However from what I have read lately it seems that most breeders just heat their fish room & use individual box or sponge filters in each tank? I have also seen some of the drip style systems that provide a constant water replacement? Which system would be the easiest to maintain & what are the pros & cons of each as far as breeding goes?

[blitzen25bm]

heat the entire room if you can will be easier that way and probably more efficient if you have a lot of tanks.

i would go sponge filters with bare bottoms. the sponges will provide really good bio filtration and will be easiest to clean and the barebottom will make maintence easy too. every little bit helps when you dealing with that many tanks. you will need a lot for show quality fish. tanks for breeding, a lot more tanks for fry growout and you will have to separate the sexes to control the fishes bloodlines. basically you are going to be dealing with a lot of fish unless you are just starying off with 2-3 trios. so just keep it simple.

[got_nailed]

I bread Tetras fish for 4 of my LFS. I have 5 55 gallon tanks using a 75 gallon sump for my fish that I will bread. I use 20 longs for the breading. I move them to 55 gallon grow out tanks (20 of them) that has a 100 gallon sump. All my sumps do use UV on a portion of the water going through the sumps. For the final Q tanks I use 20 highs that use sponge filters and the owners come and get them on Fridays, they buy the fish by the tank. I don’t make but about $500 a month by the time I pay the power bill (I have well water) and get new stuff.

I would go with canisters on the large tanks and sponges on the smaller tanks. I think that heating the room is the best but can be hard to keep a room from 78 to 80.* I guess you’re not looking at about 10 to 15 tanks to start with so heating each tank will be the best. I would try to find a large water holding tank around ½ as much water you are planning to use in a week. This way you can “air off” your water. Most of the time this will stop the use of some chemicals be added to your water.

Good luck with your Guppies and remember you will have top do something with all that aren’t up to your likeing and I guess send them to your LFS. I would get to be good friends with them.

I don’t count any of these tanks as my pet fish, but there part of my living now and with all the tanks I have it’s going to be too hard to stop.

[dwall174]

Here’s a drawing of what I’m looking at! There will be 18 tanks to start with, So heating each tank would not be an option. As for the replacement water I have a 75 GPD reverse osmosis unit that I use for a 140 gal. reef system. So there shouldn’t be any problem with the water. My main question is will a central filtration system with an UV unit prevent future disease?

I also thought of setting up a continuous drip system however if I can’t find a good way to heat the whole room I’m not sure of how to heat all the tanks?

[dwall174]

Originally posted by blitzen25bm
heat the entire room if you can will be easier that way and probably more efficient if you have a lot of tanks. Any ideas on a permanent style heater that will handle the extra moisture & humidity? http://www.mcmaster.com/catalog/110/gfx/large/1991kp1l.gif This on from McMaster-Carr (http://www.mcmaster.com/) part # 1991k66 looks pretty good being that It's Stanless Steel it shouldn't rust.

[got_nailed]

I heat my tanks. My basement is to big to heat and I was talking to a few people and they couldn’t tell me how to keep it with in 5* without running up the power bill so I went with each tank. There is a room heater that will come on if the room gets to cold but it’s set about 5* below the tank temp.

Ok this is just a brain storm, so read with caution.
If you heated a 55 gallon trash can of water to 81*. Use a pump to run water thought hoses to the tanks where the hose would dip into each tank and heat the tank. The water would end up back into the trash can where it would go again.

Hmm that though needs a lot of work.

edit
Well I have done more thinking on this.

If you have a 55 gallon can that’s heated and you pump the heated water through tubing. If you put a loop of tubing in each tank, depending on how thick the tubing is and the difference of water temp it could raise the temp of the tanks but I think it would not be efficient.

[dwall174]

Well the system I’m thinking of going with would have a storage tank with a heater in it that would slowly continuos drip into the tanks but then just overflow through a bulkhead to a floor drain. However as you mentioned it probably would be hard to keep a constant temp. That’s why I’m figuring on insulating the cement walls & inclosing the room & heating it! I would prefer not heating the room so that it’s more comfortable to work in, Not to mention the extra cost to heat it.

[got_nailed]

What would you use for heat that dose not cycle with a large temp fluctuation? I’m thinking more than 3* would play with the tank temp.

[dwall174]

I would be able to hold the temp. steady in the storage tank! I just figure that the fact that the drip rates will be slow (about 2 GPD) for each of the ten gallon fry grow-out tanks, That it would be hard to regulate the temp just by the drip rate?

Looks like I need to set-up some practice tanks, & see what happens?

[got_nailed]

If you get the room temp to stay in the 70’s use some cheap 50 watt heaters for the 10 gallon tanks. I don’t know but if you find something that works god let me know.

[750t]

If you kept your fish room as small as possible and very well insulated I dont think it would be that hard to maintain a temp of 74 to 76 degees. If your basement is large heating the whole area would be a waste.
Im into guppies myself in a way smaller scale than you. I have 7 tanks. 2 of them have no heaters, I did this to see what the effects would be. 1 of the tanks is a 29 gal the temp varies very slowly from 68 to 72 depending on the temp of my home. But with summer coming and the ac on I will get a heater for both tanks. Anyhow the 29 is an all female tank and these fish are doing very well, I have some huge females and very healthy.
After my first purchase I did have alot of deaths but since my first batch of fry I have never had any diseases. Guppies are a very hardy fish after they get used to a constant envirement. Guppies at fish stores have been stressed way too much imho.

[dwall174]

Thanks for all the information! Being that my fish room will be next to my water heater & the furnace I will probably get some radiant heat from them. In fact I could add an outlet to the fish room from the furnace. My main concern would be in the spring & fall when it’s normally around 60*~65* in the basement & I would not need the furnace, As far as the summer it usually stays about 75* in the basement during the summer so that should not be a problem. I do have a rapid recovery 50gal hot water heater so I may be able to add a small radiant heat loop off of the water heater for when I don't need the furnace?

I'll keep you updated on what I figure out!

[750t]

I saw this on ebay thought it might interest you Item #2397049030

[dwall174]

That’s something like I wanted to build (central style filter system)when I decided to start this! However after talking to some other breeders, I think I’m going to go with the individual sponge filters like John (blitzen25bm) mentioned before & set-up a continuous drip system for the replacement water I have read a lot of negative remarks on the central filter system spreading disease!

I believe I have the tanks & filters figured out! Now I just need to figure out a economical way to heat them & keep the temp steady. I’m going to set-up a couple of test tanks to see if the slow drip rate I was talking about before will be able to maintain the tank’s temp?

[dwall174]

I’ve heard of making a loop from your hot water heater to one of those finned heating pipes to heat a fish room! Has anyone tried this or know anything about setting one up?

[got_nailed]

What would regulate the temp in the room using the hot water heater? A long hot shower would heat the room up to much I would think.

[dwall174]

I remember reading about it around a year ago! However I never bothered to see how it was hooked up! :duh:

I would assume that you would need some sort of slow circulating pump & a check valve that would be able to handle the hot water & a thermostat to control the pump?

[dwall174]

One of my other concerns has been about the excess humidity that would be created by a fish room being in the basement. I read a post on another board where a guy had a lot of tanks in his basement for breeding angles & discus, & the high humidity caused his floor joists to warp & twist making his floors uneven! I do have a portable dehumidifier rated at 40 pints per 24 hours! I think that may be a little small for all the excess humidity? BTW I don’t have central air which would also help out a lot with the humidity.

I do plan on adding exhaust & fresh air intake fans, Although they would only be effective during the summer! During the winter it would be removing the heated air or brining in cool air! I have looked into a Air Exchanger (http://www.jehmco.com/PRODUCTS_/HARDWARE_/Air_Exchanger/air_exchanger.html) However they are a little on the expensive side!

Thanks for answering all my different questions! I'm just trying to set this fish room up correctly the first time! That's the reason for all the questions. I would rather ask a dumb question versus making a costly or dumb mistake.

[dwall174]

Any Ideas on how to help control the humidity?

[Hans]

tile the floors and ceilings like a public shower?

[got_nailed]

I don’t think the humidity will get up to much unless the room is shut up. With some air flow the room should be fine.

If you heat the water in a 55 gallon trash can to 80* and use a few pumps to push the heated water through tubes that loop into the backs of the tanks. This would give you some heat transfer for the tanks but I don’t know how well that would work. You could use 2 300watt heaters for the trash can. I guess you would have to treat for algae in the trash can. The heat transfer would depend on how thick the tubing was and how much of the tube was in the water. I would use a thicker tube where it wasn’t in a tank to keep the water hotter in the tubes. I would leave the pumps going 24/7 and by keeping the can temp upin the trash can it shouldn’t flocculate too much. It would tack some playing with at first but should work ok I think.



Hans I think that the fan that blows air out helps whit the tile the floors and ceilings like a public shower. Or it would just build up.