Native tank, a documented startup.

I haven't found a wealth of information on this subject, so I figured I'd document the startup life of the native species tank I'm starting.

First off, I decided to do a native species tank when I moved back to Illinois. We have so many neat looking sunfish species that alot of people have never seen, I wanted to give some people a glimpse of what is really in the water around here. My plan is to start with a 30 gallon, and move to an 85 gallon once I get things working and I have a good understanding of the fish and creating a comfortable environment for them.

I got my 30 gallon converted from saltwater to freshwater, it took me 6 hours of cleaning salt off the filters to get it ready. I'm using an HOT filter, with a biowheel and a powerhead. Black gravel base about 4" thick. No heater. This tank is in my finished basement which is stable in temp with a little bit of seasonal change, current tank temp is 75. I grabbed a structure out of my other freshwater tank, put it in, threw some food in the tank to get it to cycle.

3 days later, the tank is chemically showing signs of being ready, I do a water change, grab the fly rod, a box of small flies, and head to my grandpas pond (another one of my fish population management projects). I got 2 Bluegill with my first 2 casts, there are thousands as they have spawned about a month ago......(So I threw on a large popper and caught a 3.5 lb. Largemouth, admired her bueatiful greenish/blue coloration, and set her back in the weedbed she came out of to be caught another day)....filled my bucket up with water put the gills in, and dropped in an airstone for the ride home.

I got the fish acclimated and released them into their new home. The smaller of the 2 acted comfortable right away, finding a structure, and assumed a hunting position. The larger of the 2 freaked, darting madly and ended up injuring himself a little on the tail. I put in a scoop of "Please Release Me" (bass fishing livewell additive, it's like fish dope) and he calmed down a bit after it took effect.

3 days later, the smaller of the two seems content, he's found a hunting spot he likes, has even dug a small depression so he can get down lower. He's been eating wax worms and tiny largemouth fry scooped out of the same pond with a dip net, I believe he's picked off a couple snails that hitched a ride out of the old tank as well. The larger of the two freaked out after the PRM wore off, he made his injuries worse and was laying at the bottom of the tank, barely breathing. So I bucketed him, took him back to the pond, and no sooner did he drift down a couple feet, a largemouth swallowed him up.

I'm currently working on getting the remaining gill to eat dry food. He has shown zero interest so far. I've also caught some moths and stuff hanging around lights at night and thrown them in the tank. It's neat to watch the gill hunt down the insect on the top of the water. They approach, pause, approach, pause, approach, pause, strike. It's neat.

More as the life of the tank progresses..............

So the tank has been rocking along pretty well.......until Wednesday. I dropped a couple wax worms in the tank and noticed water on the side. I wiped if off, it reappeared. I have a leak. I ran to Petsmart and got a 46 gallon bowfront and my wife and I did a switcheroo yesterday. The fish seemed to handle it pretty well.

Regardless. The Bluegill in the tank has become quite friendly, despite me putting a hook in his mouth two months ago. He'll take wax worms out of my fingers most of the time. He'll follow me around the room and raise his fins like a Betta does, maybe he's proviking me to reach in so he can stick my hand full of dorsal spines.

I got two goldfish from a friends failed backyard pond to keep him company. With the lack of rain, we've been put on water conservation and he can't keep if filled, legally. Maybe I'll get a Largemouth this weekend and watch him hunt the goldfish down.

I got the BG to take dry food. He seems to like Chiclid food best, possibly because of the floating nature of the food. Tends to stay away from the goldfish flake.

Bluegill are extremely messy. No question about it. They crap like pandas. However, this has caused the snail population to go mad, and the Bluegill HAS been picking snails off. Funny how that works sometimes.

I've been using distilled water fromfor water changes, our city water sucks big time. I'm trying to keep the nitrates below 10, because I don't know what Bluegill can tolerate. I assume they can survive some nasty conditions, because they're known for being a really tough fish, but I don't want to take that chance.