I hope cory spawns soon! She looks painfully fat

[dougall]

I want the mysis as live food.. so they will only live in saltwater

There arent many species of fish I would consider trying to breed, maybe pencilfish or Aspidoras.

Otherwise maybe fresh or salt water pipefish, saltwater pompom crabs, cleaner shrimp or cuttlefish.


Otherwise I'm happy keeping plants.

 

[fishorama]

Oh you salty people! I had hoped years ago that my husband would learn marine tanks in retirement. It's been 10 years, it's not happening. But that's OK now, I've lost the salt mojo.

 

[dougall]

I just like the unusual, that's all.

And as long as you can read salinity, test water, and mix salt water you should be absolutely fine . It's not that difficult or expensive.

Maybe look up macroalgae tanks if you want a gateway type tank.

 

[fishorama]

I just wanted a pair of clownfish (of any species), a nice anemone (of some easy kind that the clownfish would like),...& a mandarin dragonet...before I understood how dlfficult dragonettes are to keep & feed...I think I'm out of my salty fantasy...sigh.

My neighbors are close, they have an anemone & clownfish (not a pair) & maybe a featherduster or tubeworm? But they have a tank service...nah...not for me...

 

[dougall]

Yeah
The fish can be expensive or difficult to feel (Biota sell dragonets that they have captive bred that they generally ship eating pellets, but $$$)

I'm not planning to get any sort of saltwater fish until I can culture their food first, but I will do again.. and that is mostly what is in my way for now.

We have done clownfish, corals, that sort of thing.. but between a heater failure and a tree falling on the house, both of which killed off the tanks contents, we let it slide for now.

Maybe soon.

 

[fishorama]

Oh dear, I remember when the tree fell on your house I think. Weren't you guys on vacation?

Heaters are probably the weakest part of our hobby. I have a couple spares but don't use any & haven't for 10+ years (except in QT once or twice), since we moved to CA & tried cooler temp fish. Between climate, indoor old folk's temps & tank equipment, they stay in low 70Fs mostly. Largish tanks, they don't cool too much overnight.

OK, now I'm going to, just very casually, lol, check out that site...captive bred & pellet eating dragonets?!?! OMG!!! My fantasy may be back on track for a while at least. My husband did not do cartwheels of excitement when I told him...he may have forgotten the cuteness of dragonets...& of course clownfish & anemone interactions...but the $$$ may have scared him a bit. TY dougall

 

[dougall]

We were out of town at an aquarium convention, getting breakfast before it started.

Then drove hours home through a major snow storm.

At least with the tree.

Different fish convention when we had the heater problem.

Almost like we don't actually do anything else.

But our house is kept in the low 70s, so just stick to what works around that temperature.


And good luck with the dragonets.. you will likely find that clownfish can be found pretty cheaply now.. so many folks are breeding them; at least as long as you don't want the crazy designer styles.

 

[fishorama]

Oops, I see dragonets eat live copepods "but can be trained" to pellets or frozen foods...I'd like an already trained eater...(sigh) & a more willing husband/fish partner. Not yet...

How old am I that $100 fish doesn't shock me now? I remember the first zebra plecos we saw & thinking "now there's a $100 fish!". That was 40+ years ago...Now people like 2tank breed them!! Certainly not for the faint hearted or skimpy wallets, lol...But still awesome fish!

I have seen some of your "designer" & rare clownfish but I'm more a fan of tank bred tiny cuties of ordinary species. I want my first foray into salt to not be hard to feed critters...if it's time for that...But you've given us a tiny shove in your salty direction.

 

[dougall]

If you want easy to keep, feed, breed and buy fish in a saltwater aquarium, you can just start with black mollies.. they will happily live imn saltwater if acclimated properly (and back if so desired).

My first/only foray into clownfish were the black Darwin's clown. They are a naturally occurring variation of regular clowns. I want to say we had a bunch and they were wild caught.. but this is mostly when commercial breeding of clownfish was new and the designer ones were really new and expensive.

They were doing well until the tree fell.

There have been lots of corals grown from cheap frags, a couple of frogfish, apparently a mantis shrimp we didn't know about and numerous shrimp.

Outsidevofcany oddballs, I would be terribly happy with a tank of coral and breeding cleaner shrimp... But one day.

Saltwater certainly isn't something to worry about; I think my biggest concern is culturing live food. Sometimes you can just buy them from a local store, and you can often hatch your own brine shrimp to use.

 

[fishorama]

No live bearers ever, ever again! My mantra for 40+ years. To me live foods are a treat, not the only food my fish will eat! White worms were ok in a cool basement; red wigglers, maybe to stinky/composty/fruit fly-ish, & too large for many of my fish.

You don't want to breed fish anymore, I don't want to breed food beyond a few occasional special niceties. I wish I could culture whiteworms or harvest my blackworms but neither is easy here