a fish tank for a museum

[chefjamesscott]

so here is what the fish room looks like now

The top 2 tanks are going to get cleaned tonight and set up to be the feeder tank and the grow out waterchange tank. I decided to put the 2 racks along the right wall to make a neater room.

the gar tank I took out all the fake plants and added more wood so it now looks like this

with a good amount of room for the fish to be able to swim under an through the wood. I watched jennifer the gar to see how she took to the new arrangement. It seems as if she was really enjoying the new look.

Now a ? for all you gar experts, this gar has been in the tank solo for about 5 years will it be territorial with any new residents. It has been fed nothing but feeder goldfish for it's entire life will it see a fish 3/4 of its length as a food source, or even a 5 inch bichir. My one knifefish is topping 8 inches and I am pretty confident that I can put it in with the gar and not have an issue but the smaller bichir I am wondering about, so long as there is a supply of feeders will the gar leave the others alone or should I proceed with the plan to rehome the gar and do all new tank mates.

 

[arcanecircle]

Lumpray and Hagfish! they are ancient altho i don't kno how many people enjoy seeing ugly blood sucking gut invading fish

 

[chefjamesscott]

Lumpray and Hagfish! they are ancient altho i don't kno how many people enjoy seeing ugly blood sucking gut invading fish

well I think I will pass on these two :eek3:, actually the university here has a experiment they are doing with trout and lamprey the resident biologist gave me the tour of the fish room very ugly to see what they are studying.

 

[chefjamesscott]

Ok time to do the next leg of the update, the restock of the main tank goes down this weekend. I would have done it earlier this week, yet, I have a food expose that I am part of that took my week and this weekend to do.

I finally got the fish room totally cleaned up and the 2 60g tanks that I decided should stay cleaned up. A few pics.

before and after

the finished fish room, if anyone remembers the show sanford an son I really felt like sanford going through the junk heap to make complete tanks out of these 60g. No matter how hard I tried I could not get these tanks completely descaled but I think they turned out ok.

the counter top 20g will be for breeding our own stock of feeders probably guppies
the far 60g will be set up as a brackish mollie tank
the near 60g will be a grow out various other feeder

I will be loading up the feeder with the best foods possible to make them totally loaded with nutrients so as to be the best fish food for the main tank. The museum signage for the main tank very specificly refers to how the ancient species of fish were predatory and therefore live feeders are the way they want to go.

I will take some pictures of the stock on hand as I transfer them to the museum.

the residents of the main tank that I currently have in my possession are 1 8 inch needlenose gar, 2 4 inch spotted florida gar, 2 spotless clownknife 6 inch 9 inch, 1 cuvier bichir 4 inch, 2 ornate bichir 4 inch and I am thinking that is the total population to go in.

 

[serissime]

cool! can't wait to see all the fish in their new home!

 

[goalieman59]

I am blown away by how much of a change, great job. Where is the museum at, you may have said so but I didnt see it.

 

[chefjamesscott]

The museum is The Royal Saskatchewan located here in regina, saskatchewan, canada.

Well last night was time to move in 2 of the prospective tank mates to the main tank. After watching the resident gar for a bit I decided to take a chance and drop in 2 of the new fish, by take a chance I mean I dropped in my silver arow that I had been growing for my own monster tank. I thought well its about 7-8 inches so it should well be big enough to avoid being eaten by jennifer the saskatchewan spotted gar. The spotless clown knife is an easy 10-11 inch and looks very wide so should be avoided by the gar.

this picture was after they had been in tank for about half hour took it as I was leaving

honestly jennifer is like totally fascinated with me so curious has taken a greater interest with each time I am there, she literally will hang out by the side of the tank where I am. I did a water change last night and it was almost like she was hanging out saying thanks for loving me or she wishes I was a feeder fish LOL.

I had to also move the arow out the 140g grow tank here because the 2 spotted gars need to be able to eat the white cloud minnows and the arow was like gulping them down a dime a dozen.

it even would try to take them out of the gars mouths when they had caught them was afraid it would snap down one of the gars by mistake.

as well last night I brought one of the other gars for the tank to the 140g from my home 70g grow tank

now it can grow a bit more with the 2 spotted gars

and the fish room is now in due process tanks full and gettin super cycled whoooooot

now to go back today and do stage 2

 

[catnipgal]

I'd suggest a dark green background. It will make the tank look more 'planted' and darker color fish will pop better.

 

[chefjamesscott]

ah the museum artist crew is working on doing a backdrop painting that replicates the archaic fossil look of the displays around the tank should look kicking

 

[mel_20_20]

Love this thread. Keep the pics coming chef. You're doing an awesome job. I know Jennifer must be very grateful, lol.