how did your fishkeeping get started?

[Darkspyrolir]

76 degrees is fine for goldfish, the problem was you got them from the fair, everyone knows that 99% of fair fish live 1 week and 1% live 5 years. I have actually always had a feeder goldfish, always 2, then I went to college. I didn't have anything for a while till I showed by boyfriend a local legend fish store, he was hoked and wanted fancy goldfish. After buying 2, we treated them like regular goldfish in a bowl cleaning them every week. We totally killed them by cleaning too much. Now I can officailly say that I am a pro at ph lvls, bacteria, temperature, etc. and have even had my goldies breed on multiple occasions! Practice makes perfect, also reading up on everything works as well!

 

[FallenAngel]

I started of with a 7g tank with a few goldfish (as you do).

My cousin kept suggesting that I should get a tropical tank... A few months later, I decided to get.... axolotls. Nope, still not tropical. I got them a 14g tank.

But then in January, my grandfather died. In his path, he left behind a 25g and a 35g which I inherited. Long story short, the axolotls moved to the larger 25g and I turned the 14g into a tropical tank. As I started to prefer the tropical side of the hobby, the axolotls got downgraded to another 16g tank, and the 25g became a tropical tank.

It stayed like this for a few months, the only addition was a 10g QT tank. Around September I realized that goldfish were too big for the 7g tank (yeah it took me long enough) so I 'inherited' a small outdoor pond that wasn't being used from my grandfathers house. So that left me with a 7g. I turned it into a coldwater tank, which so far only has 3 white cloud mountain minnows.

Then I got my 35g tank, from my grandfather, he wasn't going to use it lol.

Yet another tropical tank, which is quite heavily planted and hasn't been stocked with many fish yet.

Well that's my whole fish-life story. Thanks for reading :grinyes:

 

[fishboy7]

Well, when I was in younger, I was put in a group for a project in English class. There was only one boy in the group, so I talked to him. Eventually we became good friends. He invited me over one day and I seen his 10 gallon fish tank. I really liked it and asked my dad if I could get one myself. I got a 10 gallon and stocked it with my dad's help (he kept tropical fish when he was a kid).

Many years later, I wanted a bigger tank. So, I moved the 10 gallon to my grandma's house (at my mom's request) and got my 36 gallon bowfront. Then I added a 5 gallon quarantine tank. Right now, the 36 gallon is being setup, so I'm at "stage 2" with my fish tanks.

I'm still good friends with him, and we both still like fish tanks. I guess school isn't so bad after all (At the time I hated that English class, but now I'm glad I was in it!).

 

[Plague]

For me it started with my grandparents. I don't have a healthy relationship with my grandmother, she always believed I could not do things as good as her. While I was growing up she kept a 45g tank with fake plants and it was well overstocked with some catfish, 2 plecos, 2 kissing gourami, blue gourami, jack dempsy, 5 skirt tetras and some other fish. We even had baby peacock bass in there (from my lake).

I became 18 and decided it was time to prove myself. Started with a 1/2 gallon betta bowl. I decided this was not enough and changed to a 1g tank. Both these tanks had no heaters and I would do full water changes every month. My grandmother did full water changes and a scrub down of the tank every 4 months on her tank. At the time I didn't really feel I needed to do research so I kept doing things my way. My first betta died of age at 6 years old. That betta was a valentine gift from my ex girlfriend.

After the fish died I decided to buy some other types of fish. Ended up stocking it with a Leaf Fish (carnivorous kind from S. America) and a yoyo loach. Yeah those two in a 1 gallon /facepalm. At the time I didn't know about cycling and the fish quickly died from ammonia spikes. After I decided to keep two red tail black sharks in the 1g. They also died from the ammonia spike, at the time I thought it was the ph. These four fish I had returned to the store and they only checked ph so they exchanged it for me. Ended up getting another betta with extra gravel. The betta being an anabantoid wasn't hurt by the ammonia spikes so it lived. Thinking I was getting good I decided to buy a second tank; 1.5 gallons.

I kept 2 yoyo's in there with decorations as caves. I was starting to do research but believed the whole minimum tank size thing was a business move to get people to buy big tanks. They died of suicide (jumped out of the tank due to ammonia). I was getting tired of my colossal failures and was about to give up on the hobby. The second betta I bought was moved to the 1.5 gallon and the original 1 gallon tank was put away.

Some weeks passed and I was left unsatisfied that I couldn't do better. I did heavy research, learned about cycling and minimum tank sizes. I also read about planted aquariums. I decided the easiest method for cycling was to use a product to cycle. I secretly bought a topfin 10 gallon starter kit with gravel and nutrafin cycle. My grandmother was pissed since I was killing everything but I set it up. I fed the tank fish food and added nutrafin cycle. Followed the instructions and added plants. After a week I added glofish and a black mystery snail. This tank was my first successful tank and was well stocked with plants. But this wasn't enough.

I had proven that I could keep a tank and it was time to go big or go home. I saved for months and bought a 55 gallon topfin starter kit with two AC70's and an odyssea 48" T5HO fixture. I had read and understood about lighting and its relation with plants. After some time I ended up having my current tank, a 55 gallon planted community tank with around 50 fish. I had finally beaten my grandmother, doing weekly water changes and maintenance. I had kept a tank bigger than hers with minimal effort.

My 55 gallon tank has been established for 6 months now everything is going perfect and I finally have a strong expertise in fish keeping. I decided for my own satisfaction and obsession with fish keeping to set up my 10g tank again. I am in the process of having a 10g sorority planted tank ^.^ Throughout all of this I got my best friend interested and he now keeps a 10g nano reef tank with two clowns and he just recently set up a 2.5 micro planted tank with 2 guppies.

That is my long wall of text of my fishy story

 

[furfinsfeathers]

Our first fish as kids were 2 secondhand goldfish in what I think was a 1/2 gallon bowl from a neighbor family who'd tired of them. I think they both died within 6 months to a year. In high school I had a series of tropical fish I kept in an unheated, unfiltered bowl, not knowing any better. I didn't know anything about proper fish keeping until I got a 20 gallon tank with 2 sickly feeder goldfish at a yardsale about 4 1/2 years ago and started reading on the internet. The goldfish got upgraded to a bigger tank and lived for a couple years (amazing considering what bad shape they were in). My son and I both loved watching the fish and we've had one or more tanks ever since.

 

[thebrandon]

I don't remember the first fish I got. I do remember the first tank I had, and all the mishaps I went through. Well I guess it was mostly my mom who went through them because I was a little kid lol. I had a dojo loach who unfortunately jumped out. Then I got a 55 or 60 gallon tank with an oscar that was given to me. I no longer have either of those tanks, or any of my original fish because of how long ago that was.

Now I have my 134 gallon tank, my 120 tall, my 50 and my 30, and hopefully a 80 gallon salt water tank tomorrow

 

[shaynablizard]

My middle school science teacher had a 55 gallon full of guppies. He would allow students to take the fry home and set up their own tanks. I did this. When I left home I didn't have tanks for a long time. After I bought a house, I picked up a 35 gal hex for a dollar and the next thing I knew I had like a dozen aquariums!

 

[EMTOkami]

My fiancée moved in 3 years ago with two 10 gallon tanks. She taught me how to generally take care of the tanks. I then decided to get her a bigger tank for a birthday present. Once I'd mentioned it to some friends I started getting tanks randomly given to me because people didn't have the time or space. To make a long story short all my friends who've ever thought of owning a tank now has one and we now have a 55 gal. community, a 5 gal. betta, a 10 gal. shrimp tank with 2 shrimp, a 10 gal. I'm trying to get some panda corys to breed in, a 20 gal. tall planted housing all my bigger fry that I've raised and a 30 gal. planted I started about 2 months ago housing all the smaller fry.

 

[Shogun_FC]

I got into the hobby from my other hobby, fishing.

Been fishing my whole life, both My Parents would go pretty much every weekend in the summer, My Grandpa coming along most of the time. Then eventually my parents split, Mom got with a douche bag that didn't care for it and Dad passed away when I was 13. Still continued to do my fishing with My Grandpa though.

Anyways, as a kid spending so much time fishing, I always had a love for nature, chasing after frogs, lizards, snakes, catching fish ect. First I started bringing home baby turtles I'd find in the spring, little frogs and snakes, eventually having a large collection of tanks/terrariums I used for the reptiles.

Then as I got slightly older into my early teens, I sort of lost interest in the whole reptiles thing. Also my fishing started becoming more advanced, started setting up bait tanks to store baitfish ect.

The one thing that really set it off though, was when I was out catching bluegill for catfish bait, when I spotted this large swarm of tiny bullhead catfish around a brush pile right off the bank. I took a cup and scooped up about a dozen of the tiny things, then took them home and put them in a tank. At the time they were the coolest thing ever, sooo much fun watching them gang up and rip apart a nightcrawler.

It was on from there on out, those fish made me take notice of how much fun it was keeping fish. Looking back I feel so bad for those fish, I kept them in a 30 gal tank (stunting their growth, they never got over 4")for a good 5-6 years before eventually adding in a baby flathead catfish that eat the entire stock of the tank overnight...

It took my a while to learn enough about the hobby to do things correctly, but that is where it all started.

 

[kris_66]

When I was little maybe 5 my neighbour had a fish tank with penny turtles in it. I used to dig up earthworms and feed them lol. I also used to go to the LFS and look at all the beautiful fish in the tanks. Skip to a teenager at the local fair getting a couple goldfish. Cant remember where I got a tank, but they died a few days later as I had NO idea about putting in water conditioner. I was upset. Didnt get into the hobby again till I was in my late 20's with 2 kids. Got a 3 foot tank, and had BN, a gorgeous blue angel, neons, harlequin rasboras, flame tetras, and other tetras. Of course I knew about putting in the chlorine neutraliser, but that was it. The fish were fine for months. I did water changes maybe every 3-4 weeks, and the occasional ph test, but that was it. Had those fish for months, until I went to a freshwater creek and bought home some little shrimp and other little fish and put in the tank. Within weeks ALL the fish died.

Back then I didnt know about ammonia, nitrites, nitrates etc. Now looking back I think it was a miracle my fish lasted so long. I never cycled my tank, just filled it up, waited a day or two, then added fish lol.

That was like 10 years ago, back in Australia. Now, here in Southern California, I've been wanting to get back into it for the last couple of years. Now my husband and I have bought a house, I've been patiently waiting lol.

We bought our 7 year old son a 10g for his birthday and it really made me yearn for the hobby again. I've always loved fish. Finally I got myself a 55g! Going to fishless cycle it in the New Year and am soooooooooo excited! I've been reading up on everything I can so I dont make any errors and lose my fish and plants when I start. Still worried though lol. At least if I encounter any problems I know I can come here for advice!!!