Goldfish ramblings...your comments welcome.
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I have 7 Comets from ~4-6+" and a 7" pleco in a moderately planted 75G (~48"x18"x18")
background:
6 were bought as cheap feeders; I moved them to the 75G from a 30G breeder last spring and added the 6-and-a-bit" fancy comet given to me by a friend (it was very unhappy in a 15G tank).
3 Penguin 660R powerheads drive an RUGF with ~2" of gravel. A Whisper 60 HOB helps out. I won't lie and say I do a PWC every week, but more like every 2-3 weeks 25-40% PWC/gravel vac. Even then I have to FORCE myself to do water tests, cuz it's always ph ~7.8, and 0-0-0 (with two different test kits). Ammonia NEVER seems to be a problem.
I realize the water change is probably MORE important than the gravel vac'ing and am working on a powerhead-driven solution to a quick non-vac PWC.
All seem happy and growing. Nobody's getting picked on...other then being "whapped upside the head" by the pleco when they steal his food
I've considered trying to find a local backyard pond that would like to rehome these guys. Welll...
-My wife and I are rather attached to them...yes they are big mooches, but we did raise them from the dozen stressed-out feeders we started with. OK, so that's not real hard with GF
-The Smallest and Largest ones technically still belong to my 5-yr-old neighbor kid. She likes to come visit her fishies.
-It's too late in the year for that now, anyway...
So...Do I leave well enough alone til Spring? I could move the two smallest to a 20H tank, but I think they'd rather be with the group; and there's not much swimming room in a 20H anyway.
Hmmm...in the Spring I may be able to either convince my wife to build a 200+ gallon pond or find them a new home once the wx warms up.
There's a thought.
FYI, she already shot down the 300 gallon basement indoor pond idea
...though it probably would have become a very expensive cat toy/feeder !
--Don
--------------------
I have 7 Comets from ~4-6+" and a 7" pleco in a moderately planted 75G (~48"x18"x18")
background:
6 were bought as cheap feeders; I moved them to the 75G from a 30G breeder last spring and added the 6-and-a-bit" fancy comet given to me by a friend (it was very unhappy in a 15G tank).
3 Penguin 660R powerheads drive an RUGF with ~2" of gravel. A Whisper 60 HOB helps out. I won't lie and say I do a PWC every week, but more like every 2-3 weeks 25-40% PWC/gravel vac. Even then I have to FORCE myself to do water tests, cuz it's always ph ~7.8, and 0-0-0 (with two different test kits). Ammonia NEVER seems to be a problem.
I realize the water change is probably MORE important than the gravel vac'ing and am working on a powerhead-driven solution to a quick non-vac PWC.
All seem happy and growing. Nobody's getting picked on...other then being "whapped upside the head" by the pleco when they steal his food
I've considered trying to find a local backyard pond that would like to rehome these guys. Welll...
-My wife and I are rather attached to them...yes they are big mooches, but we did raise them from the dozen stressed-out feeders we started with. OK, so that's not real hard with GF
-The Smallest and Largest ones technically still belong to my 5-yr-old neighbor kid. She likes to come visit her fishies.
-It's too late in the year for that now, anyway...
So...Do I leave well enough alone til Spring? I could move the two smallest to a 20H tank, but I think they'd rather be with the group; and there's not much swimming room in a 20H anyway.
Hmmm...in the Spring I may be able to either convince my wife to build a 200+ gallon pond or find them a new home once the wx warms up.
There's a thought.
FYI, she already shot down the 300 gallon basement indoor pond idea
...though it probably would have become a very expensive cat toy/feeder !
--Don
