Subj : New fishkeeper? To : mark lewis From : Carol Shenkenberger Date : Fri May 02 2008 08:05 pm > CS> Once cycled, a tank needs about 10 mins every 2 weeks to > CS> filter out fish poop from the gravel and change the filters. > > FWIW: i don't even do this... maybe possibly once every 6 to 12 months... i > view my tanks in the same realm as a pond... however, i only feed my guys on > every two or three days so i don't have the problems that others do who feed > their's every day... i also don't have a lot of sunlight available to my tan > in addition to all of them having timers for the lighting which are only one > for roughly the same amount of bright daylight as one gets in nature ;) Hey that works! I was trying to average it. We'd actually do the vacumn thing once a month with our goldfish and took about 20 mins (keep in mind it's a big ass tank!). Oh Janis? Or anyone else new to this who is curious? They have these really *simple* plastic tubes with a sort of funnel on the end. The tube is long (ours is 8ft) and flexible about like a garden hose. All you do is dunk the whole thing in the tankl to fill, then cover the small (no funnel) end with a finger then lift that part out into a bucket. Natural syphon and will do all that is needed. You use the funnel end to sort of vacumn the poop out of the gravel. Expect with goldfish (and others) to have the water look all groddy for a bit after but the filter will take care of that pretty fast. > [trim] > > CS> Fish load is the most common new tank keeper mistake. Rule of > CS> thumb is about 1 gallon per inch of fish so in a 10G tank, you can > CS> reliably hold 10 small fish of 1 inch. This starts to shift though > CS> with fish over 2 inches and they need more room. Don't look at the > CS> fish's current size, but what it will grow to be. If the tank > CS> depth isnt twice the size of the final adult fish, think 3 times > CS> before getting it. > > you should see how big the four "goldfish" a friend got me are in my 30g > tank... they're in there with the 4 remaining feeder guppies that i have... OH MY! I wouldnt have 4 goldfish in my 70G! Yes, when they are younger but once they grow, you will have a minimum 6 inch body (plus several for tail). The 'one gallon per inch' shifts totally when you exceed 2 inches of fish. I'm told a goldie (and most other 6 inch fish but specifically a goldie) needs more like 5g per inch. That would be 30G each. I could be wrong but it's stood me in good stead as a rule of thumb. I've seen folks say you are mistreating a fish if it doesnt have 10G per inch but lets face it, I dont want a tank with a single oscar . > about to move those guppies over to my 20g beta tank and get some more... ya > just can't beat $1US/dozen and they're the same ones that you pay higher pri > for because they're "pretty" :? Oh I had guppies in the big tank too at one point. It was fun. I had mollies as well but the guppies overbread the mollies eventually and we had just guppies. I am thinking to add mollies to this one but will need to add a slighly agressive (eats small fry) fish to keep the tank in reasonable balance. > at one time i had some fishing minnows that i purchased at $1/dozen... they > were around for 4+ years... the largest was larger than a big sardine you ge > in a can... fast and mean, too... very aggressive but they wouldn't/couldn't > eat the snails and other things that came in with live plants... however, th > one or two goldfish were quite happy to take care of those :lol: That would be cool! Meantime, I bet you have a better than average filter going there. We do too as well as 2 air fed bottom filters, and 2 'bubbler' decorations. If anything we are over airated just now but as we add the fish, that will work out. xxcarol --- SBBSecho 2.12-Win32 * Origin: SHENKS EXPRESS TELNET://SHENKS.SYNCHRO.NET (1:275/100) .