good deal! fish tank whoo

[Babyblue5290]

I just got a 25-30gallon tank for $20! ^_^ whoo

I went to petsmart, saw the fish tank on sale and brought it to the check stand. They said the codes didn't match, as the sale was for the smaller fish tanks, but they gave it to me since it was on these ones! They now cost $60 at petsmart, though that's overpriced it's still worth more than $20! It came with lid and light already in it. It's pretty nice and big.

I have everything set up, though it's sparse with only a few hiding spots and some gravel rocks. I have one white and orange gold fish in it right now, but it's way too big for just one fish IMHO. So I'm going to get some other fish.

There's a few fish that I'm really wanting to get, but wanted to see the set up for some of your tanks. Pics please! ^_^

 

[smkie]

do you know how to set up a tank? IF not i got some good pointers.
THe biggest one of all is DO NOT invest in fish yet. SET it up, get someone's that has a heathly tank's filter pad and set your tank up with good bacteria. It will get cloudy for a bit but will clear up. You have to have a good balance. Most people run out and buy fish right after they treat the water with drops thinking that is enough, it isn't. Your one fish can be your tester fish, hard on him but since you already have him that will have to be the way it is. THen when you do get ready to add new fish in a few weeks to a month, IT's best to have a small "hospital bucket" to isolate until you know they are disease free. SEtting your tank up slowly and carefully is the most important stage to having success with your fish.

YOUR filter will be your most important part of the equipment. Plus goldfish are very acidic and a lot of your tropicals do not live well in that kind of atmosphere so it is best to keep goldfish with goldfish. IF you want angel fish and others, don't put goldfish in there. I adore goldfish, they are my all time favorites but they are absolute pigs.

A plec is also as far as i am cocerned a necessary fish. (i can't remember how to spell the rest of his name) because he will be a garbage eater and keep the algae off the sides of your tank.

I tried one thing i found awesome to use a small plastic ring that floats and place your food inside of it. THe food will stay in one spot and not get blown all over by the filter which is why a third of what you feed just rots. I tried it with my goldfish and was very pleased.

WHen you do purchase your fish look out for white specks, (ick) or fin congestion ..red lines, raised scales, (dropsy) it really is best to read up so you can recognize so your tank doesn't get infected.

 

[FoxyWench]

ok #1:
if you have goldfish...you need 20 gallons for 1 goldfish and 10 gallons per goldfish thereafter...yes you can put 2 goldifhs in that new tank...goldfish grow between 8 and 12 inches (comets can get even bigger!) full grown and being veyr messy fish they require double the space of freshwater tropicals.

they do well in cold-room temp water and like lots of plants with slow current for fancy (round bodied golds) and fast current for shubunkin and commets.


common pleco will get WAY too big for this tank (and cannot be kept with goldfish anyway as they require WARMER TEMPS!) a common pleco will reach 12+ inchers full grown and are tank busters in anything under 55 gallons. there are smaller pleco (bushynose) that work well for 29+ gallon tanks but again these CANNOT be kept with goldfish.

infact the only fish that do well with goldfish are OTHER GOLDFISH, you can occasionally get away with whitecloud minnows too but they tend to be too fast for fancy goldfish and can spook them.

now if you want to open your options, take the goldfish back to the store (which i would do anyway because your tank is going to enter a cycle which may very likely kill it anyway) and buy a heater...
if you heat the tank to 76-78 degrees you will open your options to be able to set up a very nice little community tank that can include all kinds of pretty little fish.
but without a heater your stuck with goldfish...and goldfish will NOT survive in a heated tank so they cant be mixed.
in terms of freshwater tropical fish the rule of thumb is 1 inch of fish (FULL GROWN) per gallon of water...(for most community fish, because obviously a 10inch fish is not going to be happy in a 10 gallon tank because they wont eb able to properly swim, however you could have 5, 2" fish in a 10 gallon tank)

in terms of setting up the tank...
its going to start cycling...this should be done FISHLESS (to prevent unnessicary fishy deaths) there is lots of info on fishless cycling your tank online.
this process can take anything from 2 weeks to 2 months (sometimes longer) but is ABSOLUTLY nessicary for a healthy tank.


not trying to discourage you...more have you put lots of thought into where you want to take the tank NOW because once there set up its hard to simply change your mind...start with goldies (they can live 10+ yrs) your with them untill they die since you cant mix tropicals with them...
and visa versa...

but also keep in mind fish are ADDICTIVE!

i started young with a 10 gallon with some neons and a gourami...and its gone from there.
right now i have:
55 gallon all male peacock cichlid tank, in progress, currently has 5 males.
29 gallon "pond rescue" tank, our pond isnt deep enough for the winter so its set up bare bottom with 2 75 gallon filters on it and is currently home to 15 small shubbies, commets and 2 small koi. this tank is WAY overstocked! but 2 75 gallon filtration unitis plus 50% weekly water changes and twice weekly bottom vacuming keeps them safe for the winter. they will get put back out in the pond in the spring.
29 gallon "mums tank" tropical community tank. includeds a gourami, some black neons and a redtail shark, still woring on it.
3 x 2 gallon betta bowls.
plans for a 10 gallon ram or shelly tank or possibly a salty tank for a pair of clowns lol.

id love eventually to have a custom built in wall 175 gallon tank filled with peacock cichlids and a 55 full reef tank.

 

[borzoimom]

Having gold fish in there already I would go with similar due to the fact gold fish can give off more ammonia. Maybe orandas? They come in lots of colors. Also is your tank long or high? Some fish are schoolers and others are divers.

 

[Angel Chicken]

Everyone has gave some wonderful advice! Kudos to you all!

I also wanted to say that you can leave Mr. Goldy in your tank, but he'll most likely die during the cycling process. Which is ok in one sense, I did that for my cycle, bought 10 little feeders and let them cycle the tank for me. They died, I left one or two in for longer than the others, and completed my cycle in less than a week and a 1/2.

Secondly, the 1 gallon per inch rule is false, and can lead to an overstocked tank, which can lead to more problems from there. Pet stores invented this rule just to get people to stop cramming 50 goldfish into a 10 gallon tank.

For example, a 10" Oscar cichlid will NOT fit in that tank, not even for a little while. Those need more like 100 gallons. There are so many other considerations to take as well, like the fact that some fish are aggressive, some are schoolers, and some are not. It's better to consider the adult size of the fish, how many your getting, how much you'll be changing/cleaning your water, and so on.

The best thing you can do is do your research. There are all sorts of fish that will go into a 25-30 gallon tank and your options most certainly are not limited!

A few places to check out...

http://www.fishforums.com

Both places offer alot of great advice, and while I haven't visited either in some time, they are great places to go. Lots of well-informed people.

And now, some pics of my set-up.

55 Gallon Tank
Inhabited with:
2 Red Zebras
2 Yellow Labs
1 Eureka Red
6 Afra Cobue
1 common plec (who is a whooping 13" at 2 years! I'm going to have to get rid of him soon ) - insert sad face here-

Some pics of the fish

Eureka Red (These pics are old, so he's juvenile in these)

Mack Daddy, my prized male, and best breeder (I swear I'll cry if he ever dies!)

 

[smkie]

MY plecos did just fine. WHen one got too big i traded it in for a small one. I had a 55 gal. I would have found it hard to manage a tank with my goldfish without one. But i also had mine where it got some light from the window which kept the plants and the duckweed on top healthy that the goldfish liked to eat.

I would avoid feeder fish at all cost they are about the most stressed and diseased of the lot.

 

[FoxyWench]

hence the 1 inch of ADULT size with consideration to adult size, as i said 5 2" fish would be fine in a 10 gallon tank, but one 10" fish would be more than cramped...use common sense, it is a very good idea to find out what the ADULT size for each fish your interested is...most people assume 1" per gallon means NOW, but its intended to be ADULT size and only as a GENERAL rule of thumb, more space is always better.

many plecos do "just fine" in cold water, but they are a tropical fish and require 74-78 degrees to realy be happy healthy fish...and yes it is common for common plecs to bust even a 55 gal at over a ft at maturity!!!

personally i dislike cycling WITH fish...it just seems like such a waste of a life, just because there fish does NOT mean they are ok with dying SLOWLY form amonia poisening over the next week or so just so you can have a quicker cycle...but to each his/her own...they may just be fish but they are still alive and feel pain (and have memories, goldfish are actually smart!) and im fairly certain death by amonia poisening is not pleasent. and id never cycle with feeders, while your cycle may quicken feeders are notoious for introducing all kinds of parasites...i automatically treat for pretty much EVERYTHING if i buy feeders to add to the pond in spring, they go into 2 week quarentein with some aquarium salt, parasite treatment ect first to avoid infection.

the key here is REASERCH and have fun...and expect to expland because it is...very adictive lol.

(mack daddy is a stunner!)

 

[Angel Chicken]

To each their own, you are on spot there. For your information, I have never used your regular petsmart fish, these were top-notch, spent good money on, high quality fish. Shipped to my door.

Honey, I am using common sense. I've been doing this for YEARS. The one inch per gallon rule is and has been outdated for years now. Any of your regular pet-mart people will tell you to go buy the 1" rule, but if you contacted an actual breeder for fish, they wouldn't sell jack to you for believing that junk.

Do I need to find the articles for you?

Call me a fish snob if you like, I know what I'm talking about here. I won't have anyone tell me to "use common sense" when they themselves don't know what they are talking about.

 

[Psyfalcon]

Stop yelling over semantics. I'm pretty sure you mean the same thing, or at least not condoning Oscar- stuffing.

I always tell people the gallon per inch rule does not work. This is borne from lots of time on a fish forum with lots of newbies. In reality, it works fine with neons and white cloud minnows (my choice for a cool water 10) but not so well with Oscars and Plecos.

The problem is, after explaining this is some detail, they will agree... "I want 6 neons and a dwarf cichlid pair in my 20 gallon" which is rather close to 20 inches adult size. Then... they go out, and see the baby Oscars. They come back going "but they aren't much bigger than the Ram you said I could have!" They have forgotten about adult size in the moment, or failed to see a size card.

You also run into compatibility problems like adding tiger barbs and Angel fish to the same tank. "But they'll only be 30 inches in a 55!" (The tiger barbs de-fin the Angels in 3 hours).

So, I tend to tell people to ignore the rule, but then you end up guiding them through a more holistic (I hate that word) approach based on habits, habitats, compatibility, and size, and that takes some time.

 

[smkie]

I would not cycle with fish either. Ever. Foxywench your tank is lovely.
THat was about how big my plecs got. Hopefully they went to a warmer enviroment to live out their lifespans and be more comfortable.

 

[FoxyWench]

wow ac take a chill pill, i didnt mean to ruffle feathers and because of which wastn targeting/adressing YOU particularly like aparently it seems you thought i was...
i wasnt telling YOU to use common sense, i was stating in general, as i said twice, the rule works fine for 1-2" ADULT tropical community fish, but is not going to work for a 10" oscar in a 10 gallon tank ect.

and psy you are indeed complety right,
it happend quite a bit when i worked at petco, id explain that in someones 30 gallon tank they need to take into mind, the ADULT size, and nature of the fish they are interested in and then point out possible combinations, and they then decided that since that tiny little baby "ast african" is tiny or the baby oscars, i flat out refuse to sell common plecs to anyone with under a 29 gallon tank and in those cases explain that hes going to reach over 1ft long and will need upgrading to at least a 75 gallon by the time that tiny lil fish is 2 yrs old...

unfortunatly it doesnt matter WHAT rule you go by. theres always goign to be folks who decide they want that baby oscar in their 10 gallon tank and they will go elsewhere to buy it if they have to.

i was also unaware that you could buy FEEDER fish online, im betting the shipping was insnane on that bunch...personally i couldnt condone paying 4-10 cents per fish and $50 on shipping them to my door to kill them during a ccle (or feeding them to any critters) but im poor lol. in general i wouldnt use regularly availabel feeders in any tank your planning on using for anythign else without treating it first. MOST people are not going to go online and buy there just to be sure their fish arnt sick.

persoanlly all my peacocks have come from a geat breeder online, yes the shipping was high but i knew i was geting healthy fish and they type i wanted...
but for feeders and neons ect, people wont pay the shipping when they can get them local.
try not to take things so personally...i too have been keeping fish for YEARS and have found that in terms of SMALL PEACEFULL TROPICAL FISH the 1" of adult size per gallon works fine...but it has to be adult sized and with goldfish, 20 gals for the first, 10 gals thereafter and more if your planning on commets unless your willing to clean alot and way overfilter.

 

[bubbatd]

Very nice !

 

[Angel Chicken]

Foxy, no offense intended. I apologize, I was foul last night and took it out on you

You can buy just about any fish online. The shipping ain't too bad, I knew lot of people so I often got awesome deals on fish and most of the time got them shipped REALLY cheaply (my cobue's shipping was like 5 bucks for a box of 15!!). Feeders wasn't cheap either, they cost me about 20 bucks altogether (including shipping) for like 10 of them or something. I very well could have went to petsmart or Wally World, but I was advised not to do that by Rob (since at the time he was the experienced one).

My future tank is in the works as well. My store (I found one in Hickory that actually sells GREAT fish, but the silly Chinese man opens like 3 days a week (at weird times). He has the most fantastic Frontosa fry that I am dying to get ahold of. Not until I move though.

For those of you that are wondering... this is a frontosa.

 

[Raine]

I'm just getting back into fishkeeping. I sold all my tanks about 5 years ago.

My preference is South American Cichlids.. although I also kept some Central Americans, plus catfish and pleco's.

The only tank I kept running was a 10g. It housed a pair of clawed frogs but they both passed recently. I was going to take the tank down but I was giving a supposed baby convict. Once I got a good look at it I realized it's a 1 inch Jack Dempsey. Don't worry I will be upgrading. I want to get a 6 foot tank after christmas. Probably a 125g or a 150g.

Here's an old pic of an Oscar pair I rescued. They were about 10 inches and in an overfiltered 75g. It's a 4 foot tank and they make it look tiny. They were a breeding pair and got along famously. Otherwise I defintely wouldn't reccomend putting 2 in a 75g. I wish I still had these 2.

 

[Babyblue5290]

Jeeze guys, a bit stressed lately? O_O

Thanks for the advice, but I'm not really as interested in types of fish to get as the actual tank set up. And this will be fresh water, not salt water tank.

I did just realize one thing I've forgotten to get, the heater! >_< oops. I'll have to go get one tomorrow or this weekend.


oh and no worries about the gold fish I have I mispoke when I said he was IN the tank. The tank isn't even set up yet. There's no water in it at all, I'm finishing setting everything up today in a bit. So don't worry about that. The goldfish is in my other tank right now (yes, this isn't my first fish tank! should've mentioned that).

So I want pics of tank set up, (eg. plants, rocks, designs, themes etc) not about the types of fish or how to care for them. I know what I want to get and I know how to care for them. Thanks!

Fish I have right now.
1 common pleco (about 10in) (in his own tank)
1 common goldfish (an inch maybe right now) (in a small tank (10g) right now while the others being set up)

I've had other fish in the past, but we had a very long power outage in winter that killed all our fish except one pleco because there was no power to the heater and the water got freezing. was an orange/white oscar (grew about 7inch long)

bbl sorry gotta run

 

[FoxyWench]

AC no worries, i took a small pissy pill that day too, it was just one of those days for a few people i think!

i LOVE fonts, dont have the space right now for them but mabe one day...though in truth, im thinking my next upgrade will be so i can have even more peacocks, im just enamoured with them

ill have to get pics of my tank for you BB,its a 55 gal and im ever working on it, right now i have 4 peacocks (1 ob, 1 lemon jake, a very young dragonblood and an albino ruby red) and 1 OB zebra who suprisingly gets along with everyone (he was a rescue and zebbies can be monsters!) and 2, 4-5" pleco (both also rescues who i do have homes set up for once they outgrow my tank, but right now there doing a top notch job of demolishing all the algea lol)
im still working on it, right now the tank is set up as a dividing wall between my livingroom and bedroom, has home made rocks in the center to about 1/2 height with lots of caves and crevises and fun hidey places and tunnels, and a basic sand bed. im planning on adding some plants (either real or fake since supposedly peacocks are ok with live plants) and mabe something to just add interest since it is a huge showpeice, i saw one that was in a hippo tank at a zoo and when they were setting up the tank initially they made a lifesized crocodile skull out of carved foam, made it up to look like real bone and with the teeth and eye sockets theres lots more crannies for their cichlids
id love to do something similar...

upon set up with no fish.