Something smells fishy...

So in my last post I said I was starting a fish tank again. It's true it's just been happening really slowly. I decided to try my hand at a community tank this time because I am only going to be here for another year then i will have to move it. On top of that I figured it was time to add some live plants to my aquarium experience.

So when I was buying the parts of my aquarium I decided to get a nice light fixture. What I didn't realize is that the lighting I bought is classified as high lighting for my tank (as opposed to medium or low lighting) I thought I was getting medium lighting. So I bought some plants mostly from a fellow fish lover at http://www.aquariumadvice.com/ (not only do I keep fish I like to read and talk about them too). Some of them seemed like they weren't doing so well. I found out that because of my high lighting I needed to be adding CO2 and fertilizers for my plants to remain healthy. So instead of shelling out a bunch of money for a CO2 system I tried to try my hand at a DIY CO2 system which failed epically. So I am adding fertilizers and hoping that will be enough.

I had a really hard time deciding what kind of fish I wanted to put in my tank since I am doing a freshwater community tank. I finally decided I was going to start with a big school of rummy nose tetras.

Well because of Nebraska's hard water the rummy nose didn't work out they were to sensitive to it. :( So I had to rethink my stocking ideas (the fish I am going to stock the tank with.) I finally decided to add a school of Black Neon Tetras. I went to PETCO and they were having a sale so I ended up getting 16 for the price of 6!

I took the rest of the rummy nose tetras to the fish store. Now I will let the black neons settle in for a couple weeks before adding anything else, but I am excited because now I have fish again!

Breeding Cichlids

For those of you who don't already know I love animals! Within this love is my love for fish. I want to tell the story of how my love for fish and the keeping of them began ... but not today.

Today I just want to tell you about my love of cichlids. This began one summer when I was looking to buy some new fish, but not just new fish I wanted to buy the prettiest freshwater fish I could find. I ended up buying four cichlids.

Over the course of a year and a trip to Ohio and back my four cichlids became one cichlid. A friend who saw my one cichlid offered to trade my adult male for ten babies. I immediately said yes and my true love for cichlids began.

Since then I have added and removed a few fish from my tank. Recently I have had some success and disappointment with my fish. I had a red zebra pair that had 37 babies! 5 of wish I have since given away. I am going to keep 5 of them and sell the rest.

These guys are currently in my friend Jason's 55 gallon so they have some room to grow without having to worry about getting eaten by the adults.

The other kind of cichlids that I am breeding currently weren't as successful this time due to an error on my part. Cichlids lay eggs which after being fertilized are carried in the mothers mouth until they hatch. Once they hatch the mother

releases them and they are then on their own. To avoid the babies being eaten when I notice a

female is holding I move her into my 10 gallon hospital tank. Then after she releases the babies

I put a divider in between her and the babies . Once she has regained her strength I put her back in the main tank a remove the divider so the babies have the whole tank to themselves.

Well this time I didn't put the divider in right away so

instead of having about 20 chipokae babies I have 6. Having and especially breeding fish is fun, but it also is a learning experience. I would recommend it to everyone but start small!