Tank birthday, 47+ years

[atoll]

Thats because your shoulders were up near your ears. :rolleyes:

I just got out of the Army in that picture. The next year I had hair growing out of everywhere. :eek:

I have hair growing everywhere now, ears, nose, eyebrows and places I would rather not mention, :eek:but not so much on my head:rolleyes:
Pic taken not so long ago with 2 of my bestest mates but sadly not mine. :(

 

[Paul B]

Now those dogs have some hair. I am jealous. :D

 

[atoll]

Now those dogs have some hair. I am jealous. :D

The older one (black and white collie) named Jed has to have a hair cut ever 6 months. I am reliably told although I don't own him he apparently believes he owns me and come to think about it he probably does esp as he is a alpha male and am not going to argue the fact with him.

 

[Paul B]

The airship is almost finished.

 

[locito277]

The secret is... Are you ready?.......The secret is..... Never quarantine anything unless you can do it in a tank as large as your main tank. And while you are quarantining, (which I would not do anyway) feed the fish live or fresh frozen foods, not just commercially available foods.

That is the entire secret in a nutshell. The total mystery is solved. We shall never again have a sick fish. Nothing, no ich, black ich, velvet, crushed velvet, dropsy, internal worms, flukes, flounders, or the heartbreak of psorisis.

Ive been copying your style. Live blackworms galore, live clams from the market. I do have to utilize a lot more frozen foods which I mix and match to get a little of everything in their stomachs. I can say things definitely got better. Everyone gets dots for a few days but it subsides. Trying an Achilles now and he has his spots may have lost a little mass but looking better today than yesterday. Loved the blk worms! I do let them sit in a acclimation box in the system due to the amount of fish in there though. Thanks for the heads up. You and Justin Graham got me hooked on the worms. You don’t dose the worms with selcon do you? I k ow you mentioned one way or the other but can’t recall.

 

[Paul B]

No, you don't need Selcon. I also use LFS food so you are doing great. :D

 

[Paul B]

If you are feeding live things such as worms or the right frozen things like clams, Selcon is not only not needed, but you can't make Selcon stick to wet or frozen foods. It will just wash off as soon as you put it in the water. If you feel you need to use Selcon you can put it on something freeze dried where it will absorb nicely.
But real food, especially live food has everything in it a fish needs.. Clams are my favorite food because they are filter feeders and full of minerals including calcium which is one mineral that fish normally eat a lot of because their fish prey has a skeleton that fish digest and that is made of calcium. I use live worms, blackworms and whiteworms mainly for the live bacteria and to get and keep fish immune they need the correct live bacteria every day, Good and bad bacteria.
I occasionally lose a fish but never from a disease. They get old or get bitten. Sometimes they jump out or I assume, like people they can get some internal disease or injury that we can't diagnose or even see. I also have seen my fish try to jump out and smash themselves against the light, that has to cause something.
Occasionally at night I hear a splash and can only imagine if they are chasing each other where one or both of them jump and hit something.
But fish should never get sick and if you get them immune, they never do. :cool:

 

[User1]

Your airship main body there reminded me of an old toilet float in the tank. Regardless, you are doing a great job has always. It is neat!

 

[Paul B]

Saf1. Thank you. It is a toilet bowl float. That airship was about half finished in that picture. Now it has a lot more "acutriments" on it including sails and propellers. I will take a picture when I get time. I still need to design a stand. :D

 

[Paul B]

I am going out east near where my new condo is today and I will also try to collect some water here. The last time there was to much ice and the waves would have sunk the Titanic so I wimped out and didn't get any water except where the waves broke over my head. Hopefully it will be calmer. I will try to get 15 gallons and some sand. There is no mud there but the bacteria in the sand is almost as good.
The Long Island Sound is 27 miles across here so it may as well be the Atlantic Ocean. The water is very clean and I have used it many times. I just have to strain it because it is so rough this time of the year that it is filled with floating particles and pieces of seaweed.

 

[mcarroll]

You just still upset that you didn't bring ice skates. :eek:

 

[85173]

You could have collected your water easily Paul. All you had to do was snap some icicles off the hand rails! And you wouldn't even have had any water slosh out of your bucket in your car on the way home!;)

 

[Paul B]

You could have collected your water easily Paul. All you had to do was snap some icicles off the hand rails! And you wouldn't even have had any water slosh out of your bucket in your car on the way home!;)

Now you tell me that. :confused:

 

[atoll]

I am going out east near where my new condo is today and I will also try to collect some water here. The last time there was to much ice and the waves would have sunk the Titanic so I wimped out and didn't get any water except where the waves broke over my head. Hopefully it will be calmer. I will try to get 15 gallons and some sand. There is no mud there but the bacteria in the sand is almost as good.
The Long Island Sound is 27 miles across here so it may as well be the Atlantic Ocean. The water is very clean and I have used it many times. I just have to strain it because it is so rough this time of the year that it is filled with floating particles and pieces of seaweed.

Do you have to strain out mermaids and perhaps the odd supper model?

 

[Paul B]

Yes, and Oldsmobile fenders, I use a big sieve for that. :rolleyes:

 

[Zack K]

Hey Paul, looking to expand my horizons on live foods once again. I was wondering if I could ask a few questions. I was just wondering:
-Where you got your Live Black Worms from?
-Do you get your clams from just the supermarket?
-What about BBS?
My local hatchery closed down where I used to get my worms so I am running out of options. My local SM has clams that I am get. Same place I buy my shrimp for my Anemones. I also did reading up on your feeder and will most likely be implementing one shortly. I like your idea[emoji57]
-Zack

 

[Paul B]

Zack, nice to hear from you. I get my blackworms from a LFS but I realize many people can't get them and have to order online. The problem with that is that you have to buy a lot of them and you may not be able to keep them alive as they have no sense of humor. I think for you, where you live, whiteworms would be a better choice. They live in soil and reproduce very fast. You buy a small culture of them online and in a few weeks you have thousands. I believe (but I am guessing) that they would be as healthy as blackworms and also carry some really good bacteria, maybe better than blackworms due to their dirt environment. You pay for them once and have them forever. I have the same culture going maybe 8 years now and I use them every few days.

The clams I get in a seafood market of a SM. I buy the biggest clams I can find or I order some. A "chowder clam" can be almost 6" across and last a month or more. Those tiny clams you get are only good for one meal.
Big clams are common here and about 50 cents. I get them live and freeze them but you are quite a ways from the sea so i am not sure.

Brine shrimp eggs I get from Amazon or my local LFS. They are very common and I designed a hatchery and feeder for them that I have been using for many years and I use them every day. If I didn't I couldn't keep mandarins, much less spawn them.

Here is my whiteworm feeder for the mandarin that prevents the larger fish from eating them. Now my large hermit crab learned about the worms so I have to push him to the other end of the tank or he eats the mall. Whiteworms live many hours in saltwater.

 

[beaslbob]

Just curious does the salt freeze in the ice or is there less or no salt in the ice?

 

[Zack K]

Thank you Paul! I will be grabbing some clams here shortly, along with a shrimp for the Anemones. I will pick up some phyto, BBS, and good nori tomorrow. So you supplement Vitamins with your food? I know I think it read a post from you awhile back where vitamins were not absorbedin the live food (as expected) and you found it to not be beneficial.
As for the worms, you are right, I will probably be going with white worms. Thanks for the advice!
-Zack

 

[Paul B]

Beas, the salt freezes in the water. Remember it was 6 degrees here the other day. Salt water freezes, just at a colder temperature. The bay where my boat is was frozen and that is ocean water.

Good Luck Zack. I don't add vitamins, if you feed correctly, you don't need them