Anyone have pet fish??

[violet-glow]

Thinking of getting a new fish tank as the one we have is medium sized, but all the goldfish we get seem to die in it. We buy the weed stuff to provide oxygen to the water and we use that blue stuff to make the water all nice and pure, but it doesnt seem to help.

Any ideas?

 

[clairescunny55]

i used to keep coldwater fish and like you say they didnt seem to last long so i invested in a heater for tropical fish and i found they lasted longer and are much prettier to look at

 

[Robyn_]

all i can suggest is that you ask people at a pet place of fish place where you are going to get the fish, my friend had the problem a few yers ago where all the fish just died after a certain amount of time, we found out it was becasue there was disease within the fish at the place,
nothing to do with the water.
but it is best to make sure all the water is fresh and get the product things to make the water nice, and if you put the fresh water in make sure you dont add the fish in straight away,firstly make sure you left the cleaner stuff in a few days and then when you go to put the fish in leave them in the bag floating in the water for a bit so they get used to the temp first.

 

[violet-glow]

that was probably what I did wrong then. I never left the fish floating in the bag. I feel so guilty now, poor fish. I hope their happy in fishy heaven

 

[emma28]

Having fish is more of a nuisance than i'd ever imagined. Ours came with a care guide about how not to stress them or worry them etc, and I thought ffs, they're only fish!!

Our little boy asked santa for one last year and sure enough it was sleeping on christmas morning, damned thing. My DH has a diving bottle of oxygen and he put the tube into the tank and let in bubble for a while. ( only we could have a sodding goldfish on recuss ) That revived it a bit, and it's still alive and kicking 9 months later, with very little help from us!

 

[sam96031]

i used to keep coldwater fish and like you say they didnt seem to last long so i invested in a heater for tropical fish and i found they lasted longer and are much prettier to look at

we were exactly the opposite! i bought tropical fish for DH but they all kept dying, so i then bought 2 goldfish and even though one died the other is still going strong

 

[Tangerinedream]

Having fish is more of a nuisance than i'd ever imagined. Ours came with a care guide about how not to stress them or worry them etc, and I thought ffs, they're only fish!!

Our little boy asked santa for one last year and sure enough it was sleeping on christmas morning, damned thing. My DH has a diving bottle of oxygen and he put the tube into the tank and let in bubble for a while. ( only we could have a sodding goldfish on recuss ) That revived it a bit, and it's still alive and kicking 9 months later, with very little help from us!

sorry but thats really funny- and its good that it survived

violet glow, they can get stressed out if they are overcrouded, thats what happened to mine and they died

 

[X5OT]

i have kept tropical fish for about 10 years now - I have a large tank of Malawai cichlids. The fundamental things needed to keep the tank running well (and the fish alive!) are:
- tank size appropriate to number of fish
- adequate filtration
- frequent partial water changes
- not over feeding (once every other day is plenty)

Other things you could do:
- take a water sample to your local fish shop and ask them to test it for you. High levels of ammonia, nitrate and nitrite are harmful to fish.
- if starting tank from scratch, let the tank run for at least a week before adding any fish - the tank has to 'cycle' (time for the good bacteria to multiply). Ask the fish shop which one fish to put in the tank (some waste is needed for the bacteria to feed on so they can grow).
- easiest way to provide extra air is via an airstone runing on a pump. Although, bear in mind that if you want to grow plants in the tank, they won't thrive with the air stone on (plants feed on carbon dioxide and then release oxygen into the water themselves, so providing extra oxygen into the tank can mena less carbon dioxide for the plants to feed on)

I guess the most important things are:
ADEQUATE FILTRATION
DO NOT OVER-FEED (no matter how hungry the little buggers may appear to be!)
WATER QUALITY

Hope this helps

 

[mum2A&L]

We had cichlids in the past, and they used to eat each other

the best fish we had where congo puffers. I used to watch them for ages!! Oh, and we had one fish (i think it was a L17 - it was a 'man made' fish and so didn't have a Latin name). He was black and white and really quite pretty!! adam used to work with tropical fish so we used to get a few of the extra that where sent by mistake. We had 4 tanks at one point. Now we just have the two, but i need to either buy alice some more fish or put one tank away.

When I was at school my mate kept a goldfish alive in a cereal bowl and feed it a chip a fortnight. It stayed alive for AGES, until he brought it a proper tank, and food and everything and it died two weeks later!


alices goldfish died the other day, but they never looked that great when we brought them.

 

[trixipaws]

hmm i dont kno, we keep 4 fishees in a tiny pond outside and we dont need 2 do anything xept feed them and they look after themselves. they even stay in thru winter, it ices over them but they just fine!