Collecting trip

[diverdown69]

I went to the jetties today and did a few little plankton drags with an 83 micron net. That was just to satisfy a curiosity that was burning. I didn't really see any fish that were small enough to put in this little tank, so I went to another place in Rockport, TX. The beach park there (on Aransas Bay) is known for being the cleanest (best water quality) in the area so I put the cast net to work and managed to get three spotfin mojarras (Eucinostomus argentus, Family Gerreidae). These are neat little fish because of their schooling behavior and their fairly high activity level. I also got one pinfish (Lagodon rhomboides, Family Sparidae) and put it in the tank. WIth the pinfish, the tank looked too full and probably was. I released the pinfish back th where I got it.
I also got a few little hermits. They quickly made themselves at home and are currently becoming escape artists.
Let's see how my water quality goes...

 

[sicklidkid]

Cool could you post some pics?

 

[diverdown69]

I'll post up a few pics of the fish, but I can't get tank pics yet. I don't have the digital camera until later this week. I'll find some pics of the spotfins and post 'em up in a few minutes.

 

[sicklidkid]

OK cool

 

[diverdown69]

First pic is of the spotfin mojarra. The key characteristics to this species are the black spot at the base of the first dorsal spines, the deep body, and the deeply forked (bifurcate) caudal fin.

 

[diverdown69]

Oops. How did I manage to attach the same pic two extra times? Oh well. Mods, feel free to edit out two of the pics.
Here's a pic of the pinfish (a.k.a. pin perch). I may go ahead and get another one to put in the tank if I can find a smaller one than the one I had...it was at least 6 inches long. Coloration, scale counts, and the 6 vertical bars are keys to this species.

 

[diverdown69]

The more I fool with this tank, the more I talk myself into a native species tank instead of a reef tank. I have two tanks on the way, one a 110-gallon (I hope) and the other a custom-made 89-gallon (3x2x2) lexan tank that a friend is in the process of fabbing up. That 89-gallon tank my end up being a native species tank with things like these fish in it. I tried like crazy to net the Gulf pipefish (Syngnathus scovelli, Family Syngnathidae) I saw but it managed to elude capture...this time.

 

[diverdown69]

Here's a better pic of the spotfin mojarra. You can really see the black spot on the margin of the 1st dorsal fin spines and rays. There is another black spot at the base of the first dorsal fin spine, but you really can't see it in this pic.

 

[seafan]

Nice bait. In Florida we use both of those for grouper, and red snapper.

 

[seafan]

I sometimes catch parrot fish: redfin, stoplight, and even some cool wrasses and put them in my qt tank for a little while. However they're temperamental, and hard to feed so I have to release them. 8)

 

[diverdown69]

Yep. Bait. The pinfish are good for red drum and speckled trout. I haven't used the mojarra as bait yet, but I would imagine that it would work pretty well. We have to go offshore to the oil rigs for red snapper and grouper. They aren't generally found in the bay systems.