What Made You Want A Freshwater Aquarium?

[zephyr]

The thing with plecos to me is that it looks sort of prehistoric

Thats a great way of explaining them! I am a little dinosaur fanatic, (or used to be) so that appeals to me.

[jeffd902]

I guess I have allways been facinated with fish. Everytime we went to a store that sold fish, I would allways stare at the display tanks. One time last summer we were at Mejer, My wife finally said that were getting a tank because maybe if I had my own fish, we can move past the fish in the store without me staring forever. Needless to say, It didnt work. Not only do I look more, but now I drag her to pet stores, looking at 55 gal setups, Drooling over African Ciclids, going back and forth over the food to give my current crop of Tetras and Corys. I also talked her into letting me subscribe to a magizine. Now im waiting to get that 29 gal I got from a buddy set up.
WOW 7 months in and I'm truley addicted

[jollyone11]

How I got started ,Hummm. Well at 13 we had a 29 gallon tank with oscars . Both got to big for the tank . One day the one broke the heater . I guess you all know what happens next , Boiled oscar! Next it was a commuity tank for a bit then one day then guy at work gave me convicts . Well me 17 at the time and still not knowing much about fish put them in . Needless to say in weeks to was now a convict tank . They were fun to watch, but I then went off to college . I had no interest in fish for long time . In 2000 I got married 27 at the time . One day i say to my wife that I would not mind having a tank. Two
years latter while she was a yard sale bought me a 10 gal.tank. Well , at this point i still didn't know a whole lot about fish . We went to wal-mart and got 4 gold fish 1 beta and a placko . Well did not take long till the placko and the beta was dead A.K.A ammonia . This made me get a book (what should have done in the first place )and read . Boy did I have a lot to learn (still do lol )
Next we got a fish bowl for the gold fish . I really don't care about goldfish that much ,I wanted better fish. Next we got glo light tetras kinda cool looking .Still have both . I next knew I needed a bigger tank . One day in the paper a 30 gal was in there $50 latter a new tank. This tank did not take long to fill . Bought 2 more 10's at a yard sale . Put a blue lobster in one and a pair of endlers in the other in hopes of breeding them . both of the died The blue lobster lived for a while , it is not that great of a fish to watch . It died too not sure why still? Well next I found a 55 gallon for $20 at a yard sale this what I was looking for . It was not all there and it took me a few months to come up with what i needed ,but I got it done .
Well I knew what I wanted next CICHLIDS .I was first thinking of oscars which are cool ,but I have friends who all have them and I had them at one time . I wanted something different . Well I found it the green terror .
I love the sound of that named . Got one of those and a Jack and a firemouth .
Well the fish got sick (thats when i ended up here thank god i did)
I saved the jack and the green terror ,but the firemouth died
Now they are doing great . The terror eats so much I call him gulp. The Jack is tiny because he is the smallest .

[BlowFish]

Always had one.
Guess it was the first thing my family gave me after I was born.
Or maybe they already had one started for me even before I was born...

[d9hp]

I may be a little late on the pleco story but, have you guys seen Star Wars I. I think the guys name is Jar Binky or somin. Its been a while. He looks just like my sailfin pleco.

[fishfreek]

Originally Posted by d9hp

I may be a little late on the pleco story but, have you guys seen Star Wars I. I think the guys name is Jar Binky or somin. Its been a while. He looks just like my sailfin pleco.

Its jar jar binks.

I think thats how you spell it.

[d9hp]

Well, back on the subject. I got a tank out of JEALOUSY! I got a 10 gallon when I was young, had some cool fish, gave them to the neighbors, whose dog crashed their tank. Then one horrible day my dad backed into my tank (which was in the garage). About 7 years later, 6 months or so ago, While at the beach, i saw a cool salt tank and was hooked. Most 14 year old dont have the money to go salt, Im one of them. So i traded some of my old junk for all my freinds tanks. I got 3 little fish bowls and a one gallon setup. Now I am down to a toad tank but am wanting to get a paludarium soon, size will be around 25 or 29 gallons.

[cdawson]

When I was growing up I loved fish, anything to do with fish amazed me (still does). I made my parents take me to the vancouver aqaurium almost every weekend, no matter what it was the only thing that could constantly amaze me. I always wanted to get fish, but my parents would never let me. Until one day I gained the status of adult and had my OWN money, the first tank I got was a 10 gallon with a 3 spot blue gourami, tiger barbs and an albino channel catfish. Since then I've now got 2 10 gallons, a 30 gallon amazon setup and I just purchased a brand new (now cycling) 50 gallon brackish tank to put a green spotted puffer I'm temp. housing in my amazon tank, an archer fish and 2 mono argentus. Within a few weeks I should have pictures of all of them!

[totalbeginner]

i'll try to keep it brief. One of my earliest childhood memories was of gazing for hours at a school of neon tetra's, the shiny neon blue stripes were like headlights to a rabbit. I can't even remember who's tank it was. I was in my little sisters work (LFS) and was just browsing, 20 gal tank kit £120. bought it, set it up, hey presto hobby in a box. OK not quite as easy as that, but not as difficult as i thought. now i'm hooked, got a 30 gal tank cycling right now and a quarantine tank that just need setting up( one thing at a time though. next year i want one of those 300L corner bowfront tank, wicked.

My only regret is that i did not join aquarium advice before i started, i wish i knew what i was doing when i was doing it instead of knowing what i did after i did it. luckily i haven't made any serious mistakes YET.

[the Ents]

Hi all,
thanks for this wonderful site - even if we don't write, we read up on something every day here - the fount of fish lore.
i had a 10 and a 20G when i was a kid; danios, swordtails and fry, mollies, cories, angels, and plecos (back then, noone could tell us just what these weird prehistoric -lookin fish were. i had a book- and thought they looked like this type called loricariid - to a 12 yr old named lori that was kool...). We both had dogs and B had a parrot who still lives with his Mum back in England.

Boris and i decided this past xmas to 'take the plunge'...with fish.
This was soooooo much less commitment, we thought.

Also, i'm in the bio-clock, now-or-never time and thought a pet would 'tide me over'. (Sorry 'bout the puns - i'm from Milwaukee and it's almost a cultural thing. Real 'groaners' get special recognition....)

Also, life in NYC lately has been very stressful (HA!), full body case of hives for me, and cluster headaches for B and my fish get total credit for being healers! You know what they say about the one who saves your life....
Since then, we have succumbed to MTS and now have upped to a 55G, and 15G and the 10 is a Q-tank now. We've just had a second batch of guppy fry this morning( i know, hard not to do), the mollies are gearing up for theirs, and it seems the cories are bumpin bellies, too. We've had our share of emergencies, beaten cases of ich, shimmies, dropsy (mygod, it now sounds as if we're bad fishkeepers) and are learning all the way. Hopefully we never make the same mistake 2x. We feel much better knowing there's this site to learn from.

We have a pt -time production co. which specializes in outdoor camping weekends like mini Burningman or Glastonbury; lights and sound, DJs and live acoustic drummming circles and transformational environments, with emphasis on live-action roleplaying, a la Lord of the Rings, and we've just finished throwing a fish-themed party in a huge loft. However, we aren't getting much else done cuz we just sit and watch the fish! It's like having a mini-festival in our own lv room! How we are going to survive without'em during the year's annual festival, i don't know!
Fantasies of bringin' 'em along to live in 'Gollum's Fishshack' are flitting through ma hed...jus' kiddin'
We'll get phishie photos to ya'll soon.
Thanks fer being there!