Just Rambling

[paul b]

There are varying degrees of interest in this, and all hobbies.

I don't exactly where I fall in this because it is not really a hobby for me but a way of life as I have always had a tank of some type. But I think many people get into this when they are older and see a beautiful tank and want one. That is normal. Some of us are into the beauty of the tank and inhabitants and just think of it as a thing of beauty or an art form. Tanks in Malls and Dr's offices are there for that purpose as the majority of the people seeing them are just intrigued by the beauty.

Then there are some of us that like the technical aspect and buy all sorts of controllers, dosers, wave makers, ozonizers, test kits, oxidators etc. They like testing, tweeking, and generally having control over the parameters and enjoy the chemical aspect.

Others just love animals, all animals, Kawala bears, duck billed platypusses, oselots, llama's, horned toads, earthworms, Yeti's etc. And feel bad for the animals in the store so they have to buy them, name them, pet them, read to them put them in their will and if you are into that, that is fine. (Wierd but fine)

Then there are some of us (such as myself) who enjoys the thrill of keeping these things alive and getting them to spawn. I have been into this for quite a while so I feel that if I can't get an animal to live for at least it's presumed lifespan, I failed and if I get another one of those same animals I will treat it differently. It is not for me to say but if you keep buying fish and they keep dying in less than a year, you are doing something wrong and maybe should change something.

Now at this point in my life and it this stage of the hobby for me, I feel that I can keep almost any animal alive for it's normal lifespan. I have kept just about every fish available and not just one of each specimin so I have learned what to do and more importantly, what not to do.

My tank has had a few episodes of every malady and disease possable and some that are not possable.

I realize there are all sorts of problems and I cringe when I read some of the cures and treatments. I promised myself that I would not post on ich threads any more but sometimes I just can't help it.

Don't worry I won't talk about ich here as I don't see it as a problem and don't think fish should get that.

OK I have to stop. Anyway about keeping fish, as I have said numerous times it all comes down to our level of interest in the hobby and how much time and space we want to put into this. I purposely didn't say "money" because another thing I don't like to mention is that so many people spend so much on this that is un necessary, but again I hate to get into that.

Don't get me started on Hair algae because that is just one more topic I promised I would not post about as it is another simple thing but those threads are all arguements.

Getting back to food, I feel the biggest problem is that fish want to eat all day and we can only feed them once or twice a day (myself included). If we could feed fish a few times a day "with" the proper foods, our fish would live 10 or 20 years and be disease free. Feeding correctly is where I differ from many people as to what fish should be fed.

I know what to feed fish and as I said, I think I can now keep any fish. Even Great White Sharks. I mean everyone knows that they prefer surfboards. Every time you see that there was a shark attack, you see this picture of this surfboard with a big bite taken out of it, so obviousely, they eat surfboards.

I mean, is it me?

[Jan]

LOL!!! I'm certain you can keep anything from the ocean alive and thriving. Please don't keep great white sharks. There's enough going on with missing people near the beaches out by you. Hey, could someone elase be keeping great whites out in Gilgo beach? Maybe that's what has happened in those unsolved murders?

 

I really enjoy reading your musings, Paul. Thanks for sharing. There's a lot of good stuff going on in that brain.

Jan

[Origami]

I know what to feed fish and as I said, I think I can now keep any fish. Even Great White Sharks. I mean everyone knows that they prefer surfboards. Every time you see that there was a shark attack, you see this picture of this surfboard with a big bite taken out of it, so obviously, they eat surfboards.

It must be true. You hear from time to time about them spitting out the surfer, but when was the last time you heard about them spitting out the chunk of surfboard that they just ate?

 

Paul, you're a riot. That would get you arrested in some countries. God bless the USA.

[GraffitiSpotCorals]

But what else are you interested in? I think most of us know you like feeding worms and keeping healthy fish. I would be more interested to hear about your thoughts on hair algae and ick just for a "different" conversation.

[Sharkey18]

I love your musing Paul!

[sachabballi reef]

Paul please please write a book.. I would love to sit down and just read all your ramblings on everything and all subjects that enter your mind while sipping on a vodka tonic . You are the single most entertaining and interesting member on here or RC hands down.

 

Sent from my DROID RAZR using Tapatalk 2

 

 

[paul b]

But what else are you interested in? I think most of us know you like feeding worms and keeping healthy fish. I would be more interested to hear about your thoughts on hair algae and ick just for a "different" conversation.

 

Piper27, I have been doing this for over fifty years and posted many times on my thoughts on Hair algae, ich, Paris Hilton and other things, I even spoke at WAMAS, but I forgot what I spoke about.

My thoughts on ich starts fights because my fish don't get ich and have not in about 35 years or so. And I don't have to quarantine.

Fish should not get ich. If your fish gets ich, it is your fault, not the paracite or the fish.

It is so simple but people seem to resist the answer and keep doing the wrong things.

I am fed up to here (my hand is under my chin) with ich posts.

OK now you got me started so I have to go into it a little. Then people could throw rocks or Paris Hilton's dog at me.(I wish I could find the article I just wrote about this)

Fish, unlike us make antibodies in more places than we do. One place they make antibodies is in their slime pores. We have sweat pores, fish make slime. That slime is not there just to make it harder for us to fillet a fish, it is there to protect the fish from. OK here it comes.. Are you ready?

Paracites. But also unlike us, a fish that is not in the best condition it can be, will not be protected from anything because there will be no antibodies in it's slime. Or if there are, they are weak.

A fish in perfect condition is a spawning fish. It is a huge burden on a fish to develop eggs because eggs could be 1/4 of a fishes weight and most of that is oil. When a fish is in spawning condition, it's antibodies are ramped up and they don't get ich. How do I know? In 35 years I have been adding all sorts of animals to my tank from dozens of LFSs all over NY, I also add NSW, amphipods, mud, copepods, seaweed, shrimp, flounders, lobsters, snails, and Godzilla if I could catch him from the sea. So there must be ich in there. Has to be, am I correct? But no ich. And some of my fish are 19 years old and still spawning.

 

Just 3 weeks ago I bought an ich infested copperband butterfly in a LFS for $10.00. It was $10.00 because it was ich infested. I put him in some copper for a few days then put him in my tank. Perfect fish. I gave him away because he didn't get along with my other copperband.

I don't have to worry about the ich infecting my fish because my fish are in spawning condition.

They get that way from eating the correct foods, not flakes or pellets but whole foods such as clams, Mysis, new born brine shrimp and yes worms, every day.

So that is the secret.

Another bit of information as to why my fish are immune from ich. I rarely get sick, I don't even get colds but when I go to Mexico I end up in the hospital. The Mexican people don't live in a hospital. When I was in Viet Nam I spent an entire year in the jungle, never coming out. Every day I had to take a malaria pill or I was almost guaranteed to get malaria. The Vietnamese people didn't get malaria. Why? Because they are exposed to malaria every day and built up an immunity to it.

If we quarantine all our fish, they will never become immune from anything and as soon as a paracite is added, everything gets it and dies.

So that is my thoughts on ich.

 

OK I am going to get a tranquilizer, or a glass of Scotch, then we can start a rant on HA or anything else you want to talk about. Under gravel filters are my favorite topic but no one wants to talk about those because thry are jealous that they don't have one.

Edited May 8, 2013 by paul b

[howaboutme]

If we quarantine all our fish, they will never become immune from anything and as soon as a paracite is added, everything gets it and dies.

So that is my thoughts on ich.

 

Man, this is refreshing to hear. I've thought about this as well in my research. Of course, I don't have the cajones, nor the resources, to go against the "norm" but it makes total sense to me. It reminds me of research that I've read regarding children that grow up w/ furry pets are more immune to certain things because they have been exposed to them while growing up. (Don't quote me on that exactly, it's been a while.)

 

I enjoy your insights!

[GraffitiSpotCorals]

I went to that wamas meeting, it was my first. You talked about making rocks and somehow made me create a hang in tank refuge (now my whole sump..). I thought it was cool and getting into this hobby has helped me change my life. I appreciate the ich speach you just gave too, I view it somewhat the same way. What do you think would happen if different disease was introduced to your tank? *quietly waits for the hair algae rant*

[paul b]

Man, this is refreshing to hear. I've thought about this as well in my research. Of course, I don't have the cajones, nor the resources, to go against the "norm" but it makes total sense to me. It reminds me of research that I've read regarding children that grow up w/ furry pets are more immune to certain things because they have been exposed to them while growing up. (Don't quote me on that exactly, it's been a while.)

 

I enjoy your insights!

 

Thank you, but if you quarantine, keep doing it. I don't want to get a bill for all your dead fish. This takes a while and fish don't get into great shape overnight. Also if your fish are not spawning or making spawning jestures, they are not very healthy and are very suseptable to ich and everything else.

The norm used to be what I did because I started this when the hobby started, I think that was on a tuesday about 2:00PM. Then they invented the internet and everyone added bits of information, most of it wrong but just by sheer volume it became fact. Like cleaner shrimp to cure ich. I love that one but so many people believe it that it is fact. It is also one reason I don't like to get into ich threads, Your shrimp did not cure ich, it went away by itself just like your snail did not cure an entire tank of Hair algae. But what do I know?

It's like when there is a shark attack, the shark bit the surf board so logically sharks eat surf boards.

 

I went to that wamas meeting, it was my first. You talked about making rocks and somehow made me create a hang in tank refuge (now my whole sump..). I thought it was cool and getting into this hobby has helped me change my life. I appreciate the ich speach you just gave too, I view it somewhat the same way. What do you think would happen if different disease was introduced to your tank? *quietly waits for the hair algae rant*

 

What different disease would you like to introduce in my tank? Mononucliosis, the heartbreak of psorosis, hypertension, hoof and mouth disease, leaprosy, conjuntivitiis? We can try them all.

Edited May 8, 2013 by paul b

[zygote2k]

FWIW, I've seen a Yeti twice when I was younger, but what we really want to know is how you feel about Ms. Spears.

[paul b]

Ms Spears doesn't really interest me but I did help build the NY Playboy Club and stayed there for 2 years after it was completed, just in case they needed something, I used to take the bunnies out to lunch all the time and I was the General Foreman for the building of Penthouse Magazine in Manhattan and I worked a couple of Victoria Secret photo shoots.

They wouldn't let me put the wings on the girls. Maybe because they are all 6' 10" and I couldn't reach their shoulders.

So I do know what good looking girls are supposed to look like. I even married one.

Edited May 8, 2013 by paul b

[YHSublime]

I did help build the NY Playboy Club and stayed there for 2 years after it was completed, just in case they needed something,

 

I probably would have stuck around longer, you know, just in case.

[paul b]

Piper if you want to hear a Hair algae rant I could also do that. Hair algae can not be cured because it is not a disease. It is a natural part of any healthy reef and if no algae is growing, that reef is in trouble. It's the same with a tank. I dive and have spent about 300 hours underwater. OK, 200 sober hours, but I learned one thing, maybe 2. Algae grows everywhere. You don't see it because the sea is filled with "mostly" herbifores. Guess why? The most numerous animal on a reef are not sharks, moray eels, lionfish, scorpionfish, or the Loch Ness monster, although I think he is fresh water, I am not sure. The sea is filled with tangs, rabbitfish, algae bleenies, slugs, and if you dive at night, the rocks are covered in urchins. Imagine that, all those herbivores living in the sea that is not supposed to have any algae. If 100 8" tanks all decended on your fifty gallon tank for a day of feasting, How much algae do you think you will see? If you threw 100 urchins in there, guess what would happen?

(I used to have a sea urchin collection business and 24 of them all spawned in my reef at once, Don't ask)

Anyway, we want algae, we love algae, we want to be algae's best friend, but we want to be the king of algae, yes we want to be an algae dictator because we are mean and want to enslave algae, why? because we are smarter and better looking, well some of us.

So we want to force algae to grow only where we want it to grow, and not on our corals.

So, being that algae is stupid, we just make a place that algae likes better than in our tank. Algae loves to bask in the light, somewhat like Paris Hilton. So we make a place that has a little more light. Algae also loves fast moving water, kind of like.... OK I can't think of what likes moving water so work with me here. So we make a place that has more light and faster moving water for the algae to grow and Vualaa, the algae will grow there (say that with a French Accent)

Algae is self limiting meaning it will grow as big as it has nutrients for, then immediately stop growing as algae has no stomach and can not store extra nutrients. As soon as the algae depletes just one of the nutrients in your tank, it will stop short. If you listen close you can hear it put on the brakes, that's how fast it stops growing. It could be iron, nitrogen, phosphorous or a few other things. So algae is the best reducer of nutrients you can have. You can harvest the algae or let it keep growing, it doesn't matter as the nutrients are locked up in the algae. Eventually you will have to harvest it to allow you to add more nutrients in the way of food.

So you don't need all those silly, expensive chemicals to reduce nutrients when stupid algae works for free. My tank is 42 years old and the nitrates are about 40 or 50 yet there is no algae in my tank, but it is in my algae trough which is a shallow trough above the water with fast moving water and more light than my tank.

The biggest problem is that my methods don't cost anything so no one can make any money on them.

 

[smallreef]

paul, can i just say, i concur,lol

you have a very non-scientific way of saying it, thankfully.

the worlds oceans wouldnt survive if we as aquarists subjected it to the crazy things we do in our tanks...

so why not just try to replicate the ocean better...we cant all have tangs in our tank but we can all build algae boxes, or even those new

upflow things...those look cool! its just doing something mechanically that fish are able to do naturally...

[paul b]

Small reef, my algae trough removed from the tank here for new lights was free. It is a Home Depot PVC fence post sliced in half and I installed some discarded LEDs over it. It sits in the back of my tank just above the water and the outflow from my skimmer feeds it. I have no sump

 

Edited May 9, 2013 by paul b

[smallreef]

ohh i like that...though i love my sump and skimmer,lol

but when i have a bigger tank again i may do something like that in the cabinet..or one of those bucket algae scrubber things..

we'll cross that hurdle when i move again in 5 years back into my house where i can do anything with any size tank i want and am not limited by renters agreements and such,lol

[howaboutme]

This thread is saving me a lot of money.

[paul b]

This thread is saving me a lot of money.

 

I will send you an address where you can sent that saved money.

 

My 100 gallon reef costs me $960.00 a year and that includes electricity and food, for the fish, not me.

Edited May 9, 2013 by paul b

[AlanM]

If you're still rambling on this thread I want to hear the story of pulling a fish out and draining the fluid from a popeye with a needle.

[sachabballi reef]

And I want know what happens to a tank when 24 urchins spawn at once..

 

Sent from my DROID RAZR using Tapatalk 2

 

 

[paul b]

And I want know what happens to a tank when 24 urchins spawn at once..

 

Sent from my DROID RAZR using Tapatalk 2

 

I told you not to ask, but since you asked, the water turns into Half and Half and you can't see anything, also my five gallon skimmer bucket overflowed al over the rug. Not a pretty sight.

If you're still rambling on this thread I want to hear the story of pulling a fish out and draining the fluid from a popeye with a needle.

 

Didn't I post that someplace? Pop eye is caused by either fluid or air that gets trapped behind the eye and has no place to go. If you look at a fisahes skeleton, that eye socket is a dead end with a tiny hole for the optic nerve, there is also no blood back there so the fishes immune system does not work well there. It usually abates on it's own but if not, of if I want to cure the fish in a few seconds I take a hypodermic needle and stick it in the stretched skin where the eye meets the skin. I don't puncture the eye, just the stretched skin. Of course I am holding the fish in a net while I am checking his insurance coverage.

You can't stick it in his brain because there is bone back there and you just have to insert it a little. Pull back on the plunger and the eye instantly goes back to where it is supposed to be. If fluid comes out that means it is an infection and sometimes I again stick in the needle and inject some antibiotic, then draw it out, but usually that is not necessary. I never lost a patient or blinded anything. If you think this is cruel, the next time your eye is sticking out to where it may pop all the way out and blind you and I said I could cure you in 3 seconds, would you say something like: "Oh no sir, I like my eye sticking out like this and I think of it like a fashion statement" Or would say: Hurry up, fix the thing?

It's up to you.

 

Besides I don't think fish feel real pain but even if they do, that stretched skin is to thin to even have any nerve endings.

But that is for another wierd thread.