drewzero1

I found a tentative location for my patio pond planter and filled it with water. I've got some pots picked for planting and now I just need to propagate some plants! (And figure out an air hookup.) I'm going to keep an eye on direct sun and water temperature over the weekend, may need to move it for a bit more shade.

I thought it was a molly, but the dorsal fin is making me think platy.

There was a thread on aquarium streaming a week or two ago, it made me realize I need a better camera!

I really like my white cloud minnowss in my unheated tank. They do fine down to at least 50°F, which is the temp in my basement for most of the winter. 🥶

It truly is a catch-22, however I can understand their reasoning in this case. Since the mid-2000s we've had outbreaks of Viral Hemorrhagic Septicemia (VHS) in some of our waters causing fish to bleed internally and die. As far as I'm aware it's not in all bodies of water in WI, and the DNR has been attempting to stop the spread by stopping people from moving live wild-caught fish. I had hoped it would be temporary but I'm losing hope. Eventually we'll just have to ban wildlife altogether.

Thanks for the links! I'll have to check those out. As annoying as it may be that I can't just go to the lake or river within a mile of my house and bring something home, the DNR know what they're doing. Not only are they working against the spread of invasive plants and animals, but they're also trying to stop diseases like VHS from entering new areas. If nothing else, I've gained a lot of respect for their struggle with those issues.

@Fish Folk The tadpole madtom, an excellent choice! They've got venomous spikes on their fin rays, so watch out! Good call on the caveats/warnings as well. I've been looking into options for legal collection of live fish for aquarium use in Wisconsin and (as far as I can tell) the DNR prohibits it entirely. Instead they have a few fish farms listed that sell some native species for pond stocking, bait, and aquarium hobbyists.

I scooped out more duckweed from the 40, reworked the light hanger for my desktop tank, and cleaned out a small planter I'm hoping to use for a patio pond this summer. Now I'm researching for a little trip to identify and possibly collect some native plants from a pond that is not connected to my local lake system (or, if that's not an option, finding a local nursery that sells native aquaric/emergent plants). I haven't wanted to do the work I'm supposed to be doing today, so I guess I've been procrastinating with fish stuff. 😳

I would consider a fish tank a luxury inasmuch as I would consider any pet a luxury, though fish can be cheaper to keep than many other common pets. (I definitely wouldn't try to keep a cat on the amount I spend on fish.) As with other pets there are potentially life-changing intangible benefits that come with keeping them. I spent another half hour tonight scooping out duckweed, listening to music, and checking in with my fish. It was a bit tedious but I appreciate the opportunity to wind down after a busy couple of days. Sometimes I find that watching the aquarium inhabitants going about their lives can help me process things I'm thinking about.

These are all so cool! If I keep hitting refresh, sooner or later you'll get down to W! 😅

@Biotope Biologist Out of curiosity, what's the name of the offending site? I'll add it to my avoid list.

As long as our devices rely on subscription services, we do not truly own them.

There are a lot of sites that make a business of churning out "articles" that appear convincing enough to search engines like Google, but that don't pass the sniff test for a human reader. A lot of the content is automatically generated or paraphrased (and I use the word loosely here) from legitimate sites either by bots or non-native speakers. I was searching for information on different kinds of sausages and this came up. I'm a bit worried some space aliens are sharing recipes to "bring a different kind of feel to the humans."

I used to want to do some serious breeding, but I absolutely don't want to get into the "racks of tanks" stage of MTS. (Not that there's anything wrong with that! People's levels of commitment to a hobby are no-one's but their own!) I'd like to get to the point where I can have one nice display tank and one project/breeding tank, and a summer pond outside. I'm really interested in native fish. When I was a kid I used to love catching stuff and watching it in a tank for a while, so I'd like to try collecting now that I have some idea what I'm doing. Keeping white clouds has made me appreciate having an unheated tank that follows seasonal temperatures of my basement and watching the fish change their behavior based on the season. Further down the line, I've always wanted to try saltwater. The corals are so cool and I'd love to try keeping something striking like cardinal pyjamafish. I figure that's best saved for after my child(ren) are grown a bit, assuming we still have any disposable income by that point. 😬 My SO said the other day that I should keep starfish instead of shrimp, so I've been looking at what that would take 😜

Looks like goldfish to me as well, especially the double caudal fins. A lot of young goldfish start out with black coloration which usually goes away as they get older.

I spoke too soon! Woke up this morning to around half an inch of snow on the yard and my car. (I'm glad it didn't happen yesterday, or it would've made the egg hunt a lot more challenging!)

I've seen a lot of reports that Apple phones are more private than Android, but recent events like the CSAM scanning debacle really make me question that claim. Depending on how far you want to go... If I wanted my phone to be truly private, I'd avoid them both and use a "feature"/"dumb" phone. Or the next best thing, a de-googled Android smartphone. Certain models can be rooted and flashed with alternate firmware like LineageOS, or sent to a company like /e/ and they'll do the techy stuff for you. Caveats abound, including device support/warranty issues, inconveniences & instability with some software, and the tech know-how required to set it up in the first place. Not to mention that you still need to trust the hardware manufacturer and firmware provider. I've done it before on a device that wasn't my main phone, and I'll probably end up flashing my phone when the manufacturer stops providing updates. I'm hoping in the near future that mainstream Linux powered devices like the PinePhone reach a level of maturity to be reliable enough for primary use, but I'm not fully convinced that they're ready yet. For now, I will maintain a level of distrust for my phone and every app installed on it.

We saw some flakes on Thursday but no accumulation. It's been in the 30s and 40s all week, overcast in the morning with occasional rain, sunny in the afternoon but still cold and windy. We had a few days in February and March up into the high 50s, and we're ready for that to come back! @FrozenFins Your username seems appropriate!

I got the webcam working for my office tank, but since the building was closed today nobody was there to turn the lights on. So I sat for a few moments staring at a darkened tank and watching for shadows of fish. Just for fun I might log in in the morning and check on them, before actually going in to work.

Stopped in at work on my day off yesterday to check on my rasboras, who were looking good and hungry. Fed them a few dustings of flakes which they voraciously attacked. Waiting to hear back from the LFS whether to expect the rest of the school on Tuesday, or if they'll take longer to come in.

Me too! I've been wondering what happened, was especially looking forward to more wisdom of the ages from Rosario and Joe. Recently I started listening to The Aquarium Guys as well.

I spent some time last night trying to set up webcam streaming from my work PC, but didn't quite get it working. Between the webcam, the video streaming daemon, and the VPN tunnel, there were too many moving parts to get it all straightened out in one evening.

I have, almost daily, but it's usually not pretty! Got into work and was greeted by three rasboras, all seem very alive, happy, and hungry! They've already colored up a lot since yesterday.

I have a two year old who would beg to differ! 😈 My office tank completed the (re)cycle after the tank size and filter upgrade, so I bought the three lamb chop rasboras the LFS had, and ordered three more. I added them at the end of the day before going home so I've been nervous all night! Next time I'll try to add fish when I can keep an eye on them.

We both decided to steer clear of Samsung, since they seem to want to have their own version of all of the standard apps and a lot of weird bloaty stuff too. (Facebook preinstalled? No thanks!) They seem to have decent hardware but I just couldn't stand the software. The "not 4G" is probably relating to VoLTE (voice over 3G). A lot of older 4G phones used 3G for voice calls, which won't work when the 3G network is shut down. On top of that, certain carriers require that a phone be on their list of VoLTE "certified" phones or they won't activate it. (I got a crash course in the state of the art when my 2G phone stopped working last year.)