How Do You Enjoy Your Fish

[Hoi Polloi]

For me, it usually is while drinking my morning coffee and watching them interact.

[CT_]

I feed with my son in the morning, which is a ton of fun.  And then at night in the dark after everyone goes to bed I turn a lamp on and watch my otos eat with my nose 1" from the glass.

 

That's not creepy right?😅

 

[H.K.Luterman]

I have a rolling computer type chair that I sit in and move between tanks to take a look at what's going on, usually with my camera (phone) in hand. I work from home so I have lots of opportunities to take breaks and see what everyone's up to. 

[Patrick_G]

The absolute best is when my Daughter gets excited about the tanks. She is actively lobbying for a wet pet and trying to enable my MTS! I’m not ready for that commitment but I love her enthusiasm. 

Edited July 19, 2021 by Patrick_G

[Guppysnail]

🔍👀 all day! Its good to be retired

[HH Morant]

My aquarium is in the study, so I am at my desk or in my reading chair. I spend most of my time in the study and the kitchen. Soon I will have another tank between the kitchen and the dining room!

[Phantom240]

Rolled with veggies, rice and nori. Also, I'll just sit on the couch and watch them like a creeper after work (timer comes on around noon, shuts off at 10pm). 

[Patrick_G]

On 7/19/2021 at 3:47 PM, Phantom240 said:

Rolled with veggies, rice and nori. Also, I'll just sit on the couch and watch them like a creeper after work (timer comes on around noon, shuts off at 10pm). 

And smoked! 
(so sorry but I’m a middle aged dad, I couldn’t resist) 

[FlyingFishKeeper]

Really any way is good for me, although dipped in batter then served fried with a side of chips, and lemon &/or ketchup is amazing. I feed them, then I'll usually also bring a chair over and sit in front of my tank at least once a week, usually more. Sometimes I'll also work, read, or write forum posts in front of it as well!

Edited July 19, 2021 by FlyingFishKeeper

[FrozenFins]

@Patrick_G Fish are freinds not food , jk

I like feeding my community tank and watching all the bottom dwellers come out and eat. I often will watch them until theres no food left to be eaten. The community tank and the 10 galllon guppy tank is downstairs in our living room, so I often am down there do other things and will watch the fish every now and again.

This morning my upside down catfish were very active so it was fun watching them.

Edited July 20, 2021 by James Black

[laritheloud]

I love to grab a snack or a cup of coffee and watch my fish during feeding time and during the afternoon. I find there's the most activity and frenzied fun during feeding time, but in the mid-afternoon is when I catch my gouramis behaving cutest. They tend to interact with each other very sweetly, doing little tentative 'feelers' touches and following one another around. It's soothing and adorable!

[Trish]

I enjoy them all day long.   Hubby and I always share coffee with the 50 gallon every morning.  2 tanks on the counter where I prepare dinner, rams are very curious about supper prep haha!    The 40 community and 29gallon have a settee between them, I just can't make up my mind which one I want to watch!  

[Phantom240]

On 7/19/2021 at 6:13 PM, Patrick_G said:

And smoked! 
(so sorry but I’m a middle aged dad, I couldn’t resist) 

 

Oh man, I have family up in alaska that makes the BEST smoked salmon I've ever had. I practically beg my dad to get his uncle to ship us a box like every year. 

[Patrick_G]

On 7/19/2021 at 5:47 PM, Phantom240 said:

Oh man, I have family up in alaska that makes the BEST smoked salmon I've ever had. I practically beg my dad to get his uncle to ship us a box like every year. 
 

I make a big batch a couple times a year to eat a give away. It’s a Seattle classic!  

[lefty o]

i like to get in the tank and swim around with them. in reality, i just enjoy watching them on and off through the day.

[Crabby]

I mostly enjoy them when I’m feeding. I’m yet to get a beanbag or something to use to relax in front of my tanks, but I make the most out of feeding times, usually spending a few minutes per tank. All my fish get excited for feeding time, so I find it’s the best time to watch them! I also have fun playing with my bettas and apistogrammas, who are more than happy to come up and wiggle at me, or nibble on my fingers (although I swear my male betta ‘Bear’ is trying to rip my fingers off 😂).

[Odd Duck]

My 100 gallon is in the living room right next to the TV.  I watch the tank as much as the TV and I just barely started adding my schooling/shoaling nano fish.  I just kick back in the easy chair and spend the evenings watching them.

On the days when I can sleep late I lay in bed for a bit (or sometimes more) and watch my pea puffer tank and my cubes that FINALLY got some shrimp in a couple.  The other 2 cubes are waiting for either my geriatric bad boy pea puffer or a plakat Betta in the 6 G, but I’m going to need to attach my driftwood to some slate for the 14 gallon (it’s *not* sinking!).  So there’s a very exciting (🙄) empty cube in the middle of my “low row”.  It will get either a Betta or a small school of nanos.  I haven’t decided, but I’m leaning toward nanos, likely chilis.

I have a comfy office chair that I use for observing my 75G, 29G plant holding that has the last (for now) of my bronze cory babies, and my 12G QT tank full of schooling/shoaling nanos that will go into my 100G in 1 week.

I have to stand to watch my 10G QT with more shoaling nanos destined for the 100G in about 10 days, the subadult pea puffers that are awaiting definitive gender determination, and bad boy geriatric Pea Daddy.  Middle row of my tank bank is shrimp breeders and the rocking chair works for that level.

[mountaintoppufferkeeper]

The fishroom is by the sliding door to the backyard so pretty much each morning afternoon and evening I'll stop and watch for 5 or 10 minutes while the dogs go exploring their fence line. I sneak a wyze cam view if anything fun is happening pike fry , kribs caved up, puffers spawning, etc it records the motion and i can watch it back. 

[ChemBob]

My tanks are in my living room. I feed in the evenings and tend to watch them to decompress after work. I also enjoy trimming the plants and getting things back tidy on maintenance day. There is something very satisfying about a newly cleaned tank. 

[PineSong]

Wow, so jealous of many of you. Retired! 100 gallon tank! Schooling nano fish! So nice to imagine.

My tank is between the kitchen and dining room so I can watch my fish from either side. I sit and stare at the tank when I'm having my morning coffee, but I also enjoy having them there when I'm in the kitchen making meals or cleaning up. The space where their tank is used to be dedicated to houseplants and I like the sparkle and sound of water that a planted tank brings to the space. 

[Ben C.]

I teach in my home studio, and I have an aquarium in both rooms I teach out of. So if the day isn't going so well...I just gaze wistfully...feeding time though is probably the most fun. Once you get a confident group of fish, they all come running! er....swimming.

 

edit: forgot to add my fry tanks are on the ground of a spare closet. So I spend also a lot of time just laying on the ground and watching...the cats have learned that they also can come lay on top of me and watch too. It's very hard to stay awake after that.

Edited July 20, 2021 by Ben C.

[Ken]

The view from my chair right now, about 9:30pm our time. I spend way too much time just like this after the Mrs. goes to bed. @Ben Ochart just got a giant new tank, I'm not much of a cichlid fan but he presents a lot of good general knowledge. 

[Torrey]

I have my fry growout tank beside the bed, so I can easily feed every 4 hours the first week. Since they have to go almost an 8 hour stretch during the day w/o food, I offset by feeding every 4 hours the rest of the time, and do 3 water changes a day for the first 3 - 4 weeks. 

 

I have my rack in my bedroom, also, and I can watch from the bed if I have a flare, or sit in a chair or on the stool to watch the parent danio stock, the ornate ornata, the guppies, betta, amphopods, snails, orchids blooming, and garden plants. 

I also propagate moss.

 

On my dresser I have a new 10 gallon set up. It's essentially a Waldorf scape, the plants are thriving. Only a week old and new growth already!

 

I'm waiting on a new timer, so I have not perfected the lighting yet, and haven't seen any pearling, but the growth has been a pleasant surprise and a testament to Cory's recommendation to "fertilize the heck out of it at start up". There are a handful of amphopods and snails keeping the melt cleaned up. It's really cool at night to see the tannins condensing and settling in the "valley" of the tank, looking like a reddish river winding between 2 large hills. Lots of photography here!

 

In my spouse's room, we added an ottoman for storage and it doubles as bench seating. I can spend hours sitting on the ottoman watching the guppies and their babies. A fellow member shared some frogbit with me, and the frogbit, duckweed, and water lettuce provide plenty of hiding for fry while complementing the creek inspired hardscape. 

 

Slowly propagating more moss to enter the tank in next year's IAPLC.

We have 3 pico tanks in the living room. One grows snails for the ornate ornata and for the assasin snail, one grows algae and is currently quarantining 2 nerites, and one grows sprouts and houses the assassin snail.

 

Outdoor "pond" on our patio provides phytoremediation of used tank water and grows out plants. I love sitting on the porch in the evening/late at night when it's quiet, and enjoy the sound of the water fall feature in the pond. I keep a few guppies to eat any mosquito larva that survive the water feature.

In the dining room, I am waiting for the rest of my plants to come in, so I can finish planting my 4' 'show tank'.

 

I have been slowly acquiring the hardscape, and I am buying a few of the plants each month and putting in grow outs so they will be completely acclimated by the time I finish the build. Considering angels, haven't decided yet.

Once that is complete, we will probably spend more time in the dining room than anywhere else in the apartment 🤣

[AnimalNerd98]

I have a rack system next to my desk in the living room. In addition to my 5 aquariums, I also have some terrariums for my Asian Painted Frogs and Leopard Geckos. On the far right is my tarantula shelf.
I tend to watch my tanks while sitting or lying down on the carpet at around 9-10 PM after I give the nightly feeding. My wife has photos of me crouched down on the ground, with my butt in the air as I zero in on new babies. 

[Chloe and Speckles]

I set up my tank next to my recliner chair that I sit in a lot. My betta and ottos are totally friends, and it's really cute when they have moments. Sometimes an otto will swim on top of my betta and they swim together for a little bit. A lot of the time my betta will swim near to where the otos are going up and down the glass, and then swim less like he normally does and more like an otto, I think that's him interacting with the ottos. Sometimes when my betta is just about to get food and he's all excited, he'll bump into some of the otos on accident and they totally take it, they don't swim away or anything. I got my ottos so that my betta could have some friends, so it took me completely by surprise that the otos are interacting with me. They generally swim up and down the glass in a particular corner of the tank, but if I shake my head slowly at them, one or two of the otos swim over to the side of the glass that's closest to my head and swim around looking at me. And my betta is really interactive, but this is getting long so I'll leave it at that. It's SO CUTE and I didn't expect to get this much out of keeping fish.