Hello! (SF Bay Area)

[Chris C.]

Hey there everybody!

 

Since I've already posted once (just now) in the Disease forum, I thought I should probably introduce myself.

 

I'm Chris. I teach high school students with learning disabilities, and last school year, right before schools shut down, I was able to set up a tank in my Biology class for my students to observe and learn from. Disclaimer, I knew NOTHING (even less than Jon Snow, if anyone here likes that GoT reference any more). My husband knew more, but still not much, and has since made it his priority to keep the tank in excellent conditions for our fish friends.

 

Thankfully, I was able to relocate the donated tank and district supplied fish to my home on the last day that the school was open. At the time, we had 4 male guppies, 2 female guppies, some floating Elodea, and pond snails (which we very quickly had to get rid of, as we went from 5 to at least 60 way too fast). The Elodea was snail egg infested, so it had to go as well, unfortunately (but not until we got a new tank).

 

After relocating, we lost one of the males shortly after both females gifted us with WAY MORE FRY than we could handle. Another teacher in my district was able to take them, and a friend with an established tank took our adult females. That left us with just 3 adult males in our 16 gallon tank.

 

We discovered a high scud infestation and were worried about the bio-load, so we changed tanks (to a 15 gallon that was in much better condition than the donated tank) and gravel (kept the filter, filter media, decorations, and as much of the water as we could) which got the scuds under control (I'm sure we still have some, but nowhere near as many as before). And we added some Vallisneria and Cryptocoryne Parva.

 

Just about 2 months ago, we added 2 new male guppies and 12 neon green tetras, and things have been great ever since. We've relied heavily on Cory's videos and the facebook group when we've hit roadblocks. As much as I WANT more fish (and more tanks) our lease won't let us have more than what we've got.

 

I don't have any GOOD pictures, but I do have a video... Here's a link: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1YALRy156xOooBa1sXLXdQwG3-OLKGo2u/view?usp=sharing

 

I'll try to get pictures soon!

 

 

[Irene]

Welcome to the forum and thanks for sharing your story! Glad to hear that Aquarium Co-Op has been able to help you so much on your fish keeping journey. 🙂

[Ben_RF]

Welcome! Thank you for sharing your story and that is pretty awesome.  I hope you like it here, its a great place to be.