NERM Week 2022 - What did you learn this year?

[Beardedbillygoat1975]

I don't know about y'all but I love a good pearl of wisdom. So we are wanting to compile the things you've learned since July 2021 until now. 

Just post your pearl of wisdom below. It can be simple, it can be a koan, it can be funny, it can be sad and above all it needs to be NERMY!

[sairving]

Always have a backup plan in case your fish tank cracks or springs a leak. It can be buckets, rubbermaid bins, totes, a spare tank etc. My tank cracked during a water change back in February. It sucked.

Edited July 8, 2022 by sairving

[Patrick_G]

Sometime in 2021 I realized that not every tank is a “display” tank. It blew my mind that people have rooms full of tanks that are just for breeding. 😁

[eatyourpeas]

Things break. It does not have to mean the world is coming to an end. 🙄

[xXInkedPhoenixX]

You can never have too many floating breeder boxes or too many fish meds. 

[CKetchum]

Continue to learn and grow as a hobbyist. It's ok to fail, start over and experiment a little. Everyone has there own versions of failures and successes. 

[dan12boy]

You gotta not get discouraged when your fish die, use it as a sign to learn more and more so the next get to enjoy life.

[Torrey]

It's okay to take the time to fully explore all the options. Slow really is the fastest way to sustainable. Most importantly, with a bit of planning, dedication, and good communication regarding clear expectations, it *is* possible to have a healthy online forum!

[ccc24]

That keeping fish is an experiment. A long experiment and that internet lore is rarely, actually accurate. 

[nabokovfan87]

ORD...

It's been a heck of a year, but I think the best advice I can give anyone:

It's difficult to express or understand the full scope of something until you are arms deep in the tank, sometimes. Which simply means that it's better to ask questions and try to patiently view things going on in the tank than it is to answer the questions without doing so.

I screwed up a lot this year by playing with the knobs, but I think the worst part is when you make a mistake you can't recover from.  Small adjustments, patience, observations, notes, it's all extremely helpful.

[Cinnebuns]

I haven't even been doing this hobby a full year yet so I have learned A TON!!  

One tip I got very early on has saved me, and some fish, many many times. I always keep a smaller filter running in my main tank that the tank does not need.  This is purely to keep it cycled for "oh s#!@" moments. You never know when you will need a cycled filter to throw on something. I have used it in many situations. Most recently, I received a large amount of guppy rescues. The tank I had ready for them did have a cycled filter, but it was not cycled for that large of a bioload. Instead or worrying, doing a bunch of water changes, and likely still having some die, I threw on my extra filter and was good to go!

[Beardedbillygoat1975]

Thank you everyone for your comments and very considerate advice!! Keep Them Coming!!!

[FLFishChik]

Not all of the beautiful, artistically scaped tanks you see on YouTube are successful. A lot of them end up failing and we rarely (if ever) get to see that side. You watch the build, see the awesome result… and then you never see it again because it probably failed. Makes me feel better about my attempts (and failures) at scaping.

[Beardedbillygoat1975]

@FLFishChikthis!!! Absolutely I am glad you found this out early in your hobby. 

[Jennifer V]

One of the best lessons I have learned is it's much more enjoyable to involve your family, whether that's your spouse, your children or your forum compatriots, this "hobby" is so much more exciting when we invite companionship rather than going at it in a singular way. 

 

[Chick-In-Of-TheSea]

I learned how to incubate and hatch mystery snails and raise them! ❤️🐌

Edited July 11, 2022 by Chick-In-Of-TheSea

[mountaintoppufferkeeper]

 In this NERM year

I arguably became a slightly accomplished freshwater puffer breeder. and earned my breeder certificate from the Colorado Aquarium Society raising the first captive born Pao cf palustris .

 

During the year I raised decent numbers of Pao cf palustris and even documented spawning behavior in F1 fry at 9months old.

The biggest thing "re-"learned this year is to not fight the process and take the learning lessons for what they are learning. The palustris experiences of failures, partial successes, and eventually full successes, have prepped me to better care for fuuture Pao cf palustris and hopefully utilize what I have learned to accomplish similar successes with my two other current puffer breeding projects: a split colony of 7 Pao baileyi (4 smaller in one tank, 3 full grown in another),

 

and a colony of 5 Tetraodon miurus. 

 

It's been a pretty good year 2 on the forum. A great resource here. 

[Chick-In-Of-TheSea]

On 7/10/2022 at 11:24 PM, mountaintoppufferkeeper said:

I arguably became a slightly accomplished freshwater puffer breeder. and earned my breeder certificate from the Colorado Aquarium Society raising the first captive born Pao cf palustris .

Congratulations! Oh those cute chubby little fry. ORD 😍

[Tanked]

This year is only half over. I haven't learned anything really new and useful to my situation, but thankfully I continue to glean little nuggets from all of the others here. What I have learned or relearned:

My adopted Angelfish can be a breeding pair,

My old adopted Ember Tetra is much happier and active in a tank with smaller fish. I should have moved them sooner.  

For now, the Duckweed is no match for the Silver Dollars.

SAEs can lose there stripes.  Mine have not.

I have no idea how to balance my planted community tank, or break my Banana plant out of its dormancy.

Proactively trimming new plants seems to be a good idea.  For me at least, the cuttings often do better than the parent.

The internet seems to be devoid of information describing the breeding behavior of Red Tail Tinfoil Barbs.  I'm not looking to breed them, but I am wondering if one of mine has become a jerk.

 

[nabokovfan87]

On 7/8/2022 at 8:50 PM, ccc24 said:

That keeping fish is an experiment. A long experiment and that internet lore is rarely, actually accurate. 

I saw a pretty awesome talk on this last night.  Really interesting stuff about how to view your tank, how things progress (and specifically why), and how we give the tank itself a good environment as opposed to introducing issues.  Essentially, nature balances itself, but the tanks we keep are specifically not nature because we control them.
 

 

[PaigeIs]

 I had an epiphany today in a BBS pet store (rhymes with MetsMart). While browsing fish,  I was there to buy dog food, I overheard the clerk tell a potential buyer that otos are perfect for freshwater or saltwater tanks.  The mark, I mean customers, were holding a 10g kit and a betta fish.  Once they walked away, I went to look at the otos and found only one sad looking oto in a tank with a bunch of random fish, not all living.  Anyway, I bought it. I don't know if it will survive, but if it doesn't, at least it's last days won't be spent either starving to death in a chain store, or dying from dehydration in a 5 yr old's brand new salt/fresh water aquarium.  As I stood in line with a 50lb bag of dog food and a $1.99 fish I realized that I am not just a dog person anymore.  One year, and three nano tanks later, I am a fish person too.

P.S.  A big thanks to everyone that has (and continues to) answered all my questions and offered excellent advice.  I probably would have given up in week three (12 dead fish!) without all of the support.

Edited July 12, 2022 by PaigeIs
typo

[Katherine]

I've learned that several of my tetras will stalk the zebra danios when they're exhibiting breeding behavior so that they can eat the freshly scattered eggs. 😂

And also how cool mystery snails are.

[Patrick_G]

@PaigeIs, I think I’m going to start buying all the big box Otocinclus. I think it’s a win for both me and the Otos. 

[lefty o]

im too old to learn!

[nabokovfan87]

On 7/11/2022 at 5:56 PM, Patrick_G said:

I think I’m going to start buying all the big box Otocinclus. I think it’s a win for both me and the Otos. 

but then they will just order more.... 😞  It shows up as a high turnover item.

I got mine from Aquahuna!