My b-day present to myself :)

[birdsnreps]

well, ive always wanted a large fish tank, so today we went to an awesome little local fish/reptile store, and we picked up a used 55gal with stand, gravel, the tank itself, a brand new Rena filter, and the lights for a great price!! then i just had to have the driftwood, which i have never had in my tanks before :) they have a huge display tank that has large pieces of driftwood in it (not for sale), that i have always wanted, and today they had some driftwood available for sale to the customers, to i picked up two pieces for this new tank :) it grows some algae on it naturally, but the algae makes it look nice and natural, not dirty and trashy like an un-maintenanced tank.

we also hooked up two long airstones, but i think we need a bigger air pump!! lol, ill prob just wait for someone to return one at work :) you can see in the pics two bubble-walls in the back of the tank.

*sigh* now, we need to pick up some background paper so we wont have to look at the wall behind the tank, and ill have to pick up a glass canopy for a 55gal. I treated the water today, then tomorrow im gonna start adding some plants :) we have some really nice, large amazon sword plants at work for like $3 each, which is a great deal for plants their size :) now i have to figure out which smaller plants to place in the front of the tank most of the ones we have at work grow really tall :(

THEN maybe we can start adding some fish. i think we will put some comets to get the bacteria going, then i can add some pretty tropical fish :) we are having a really hard time deciding which fish to add though i REALLY want some red belly pacu's, but they get way too big for a 55gal :( so ill have to wait on those guys. i saw some really beautiful rainbow fishes, with pretty reds and blues at the shop we bought the tank at :) i think we will try some of them out, but they are pretty small, so we can actually get several smaller fish and still not be overcrowded :) i love mollies too, for some reason lol, they are just SO cute to me :) the shop has TONS of beautiful cichlids that i would love to have, but right now we want peaceful fish, so we cant get none of them yet, at least not til we hook up some more tanks :)

anywho, this is the tank as it is today. tomorrow we can add plants, then wait for another day at least, then finally some fishies :) we will post pics as we start adding stuff to the tank.....

[Tom Lawless]

Cool Tank. I have a 15 gallon Mini-Reef but will upgrade soon to a 40 gallon (this upgrade would have been accomplished sooner if I had not had the Bing side track). I love a tank with real plants. Someone told me not to plant real plants into the tank until that nitrogen cycle took place. I don't know if that's true but I thought I'd throw it out there.

I love the driftwood too.

Someday I want a big freshwater tank like that for Discus and Angel fish. I love those guys.

Good luck with the new tank. They're a lot of fun.

[birdsnreps]

i have a 30gal right now that has two murderous angelfish!! i LOVE the angels, but OMG....i bought four at the same store at the same time, and then i bought 4 more at another store around the same time cause the first store didnt have any more. well, two of the angels from the first store decided that they ruled the tank, and they killed my other angels!! they seemed ok at first, but the two kinda looked like they might be bullies, and then when i woke up the next day, all my other angels were dead, and they had bite marks on them and their fins were trashed :( they were GORGEOUS angelfish, i was so sad :( but i cant buy any more angels cause of the two murderers i have in my tank, LOL. they leave the other fish in the tank alone, its just other angelfish that they dont like for some reason

btw...ive never really used live plants in a brand new tank. i have used live plants a few times, but each time i ended up with a snail prob UGH....so i stopped using them lol. in the tanks that i did try the live plants, they were already established tanks, so no probs there. ill have to ask the manager about not having live plants in the new tank i know customers have tried it and they havent come back to complain or return fish LOL.

[macawlover]

Congrats! That looks like quite the tank! We have an outside 15 gal tank for goldfish and bettas (I currently have two males in it, and they do fine together), and a 10 gal for them to go in during winter months.

[birdsnreps]

later on im gonna get the 150gal that i like, it has a really nice shape that doesnt take up tons of space. the shop i bought this tank from has TONS of huge beautiful tanks in the back that people dont want any more, most of them dont leak, but some of them do for some reason, so people give them to the shop. the shop has a 250gal tank with stand that i WANT!! lol, maybe after we move :) that too is a great price!!

[amanda143]

Wow that is a lovely tank! We have a 55 and a 45 with Oscars. I pretty much refuse to buy any other fish I love those guys so much. It's like having dogs that swim (none of mine do lol). =p Where is this store located? We just moved to Burleson so the one we went to is too far for us now. :/

[MicahEspudo]

Haha I'm thinking about getting a 10-20 gallon nano for my room (as if my room isn't crowded enough)
I need to build a custom desk for my DJ/music recording gear and then I'll have more room for cages and a tank :)
Luckily my dad is good at wood working :D

[birdsnreps]

i LOVE oscars, but i think the 55gal is still too small to house a few adults :(

btw...these are my murderous angelfish LOL these guys follow you all over the place, they are on a countertop in between the living room and the kitchen, so they always see us walking by, i guess they are either wishing we were gonna feed them, or maybe they are plotting their escape LOL

[amanda143]

Originally Posted by birdsnreps

i LOVE oscars, but i think the 55gal is still too small to house a few adults :(

We had our pair of Oscars (Felix & Oscar) for almost 6 years. They sorta stopped growing after the 3rd year. The only other thing was a pleco and he was HUGE! 0.o I have read that most cichlids will only grow as big as the tank they are in. Move them to a bigger one and they will get bigger. We bought ours as little 1 inch babies so by the time you are ready to upgrade they'll be a decent size.

[birdsnreps]

nah, they dont stop growing really, they just slow down. i was just in that shop today, asking about this HUGE oscar and this HUGE pacu, each was at least 12in long, the pacu was prob about 14in long, no joke. i was asking about them and the guy that owns the shop says they were just dropped off by their owner who KEPT THEM IN A 20GAL TANK TOGETHER!!! and they were that huge lol. if anything, those two poor fish were living proof that they really dont stop growing. they were so huge in such a tiny tank that the oscar has very noticeable damage to his face, his bottom lip is bent in alot, it looks like hes biting his bottom lip :( the pacu's face looks like its smushed in as well, the owner says its from hitting the tank walls so much while trying to move around :( they wanted to give me that pacu, and i REALLY wanted him, but i just dont feel that the 55gal is nearly large enough, considering that the pacu is still gonna double in size :(

i love big fish, but im a firm believer in buying fish that will fit in my tank comfortably as adults, not as they are now, small and young. a full grown oscar, or pacu, or whatever else gets huge, id just rather wait until i can get a big enough tank to where i feel they can turn around and swim around comfortably. even at work i turn down sales cause these people wanna buy our baby fish and house them in tiny tanks, not even caring that the fish WILL grow much too large for the tanks they have now. UGH...one time i had a lady who wanted to keep a bala shark in a betta bowl!! the shark was as long as the betta bowl, and he was still only about 4-5in long!! these people probably turn around and buy the same fish at another store from someone who doesnt care or doesnt ask what size tank they have, but hey, at least its not "MY" fish that they are gonna keep that way.