[massa]

Hi, has anyone got an Aquarium? was thinking about getting one for the front room but other than gold fish as a child have had no experiance of keeping fish! i would ideally like to keep marine fish as i think they look better than th tropicals and cold water varieties.

[Foghorn-Leghorn]

I used to keep an aquarium - strictly tropical fish only though.  I've never kept a marine tank myself but I know they are very involved and take a lot more looking after than a tropical or coldwater set up.

[Brambles]

We used to have a very large fresh water tropical fish tank, it was no trouble at all, just keep an eye on the filters as they need cleaning quite regularly.   Mostly just feed and watch for pump, filter etc.. breakdowns (which in our case was rarely)...  Other than that....  watch, relax and enjoy 

[spottymint]

Hi

Marine fish need exact water conditions, you cannot get it wrong otherwise they all die.

You need a large tank (water conditions more stable)
Great filteration, protein skimmers & most modern tanks have sumps.
Coral sand & rocks to keep a high PH.
Full maturation (understanding of the nitrogen cycle)
The cost of the saltwater additive
Test kits
An reverse osmosis kit or buy in, RO water.
Some fish easier to keep than others, some may need special foods, some cannot be kept together.

Start with goldfish or even tropicals, been keeping tropical for 21 years, made many costly mistakes & I'm too nervous to try marines.

Once you understand the basics of water quality, fish are easy to keep, but marine require a lot more chemistry, eg specific gravity ? Correct quantity of salt dissolved in the RO water.

Sorry to put a downer on your idea, marine's tend to be a very expensive hobby & you must do your research.

[asd1]

We have a fresh water tank with two musk turtles and seven guppies in it, we have found them all very easy to look after just don't get male and female guppies or you WILL get babies ! Start off with some basics and go from there

[Paul Plots]

I agree with spottymint....

Not a good idea to go for tropical marine if you have no experience of tropical fish.
complicated
expensive
very demanding conditions

Tropical = much easier and once your tank is stable (well settled) you'll have no problems if you introduce just the right number of fish a few at a time. A community tank is good for variety.

Drop into a good aquarium shop and ask for advice but avoid shops that sell only a very few fish unless you know how to recognise healthy / sick fish. One ill one can damage the whole tank.

[spottymint]

One other thing,research what fish you are buying or go to a good independent fish shop.

Pangasius cat fish sold by a major pet shop chain, grow huge, sold as (river cobbler, basa by Tesco/Sainsbury)
Silver sharks grow big
Most cichlids grow big, terratorial, eat small fish ie neons/guppies
Spanner barbs & tinfoils are doing the round again & grow huge.
Pictus cat's, love them but will eat anything which fits in their gob.
Fire Eels

Some species above can be kept in a species tank ie cichlids.

Feel free to pm for any advice if you do get Tropicals. 

[Foghorn-Leghorn]

Additionally it's worth finding out the hardness of your water supply - my parent's water is naturally soft (reservoir water), whereas where I live it's hard (think limescale a plenty!).   

Some fish suit softer water, such as most tetras where as livebearers (guppy, platty, molly, swordtails) prefer harder water. 

It just makes it easier if you don't fight what you've got to work with, otherwise you're constantly adding treatments to change the PH and it's very easy to crash your tank if you're not careful.

Strange as it seems, bigger tanks are easier to maintain as once you've got a well established and cycled filter, the extra volume of water can deal with any fluctuations in water conditions easier than a small tank.

I loved my tropical fish tank - much more relaxing and interesting to watch than the TV 

[spottymint]

Watching a 5ft tank as we speak. 

Fishkeeping sounds hard, but after the inital start up & getting the tank matured. Fish are easy (tropical/Goldfish).

That's why we have a 5ft tank, a 3ft tank & a 2ft tank, a fishpond, wildlife pond and a wildlife barrel !

O/H wants a shrimp tank & I'd like a beardie 

Forgot, breeding Bristlenose catfish & mollies too.

[Paul Plots]

We have a new 5' tank standing on it's end. It's a replacement for the 6' by far too much that my son had in his first-floor bedroom for three months after I had said, "Please don't have that up-stairs".... so he ignored me and his mummy backed him up. Bless her.

So.... when there was a loud bang in the middle of the night because he had whipped a rug off a chair and something heavy flew from it and hit the glass I was not that surprised.  

Once I had seen the water pouring onto the carpet in his room I left them to it with buckets and shouts while I wander to the room below and moved my wife's computer and other electrical equipment, plonked a bucket under the drips from the ceiling, made a whole in it (the ceiling not the bucket!!) and went back to bed.

It was very quiet the next morning.

The tank goes down-stairs (and no one is agruing) especially as it is tall and deep enough to bath in.  
I forgot to say all of the fish survived!! 

[New shoot]

I've recently got an aquarium.  Started with a 60L tank last summer a customer at work gave us - was moving house so aquatics took the fish and I had the tank 

Then moved up to 90L tank just before Christmas, planted up with real plants.  Got dwarf algae eaters, firefoxes (thread algae eaters), lampeyes and cherry red shrimps.  I love watching them all - the shrimps especially are good fun as they constantly mooch about feeding - never seen such busy little folk.

Once you get into the routine of water changes and basic maintenance it's very easy to keep tropicals, but find a good fish shop and get as much advice as you can to start with 

[Rhiannon]

I have kept and bred all sorts of trops and coldwater fish professionaly  over the years ive also kept marine fish and corals, it is an exacting hobby expensive and not for the impatient .

For many years i was Admin/Mod on a forum for marien fish and corals and the mistakes made were mainly overstocking and a misunderstanding of how filtration works, there are many ways of filtering a marine tank and much bad and outdated advice is often given.

mainly start with the biggest tank you can afford ,nano tanks are very unforgiving , 260 litres and no less , you need a supply of RO water you can get from a marien fish shop to mix your salt with , 15 to 20 kilograms of living rock , 2 or 3 powerheads heater lights , lighting depends on what you want to keep , UV unit protien skimmer..shall i go on? lol...

Goldfish are not easy indoors either thier big messy gross feeders, Trops  are possibly your best bet, theres a range of micro rasboras and m,any brightly coloured tetras now available to have in small tanks , thier more forgiving over water conditions than marine fish .

If you want to do marine i can guide you step by step on Berlin filtration flow rate stocking etc, the greatest thing you will need is patience and lots of money lol...

[Ma and Pa Snip]

Hi, has anyone got an Aquarium? was thinking about getting one for the front room but other than gold fish as a child have had no experiance of keeping fish! i would ideally like to keep marine fish as i think they look better than th tropicals and cold water varieties.

Simple advice, which I give as someone whose family had their own specialist aquatic retail outlet and as someone who also worked for one of the biggest specialist aquatic product manufacturers in the UK  for many years.

Don't run before you can walk.

To keep marine fish requires more than a basic knowledge. If you have not kept fish other than as a child I would seriously advise you to start with a tank of community tropical fish.

But before you even do that, go buy a book and read it.

I would suggest
Interpet Bumper Tropical Aquarium Fish book


This book covers basics which will help you in keeping your fish alive. It also gives advice on types of fish & their specific requirements.
Other more advanced books are available, whatever book you buy I would advocate ensuring the author is experienced in fishkeeping in the UK.

 

[Rhiannon]

Hmmm Maidenhead? 

[Aunt Sally]

I've kept tropical fish for about 30 years and they are delightful and interesting.  They make marine fish look like plastic toys to me