11 replies to this topic

[Evan P]

Hey there everyone,

I've been finding myself having less and less time for my indoor fish. Although my pond is still doing well, I have taken most of my indoors fish outside and am left with a bunch of empty tanks. I will probably be tinkering with a lot of my smaller tanks to make a more expansive rack system for use this spring, but until then I really want to just focus on having a single, low-maintenance tank. I have a number of directions I can go with this. The 33 gallon long is drilled and could be used with a sump or just a recirculating system. I also have an corner hamburg matten-filter I would like to continue using, which I can either use with one of the previously pump-fed options or I can put caps on the drilled holes and power it with air. I have some pretty strong LEDs that I can run to have a planted tank, and I have space to do emergent plants if I wanted to. 

More or less, I want to try a set-up that is continuously interesting and can be a good escape from the cold winter weather that is about to strike MN. I am not opposed to frozen food, and I actually might enjoy live food, so long as the cultures are relatively simple to maintain. Breeding would be cool, but I don't plan to put hours of work into achieving it.

Any ideas are appreciated. Thanks!

[Michael Wolfe]

Cyprinella and Hydrophlox

[Evan P]

Cyprinella and Hydrophlox

I had a feeling you would suggest this. I would try it if I could find some new Cyprinella to try. I've gotten kind of tired of my local spiloptera, but have thought about keeping trichroistia or callistia. As for Hydrophlox, I have some N. chrosomus out in my pond I could pull in. N. lutipinnis would be cool, too. Any other specific species you suggest? 

I wonder how I could incorporate some emergent plants. I really would like to try something very different, and a strong nutrient export system supplied by the emergents would definitely help cut down on maintenance.

[zooxanthellae]

Ever played around with a paludarium? I've been thinking a lot about making one for some killis lately, and everything you described seems to fit the bill.

[Michael Wolfe]

I had a feeling you would suggest this. I would try it if I could find some new Cyprinella to try. I've gotten kind of tired of my local spiloptera, but have thought about keeping trichroistia or callistia. As for Hydrophlox, I have some N. chrosomus out in my pond I could pull in. N. lutipinnis would be cool, too. Any other specific species you suggest? 

I wonder how I could incorporate some emergent plants. I really would like to try something very different, and a strong nutrient export system supplied by the emergents would definitely help cut down on maintenance.

 

Alabamas are really big... might be a bit of a jumper for such a shallow tank... Tricolors could be cool... what about Bannerfins (C. leedsi)? They are not as colorful, but are very cool looking!

 

Any Hydrophlox is good... have you seen the interesting Greenheads that DW has on FB?  Other ideas outside of Hydrophlox might be whatever is local for the Cyprinella you pick... kinda go regional.  Say something like taillights and C. leedsi... or Greenfins and Greenheads... or Ocmulgees and yellowfins.  

[JasonL]

A couple fundulus, a half dozen dace and darters, and a single orangespotted sunfish would be a good mix and all could potentially be native to MN depending on the species you select.

[Evan P]

Ever played around with a paludarium? I've been thinking a lot about making one for some killis lately, and everything you described seems to fit the bill.

 

I had a paludarium setup for a while, but it never really came out how I would have liked. Killies in a paludarium sound really interesting, but the key for me if I am going to devote part of the tank to being a land area I would want some kind of creature that would take advantage of it. Any ideas?

 

 

 

Alabamas are really big... might be a bit of a jumper for such a shallow tank... Tricolors could be cool... what about Bannerfins (C. leedsi)? They are not as colorful, but are very cool looking!

 

Any Hydrophlox is good... have you seen the interesting Greenheads that DW has on FB?  Other ideas outside of Hydrophlox might be whatever is local for the Cyprinella you pick... kinda go regional.  Say something like taillights and C. leedsi... or Greenfins and Greenheads... or Ocmulgees and yellowfins.  

 

I suppose you have a good point about the Alabamas. I've actually never seen Alabamas, Tricolors, or Bannerfins in person, but from the pictures I have seen, they are all quite beautiful in their own ways.

"Any Hydrophlox is good" should probably be a NANFA motto. Those Greenheads are quite lovely. I do really like the regional idea, particularly the Greenfin/Greenhead and Ocmulgee/Yellowfin ideas. I never realized how beautiful those Ocmulgees are.

 

 

A couple fundulus, a half dozen dace and darters, and a single orangespotted sunfish would be a good mix and all could potentially be native to MN depending on the species you select.

 

These kinds of tanks can be really enjoyable, but I have been keeping them for a few years now and want to try something different. I have kept many MN native species, so I either want to try something from somewhere else in the US, or created an incredibly specified tank. For example, there is a roughly 6 foot wide, 10 foot long pond in the middle of a field about a mile from my house with an abnormally large population of Central Mudminnows. If I were to do an MN native species, it would be a specialized biotope like that.

[Michael Wolfe]

 

"Any Hydrophlox is good" should probably be a NANFA motto. Those Greenheads are quite lovely. I do really like the regional idea, particularly the Greenfin/Greenhead and Ocmulgee/Yellowfin ideas. I never realized how beautiful those Ocmulgees are.

 

 

Let me know when you want to come down... I've got an easy access Ocmulgee spot... and yellowfins are in every ditch around here.

[NotCousteau]

Pygmy sunfish colony.

[Josh Blaylock]

Ever played around with a paludarium? I've been thinking a lot about making one for some killis lately, and everything you described seems to fit the bill.

 

I have been wanting to do one of these for a while.  I'd like to do one with some water running from top to bottom, some small fish and salamaders.  I thought a 40 breeder would be a good size for that kind of project.

[Doug_Dame]

Rainbow darters are native to MN and are excellent aquarium fish with personality. IME, they're energetic and flexibly-minded enough to get food in a tank with shiners, and will take flake food.

 

A 33-L is a nice tank for darters and minnows that are happy in relatively shallow water.

 

HTH

[WheelsOC]

Looking at Doug_Dame's avatar, what about a heavily planted tank with ~dozen flagfin shiners? Some dark substrate, a ton of greens, and those little golden/blue/red fish darting around would be pretty striking, I think.