Greetings from the Cape Town

Hi there,

Jack here from the Northern Suburbs of Cape Town.

I'm currently sitting with 4 tanks (2 x 5 gallon, 1 x 10 gallon and 1x 55 gallon) and looking after zebra danio, zebra danio fry and a goldfish. I would like to keep and breed the zebra danios for a while, largely to raise funds for more equipment and some Tanganyikan cichlids.

Hoping to get in touch with some people in the Cape. The pet stores are expensive and where I can culture live food, breed small fish and do DIY equipment I'm willing to give it a try... my 55 gallon tank is currently being seeded by DIY internal filter (powered by a cheap power head).

The best laid plans of... well we'll see what happens.

 

Welcome Jack - like your aproach....

 

Hi Jack!

Hope you enjoy TASA as much as I do!

Yes, the stores are expensive... and anyway, DIY is half the fun, isn't it?

 

Hi there, enjoying the heat?

 

@azurekoi - cool man, enjoy the discussions on aquaponics... had a read about them paludariums, sounds like a project for the future.

@tracyp - yeah, the DIY stuff does make it more interesting, sort of forces you to have a better understanding of things too. I must admit, on the smaller scale the commercial products tend to be cheaper but when it comes to things like a 2000 litre an hour canister filters, well that alone would dwarf the cost of the rest of my equipment put together.

@freerider - simply put, no! I can't stand heat, makes brain 99.9% non-operational. My 55 gallon tank was up to 28 degrees yesterday... at least I need not run heaters this summer... actually thinking of ways to cool things down, short of a fan.

Shot for the welcomes and all... hope to stick around and learn some.

 

My tanks where also up to 28 yesterday and the day before, managed to cool them to 27 with the tops open and a fan blowing over the surface of the water.

 

Welcome to the forums. Enjoy the stay. Learn lots like we all did.

 

@Jack Stone

Hey Buddy - Welcome. I would also like to breed danio's. But having a hard time. Whats your secret? Maybe we can arrange for a visit, wouldnt mind buy some from you as well.

 

Welcome Jack
Tangs are awesome and there are lots of people in cpt that have and know them well...i am keen on doing diy myself and am keen to interact with people like yourself who are hands on...i am building a 3d background for my 600l malawi community tank and am trying to find the right epoxy and where to buy it, am not stuck just dont want to waste time and don't want to waste money...i have found this fishkeeping community to be a very friendly one...have fun

erm guys i reached 28 yesterday cos i was lazy but a fan under the hood brought it down to 27 too...heard about ppl whose tanks reached over 30...scared about that...i keep that powerhead gushing for oxygen...when i'm not lazy then i can pretty much keep it at 26 even when hot by floating two litre bottles in the tank...it really works but its alot of focus and time(because you're the thermostat).
have a super day
fire

 

@ryanj252 - the only real requirement is that you prevent the danios from eating their eggs, the eggs aren't sticky and do sink so you just need to give them a safe place to fall, like a layer or two of marbles. Also, to ensure they reach their safe haven before the adults eat them you should keep the water level to about 10cm of swimming space.

I don't have food for them so I put in some java moss and an apple snail to give them something to sustain themselves. Next time, I'll have some green water and insoforia ready to feed them as they start swimming and will use a better method protect their eggs from being eaten. Marbles are better than the plastic pebbles I used because the fish could easily move the plastic. I think a solid sheet of plastic with plenty holes in it will be allot easier to remove later, and you'll want to remove them to see the fish and allow the snail to keep things clean.

The fry are way too small to sell at the moment. If you want to buy a small tube/container of Liquifry No 1 (for egg layers) we can split it between us and I'll give you half of the danios to raise? Pop me a PM if you want to do this. The Liquifry apparently creates insoforia very quickly. I'll let you know when I got the tank setup for breeding again and you can come have a look at it.


@dragon8 - The epoxy stuff you're looking for is call Marine Epoxy I believe. I bought a tube for a caulk gun for R27 (on special) at Brights hardware (I think). Maybe call up your local hardware stores and ask them for Marine Epoxy, you should get a few hits and could expect to pay around R50-R60... you'll also need a caulk gun if you don't already have one. Let me know if you can't find any through the hardware places and I'll find out the name and exact location of the one mine came from.

Ah, floating bottle of ice, dead simple!

Thanks all.

---------- Post added at 15:01 ---------- Previous post was at 15:01 ----------

@dragon8 - PS. That marine epoxy could also be called silicone glue, it's the same thing, as far as I know. I used it to repair a cracked tank and also to do plumbing for a small hydroponic tomato experiment. So long as it's the Marine one it'll be safe to use... also helps to read the container, they might well say something about using it for aquariums.

 

thank you jack

though i'm still running around finding the right one...the two part epoxy i'm looking for remains a mystery, though i found one at a koi aquaculturist in houtbay thru azurekoi's(thank you) connection but its not quite what i wanted because its black only(costs R1300 for 5litre) and the one i was looking for is clear and finishes like fibreglass...though it looks like im going to have to buy the black one and make a black 3d blackground lol lol lol

 

The stuff I'm talking about is what's used to keep the tanks glass together (with help from braces on larger tanks). If worked with neatly (very difficult to do) it will finish pretty nicely and will be pretty clear. Any commercial hardware store should have Marine Silicon or Marine Epoxy, Marine is a brand I believe. Just call them up and ask.