Fish aquariums

[Gellar]

Anyone have one? At work I have a large fish aquarium, 1250 freshwater gallons. I am no expert in aquariums and kind of inherited the maintenance with it. Typically we have species of fish that live in the Mississippi River. Currently we have bluegills, smallmouth annd largemouth bass, walleye, northern pike, a catfish and long nose gar. Our biggest issue is that our fish get Ich and I have ended up losing a few fish. I’ve tried treatments of chemicals and messing with the salinity of the water. It seems that after we get the inch and treat it successfully we are good to go for several months. If you have suggestions please let me know!

 

[texwest44]

I hated having an aquarium, and it wasn't even big.

If I recall correctly, you need to administer some ich medicine, and clean the gravel every day, and almost completely replace the water every few days. Carbon filters can absorb the ich medicine out of the water so you have to do without that for a little while, too.

I remember being told that ich parasites reproduce in the gravel, so constant thorough cleaning is required. Might even have to ditch the gravel and get new gravel and water and clean the aquarium. And some fish can be harmed by ich medicines so you have to be careful which one you use. And if theres any ich on the fish, it'll wind up in the fresh gravel and water, so that's something to think about too.

Aquariums are massive pain.

 

[Goatshoes]

Quarantine all new fish before introducing them to the tank population.

 

[Gellar]

I hated having an aquarium, and it wasn't even big.

If I recall correctly, you need to administer some ich medicine, and clean the gravel every day, and almost completely replace the water every few days. Carbon filters can absorb the ich medicine out of the water so you have to do without that for a little while, too.

I remember being told that ich parasites reproduce in the gravel, so constant thorough cleaning is required. Might even have to ditch the gravel and get new gravel and water and clean the aquarium. And some fish can be harmed by ich medicines so you have to be careful which one you use. And if theres any ich on the fish, it'll wind up in the fresh gravel and water, so that's something to think about too.

Aquariums are massive pain.

I’m in the process of treating them now. I ran out of ich-x so I had an interruption in the process. I usually treat slightly less than the prescribed amount for multiple days with a water change in between like the directions indicate. The treatment usually takes care of the issue, but I get tired of doing it every couple of months.

 

[Gellar]

Quarantine all new fish before introducing them to the tank population.

I have a 110 gallon tank I quarantine all the fish into for 2 weeks before I move them to the big tank.

 

[Gellar]

I’ve had a biologist tell me the ich is coming from baitfish that we feed. The local bait shop donates the minnows and they get them from a wholesale supplier. Before I put the minnows in the tank I drain all the water from them. I don’t think quarantining the minnows before I feed them would feasible.

 

[Gellar]

I was reading online about controlling the ich with water temperature. Everything I read was to raise the water temperature to 80-82 degrees. Before I read anything I honestly thought it’d be better to cool the water to control. Right now it’s about 70. I have a water chiller to control the temperature, but to get it colder than that I’d have to install a bigger chiller.

 

[Gellar]

I hated having an aquarium, and it wasn't even big.

If I recall correctly, you need to administer some ich medicine, and clean the gravel every day, and almost completely replace the water every few days. Carbon filters can absorb the ich medicine out of the water so you have to do without that for a little while, too.

I remember being told that ich parasites reproduce in the gravel, so constant thorough cleaning is required. Might even have to ditch the gravel and get new gravel and water and clean the aquarium. And some fish can be harmed by ich medicines so you have to be careful which one you use. And if theres any ich on the fish, it'll wind up in the fresh gravel and water, so that's something to think about too.

Aquariums are massive pain.

I’m not very regular on my vacuuming the substrate. I will try to increase the amount I vacuum.

 

[texwest44]

The gravel has to be cleaned constantly with or without itch, it gets gross really fast. Water, too.

As for water temperature, some literature says it makes the medicine more effective against the parasite, but doesn't really impact the actual parasite itself very much. I'd be careful getting the water much above the mid 70s with walleye in there. But also if all the fish die, then you don't have to take care of an aquarium which is a pretty nice deal. I am an aquarium hater lol.

 

[Gellar]

The gravel has to be cleaned constantly with or without itch, it gets gross really fast. Water, too.

As for water temperature, some literature says it makes the medicine more effective against the parasite, but doesn't really impact the actual parasite itself very much. I'd be careful getting the water much above the mid 70s with walleye in there. But also if all the fish die, then you don't have to take care of an aquarium which is a pretty nice deal. I am an aquarium hater lol.

The fish we have in the aquarium wouldn’t do good with it that high, part of the reason I haven’t raised the temperature. If all the fish die we only have a very expensive, very large aquarium. Donors don’t like that.

 

[madtom]

If the bait shop could donate night crawlers instead, those species would all eat them just as well and you wouldn’t worry about the minnows bringing ich.

I’ve had an aquarium in my office with small-bodied native shiners, minnows, dace, darters, etc. They were easy to keep and I just fed them the frozen blood worm cubes from the pet store. Another idea to diversify away from the sport fish people see all the time.

 

[Big Sky Guy]

Sell it and buy a rifle. No more ich, no more maintenance and you get a new gun. Win, win, win?

 

[Gellar]

Sell it and buy a rifle. No more ich, no more maintenance and you get a new gun. Win, win, win?

Do you think our claims department would let it slide through if I ordered a new custom rifle for “Hunters Safety Classes”?

 

[Gellar]

If the bait shop could donate night crawlers instead, those species would all eat them just as well and you wouldn’t worry about the minnows bringing ich.

I’ve had an aquarium in my office with small-bodied native shiners, minnows, dace, darters, etc. They were easy to keep and I just fed them the frozen blood worm cubes from the pet store. Another idea to diversify away from the sport fish people see all the time.

We talked about starting a minnow tank with the 110 gallon tank. Spot shiners, emerald shiners, sculpins, sticklebacks, etc.

I might try the worm ball idea. They are hard to get in the winter though.

 

[Big Sky Guy]

Do you think our claims department would let it slide through if I ordered a new custom rifle for “Hunters Safety Classes”?

If I was in charge of your claims department, yes.

 

[R.K.]

The last time I had to deal with ich, I set up a clean-bottom isolation tank, then completely drained, cleaned, and dried the main tank.

The isolation tank was smaller and is where the medication/treatment was added, without carbon filters.

Yes, it’s more work. Yes, it’s a pain. It stresses fish a bit, and takes a lot of time. But in the end, it’s a cost effective way to treat the fish and completely eradicate the problem.

 

[Gellar]

If I was in charge of your claims department, yes.

I'll let you know when there is an opening and you can use me as a reference.

 

[Steiny77]

Sell it and buy a rifle. No more ich, no more maintenance and you get a new gun. Win, win, win?

Is that a Dave Ramsey quote?

 

[Big Sky Guy]

Is that a Dave Ramsey quote?

Close,

 

[Goatshoes]

I’ve had a biologist tell me the ich is coming from baitfish that we feed. The local bait shop donates the minnows and they get them from a wholesale supplier. Before I put the minnows in the tank I drain all the water from them. I don’t think quarantining the minnows before I feed them would feasible.

I agree and didn't think of that earlier. We kept Oscars and arowanas. As long as we fed them store bought goldfish, we had no problems, but when we scooped minnows from the local drainage to use for feeding the ich followed.

I also remember something about copper pennies helping the situation. But I don't think pennies are made of copper anymore.