Is this better?
I like my tanks - they're not perfect biotopes, I've got all kinds of species mixing going on, I'm using garden pots for hides so there is a lot of man-made stuff in there - but they're coming along. As I get more driftwood and plants I hope to cut back on the man-made stuff - but I'll probably never get to zero; the priority is giving the fish a fun and safe habitat, not winning an aquascaping award.
Plants have been a tough one. I'm using only sand, no soil, which is a no-go for a lot of plants, and I'm told my pH is also a potential problem. A girl at the LFS tried to get me to buy stuff to lower my pH and vet some plants she likes, but... no. Right now I have a total of 209 gallons to manage (between the 3 tanks) and I am saving a HUGE amount of time and headache by working with the water I've got (just gonna gloat again that I can refill my tanks with the garden hose, no treatments - might have to limit that to smaller water changes in the winter, but in the summer my well water comes out of the hose tank safe and 78°).
Plus even when a plant seems like it's doing okay, the fish are pretty hard on them. I'm having some luck with my dwarf tiger lotus (which is now 3 dwarf tiger lotuses) and corkscrew val - if that's all I can grow with the water and fish I have, that's fine. Plus I have the plants above the water with just the roots in for nitrate assistance - right now it's garlic, sweet potato, and basil.
I moved the 3 eBay MLs to the 125 immediately after saying I didn't want to/couldn't catch them. I simply placed a black plastic garden pot in the tank, waited for a fish to use it as a cave, scooped it up, and poured the fish into a bowl. Easy. And as each fish left, the next claimed the pot within moments.
It's been almost a week, so far so good. Actually I think the fish are doing a little better with this arrangement (at least for now) - the sun cats in particular seem less henpecked. The rts's eye is still fine but he's got a bit of nibbling on his fins - but that dude's a jerk, I'd nibble his fins too. Don't know how to tell him if he quits FA, he'll quit FO.
I attribute the relative peace to several factors:
* Ample hides/interrupted line of sight: this is a little hard to achieve while leaving enough open water for the big eupterus to swim the laps he likes to do at night, but I think I've found a pretty good balance.
* Having several bossy jerks seems to spread out the aggression and prevent any one fish from being bullied mercilessly. I have spent a lot of time watching them at night with the blue lights on and it's really interesting - the rts will start in on a sun cat, and a ML will come over and start on the rts, and then another ML comes and starts on the first one - by which time the sun cat and the rts have simply left.
* This one's the biggest one I need to keep in mind - most of these are young fish and may get meaner with age. I have to keep watching carefully and be ready to remove fish who are too mean or too bullied.
I left the 55 gallon open for a few minutes intending to use it for propagating plants so they could grow without being uprooted, but then we went to the LFS for plants and they had a single young Eupterus (~3.5") and Mr. Heck wanted him, so now he's growing out in the "empty emergency tank/plant growing station."
This is altogether Too Many Fish, even though it's peaceful enough at the moment - I'm thinking I'll give the sun cats back soon. I've seen varying reports about their potential adult size, and if they were to reach 18" my tank would be a sad little jail for them. Even if they don't get that big, they're kind of boring.
Predatory Fins has baby eupterus with marbled coloring - like, regular eupterus with albino spots, or maybe albino eupterus with regular colored spots. I want one DESPERATELY but can't see spending that much on a fish - especially at the moment. Sigh.
