Am now thinking that this sunfish may be a red breasted, not a long ear. Not sure. Either way it's pretty lightly colored so perhaps it's a female?
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Aquarium progress
- Thread starter thedutchtouch
- Start date
- Joined
- May 16, 2018
- Messages
- 1,844
Nice work. Definitely getting me leaning to get back into this! Problem is I traahed my old tank so I can't get started again without some kind of investment, and that begs the "how big" question.
Hmmm...
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Hmmm...
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You can't do it halfway. Go big or go home!!!! Thinking about grabbing one of my 55 gals from my parents house this weekend.
you can find some decent deals on Facebook. My son was considering a couple 70’s that were just out of his budget. I was willing to pitch inbut his mom said he didn’t need one that big and convinced him to get the 40. She just doesn’t understand.
you can find some decent deals on Facebook. My son was considering a couple 70’s that were just out of his budget. I was willing to pitch inbut his mom said he didn’t need one that big and convinced him to get the 40. She just doesn’t understand.
That's how I started. Got the tank for free. But sunk a few hundred bucks into a stand/accessories... And now am wishing I would have gotten a bigger tank already lol
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- Joined
- May 16, 2018
- Messages
- 1,844
Good point. My last one was a 55. Always wanted a 125. We'll see.you can find some decent deals on Facebook. My son was considering a couple 70’s that were just out of his budget. I was willing to pitch inbut his mom said he didn’t need one that big and convinced him to get the 40. She just doesn’t understand.
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cville_bowhunter
Well-Known Member
- Joined
- Jan 26, 2022
- Messages
- 272
Looking good! Just curious, what are you planning to feed them?
I am going to attempt to get them to eat cichlid pellets, but also bugs. Just fed them for the first time, the sunfish and the larger bluegill or two gobbled up a bunch of (dead) meal worms, and a few tested/spit out the pellets, so hopefully that means they will start to take to them, not sure if any pellets were actually swallowed today. So far so good though, they all seem the same as yesterday and I'm taking eating as a good sign
They'll eventually eat the cichlid pellets, that's what I used to feed them. It will take them a little while though especially if you are giving them meal worms also. They gotta get hungry enough to eat them a few times to realize they are food.
Fish were all hanging out at the top of the water too much, so I added some water treatment in case there's too much ammonia needing to be knocked back and will likely be doing a partial water change here soon. Made the mistake of ordering a water test kit to save a few bucks and it hasn't arrived yet so am somewhat winging it re: water chemistry. Which I understand is not a great strategy. Thru are all alive so far.
Alternative theory- this sunfish is a bully and I need more tank structure/hiding places for the bluegill, or to use him as catfish bait. Promised the kids id let them help find rocks and such so that will be accomplished tomorrow. In the mean time, hang in there little buddies lol.
Alternative theory- this sunfish is a bully and I need more tank structure/hiding places for the bluegill, or to use him as catfish bait. Promised the kids id let them help find rocks and such so that will be accomplished tomorrow. In the mean time, hang in there little buddies lol.
Well they better start eating these pellets then lol. I'll feed em some bugs once the girls are here this evening because I think they will enjoy watching that
Oh and the live plants are likely gonna go, I've replanted 3 of them a few times already. Haven't given up on them yet but... Looks like I've got some opposition lol
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That sunfish is definitely a bully/exerting it's dominance over the tank, caught it beating up on one of the smaller bluegill this AM that looks like it had a rough night of getting it's scales bit off... It started floating sideways so I got rid of it before it could die and mess up the water any more. We're going on a rock/driftwood finding mission in a bit to build some hiding spots.
I may be in for a tannin battle but this old stump looked too cool to pass up and it seems the fish like it already.
Looking at that tank, I'd say you have enough room for 1 sunfish. They're super dirty and aggressive.
But, there are hundreds of species in your local ponds and creeks that you could stock more of. Darters, shiners, chubs, mosquitofisu, etc. All cool and colorful, and much easier to keep
But, there are hundreds of species in your local ponds and creeks that you could stock more of. Darters, shiners, chubs, mosquitofisu, etc. All cool and colorful, and much easier to keep
My guess is that is the direction we are headed with this one, particularly if a bluegill or two survives and grows. While looking for rocks and finding this stump we found quite a few sections of stream that were well stocked with minnows, so I'm going to slowly replace the bluegill with them as food for the sunfish or turn the sunfish into a catfish bait. If another free tank falls into my lap we'll see about splitting them, as the kids are already scheming how to get a second tank in their room (I said they have to help keep this one alive for a while first) and this is all feeding into my desire to put a 300+ gallon stock tank in the basement. One step at a time but I agree that I've got way too many fish for a healthy tank. Going to do too-frequent water changes for now, though the aggression/territorial behavior is interesting to watch it'll likely force my hand as well
Jimdude
Well-Known Member
I agree with Nutterbuster on the aggressiveness of the sunfish. My experience is with African cichlids but an aggressive fish is an aggressive fish. The way to overcome 1 overly aggressive fish is to overcrowd the tank with more of them. Then there are too many for him to single out and attack. Typically A larger tank is needed for this to work. I had a 75 gallon tank with about 35-40 cichlids at one point and they did well. When adding more it’s important to add many at 1 time because there is a community going on there and 1,2,3 new comers joining is potential for someone to get singled out. In case you don’t know, it’s going to take about 6 strong men to get a 300 gallon tank in your basement lol. I have a 155 and 2 guys can move it on flat ground but not stairs.
The extra hiding places seems to be cutting down on the aggression at least for now, and the smaller fish certainly seems to have claimed a few hiding spots. Only a few days into this whole thing so it's still in experiment mode for sure though so adjustments will continue, will keep you and nutter's advice/experience in mind. Definitely getting some tannin tea going from that stump as well (which was expected) not terrible but some more frequent partial water changes are definitely in my future. Or leaning in to having more of a blackwater tank perhaps.
For the "basement" I meant one of the plastic rubbermaid stock tanks, they are like 80 lbs, not a glass aquarium. My basement is a concrete storage area/cellar, with two large dirt floored crawl spaces flanking it, it's not living space even though I use it as somewhat of a workshop, so that's more of a growing fish out to eating size dream rather than an aquarium. The real dream if I stay in this house long-term is to dig some trenches in the crawl spaces and line them with pond liner to set up my own mini fish farm/aquaponic setup. But baby steps, I gotta figure out how to help a few fish alive long term before I jump into that type of shenanigans.