Favorite FW Fish Group

[SPJ]

Tetras
Angelfish
Discus
Cichlids
Danios
Barbs
Plecos - so ugly you just gotta love 'em

 

[reptilebreeder]

The only fresh water fish I kept was an Oscar. I've always wanted to set up a discus tank, but I don't want to get overwhelmed and burnt out, like I did in 95' so I've just stuck with the 2 SW tanks. Don't think I'll go above that.

 

[Clay Davenport]

I'm not real serious in the fish hobby but I've always admired the Discus, from that list they would probably be my favorites. I've never kept any of them however.
Cichlids would be a close second.

I do really like my pleco though. They're oblivious, living in their own little world just doing their job, and they look so cool.
Right now for freshwater I'm running a 75 gallon tank with:
1 good sized pleco
2 5-6" blood parrots
1 female gourami (recently lost the male)
1 Cichlid type (another form of hybrid, pinkish white, quite pretty)
1 5" red crayfish
and 1 feeder comet, probably 2.5" now and nicknamed shark bait. He was the sole survivor of the cycling of another tank and was added to the 75g when he was very small. He's definately a survivor, and I've gained respect for him.

I also have a 20g freshwater tank for the breeding of common guppies as feeders, primarily for my lionfish, who is still as of yet refusing anything but live prey.

 

[reptilebreeder]

I'm not real serious in the fish hobby but I've always admired the Discus, from that list they would probably be my favorites. I've never kept any of them however.
Cichlids would be a close second.

I do really like my pleco though. They're oblivious, living in their own little world just doing their job, and they look so cool.
Right now for freshwater I'm running a 75 gallon tank with:
1 good sized pleco
2 5-6" blood parrots
1 female gourami (recently lost the male)
1 Cichlid type (another form of hybrid, pinkish white, quite pretty)
1 5" red crayfish
and 1 feeder comet, probably 2.5" now and nicknamed shark bait. He was the sole survivor of the cycling of another tank and was added to the 75g when he was very small. He's definately a survivor, and I've gained respect for him.

I also have a 20g freshwater tank for the breeding of common guppies as feeders, primarily for my lionfish, who is still as of yet refusing anything but live prey.

Before I over did it and got burnt out on too many fish tanks (and still doing the reptiles), I was quite heavy in the aquarium scene. I remember all the turmoil with the blood parrots, and kinda thought it funny that they (fish people) have the same exact pro/con hybrid battles that we do. I imagine that must happen in just about every business/hobby involving keeping and breeding of animals.

 

[Clay Davenport]

Yep, and it's odd that I am so opposed to hybrid herps but have no problem at all owning hybrid fish lol. And I'm sure this thread will come back to haunt me in the future as ammunition against me in a reptile hybrid debate.
Of course the bloods are mules so it is quite different.
I've had these for a couple of years and while I still have no real issue with fish hybrids in general, I have become opposed to this specific hybrid. The reason is the common mouth deformity, I'm sure you know what I'm talking about. I'll never own another blood parrot for this reason. Well, that and the fact they insist on laying eggs every 6 weeks which they agressively defend for no reason whatsoever.
I set the tank up for my wife mainly, and we stocked it with things we both admired, but she particularly liked. If it had been my tank I'd have put piranahs in it, I'm a carnivore afficionado, but I've passed on several things I'd like to keep because they were incompatible with some of her choices.
Our salt tank though is entirely carnivore, and I really get into it.

 

[SPJ]

1 Cichlid type (another form of hybrid, pinkish white, quite pretty)

Clay,
Does your cichlid look like this?
If so, it is a pink convict. Very pretty IMO.

If it had been my tank I'd have put piranahs in it

Have you ever kept them before? Very overrated from my experience with them. Nothing at all like I expected. Maybe some of the other species exhibit "pirahna behavior" but the RB's I had were kinda boring. My oscar and Dempsey had more personality and were more interesting to watch.

 

[Clay Davenport]

That looks very much like him, but I'd have to see a profile shot to be absolutely sure. He has the classic hump on his forehead.
His fin tips have a measure if irridescence to them. As a youngster he was a pale white, pretty but not like now since the pink tones have come in.
I only said it was a form of hybrid because that's what the wife was told when she bought it, I wasn't with her.
If he's a pink convict, that's good to know. I wouldn't mind having a mate for him.
I like him far more than the blood parrots myself.

I've heard that before about the piranahs being more boring than you'd expect. I still like carnivores in general. Probably why I like my eels so much, they're my salt water snakes.

 

[Karmic]

How about Loaches!? I've got a 125gal with 11 Clown Loaches and 4 Albino bristlenose plecos.

And here's my new obsession...Discus

 

[SPJ]

Beautiful discus!!!!

How about Loaches!?

I completely forgot about them since I never see any healthy ones locally. I would love to get a group of clown loaches but all the stores around here have ich infested ones so I never got the chance to pick them up.

You have 11? That must be awesome to see when they swim together in a group. This the first time I have heard of someone actually keeping them in groups like they should be and in a large tank like they need. How big are they now?

Post some more pics. I would love to see the albino bristlenose plecos.

 

[Karmic]

Thanks! I've had 4 of the clown loaches for about 6 years. They did get ick, having come from a petstore. The last 7 I got from a guy online and they were in pristine shape. Never got ick & didn't have worms. That was some of the best money I've ever spent. They grow very slowly, but the largest one is arpund 6-7in, but he hides most of the time. I actually don't know how he crams himself into the little hide tube, but he does, and his 3 next to largest friends. The other 3 are ~4-5in and the newer ones are 3.5-4in. I'm a crappy photographer, but here goes:

These are 2 of the 4-5inchers:

This is a group shot of the 3.5-4inchers eating a cucumber slice. It's very blurry, but they were in afeeding frenzy.

And finally here's a pic of an albino bristlenose pleco in one of my guppy tanks. This is just a juvenile and a female I think.

 

[SIRS]

i voted discus ...there is not a nicer looking fw fish around I'm not into fish any more but years ago i was quite successfully in breeding discus .i mainly had wattleys but was also doing pigeon bloods which were cool another favorite fw was the clown knife they get big and have cool personalities dang see all this i might have to go get back in it ..BTW very nice pictures everyone if i can find mine i have some nice discus picture of them taking care of there young something not many fish do

 

[Rebel Dragons]

I like guppies and danios at the moment. I really dig the colors they have and the playfulness they exhibit.

With danios I have, zebra, red, purple and pearl. The guppies are a mix of metallic blues, red deltas, leopards, metal heads and a trio of purple moscows.

 

[Karmic]

BTW very nice pictures everyone if i can find mine i have some nice discus picture of them taking care of there young something not many fish do

I'd love to see the pics. Discus have it all, they get to a nice size and parental care..

The guppies are a mix of metallic blues, red deltas, leopards, metal heads and a trio of purple moscows.

I've got some red bicolors that are also throwing some neat half-black reds, but wow, they breed fast! I'm overflowing with guppies at the moment. If you have pics of the metal heads I would love to see them. I've been wanting to get some, but I'm outta space right now.

 

[Clay Davenport]

Clay,
Does your cichlid look like this?
If so, it is a pink convict. Very pretty IMO.

I figured I'd add this to this thread since it's where we were talking about him.
This is the fish my wife was told was a hybrid (what of exactly was not known).
After seeing the picture Steve posted I think he is a pink convict. What do you think?

 

[Karen Hulvey]

I think it's a Midas cichlid.
Midas Cichlid Gallery

My favorite fishes are the catfishes. I take care of a lot of fish tanks at work and no longer have any tanks set up at home. But at one time I had an entire basement full of tanks of mostly catfish. Does everyone know what most catfish like to do? They hide. People would come over and want to see my tanks and everyone wuold eventually say, "where's the fish?" Because my catfish were mainly hiding. hahaha

We have red belly piranhas at work and they certainly aren't the killers people think they are. I have no problem cleaning their tank weekly because they are little wussies and hide in the corner behind a rock. They do love their F/T fuzzy mice, though.

 

[Clay Davenport]

It may well be a midas cichlid. I did some google image searches and he does resemble some of the midas pictures I found. He also doesn't look like some of them. At the same time though his forehead causes him to not look like most of the convicts.
Apparently scichlids are somewhat variable in appearance.
I would have to say though he seems to be more like the midas than any of the other species I've found at this point.

On a side note, I sold my blood parrots from that tank a couple of weeks ago, so now we're going to have to decide on a semi large species to fill that role in the tank. It's looking quite empty now that the big orange guys are gone.

 

[cryptly]

I like goldfish. I've got one 40 gallon with several different types of Oranda and fantail, a 20 gallon with various roundbodied no-dorsalfin goldfish ( pearlscale and lionheads), and a 10 with a couple oddball goldfish that can't be kept with the more competitive and active breeds of goldfish (bubble eye, ryukin with a swim bladder problem and butterfly telescope).

My dream is to someday live where there's no weather so I can set up a nice pond of goldfish (so I don't have to worry about winterizing a pond).