Tales from the tank

It's nearly a year since I got the fish tank so here's a round-up of recent events.

Platies: Saddest news is that Baby Fish, the platy who was born in my tank and survived to adulthood, now has the property Alive=FALSE. He'd been moping about for a while although I couldn't determine the symptoms. Maybe there just wasn't anyone his age to play with. I now have 2 platies surviving from the first batch of fish - the dominant male and one of the females. Here she is stalking the flakes, emerging from cover like a big fat orange fishy submarine.



Apistogrammas: The observant will have spotted an unknown fish in the above photo. It'd been a while since I added any new fish and so I took myself to the shop a couple of weeks ago and found a lovely pair of Apistogramma Viejita. These are dwarf cichlids which are fairly rapidly turning into my favourite bunch of fish. I have a yound adult male (pictured above and below) and what was sold to me as a female, although I'm starting to think it might be a juvenile male - it is getting some red colouring around its fins which I understand is restricted to the males. Anyway, the big male is a lovely fish - really colourful and graceful.

And here's a fairly blurry photo of him, but I find it quite pleasing when zoomed out.



Rainbow fish: I probably mentioned that the male praecox rainbowfish died a little while ago. The female is still going strong although was always a bit less fun than the male. She seems to have taken to the new apisto, and they hang around together a bit, which is nice.

Penguin Tetras: Whereas I think of the platies and the tiger barb as the elders of the tank (Mr Platy even looks like he's going bald on top), the tetras are definitely the teenagers. By turns enthusiastic, stroppy, aggressive, and entertaining they bring life to the tank at all times. Among my favourites.

Tiger barb: He's a survivor. oh yeah, he's a survivor. The one that didn't die with the other tiger barbs, he keeps to himself and, pleasingly, doesn't do any of the fin nipping which they're known for. He's started coming out of his corner a bit recently so I'm hoping he's on the up. It's still the major disappointment of my tank that the other 5 died within a week or two of getting them. I'd love to have more as they're great fish, but I'm a bit nervous of that now.

Upside-down catfish: This is one cool cat(fish). I've not got a great picture yet for you - it definitely likes hiding during the day - but am still trying.

Corys: The other disappointment. I've given up trying to work out if they're unhappy or just plain boring. They're billed as the among the most entertaining and endearing of catfish, but they just hide all the time in the same old places - can't remember the last time I saw one roaming around the tank.

Oto: He's still cute, still there, and still hanging onto whatever he can find that might have algae on it.

End of story. I hope I haven't left anyone out.