Tank Thread Tank reached 38 years old...in 2009!

[Paul B]

I know my Bangai cardinal is supposed to be dying of old age but he is still with me and still looks great. He slowed down and now only prefers worms to eat. Maybe his old teeth can't chew to well.

Last week I dumped in a few thousand amphipods and hopefully this week I can get a few more. It all depends on the tide.
I also threw in some mud snails because my Grand Daughter caught them and wanted to bring them home.
Everything else is doing well but I wish someone would come over and take some of this blue sponge

 

[Paul B]

I just had to do it today. I had to glue some corals back. I had 5 large pieces of montipora laying on the gravel and every hour, a crab or fish would turn them over so they were in the dark. For a couple of weeks I would just turn them over so they had light but I got tired of that and I had a few minutes so I glued them all back on. Now I have to look for a tourniquet to stop the bleeding from the clownfish tearing pieces of flesh off of my arm.

 

[Paul B]

It seems that some of my fish are living longer than they are supposed to, at least longer than I thought they were supposed to live.
I don't keep records or remember most of the birthdays of the Supermodels but I seem to have my male pipefish for quite a long time. I think he outlived 2 or 3 females. He may be 5 or 6 years old but I lost his birth certificate. That is long, I think for a blue stripe pipefish.


My yellow clown gobi may be even older and he also went through a couple of females. It could be the other way around because I am not sure which ones are the females of clown gobies as their eyelashes are the same size and they smell alike. I had breeding pairs of those but you really don't want that as they only lay their eggs on live acropora and kill it which is the reason I don't have any more acropora. They lay eggs every week and in a short time will kill a piece as large as a cantaloupe, Trust me. If you only keep one, they don't kill or even annoy anything and are perfect pets.


Two of my hermit crabs died a few years ago and they reached 12 years old. I don't know if that is old for a hermit crab or just teenagers. The few I have now are reaching that age but I don't keep track.
One of my bangai cardinals is past his supposed age by a year or two and my breeding pair of watchman gobies died at about 12 years old.



I am not sure how old my male mandarin is but he also went through 2 or 3 females. I killed my last one at about 10 years old so I know they can get at least that old. I am guessing maybe 15.








I don't have a lot of luck with these guys.



Here is the little devil with her eggs just above her killing an acropora.



These things I can keep anywhere from one hour to one day.





Forget clownfish, they are all on social security



Of course these guys are the easiest and never get ich.

 

[gobywon]

That's an awesome sculpture. I think this pic of your cutey could serve as a model for
a terrific steampunk lamp, if you're game!

 

[Paul B]

I may use Greta as my Spokes model. She is a real "Girly Girl"

 

[Paul B]

Tomorrow I am going for acupuncture. I have a very Manly degenerative disk and if you live long enough and do more than carry protest signs and text, you may also get these old people things. Anyway almost all of your nerves go right next to your disks which were actually a mistake when they designed us because those disks are not really built too well. They are alright for the first 50 years but not so much after that.
I think pressure treated wood would have been better.


Our nerves should have been designed to go through aluminum tubes outside our body away from those disks. But I wasn't there when Al Gore invented nervous systems.
Anyway, when disks start to bulge or corrode they give you all sorts of problems depending on which nerves they press on. If it's your ear lobe nerve, you can get your ears pierced without any pain, but I don't do earrings.
It's not the end of the world and I can still do backflips. But only once.


I really don't believe in acupuncture, chiropractors, faith healers, witch doctors, herbalists, etc. I also don't have a lot of trust in real doctors unless you have an arrow sticking out of your head. If that is the case, they will know immediately what code to put on the form to send to your insurance company.
But my wife goes to this acupuncturist and she is kind of a Supermodel so I will try it. If nothing else at least I will be a little more porous, and poor as insurance companies frown on acupuncture.

 

[Bulldog5]

I did acupuncture for about 6 month I liked it. he was able to get pains I had in my hands for years to go away just after 2 appointments. Every other doc wanted me to go on a pian meds for it but I can't with my job. He also helped my knee pain. I enjoyed it very much. Work got a bit busy and I stoped going i have to get back there

 

[Paul B]

I am also going back. I think my hair started to grow, unfortunately it is in my ears.


Andy, (who works in my favorite LFS) there is a small chance I am coming in on Sunday. I hope you have something special and not those silly, common tangs, angels and gold fish you guys keep getting. I need purple gorgonians, Janss pipefish or anything that I have not seen 50,000 times. Something totally cool and odd. :biggrin:

 

[Paul B]

Happy Birthday America. :biggrin:

 

[Paul B]

I hope everybody had a great Fourth of July.
We celebrated as we always do on our boat with good friends that we have had from high school.
From out location anchored in Port Washington we could see the fireworks from Manhattan, the Bronx and Connecticut so it was a great night.
Happy Birthday America.

 

[Paul B]

I collected a bunch more amphipods and mud yesterday as I was exploring the muddy tide pool. There are thousands of baby horseshoe crabs but the mud there is shoe sucking mud and you sink up to your knees and lose your shoes. I am surprised the crabs like it.
It's places like that which keeps horseshoe crabs abundant in the Long Island Sound but unfortunately, the horseshoe crabs are less every year. I used to see dozens of adults hanging around or mating. This year so far I have seen one adult.
Their muddy habitats are slowly disappearing to condo's and parking lots. The place I go is a wildlife preserve but it is only about 200 yards long which isn't real big and the part the crabs spawn in is not much larger than a medium size home.
Even the fiddler crabs are disappearing. I still find maybe a hundred or two there, but I used to see thousands.
I still collect mud there for the bacteria and I am sure that will always be available.

 

[LongIslandAndy]

I see the water has cleared up lol

 

[Paul B]

That picture is probably from before you were there.

 

[4Fish]

Did you hit Louie's for lunch? On the other side is a great fishing spot. My wife would drop me off, go shopping for 2 hours, and then come back to get me.

 

[Paul B]

My boat is at a marina 100 yards from Louie's and we go there all the time. On the weekends their dock fills up and you have to get there early to get your boat there.
Louie's is the best restaurant there which is why they have been in business since 1907

 

[Paul B]

double post

 

[Paul B]

This morning I came downstairs and looked at my tank and all of a sudden, the tank lights went out. I walked around the back of the tank in the closet, and the lights came back on. I stated looking at the fish and the lights went out. 15 seconds later, they came back on and I walked around the back, and they went off. Every 10 or 15 seconds the lights would go out.
It is easy to fix a problem if it stays a problem but much harder to fix something that keeps fixing itself.
But in this case, I figured it out easily. I touched the copper tubing that the LEDs are mounted on and it was hot. Then I touched the "radiator" I built that is supposed to cool the water running through the tube that ther LEDs are mounted on and it was cold. That means the water is not circulating and the LEDs were getting too hot.
I didn't even think the pump was needed but now I know it is.
The tiny pump was very hot so I knew it was getting power but it was not pumping. Luckily, I have a spare.
I drained the water out of the water cooled lighting system and installed the new pump. The old one does not come apart so I will just buy another spare. This one lasted a couple of years and they are not that expensive.

 

[Paul B]

I know I keep saying my bangai cardinal is dying of old age but he is still with me. As a matter of fact, his cataracts cleared up and he is livelier than ever and he eats much more than he ever did. I think he is having a mid life, or end of life crisis as he looks like a teenager. I can't make heads or tails out of it as he didn't hardly eat anything for a couple of months and he is making up for it now. Very weird.
On another note one of my flasher wrasses jumped out. I wish it was my much to big blue wrasse. Soon I will catch that guy and give him away because he is about 7" and much to big for my tank. He also jumped out once and it was so quick that he jumped into my hands and I threw him back. I should have thrown him in a bucket but I didn't think fast enough. At my age thinking is much slower than it used to be. I am still waiting for the results of the last Presidential election.

 

[Paul B]

Some thoughts about the hobby. Now it is boating season so I have little time for my tank. Sometimes I get home after the tank lights go out so the fish go to sleep without dinner. They get over it. Sometimes I can't change water for 3, 4 or 5 months, I never got a bad text from my fish as they understand. My algae screen is so full it put up a sign that reads "Produce Stand". My fish know me and forgive me.
I think we think too much into this, especially with those stupid test kits where many people believe the numbers have to be exactly in the blue area of that little paper that comes with that $5.00 chart.
If the fish are smiling and the corals are living and opening up, forget those kits and go out for a nice Merlot, watch the sunset, have a chocolate covered strawberry. The fish are fine.
But too many times we go nuts and get all stressed. If you want to get stressed, tell your wife she looks fat in those shorts or after she spends $175.00 on a hair cut, tell her she looks like she combed her hair with an egg beater.

If you get stressed about anything in this hobby, sell everything and get out, maybe sell canoe's.
It's a hobby and everything about it is supposed to be either fun, interesting or at least make girls like you. (If you are a man of course)
My wife is a little mad at me right now because a few days ago our Daughter invited us to a dinner at a very expensive restaurant in Manhattan for a party.
I hate Manhattan and tell people all the time that if not for my Grand Kids you would have to give me at least $5,000.00 to go there for anything. If you offer me $4,999.00, I won't go. I worked there for 40 years and that's how I feel. If course if you offer me $5,000.05. Then I may go.
Anyway. My wife has always been GaGa over Tom Sellic.
We didn't go.
Guess who was sitting in the next seat that my wife was supposed to sit in? Yep. Tom Sellic.

 

[Paul B]

The Janss pipefish are doing better than my wildest dreams. Well, maybe not my wildest dreams as they all involve Supermodels, but my other wild dreams that don't involve Supermodels. like less than one percent of my dreams. The ones that involve pipefish.
The pipefish are eating new born brine shrimp. My biggest concern is that I can't hatch enough shrimp for all my pod eaters as I have plenty.
I may have to build a larger shrimp hatchery. I have the 2 Janss pipefish. 2 bluestipe pipefish, 2 mandarins, another unknown pipefish, a clown gobi, 4 or 5 queen anthias, a lepard wrasse and 2 or 3 flasher wrasses.
I can't tell exactly how many fish I have because I have a lot of rockwork and behind my tank is in a closet where 3/4s of the tank I can't see and the thing is 6' long.
The queen anthias and flasher wrasses all look the same, sort of like Supermodels and I can't tell how many I have. I have a lousy memory as it is and don't remember when I got any of them except for the Janss pipefish because that was yesterday.

Tomorrow I will forget about them and in a few months, I will be looking at the tank and say: Wow, what cool looking pipefish, I wonder where they came from.

I always had a bad memory. When I met my starter wife almost 50 years ago, (the one I am still married to)
I used to call her on a "pay phone" (google it) and hope she wouldn't answer the phone right away so I had time to look at the little piece of paper in my wallet that had her name on it.

I still have my little black book from when I was 18. It has all the girls I met while I was in the Army and it spans many states and countries, even Australia. Of course they are all Grand Mothers now if they are even alive. I hope so because, to me, they were all Supermodels as I feel most women are. It's a state of mind and has a lot to do with character, personality and their love of fish.

I met a beautiful girl once working at a place in Colorado that had a waterfall. She was behind a counter. We talked for a while and I really liked her and asked her out. She kept changing the subject and I figured she just wanted to stick a sea urchin in my eye.

I met her again and she was limping, so I asked what was wrong. She told me she only had one leg as she lost the other one from cancer and she was embarrassed to tell me.
That made me like her even more but I was shipping out to Viet Nam in a day so I couldn't hang around. The Army frowns on you not going to a war because you met a girl you liked. I never heard of her again.
If she saw me now, she would probably laugh as I am not exactly the "Stud Muffin" I was then