Well, here I am just starting to get used to summer when I casually check the calendar and find out that, hey, summer’s over, and you know what that means... yes, the aquarium season is starting once again...
Three weeks ago, I would have told you I didn’t want to see another fish tank in my life. We spent the first half of this summer getting ready to move, and the second half of the summer recovering from the move (assuming, of course, the recovery is complete now). Getting eighteen fish tanks of assorted shape and size across Seattle is not fun, and I’m utterly relieved to have friends in the club to pick on when we needed them. Now that things have calmed down we’ve got our new baseme--err, fishroom, almost completely set up. I built a nifty ten-foot-long rack to house all the tanks (down from 18 to 17, but up in total gallons). We’ve gotten rid of most of the old spawns from last year, and preparing for new ones... Kathy’s now the proud owner of four new species of Apistogramma (one of which nobody can identify), we’re moving the older fish into bigger tanks so they’ll be happier spawning (although we discovered while moving our Julies (Julidichromis transcriptus) that they were happy to spawn in a 10-gallon tank...we found some half dozen tiny fry hiding in the rocks!).
We discovered another trick in moving our shell-dwelling
Neolamprologus ocellatus cichlids, beach sand! We gathered up half a
pickle bucket of the stuff over at Carkeek Park, ran it through a
bleach wash (which is vitally important, to get rid of bio-nasties
living in the sand... don’t forget to also run through a dechlorinator
wash too), and are now using it as substrate in the two small African
Cichlid tanks. We’d never want to use this stuff in the other tanks,
because the shell pieces in the sand raise the pH of the water. But
it’s a it’s great for the Africans, they like to root around in the
sand, and it’s a darkish color, much more natural
than the usual
store-bought stuff.
But enough about my life, we’ve got a season to start!
Lots of articles abound for this issue of Northwest Aquaria. If you’ve just joined us, we’ve got an updated article all about the club to fill you in. Member Jessica Miller details her experiences with the Malawian Cichlids of genus Tropheus. Anne and Bob have spawned Pelvicachromis subocellatus in a 10-gallon tank. And Dave Sanford has spawned yet another fish!
Our first meeting will be the typical How I spent my summer
informal gathering where we find out who’s here, what fish we’re
keeping, and generally hang out. Bring any fish or plants you want to
trade or sell, and don’t forget to enter the bowl show. (Prospective
board members, we can’t get a hold of you! Please come to the
meeting!) In the next couple months, we’ll be deciding on big guest
speakers and all the other meeting topics for the year.
Looking forward to the October meeting, we’ll be featuring a very unique bowl show... Dead Fish! Start saving up all those crispy critters that jumped out of your tank, because it could win you a fabulous prize next month. Look for details soon.
Also, I’d like to plug the upcoming weekend-long Greater Portland show, which will feature (among other things) Cichlid luminary Wayne Leibel. GPAS will be sending us flyers with details soon. I know I’ll be there!
Finally, a big warm welcome to our new and returning board members. Here’s to a great year.