1fish_2fish

My river tank. It was intended to be a US native tank, but it's currently a mix of native and Asian fish.




Full tank picture. All of the rocks and wood were sourced locally. And by sourced I mean I walked down to the creek and carried them home. Well, a few pieces of rock are red slate from IDK where, but the rest are from out back. I think most of the wood was carried home from the banks of the Potomac, but that's still local. Plants are vallisneria (the grassy stuff) and bolbitus (the fern looking stuff). Usually the val is much longer, but I cut it back because it was creating no-flow spots at the top where duckweed (evil, evil plant) could flourish which then led to BGA. And that stuff's nasty. Cut the val down so I could scoop out most of the duckweed and direct the powerhead at the surface. Hopefully that will get rid of most of it that's left.



Close up of the middle with Garra rufa.



This is one of my two Garra rufa. These are the original Doctor Fish of the fish pedicures. So if you go get one of those and they have a flat round fish, your toes are probably being chewed on by tilapia. Tilapia like warmer water and are much cheaper and easier to come by.

I've got two male G. rufa. This is the smaller of the two. They fight and knock each other's scales off, which is why this guy looks spotted. The bigger one's all black.



Big Garra. He really didn't want his picture taken so this is, sadly, one of the better ones. As you see, not as beat up. Also, he is rotund, not that the other one is particularly skinny. I used play sand on top of soil as the substrate in this tank and apparently I should have spent a couple more hours washing it. I have had problems with diatoms for over a year. But the Garra seem to like eating it, even if they can't keep up with it.



This is my big male black spotted sunfish. I got him out of the feeder shrimp tank at about the size of a quarter. Currently he's about 5" long and the biggest fish in the tank. He's not the biggest fish on the property - that honor probably goes to the green sunfish in the pond - but he's one of my favorites.



It's hard to tell from these pics, but he has a gorgeous ring of almost fluorescent orange around his eye and a ring of turquoise around that. Very striking.



This is one of my unknown loaches. My guess is Nemacheilus sp. but I've never really bothered to dig in much detail. On darker substrate he does have tiger stripes, but they don't show up much in this tank. I used to have more, but the green sunfish resident at a bunch. Given that they were longer than the sunfish at the time, it was a bit of a surprise. Didn't realize it was happening until I found the greenie with a tail hanging out of his mouth. This is why he now lives in the pond. Anyway, this is the only one left. I should probably scoop him out and move him to the Battlestar with the other, nicer, loaches, but have you ever tried to catch a loach? It's not easy. I'm not sure how the greenie did it, frankly.



My tiger loach! Either Syncrossus beauforti or S. berdmorei, not sure. Bought this loach on impulse and then found out that they're rather aggressive fish. Definitely can't be mixed with the yo-yo loaches in the Battlestar. They also like a lot of current so I figured he'd be okay with the sunfish and the minnows I plan to put in this tank. I suspect he may be harassing the Unknown Loach, but see above about catching loaches. Interestingly, he has no interest in the garra at all, or the sunfish. He's probably a little lonely in this tank, but I really don't want to buy another 6 of them. Perhaps one day I can find him an aggressive loach home.



This is my male western dollar sunfish. He really didn't want to have his picture taken. You can see him better in the below video. He's my first sunnie and my prettiest. He's a bit of a jerk, but at least he doesn't chew on me when I put my fingers in the tank like the female does.



Female dollar! She's got the spot in her tail because it got nommed when she was small down to the point where it grows from. sort of like fucking up your nail bed and your nail doesn't grow right.



Last fish in the tank is the small black spotted sunfish male. He should eventually look like the big one.

Below is a video of the tank.