Good Afternoon!
We are working on revamping our fish tank. The last two weeks has brought several new fish to our 35 gallon fish habitat. My brother has recently been very active in setting up a couple of fish tanks in his home, and brought yesterday three guppies from his over stalked guppy tank. We have had a fish tank nearly the entire time we’ve been married. Although we have changed our views on setting up a tank our enjoyment is very much the same as it always was.
Slightly over a month ago we did our usual nighttime routine; doors check, dogs check, re-tuck in the kiddos check, late night snack for fish check, and then lights out throughout the house. Our tank had a bristle nose plecostomus, a large blue gourami, a fluorescent pink fruit tetra named Millie, a huge pink kissing gourami, three very large Australian rainbow fish, and two small and relatively costly bosemani rainbow fish, and a couple other odd fish here and there. The next morning, which was truly only a few hours away, we woke and stumbled into the kitchen to start a nice steamy pot of hot coffee. I glanced over to the tank and horror struck me just as fast, I knew our kids were going to be devastated. Hubby and I went to investigate the awful tragedy; every fish including the pleco lay dead in the bottom of the tank. The gross fish soup was a result of a freak heater malfunction, which raised the tank water to 107 degrees in just a few short hours.
Next came the sound we were sorely anticipating… AWE! What happen to Millie? Sweet Pea shrieked. What happened to my kissy fish mom… sob!? wept Pumpkin. So now we are in the process of rebuilding our ecosystem. The heat from the tank took several days to radiate away. Next we added a couple of fish to ease the children’s pain of loss; they rather enjoyed going to the fish store and finding new fish. Of course the next step was a new heater, although neither of us wanted to risk another batch of soup, the tank was not maintaining a consistent temperature with the night time temp dropping below a tropical fish’s comfort zone.
We continue adding a couple fish at a time and now have a new mixture of very exciting, much smaller fish to keep the household occupied. So welcome Bruce and Hammer, Pumpkins new iridescent sharks, a yellow gourami named Dinosaur, Sweet Pea’s new pink fruit tetras named Millie and Dorkus, (Seven Brides for Seven Brothers is her favorite movie) Rapunzel the blue gourami, our new algae cleaning friend the bristle nose pleco, and the itsy bitsy clan of guppies. I will be replacing my Darling Hubby’s rainbows as soon as we get a healthy batch of them into town, as they are his favorite fish. He was rather upset that only a few days after finally buying him the Bosemani’s the tank had to have a hiccup like that.
Anywho, I have recently added an explanation of this blog in a new page called About Shy. If boredom or curiosity strikes, I encourage you to go take a peek over there, it gives an overdrawn summary of why I am blogging the information I am. Also I have been updating some of the other pages, and have added over thirty new links for those looking for something to do or learn more about.
Thanks for Stopping By
~Shy Willow
~Shy Willow
*originally published on A Mom’s Handbook. com
~Sensually Yours~
Shy Willow