On the Road to Balance...

[AMcCaleb]

So, I've had fishtanks in my house since I was a kid but never really got my own tanks until last year. It started with a little 1 gallon tank from Wal Mart with 1 guppy in it for my daughter. It quickly became apparent that 1 gallon tanks are a terrible idea unless you are putting together a nano tank and are very experienced. But I was not.
I did realize however, that I really missed keeping fish since I hadn't had a tank since I was a kid so I talked my wife into letting me purchase a 29 gallon off of Craigslist. I set it up with purple and blue gravel and a sunken pirate ship decoration. I tossed in a few fake plants and it was ready to go. Went to the LFS my wife picked out some glofish and I picked out a rainbow shark, and a dwarf gourami. We were set, we went home, put them in the tank and I immediately realized that I had a new hobby.
So, instead of honing my skills in fishkeeping on this 29 gallon tank, I went back to Craigslist looking to go big right away. I talked my wife into letting me look for a 75 gallon tank and ended up coming home with a 120 gallon tank (close enough right?). I set that monster up in my living room and had it up and running in a few weeks. Another sunken ship decoration and some more fake plants and the tank was ready for fish. I threw in a bunch of fish at one time and lost about half of them. In my ignorance I had only cycled the tank for one day before adding a bunch of fish. It was at this point I realized that I needed to become a little more knowledgeable about what I'm doing.
So, at this point it's been three months since I first purchased that 1 gallon tank for my daughter. Two weeks after that I had my 29 gallon and 2 months after that I had my 120. Just a little too quickly. But I realized that there was probably more to this thing that just putting a few drops of dechlorinator into tap water and then throwing it in the tank. So, I started reading and googling. First thing I learned about was pH, then I learned about filtration and ammonia, nitrites, nitrates and how the biological filtration works. I learned the importance of regular water changes. Then I learned about stocking levels and bioload.
It took me till about June to get to that part of the learning process. My tanks were doing ok. My 29 gallon had become pretty stable. I made sure not to overstock it. I was still struggling to keep the water clear and not cloudy. My 120 was still an unstable train wreck. I was running two HOB filters that together were for "up to" 135 gallon tanks. My water looked like I poured in milk of magnesia it was so cloudy. Fish were still dying occasionally. It wasn't pretty.
At this point in time my parents came to visit and my mom brought me some java fern from her tank. I put that in the tank and quickly realized that I liked the look of real plants so much more than fake plants. This started a transformation in my fishkeeping. Over the next three months I went through and took out all of the fake plants out of my tank. I got rid of some of my fake decorations and added some malaysian driftwood and purchased my first plants.
By now, my hobby has turned into a passion. I began buying all of the fish magazines I could get my hands on. I started studying the planted tank hobby. I upgraded my HOBs in the 120 to an FX5 and I started buying more plants. Now, I reached a lot of frustration at this point because, one my nearest LFS was over an hour away and they didn't carry much in the way of plants, and two some of the fish that I had would eat most of the plants that I put in the tank.
I reached a breakthrough in plantkeeping when my family went to my wife's parents for Christmas in St. Louis and I visited a couple of the pet stores there. I found one place with a ton of plants and convinced my wife into letting me buy a bunch for our tank. I also became aware of the seachem fertilizers as well and purchased some of those products. At this time I upgraded my lights from one single bright marineland strip to a four bulb t5 setup.
Now, we're at January. My 29 gallon is overgrown with Wisteria at this point (on purpose), my 120 has a nice selection of plants in it and I'm still learning about fertilizers and photosynthesis and plant nutrition. I'm starting to think that I am almost to this wonderful place that aquarists talk about called balance when almost overnight my tank is hit with BBA. My tank was just starting to look great and I was starting to think of myself as an experienced aquarist and this ugly patch of black fuzz starts appearing on plants and driftwood. That'll take anyone down a notch. So, now I'm learning about light timing and nutrient control. I'm finding that there's always something to learn.
I called this On the Road to Balance because that's what I've been trying to reach this whole time. Aquarists talk about balance as the goal for every tank and they can't explain exactly what it looks like but it's this place where there's harmony between the plants and the fish and the filtration, where everything has evened out and there are no extremes. It's a point of harmony between nutrients and plants. I'm not there yet but I'm on my way. I've learned a ton on the way. As far as head knowledge goes I would consider myself an experienced aquarist but as far as actual experience and success I wouldn't be that bold. But, I've realized that this is a lifelong hobby for me, maybe even borderline obsession. I've got two tanks at home now with another 75 gallon in the works for my office and a nano in the back of my mind. This truly is a wonderful hobby.

[Crazygar]

Yes it is.

I started out with a simple 10GAL (like most of us) back in the early 80's and at my height had 10 Tanks running, ranging from 6.5GAL all the way up to 70GAL. Good to see that the bug has bit. We call it, "MTS" (which stands for More Tank Syndrome) and you are totally infected.

Gary

[lou zello]

yea it's addictive for sure.i started in the 60's cause one of my paper route customers had wall to wall tanks in his living room and bred platys,guppies,and mollies for all the LFS's that were around back then before the big box stores showed up,so yea i know this makes me look OLD but i'm not even half way to 150 which is what i'm (and the wife)are living to so we have some alone time after ALL the kid's are gone.

[Freshwater Tropic]

*Sign* The good old MTS days. I remember when I was getting all the free tanks and at one time had 6 tanks running. Even had that 150G up and running for a while. Man, it really bums me out only having 1 now. LOL

[C. Andrew Nelson]

My grandfather worked at a company that made light fixtures for building, streetlights, etc. He would often bring home clear acrylic cubes (usually 18" or 24" square) that have been meant to be the cover for the light fixtures. These were the rejects because a design was discontinued or there were small irregularities. As a teen I turned every one of them into a tank. I had tanks everywhere.

These days I've found a cure for MTS. It's called marriage. I'm currently allowed one tank...at least until we get a bigger house.

[Crazygar]

LMAO

Hmm, there's a term that does not gel well with me. Yeah, I guess it would, but in my case, when I was married (attempt #2) I had reached my Zenith with 10 tanks running in our house. My Ex-Wife thought I was crazy and I would catch her all the time watching the fish instead of the TV.

Sometimes they can be convinced, others times they can't.

Gary

[lou zello]

yea i know what you guys mean,after the 5th tank i was yelled at for being addicted;my reply was that at least it didn't "SMELL LIKE MY OTHERONE AND IT WAS LEGAL"

[AMcCaleb]

My wife has been pretty understanding about the hobby. She makes fun of me to our friends about it(lovingly though), but she really appreciates the work I put into it and really likes our 120 in our living room. We get comments about it all the time and she eats that up. Plus, my daughter loves the fish. She's only two but she's already learning the specific names of some of the fish and she'll sit with her face pressed up to the glass and stare at it. If she didn't like it so much I probably would be limited to just one tank. But as it turns out, my 3rd tank (the 75 gallon) is sitting in my garage right now. I just finished painting the stand and the trim and cleaning it up. Equipment's coming in this week and I'm hoping to have it cycling in my office within the next two weeks.

[ballpc]

I was keeping fish long before I met my wife and she has always been very supportive of my fish keeping. Several years ago she even suggested that I turn the garage into a fish room and get a business license. I've went from just dozens of tanks to almost 100! What can I say, she is definitely a keeper!



Best of luck with all your "fishy" projects!

Dennis