Hey guys, this is obviously my first post on this forum, but wow, what a great resouce tool you guys have here! I just recently redid a 10G tank for my bedroom and have been spending some downtime at work researching things and this is hands down the best (and most active) aquarist forum I could find on the net
Basically, I've been around aquariums since I was a little kid as my mom has always been interested in them. That being said, about 2 years ago I into the hobby myself and redid her large tank (a 55G long that had become overrun with black algae) and it is now the family room community tank complete with a wide variety of fish.
I've enjoyed the hobby so much that I picked up a 10G tank at a yard sale last summer for 5 bucks and decided to set it up in my bedroom. At first I had a small wild-caught blue gill in there, but then I quickly realized that he wasn't happy in it so he was released. On my second go-round, I got a school of baby minnows from my neighbor's backyard pond and raised them up to adult size. My girlfriend also felt bad for a couple small feeder
goldfish at the local Petsmart, so I rescued those as well. Needless to say, the feeder goldfish (Hitler and Cassanova for their markings, haha) are now MASSIVE (probably 4" for Cassie and about 6"+ for Hitler) and are living in the big tank downstairs. The recent snowstorms knocked out our power for about a week and sadly all of my minnows died
After about a week or so of contemplation, I decided to clean everything out and start from scratch yet again and get a
betta for the tank. After a complete overhaul of gravel, decorations, rock caves, etc. I let the tank do a fishless cycle. After that was done (about 2 weeks ago), I headed off to Petsmart with my girlfriend to find a new fish. We decided on a really tiny female VT betta with absolutely gorgeous colorings, and I also got two female guppies along with one male guppy to live in the tank. One of the females wasn't very healthy and she wound up not making it. However, I went out last week and got two more females along with one more male in the hopes that I'll have babies soon (a first for the fish tanks in this house). There's also two small peppered corycats in there who love all of my hiding places.
Anyway, I didn't mean to make such a long-winded first post, but I just figured I'd tell you guys a little bit about myself and my fish. I look forward to learning more about the hobby and will possibly even give live plants another try after I learn more about them (I've always had rotten luck with them in the past)
-Brian
