I’ve Been Bad

So, let me preface this with saying I’m a moderator in a large Facebook group, which I will not name on this forum. Lately I’ve been “arguing”, but it’s more of me calling people out for spreading misinformation. I don’t know anywhere close to everything, and no matter how modest I try to be, I keep having people block me or post elsewhere about me. I’ve been proven wrong by someone once and even made a post about how I was wrong.

An example was yesterday, among other wild “facts”, someone was telling people that large water changes (DONE CORRECTLY **) causes most fish not to live past 5. They said it disrupts osmoregulation, harms their cells, etc, yet when I ask for any type of proof I get the “I'm not going to explain it to you over the Internet, read a book, you don't understand science” blah blah blah.

I’m posting this here because I feel like it’s more of a close group of friends, and wild facts get shut down pretty quickly here.

By done correctly, I mean matching the temperature, pH, hardness (relatively), and using conditioner.

Tell me I’m not crazy here?

 

You don't sound crazy to me.

As admin on a FB bird group myself, you just can't make everyone happy and some people will disagree just for the sake of disagreeing.

I wouldn't lose sleep over a bunch of keyboard warriors on Facebook. Theyre just the bladder snails of the internet.

 

I haven't had fish long enough to say that my fish have lived over 5 years with large water changes. But coralbandit has loaches that are 15+ years old and we all know he does large water changes. Whether he does on that tank I don't know though.

Imo this would be the case if the water changes were irregular, and caused fluctuations.

But really when you (he) make claims like that you should offer proof. It's not up to other people to prove what you say. You claim it, you prove it. I would have been of your opinion on this one.

 

I think I made a post recently about buying some fish some a private breeder, which over here usually amounts to a house visit rather than shipping. So I got to see his tanks and have an extensive chat.
He kept multiple tanks, including overstocked species-only breeder tanks with well-grown and well-coloured fish and other tanks with notoriously sensitive fish, all which appeared to be in perfect condition and he had going for a while (not 5 years, but a year to several years). He maintained this by doing multiple 90% changes a week. If that was bad for fish then his set-ups and results, that I saw with my own eyes, would have been impossible.
Personally after a large die-off of bettas I copied my own routine for new bettas in my home from a breeder that had great success. I keep them in small (1/4 to 1/2 gallon) containers and do 100% daily changes, keeping this up for 1-2 months. It works like a charm, I haven't lost any betta since and the constant fresh water seems to perk them up. If it were bad for fish, that result should definitely be impossible.

You definitely are not in the wrong. Some aquarists are obsessed with the 'natural' order of things to the extreme - like there are people who think that about food, electronics, etc. - conveniently forgetting that it is impossible to copy the ecosystem of a lake or river in a 100 gallon tank, let alone a 10 gallon one. That is what they themselves don't understand about science.

(Plus if fish were that fragile how on earth did our ancestor 100 years ago manage to keep and breed goldfish before the advent of just about anything we use today?)

 

I haven't had fish long enough to say that my fish have lived over 5 years with large water changes. But coralbandit has loaches that are 15+ years old and we all know he does large water changes. Whether he does on that tank I don't know though.

Imo this would be the case if the water changes were irregular, and caused fluctuations.

But really when you (he) make claims like that you should offer proof. It's not up to other people to prove what you say. You claim it, you prove it. I would have been of your opinion on this one.

If the proof existed, who wouldn’t want to show it? That’s what I feel like.

 

Large WC could lead to stress, which could lead to a lower life span. I don't see how it would affect there cells or osmoregulation, unless quality of the new water is just horrible ( I am not a ichthyologist).

In my experience I have a number of fish live past 5 yr with large WC happening regularly.

IMO don't feed the trolls

 

You lost me after you said face book ..Who cares ??
Who are you again ??

 

People can be absolutely disgusting on FB!!

I've seen people many times take time to go into the profile of the person they are disagreeing with to look at their pics...and then come back and make personal attacks on their appearance or their life choices. Its just gross.

I'm a mod in an angelfish group on FB that is a wonderful group. The advice is always spot on and that type of behavior is not tolerated. It helps that it is a smaller group of a couple thousand though!! Then there are other FB fish groups with 10,000+ people. And they are jam packed full of terrible info and rude people.

It gives you a real appreciation of the great work the mods do here on fishlore. I have admittedly been frustrated with the strictness at times. Haha But it's worth it to avoid all that nastiness. Thanks fishlore mods for making this a pleasant place to be.

 

People can be absolutely disgusting on FB!!

I've seen people many times take time to go into the profile of the person they are disagreeing with to look at their pics...and then come back and make personal attacks on their appearance or their life choices. Its just gross.

I'm a mod in an angelfish group on FB that is a wonderful group. The advice is always spot on and that type of behavior is not tolerated. It helps that it is a smaller group of a couple thousand though!! Then there are other FB fish groups with 10,000+ people. And they are jam packed full of terrible info and rude people.

It gives you a real appreciation of the great work the mods do here on fishlore. I have admittedly been frustrated with the strictness at times. Haha But it's worth it to avoid all that nastiness. Thanks fishlore mods for making this a pleasant place to be.

Remember when we ran into each other on Facebook? LOL. My group has 150k+ and boy can it get wild fast.

 

People are crazy over on facebook in general.

 

Remember when we ran into each other on Facebook? LOL. My group has 150k+ and boy can it get wild fast.

Ya...I think less is more in those FB groups.

 

In the past, I’ve kept fish for more than 7 years with doing small water changes (10%-20%) about once a month. In those days, that’s how you did it.

Now, I’m doing big WC (40%-50%) once a week. My aquarium is relatively new (4 months old) but to me it makes more sense than small ones. Yes, it does stress the fish a little more, but overall I find the benefits outweigh the disadvantages.

 

I agree with water changes and for me its about 25% today but, in my past I had a goldfish that lived for about 15 years with no water change as I did not know it was a thing and only topped off evaporation.