Blue Gourami Care

Common names: blue gourami, three spot gourami

Blue Gourami, photo from Flickr Creative Commons, user Brian.Gratwicke

Scientific Name: Trichogaster trichopterus

Origin: Malaysia, Thailand, Burma, Vietnam

Life-span: 4 years

Size: 4 inches

Temperature: 72° to 82°F (22 to 28°C)

Food: varied diet of flake food, bloodworms, tubifex, brine shrimp, frozen foods, guppy fry

Care: The blue gourami is a peaceful community fish, although it will eat very small fish like guppy fry.  Generally, if a fish is too big to be swallowed whole by the gourami, it is safe to keep it in the same tank.  Blue gouramis enjoy a planted aquarium.  They also need plenty of room to swim.

Sexing: Male blue gouramis have longer dorsal fins that come to a point.  Females have a rounder, plumper belly.

Breeding: The blue gourami is an egg laying fish that uses bubble nests.  To condition the fish for breeding, separate them.  Feed them a varied diet and I've had success feeding them betta pellets and frozen food.  After a week of conditioning, put them in the same tank.  The male will build a bubble nest.  The female will lay up to 1000 eggs and they will pick them up in their mouth and spit them into the bubble nest on the surface.

The female should now be separated.  The male guards the eggs until they are hatched.  Sometimes the male will spit spouts of water into the bubble nest to keep water circulating around the eggs and prevent them from molding or growing fungus.  The eggs will hatch within 2 days and you can remove the male from the tank.  The fry love newly hatched brine shrimp.

Kuhli Loach Care (Coolie Loach/Leopard Loach)

Image by KasiaFlickr, Flickr Creative Commons

Common names: Kuhli Loach, Coolie Loach, Leopard Eel, Slimy Loach

Scientific Name: Acanthophthalmus kuhlii

Origin: Indonesia

Life-span: 10 years

Size: 4 inches

Temperature:  75 - 86 °F (24 - 30 °C)

Food: varied diet of flake food, bloodworms, tubifex, brine shrimp, frozen foods, algae

Image by memories visual depot, Flickr Creative Commons

Care: The kuhli loach is a scavenger so it spends much of its time digging around the bottom of the aquarium.  They need places to hide.  Kuhli loaches like fine substrate like sand and will sometimes bury part or all of their body in the sand.  Some aquarists claim they don't see their kuhli loaches often because they are nocturnal and like to hide during the day.  A way to get your kuhli loach to come out more often is to keep several of them in the same tank together.

Video of kuhli loaches eating:

Bala Shark Care

Common names: Bala Shark, Tricolor Shark, Silver Shark, Shark Minnow

Bala Shark

Scientific Name: Balantiocheilus melanopterus

Origin: Mekong River and Chao Phraya River

Life-span: 9-10 years

Size: 13-14 inches

Temperature:  72° to 83°F  (22 to 30°C)

Food: varied diet of flake food, bloodworms, tubifex, brine shrimp, frozen foods

Care: The bala shark is a peaceful community fish that swims all over the aquarium.  They enjoy a planted aquarium with places to hide and also space to swim freely.  Bala sharks are commonly sold when they are only an inch or two but can grow over a foot so before purchasing one make sure you have adequate space for when it grows up to an adult.  They can dart around very quickly so be sure that there are no sharp edges on decorations in you aquarium.

The bala shark is a schooling fish so you must keep them in groups of three or more, preferably at least 5.

Sexing:  Sexing bala sharks is very difficult.  The main difference is that females have a rounder belly when they are full of eggs.

Breeding:  The bala shark is an egg-scatterer.  Since sexing them is difficult, it's best to get a group of five or more and just hope that you have at least one female and one male.  The female will lay eggs and the male will fertilize them and they will be scattered around the bottom of the tank.  The adult fish will eat the eggs so you will want to remove the adult fish shortly after breeding takes place.  The eggs will hatch within a couple days if they were fertilized.

Memorialize Your Pet Fish in RIP Fish Forum

I was browsing the internet today and found an interesting forum.  Fishchannel.com has a forum and one of the topics is named "R.I.P." and it's a place to leave a note about your pet fish when it passes away.  It's the first forum of its kind that I've seen and I found it interesting, so I thought I would share it with my readers!

People say that fish aren't real pets, but I disagree.  Some people become very attached to their pet fish, and you can tell from some of the posts in this forum.

http://board.fishchannel.com/Forum29-1.aspx

How To Get Rid of Ich or Ick, White Spot Disease Treatment

Ich or ick, Ichthyophthirius multifiliis, is a single-celled parasite and is the most common freshwater fish disease that is found in freshwater aquariums.  It is easily identified by the white spots that appear on the body and fins of your fish.  The most common way your fish become sick by ick is when introducing new fish into your tank.

Treating Ich
There are many commercial products available that treat ich (white spot disease) on the market.  Be sure to read the warnings on the labels.  Some are not safe for certain types of fish, particularly scaleless fish.  The most common active ingredients are copper, Potassium Permanganate, formaldehyde, and Methylene Blue.  I've had the most luck with potassium permanganate and methylene blue-based products.  Be aware, however that methylene blue can stain things blue.  I used it in a tank with an undergravel filter and it turned the tubes slightly blue (permanently).  Again, read the directions carefully.


Temperature
Raising temperature speeds up Ich life cycle.  Most products only kill Ich that is in the free-swimming stage.  Ich has a life cycle of about 4 days, but you can cut that in about half by raising the temperature around 81-82 degrees.  If you try this, I recommend adding an extra aerator.  As the temperature of water rises, its ability to hold oxygen decreases.  So an extra aerator will help combat this.  Leave the temperature high for about 5 days while treating the ich with a commercial product.


Preventing Ich
There are several things you can do to help prevent white spot disease from taking over your tank.


Be skeptical when purchasing new fish.  Look around at all the tanks.  If there are many diseased or dead fish in the tanks you should probably not trust any of their fish and find a new store.


Quarantine new fish before adding them to your main aquarium.  Do this for two weeks.


Avoid live feeder fish.  If you have a fish that needs feeder fish, consider setting up your own tank to breed guppies or another easily bred livebearer.  This will allow you to know the quality of the fish you are introducing to your tank.  Feeder fish are one of the most common ways ich is introduced into aquariums.


Keep up on tank maintenance.  Don't put off water changes or changing your filter medium too long.  Maintain your water quality and you will have fewer problems.


Make sure the conditions of your aquarium meet the conditions required by the fish you keep in it.  Stressed fish are more susceptible to disease.  Make sure not to overcrowd your fish, provide them with adequate hiding spots, feed them the correct amount of food, and provide them with the correct water conditions.


Quarantine plants for a week if they come from a tank that had fish in it.