Hello from Southern China

Deuem

a blur of fast fish. The flat rock in the center is small dinner plate size with 3 exits. This morning the snakes were both in there resting. Or waiting. Not sure. The cameras shutter speed is on max and it will not do stop action.

Large Snakehead resting now. The air stone is about an inch and he/she could swallow it with ease.

My little AP projects. 10 liters and 15 liters on order. For now they are the baby tanks. The tilapia is on the right lower side. Sorry the light over them burned out and my phone flash is out of order also. The PVC tubes are for the shrimp. There is at least 1 in each of them. The largest shrimp now swims up to the surface to eat fish pellets when I feed the fish. Brave shrimp to swim into a feeding frenzy. He has claws and comes up boxing a way into the food. Chances are if the shrimp can nip one of them, it will die and then he eats fresh fish. Win, win for the shrimp if it makes it.

These are the large net cups I got to fit the glass jugs above. Right now it is full of flower seeds that are doing nothing. I even dug down to see nothing. No luck with anything I bought that day. I think they were old seeds. Maybe many years old. I am worried because it is the same store I bought the strawberry seeds. In the back ground are a couple of net cups wicking away in coffee cups. They are ready to be moved.

Did I mention why nothing works in Win 10. It deleted every thing it didn't like. All the little programs like phone to computer. Ipad to computer. Thanks Gates. A free piece of crap and full of lies. I want my XP3 back. It worked perfect for me. So perfect no one wanted to move up so he destroyed every thing on the net for us so we had no choice. Nice guy. What, needed a few more billion Bill? My XP3 was running like a race car. The Win 10 is like a wagon in the mud. I am now thinking of going to unix or Linux and tossing his crap out.

nosliwmas

Deuem wrote:

Large Snakehead resting now. The air stone is about an inch and he/she could swallow it with ease.

So is that really a Channa micropeltes?

Wikipedia: Giant snakehead

Giant snakehead

The giant snakehead or giant mudfish (Channa micropeltes) is among the largest species in the family Channidae, capable of growing to 1.3 m (4.3 ft) in length and a weight of 20 kg (44 lb).[1] It is native to the fresh waters of Southeast Asia (south Indian populations are now regarded as a separate species, C. diplogramma), but has also been introduced elsewhere, including the United States where considered invasive. Other names include xaal (শাল মাছ) in Assam, red snakehead, redline snakehead, and ikan toman (where ikan is "fish" in both Indonesian and Malay). The giant snakehead is known in Thai language as pla chado (Thai: ปลาชะโด).

In the aquarium

The giant snakehead, normally called red or redline snakeheads, are a popular fish to be sold in the pet trade. They are commonly sold as juveniles as pets. Some are even sold as feeders to be fed to larger carnivorous fish. They are voracious predators that will chase and eat anything that fits in their mouths. Due to this, they are called "freshwater great whites". However, they can successfully be housed with silver arowanas, clown knife fishes, oscars, and other fish from same size group.

Are you ready for this? :headbang:

Deuem wrote:

Did I mention why nothing works in Win 10. [ ... ] The Win 10 is like a wagon in the mud. I am now thinking of going to unix or Linux and tossing his crap out.

Just do it. Find a distribution that a lot of folks are using that appeals to you and go for it. Life is too short to fight with a computer.
However I'll admit it is one of my favorite blood sports... :crash:

--
Sam

Deuem

We translated it here to Channa Argus. not as big as the one you posted. Maybe stops at 80cm on average. They do sell them for food at about 60cm. Everyone likes the nice white firm meat on them. It does act a lot like an Arowana. Dot on the tail and all. they have to be related some how. If this fish grows to 1.3 meters it will have to get a job to feed itself. lol That would be a lot of minnows every day. Would need to raise frogs for it.

Deuem

Finally:

For the first time, drum roll please. I finally caught some shrimp by myself in a net by hand. And they are huge ones with claws about 2 inches long. I also got one that was so clear you could see right thru it. Hard to handle that one. The big claw ones I got went into the monster tank as food or a home if they can make it. We are just keeping the small ones for the shrimp tank. Under an inch. we also replaced a bunch of smaller snails for the carp and picked a bunch of very small fresh water clams out. They are about 1/4 inch in diameter. Half went in the baby tank and the other half for food.

We took the kid and his 4 friends with us today to the old pool. It has about 2 feet of water in it and full of clams and snails and is mountain water fed. They must have left the drain open at this point and just left it. It looks like no one has been there for over 20 years. I would love to make it my AP pond. It is huge and could fit any fish I can get here. Would be enough water for several acres of GBs with ease.

All the tad poles and frogs are gone. Either eaten by birds or jumped away. But they went from thousands to nothing. If someone collected them it is not easy to tell. The entire tank is covered with mud.

nosliwmas

Deuem wrote:

All the tad poles and frogs are gone. Either eaten by birds or jumped away. But they went from thousands to nothing. If someone collected them it is not easy to tell.

That would be nice if it really were the case that birds ate them, but the great frog decline has been happening for a couple of decades now. Frogs are particularly sensitive to acid rain and pollution -- both of which you seem to have in abundance in Southern China...

--
Sam

Deuem

The acid rain could enter the pond where they were but the water is mostly fresh mountain water and very cold. All of the eggs went thru tad pole to frogs. At that point they should be breathing air like us. I never saw any massive kill offs in the time we saw them there. There are also still more egg sacks all over the place ready to drop into the pool. These frogs make and hang a sack over the water line. Old sacks are everywhere. I will try and get a photo next time. If they are bull frogs, maybe someone pulled them for the farming of them. Lots of bull frog legs are eaten here. Even I like them. I have a friend that used to raise them and what a racket they made. 10,000 frogs in one pit are a lot to see and hear. The area has a few Chinese egrets. (sp) A very large bird like a stork. I see them feeding in all of the shallow rivers. If a couple of them found this place it would be dinner time for sure. With no where to hide they could eat them all with ease.

All of the tiny clams I put in the main tank are verified MIA. They are still in the baby tank. Either the snakes or the koi must have had a good feed that night. They were all gone by morning. Not one shell left. They came out of the same pool as the frogs. My guess is that the birds like moving targets. For a bird that stands over a meter tall it was probably just a snack. We recently had a lot of rain and all of the streams have a brown color from runoff so catching fish by site is difficult even for the birds. This must have been their backup plan. Stop at froggies for lunch.

boss

Thanks for the photodos. Good looking tank. My last WinBlows PC was XP as well, my first was IBM DOS https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_PC_DOS. For the last ten years I've used various forms of Unix and Linux. Now I'm happily using Debian 8 https://www.debian.org/. It loads and runs fast. It is also easy to maintain and use.

Deuem

Today we were able to locate a store in this town that sells fishing gear. it is real cheap stuff but it should work Ok. So I popped for a rod and spinner real. Hooks and bobbers also. The wife selected a local style collapsible pole that has no real. Just toss out and wait deal. So tomorrow it is fishing time for the bigger ones. They sold us some dried bait and I tossed a piece in the monster tank. The Koi hit it first and it was gone. So I guess they like it. we want to hook up with one of those big fish the other guys took out in front of us last time. So my new set up cost me a hundred local bucks and I hope it will last the day. I am not used to fresh water gear and every thing so light and small. I actually found hooks with holes in the shanks so that wont be a problem again. Although my last knot was able to pull in a few tree branches today without giving up. So I guess a 10 pound fish would be Ok. All fingers are crossed and gear ready. Let you know if it was a bust or success. I was able to also order a few lures but need to wait a few days. I would much rather take a fish off the surface then the bottom if I can. 10 times more the fun.

The funny thing about the tank this time is that the plants went in first on the glass, then the gravel, Then the koi moved it all into place. Good little fishy.

Wildbillnye

Deuem wrote:

Today we were able to locate a store in this town that sells fishing gear. it is real cheap stuff but it should work Ok. So I popped for a rod and spinner real. Hooks and bobbers also. The wife selected a local style collapsible pole that has no real. Just toss out and wait deal. So tomorrow it is fishing time for the bigger ones. They sold us some dried bait and I tossed a piece in the monster tank. The Koi hit it first and it was gone. So I guess they like it. we want to hook up with one of those big fish the other guys took out in front of us last time. So my new set up cost me a hundred local bucks and I hope it will last the day. I am not used to fresh water gear and every thing so light and small. I actually found hooks with holes in the shanks so that wont be a problem again. Although my last knot was able to pull in a few tree branches today without giving up. So I guess a 10 pound fish would be Ok. All fingers are crossed and gear ready. Let you know if it was a bust or success. I was able to also order a few lures but need to wait a few days. I would much rather take a fish off the surface then the bottom if I can. 10 times more the fun.

The funny thing about the tank this time is that the plants went in first on the glass, then the gravel, Then the koi moved it all into place. Good little fishy.

how'd it go?

Sent from my LG-K120 using Tapatalk

Deuem

zip on any fish yesterday. I did catch about 5 tree branches. We are having a problem adjusting on how to use the bait we bought. it is like a short stick of food with a tiny rubber band around it. The food is to hard for the hook. So the band must be the trick somehow. My bait kept coming back with just the band on the hook. The wide spotted a red fish and was after it for hours. No luck either. We will go back with corn and try that on the hook.

Wildbillnye

Deuem wrote:

zip on any fish yesterday. I did catch about 5 tree branches. We are having a problem adjusting on how to use the bait we bought. it is like a short stick of food with a tiny rubber band around it. The food is to hard for the hook. So the band must be the trick somehow. My bait kept coming back with just the band on the hook. The wide spotted a red fish and was after it for hours. No luck either. We will go back with corn and try that on the hook.

bright colored marshmallows could do the trick

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Deuem

ha ha, never seen a regular marshmallow let alone the colored ones. Chinese don't eat them. YET! You would be surprised what other countries don't have that you might like or use.

boss

Once we get our Koi outside in a pond (yet to be built) I am looking for fish for our 55 gallon tank

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Aren't Arowanda the fish that jump for low hanging fruit?

Deuem

I'm not sure about fruit but they are food jumpers. They will take bugs off of branches and tall grass. Our snake heads are noted for doing that also. They both hunt sewing needles off the tall grass or just hovering above the water. We netted one and put it in our tank and it was gone in an hour. We never saw who ate it but I do know the carp passed on it many times. 55 gallons is a small tank for a fish that big shown in the photo. It really needs a couple of hundred to feel at home. They also eat live feeder fish and can get expensive to feed. We figure our 2 snake heads must have gone thru at least 25 minnows so far. The population is starting to look thin. And scared!

nosliwmas

boss wrote:

Aren't Arowanda the fish that jump for low hanging fruit?

Yes, those are the ones! Fruit being low-hanging insects or birds. Arowanas are carnivorous... and not social. If by fish you mean plural, these probably are not the ones for your fish cave unless you just want one giant on display. :naughty:

Wikipedia: Arowana

Quote:

Behavior
Osteoglossids are carnivorous, often being specialized surface feeders. They are excellent jumpers; Osteoglossum species have been seen leaping more than 6 ft (almost 2 m) from the water surface to pick off insects and birds from overhanging branches in South America, hence the nickname "water monkeys". Arowana species typically grow to around 2 to 3 ft in captivity.

Several species of osteoglossids exhibit parental care. They build nests and protect their young after they hatch. All species are mouthbrooders, the parents holding sometimes hundreds of eggs in their mouths. The young may make several tentative trips outside the parent's mouth to investigate the surroundings before leaving permanently.

In the aquarium
Depending on the classification system used, there are 10 types of arowana commonly kept as pets; 4 from Asia, 3 from South America, 2 from Australia and 1 from Africa.

Arowanas are solitary fish and only allow company while young; adults may show dominance and aggression. Some compatible species often partnered with this fish are clown knifefish, pacu, oscars, jaguar cichlids, green terrors, gar, tinfoil barb, Siamese tigerfish, and any other somewhat aggressive fish that cannot fit in the arowana's mouth. These fish are best kept with live or frozen feed and they easily outgrow the tank within 8 to 10 months. An aquarium of at least 150 gallons is preferable. Australian species are best kept alone in aquaria.

--
Sam

Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics