My first batch of angelfish eggs

Oh yeah, four men, diet coke break!

Nothing wrong with storage box idea (if it's sturdy enough, many aren't) - but you will be able to monitor the fish better in a tank. As it's only for a short period of time, maybe you can leave the lid off one end slightly, just enough to insert your filter intake and outlet pipes, I'm not sure of the hood design, but I'm sure there's a workaround. If you've got any jumpy fish perhaps some cellophane will cover the lid gap.

I bet those fish have no idea what problems they're causing!

bearing in mind one of the men will be my Dad and the other my Uncle there will be no diet coke breaks

I've managed to get one of my neighbours to agree to help. I often help him with stuff so he's happy to give some help to me in return.

I've just been at MA and was chatting with the guy there and he's moved a Rio240 in the same manner and said it'll be fine. Because Juwel tanks have a floating bottom all the weight is taken on by the metal rim and brace. He seems to think it'd be fine to lift the tank off the base with the substrate in but I'm not even going to contemplate that! I'm relying on the stand top to support everything.
The hardest part is catching the fish!

The storage box is taller than my tank so putting one of the externals into it should be fine. I'm standing the storage box on my coffee table which is made from solid lumps of wood so that should give me the gravity to get the filter running.

Hope it all goes well tomorrow Akasha! No, not the election... the tank move!

Hi, the tank was moved last night. It's currently in the kitchen and all my fish are in my old 110 litre tank which is sat on the kitchen worktop. It's a bit confined for them but they will be back 'home' on Friday. All except one ... in my stress of catching fish I left the 110 litre unattended and somehow my female curviceps decided to commit suicide. I found her later dead and dried up on the kitchen floor. I'm pretty deverstated about it as she was one of my favourites. There's now the issue of a male curviceps all on his own and the question about whether he'll accept another female or whether it's best to leave him to live out his days all alone. He's about 3 or 4 years old and I've read they can live for around 8 years. It would be nice to think he can have some company for the rest of his days but we know what cichlids are like.

You were right though ... I wasn't going to get away with leaving some fish in and leaving plants and sand in. It was too difficult to catch all the fish and then the tank was too heavy with the sand in so 95% of the sand had to come out - there's just a thin layer still in and I've begun snail catching! I've got too many trumpet snails and now's a good time to reduce their number.

The carpet is fitted this afternoon and the tank going back in at around 6pm. This gives me the evening to get my sand back in and my plants and decor and filled back up with water and one of the filters going - the other is in the 110 litre supporting all my stock. I'm about to do a quick ammonia and nitrite test to check it's all coping - if it's not I've no idea what I'll do cos I can't get to anything to water change!!

This has been a bit of a nightmare and I've already decided that if I ever have to move house I'm going to buy some large floor tiles and stand my tank on them. That way any carpet can be fitted around my tank. Hopefully this new carpet will last as long as my old one (13 years) and so I never have to move the tank again in a hurry ... unless I have to move home completely lol

Sorry to hear you lost a fish, it's easily done. I once had a neon that took the same way out.

You'll just have to put things back together again a bit at a time. As long as one filter is working you can run two on the same tank and the other one will kick in when it's ready, I'm sure you know that lol. It might be tempting to give the filters a good once over, but I'd put that off for another month.

Well, you've got a new carpet and I'm sure you'll be matchmaking mr curviceps with some eligible female when things get back to normal.

yeah, filters are being left alone for a few weeks - as long as I can leave it. I try to alternate cleaning the filters so if I over do it the other one is picking up any slack. It's a system that seems to work okay.

We had a minor ... well more major ... panic at 9pm last night but it seems to have sorted itself. I have a wickerwork basket with two small drawers in it and that sits on the top shelf of the stand and I keep bits and bobs in - air stones, thermometers etc. When I went to put it back last night it seemed much more snug and didn't slide in as easily. I rang my Dad in a right tramatic state ... I thought I'd cracked the tank bottom somehow and the reason the basket was snug was cos it was leaking onto the stand top.
Dad came flying down here ready to help me empty the tank in a hurry but by the time he got here the basket seemed to be sliding in and out a bit better but I've still had a sleepless night cos I kept coming into the room every hour to check the water level! It's not moved a bit so there can't be a leak ... just me fretting.

I'm also having problems getting my plants back in. My amazon swords are HUGE the root ball is bigger than my fist and the roots were about 2ft long I've cut the roots down but they don't want to stop in the sand so I'm hoping today to find a fish store that stocks Unipac black sand so I can get a bag and make my sand deeper and try bury these roots.
The poor fish meanwhile are well fed up in a 110 litre tank. I feel mean

Akasha wrote:The poor fish meanwhile are well fed up

I'm sure they're just waiting in anticipation to view the new carpet

I'm not really one for plants at the moment, but I did force myself yesterday to buy half a dozen bunches of cabomba carolinia... almost right, try again, cabomba caroliniana. They're good for fry tanks and I hope they will make use of the nitrates. Whatever next... substrate! Where will it end?

all the fish went back into their home tonight and now I'm watching my panda cories going crazing and spawning!!

well ... since the upheaval of their home and subsequent move out only to move back in I've found my angel pair seem a bit 'out of sorts'. I expected some fish not to cope well - but the last one's I expected to sulk was my angels... and even more so my angel female. She's normally the bold one, the boss of the tank, but since I put them all back in the tank she's gone to hide in the plants.
I need to check tonight to see if she's eating - I've been so busy putting my living room back together that I've been chucking food in and not paying enough attention to who's eating and who might not be.

I guess I just wanted a bit more reassurance that I shouldn't be worrying...

Have you tested water quality, in particular ammonia & nitrite might have been disturbed by all the toing & froing.

hi, yes I have and both were zero. I shall check them again though now just to be certain


EDIT:

Ammonia still zero - same for Nitrite. Nitrates yesterday were at around 40. Ph around 6.5 which is the norm for my soft water

I'm guessing they're still a bit stressed. Just after I posted the female did come out of the plants and have a bicker with the male and now she's gone back. I hope moving them hasn't broken the pairing .. I don't even know if that's possible

Just thought I'd do an update for those interested.

Well my male angel has pushed the female to the rear right corner of the tank and during lights out he won't let her out. I guess the tables have turned on her bullying!

I have seen them together when lights are out swimming in the open so I'm not too worried. The only thing is I feed when lights are on and so I'm concerned she's not eating but then I can't force her to come out!

Anyone know if this normal? I've had them nearly a year now so they must be about 18 months in age. Is this just the male maturing and thinking he needs to keep his lady safely out of sight? Perhaps it's a reaction to the tank move? Any advice would be good

Thanks

It really sounds to me like those two are best separated, or alternatively that you introduce more angels to the tank to dissipate the aggression. Sometimes pairs do fall out, and if one isn't getting to feed, then that can't be good long term.

10 minutes after I posted I looked up and she was out of the corner and they were swimming side by side and snuggling up to each other! They looked for all the world like a couple in love!

I'm now wondering if I've got the wrong end of the stick. I'm wondering if the tank move and slight re-scape has made them choose a new spot for possible spawns and that's why she's staying in that corner. I'm wondering if they're both guarding it and establishing new territory?

If I saw he was beating her up seriously I'd seperate them. If I saw she was a mess and growing thin (which she isn't, she's looking healthy) I'd be more worried.

If anything the aggression between them is now less than it ever was. I perhaps used the wrong words in my previous post.

Here's what I've just seen: They were fed about half an hour ago and there's still some algae wafer left that my SAE's are nibbling. My male angel is circling looking for an opportunity to have a nip at the wafer. The female came from round the back and the male saw her. He swam to greet her, nudged her in the side with his nose (it looked more like a kiss than anything aggressive) and she swam back around the back of the wood where she's been hanging around and he just followed her. Right now both angels are coming to the left side near where I'm sat. They've had a look around and now she's hovering near the wafer. In the time it's taken me to type that they've both gone back to the right side and gone round the back again.... and now the male is back hovering near the wafer.

Ok, as you say, sounds more like they're guarding eggs/wrigglers or at least a potential spawning site.

Teamwork makes the dream work!

It's quite normal for an angel to nudge another to show their intentions. It's kinda cute

All that new water is likely to have got them in the mood for love. They're probably thinking its best to procreate before she moves the tank again! You might have to put some soft music on for them, light a few candles Good luck!

lol Dean! Bit of Barry White?

I'm just gonna keep an eye on them. It makes a change not to see them bickering. The female has always been the bolshy one, the one that's bossed the male around. Since the move she's really calmed down so maybe the minor change around in the tank has done something.

All that's really changed is a couple of plants not in the same place as before and that means the plant that they used for egg laying is now over hung by an amazon sword. It's now not possible for them to use that for egg laying and the more I think about it the more I wonder if that's why she's 'sulking'.

I'm not up for moving the sword again to expose the anubias they used for eggs (it was hard enough re-planting it where it is with a root ball as big as my fist!) but it'd be interesting to see if she'd change behaviour again if I did.

I have no idea who Barry White is... I just say random things, sometimes.

I'm sure they'll always find somewhere to lay eggs - they adapt when needs must - even in a bare tank.

Filters to make and fish to feed... my two pairs should be shipping out this weekend (my trial run of raising fry is complete) so my next lot of eggs should be from the Bulgarian Green Angels. That said, I do have some odds and ends (cobra, smokey and Peruvian F1) - so anything is possible in the run up to that event.

I think I need some platinum angels as they seem to throw plenty of blue around

I saw a beautiful pair of angels are York MA today. I'm not up on angelfish genetics but I think these were what is known as black lace angels. Both looked female but then I'm not wildreddeer!!

Fins were black, dark grey body with black stripes. They did look stunning and both quite young. It's possible they were a pair as they were stuck to each other like glue

I like black lace (D/+) one that I have is so veil and combtail that it looks like it's ill and depressed most of the time, not really my cup of tea anymore. It wasn't too bad when I bought it, but overtime the veil has developed too far in my opinion.

I just thought I'd mention it Dean, knowing you've got some breeding programs going on and knowing York isn't too far for either of us. I think these two were too young to tell if they were going to be veiltails

my female has made a reappearance ... she was out all day yesterday and she wasn't leaving the males side. They were cuddled up all day on and off, nudging each other and what I call 'kissing' each others flanks. It was so gentle and loving. Really nice to watch

I got a new camera a few days ago and was trying to get some photo's of all my fish with it - playing around with the setting etc. I'll have to link from photobucket cos I don't know any other way but I got a few nice pictures of the angels

This one is the nicest

Bristlenose looks happy too, has he got eggs under there?

hahaha... he's always laid on his back unattached to the wood. First time he did it I thought he was dead! No eggs as there's no female. He just lives under the wood with the cories that can fit in with him. I keep getting baby panda cories coming out from under there so he might be confused and raising baby cories instead lol (yes, I know that's not possible, just my joke)

I've actually just thought of the question I wanted to ask. You can see in the photo that the male has a small 'lump' on his chest. This is where the female keeps nipping him when they're in breeding mode. Is that normal? Has she created the 'lump' or is something wrong with him? He is a greedy pig and so I did wonder if it's fat but it's difficult to cut down the food when I've an entire tank to try and feed aswell as him. He's so fast and such a pig that a lot of my slower fish don't get a look in