Common beginner mistakes

[Skittyfish]

My biggest mistake was not doing weekly maintenance...
water changes
gravel vac's
and filter cleaning

and also thinking that to clean a small 10 gallon tank that I had to take all of the fish out and rinse the gravel and rinse out the tank and then put it all back in
(i was rather young and didn't have the net or a very good LFS)

 

[Fishsmurf]

As a newbie one thing that I would recommend on top of all else mentioned here is an old blanket !! Strange choice but when you do start doing those water changes at least you can keep your carpet dry & spouse / partner happy !! A lesson learnt the hard / wet way.....

 

[FuzMugly]

When I started out in this hobby a little over a year ago I already knew that those clear fish with the neon stripe on them were injected with a dye. But unfortunately many people do not. I was at my lfs yesterday and they had them in one of their tanks, I believe that they are called the painted glassfish (could be wrong). I was suprised to find out that this is one of the best sellers and that many people think this is a natural fish. So my point.....DO NOT BUY THESE FISH! In time the dye fades and the fish die because of it.

 

[Roland]

My biggest mistake was thinking that it was purley the fish that needed looking after, not the water and environment.

I agree with Val - a fundemently important aspect of successfull fishkeeping is understanding that it is mostly water parameters and the overall environment that you are looking after.

Sure, you feed them and check to make sure they are in good health, but getting your water parameters right - ie ph, temp, nitrites, ammonia etc - is the key for me. (that rhymes!)

But its all one big learning curve, and thats the beauty of it - in fishkeeping there is always more to learn.

Everyone wins!

 

[superstein61]

Ok, I won't rehash what others have said - just want to add - be very wary of disconnecting your air pump from an airstone tube.

After moving a smaller tank and setting up a larger one, I once disconnected my air pump from the smaller tank to use to test my airline / airstones in the larger one. I intended to hook it back up to the smaller tank - so I left the airstones in the tank and tied the plastic airline tubing up around my powerhead - out of the tank. Well, my test on the larger tank ran into some problems, one thing led to another and I kept the pump hooked up to the larger tank for another day. In the meantime, the plastic tubing untied itself - its now hanging down the side of the tank - and unbeknowst to me, started suctioning water out of the smaller tank. ABout 4 gallons and a wet carpet later, I finally see this after wondering why my water in the small tank is evaporating so quickly.

 

[Orbitorly]

Another thing I once did was, I pour untreated water into the tank derectly ( I was a newbie at the time ), all my fish started swimming funny. I saved 1 a Platy, I forgot it in the net that I put away. about 20 mins later I came back to use it again, amazingly the fish was still alive.

 

[Wulfy]

1) Knowledge is power. Read all you can.

2) Patience.

3) When adding chemicals make sure you separate
them so if there are negative effects you know what
has caused it.

4) Run an Aquarium log.
Make it your diary. Record price of fish, advice you get,
questions and anwsers you have, maintenance events.

5) Ask for advice, then ask again and again.
You may get few anwsers to the same question
depending who you ask.

6) One of the people before me said never to disconnect your air pump. I would say instead, get a check valve. Its essential.

You *MUST* read this article.
It deals with Sea Aquaria but is equally applicable to all aquariums.
http://www.marine-monsters.com/front/tao.html

 

[Blue]

Hi I am new here and all I can say is this thread is awesome!!!
yes I am newbie and just got a lot of good help from this thread !
Blue

 

[NJ Devils Fan]

Welcome to AC Blue!

Glad to help.

 

[Blue]

Thank you!