Well, I figured that since I am starting an aquarium blog, I might as well give a back story on how this all…came to pass.
It began when Brittni and myself lived on campus, in Rogers Hall. We had a blood-red beta whom we dubbed “Boo Boo Kitty F**k” , or Boo Boo for short (it is a long story why his name was this, and it had all to do with the movie “Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back”.) Boo Boo lived in a small gallon bowl on our desk with a ghost shrimp. When we had to move out of our room there and into another room down the hall, Boo Boo and his friend died shortly after.
When we moved into Beta Hall, which was across campus, we bought a 2.5 gallon aquarium and thus the true adventure begins! We started with 3 sunset platy’s and a plecostomus. They lived for a good while, and we added a male guppy which we named Zant, due to the markings on him that looked like the Zant from Twilight Princess. All but one of our platy’s died, so we bought two female guppies, which we named Zelda and Midna, and another male whom we named Link. Well, if any of you know guppies, male guppies don’t get along very well unless you have enough female to satiate their endless sexual appetite. In short, Link died a few days after we introduced them to the tank. Also, in this time, we became a rescue agency. We rescued another red beta by the name of He-man, and he lived on our sink in a small plastic bowl.
Well, we’ll skip forward a few months. We moved once again, and we realized we had babies! We saved as many of the babies as we could, due to guppies eating their offspring if the small fry are not smart enough to hide, or are not removed from the tank. We also had bought a ten gallon tank off of a girl on our floor, so they were upgraded to the ten gallon. The babies were then introduced into the main tank a few weeks later once they were big enough, and they grew quickly, each of them getting their own coloration and personality in the mix! He-man was moved to the 2.5 gallon tank, and he also grew.
Well, we moved AGAIN, this time to a small trailer up the road with some “friends”. The babies reached full size and maturity, and soon, we were having baby guppies swimming like crazy. He-man didn’t enjoy the move, and we had several beta’s after him before a little red guy by the name of Lucius (yes, Lucius Malfoy is his full name) came into our lives. I had bought four platy’s for Lucius’ tank, but Brittni insisted we put them into the ten gallon, which I did.
Now, at this time, our ten gallon was getting a bit cramped due to our babies having babies and so forth. My brother-in law had a 35-gallon tank which was sitting, stand and all, in my sisters old room at my home, unused. We found a kit at Petco for a 30-gallon set up, which included a filter, an aerator, tubing, plants, and even some fish food. We set up the 35 gallon and let it cycle.
We moved, yet again, and the 35-gallon was a tough one to move. We did it, however, and got everything set up. Lucius, thankfully, survived and is still with us today. We also had another beta swim his way into our hearts. Tenshi, whom is black with a white tail as well as fins, and has black along the edges. He is a gorgeous split tail, and he enjoys his home in a 3-gallon tank.
Now, as well as guppies, we have four danios, two zebra and two long finned, 3 blue platy’s, a small cory catfish (Steeve), a Raphael catfish (Raph), and our rather large pleco(Houdini). We also have some rogue snails who found their way into our tiny eco-system.
I will post pictures as soon as I can, but my user picture is the nearest picture I have to the tanks set up for the time being. I will also update whenever we get new additions (bought) or when our babies grow up to have distinguishable patterns and personalities. I would also like to take pictures of each of the guppies that we have bred throughout the past year. Both Brittni and I would like to start a salt-water tank as well, a nano-reef in our currently unused ten-gallon, however, as of now, we don’t have the space for it. That has the potential to change.
Thank you for checking out The Aquarium Channel!
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