Unorthodox ways to do things

[Paul B]

I thought it would be interesting to talk about some of the odder things some of us do that is not the norm.
Thanks to computers and the internet much of this hobby has become a cookie cutter endeavour and many people do the same things the same way.
I started way before the internet so there was no easy way to exchange ideas so I had to develop them myself. I have been doing these things for so long that I forget and think everyone does it that way, but I find that I am wrong. When I post these Ideas, people just look at me funny. Well, I can't really see them, but I think they are looking at me, or at least the computer screen funny.
So I decided to write down some of the wierd-ish things I do that some people may not have heard of. If you did, just humor me.
I think I will start with Pop Eye. I just answered a post about this and the person is still looking at me, or the computer screen anyway.
Fish get Pop Eye all the time, I don't know exactly why and neither does anyone else. I know there are all sorts of theories but trust me, no one knows for sure. But no matter what caused it, it is easy to treat. This usually heals on it's own with no help from us and I would wait a while to see if that happens, but if it keeps getting worse, the eye could completely pop out. That is not real good and I know I would not like that happening to me. Of course I don't think fish feel pain like we do but that is for another post where everyone can yell at me for my opinion.
If the fish has a severe case of Pop Eye, no matter what caused it, the eye is protruding for one of two reasons. One is gas behind the eye and one is pus from an infection. Either way it is not an eye problem but a malfunction in the way the fish was designed. If you look at a fish skull, you see a dent in it where the eye goes and a tiny hole in the back where the optic nerve attaches to the eyeball. Once gas or a infection gets back there, the preasure has no place to go so it pushes out on the eye. (we have sinuses and all sorts of places for preasure to go, not that it makes us feel any better but our eyes don't usually pop out) It does not seem like there is any blood flow to that area because there are no veins that I can see and no hole through the skull for the vein to enter. There also would be no need for blood flow there as the eye has it's own blood supply that seems to travel with the optic nerve. Of course I am not a fish surgeon but I do occasionally operate (if their insurance covers it)
Anyway, the preasure needs to be releived so the eye can get back to where it is supposed to go.
To do this, I catch the fish and hold it in a net. I position the fish so that I have access to his eye. Then I take a sterile hypodermic needle with nothing in it and gently stick it in the thin stretched skin that is still holding the eye in. Usually the top part is stretched the most. Then I pull back on the plunger and the eye instantly goes back to where it is supposed to be. Either air or a milky fluid will come out. Sometimes the eye does not go back all the way and I do it again the next day.
If I notice that there is fluid and not just gas, sometimes I inject a little injectable antibiotic, then remove it.
In the 45 years or so and the dozens of patients I have done this on, I have never lost a patient, been sued, caused blindness, or could not cure the fish.
I don't puncture the eye and the needle can not penetrate into the brain because the skull is totally behind the eyeball.
Now for people who think this is barbaric, and you know why you are. Just think, if your eye was hanging out of your head to the point where you could lose it and someone said to you that they could totally cure you in 5 seconds would you say, "Oh my God No, I kind of like my eye like this, maybe I could get on TV" Or would you say, "hurry up and do the dam thing?"
I will post another one tomorow, in the meantime, if anyone has any un orthodox ways to do things, feel free to post as I am not the God of fish tanks.

 

[Brando457]

Too funny, I remember my starki damsel I had awhile back had popeye, few days later it was down to normal. I was calling him magnetify for awhile .

 

[Paul B]

As I said, it usually fixes itself with no help (or holes in their head) from us.
But then I would have nothing to write.

 

[malulu]

Paul,

this is a very interesting topic!
may be next time you can post a video? hopefully won't get sued by those so called animal lovers...

 

[MadReefer]

Paul, I agree with pop eye observations but I never tried that. I usually let the fish be and it goes back and if not the fish was fine swimming around. Years ago when I first got into this hobby I purchased a seahorse, it had babies but then had a huge air bubble causing it to float at the surface sideways. I took a needle and attempted to pop it; the bubble did reduce but never completely. Unfortunately, the seahorse died a few days later. This next one is not fish related but what the heck. My son's turtle laid eggs and only one didn't get fungus and rot. The egg went 2 weeks beyond incubation but never hatched. The third week I dissected the egg and there was this perfect baby turtle size of nickel but it wasn't alive.

 

[Paul B]

Mad reefer, that is cool. Of course the baby most likely would have lived if you helped him hatch. But then again, maybe not. Most of us are not really fish or turtle doctors.

 

[Paul B]

The second unorthodox thing is chlorine bleach treatment of sea water.
Don't do this. Don't do a lot of the things I do. I am not responsible for anything you do, so just take it for what it is, unorthodox. First of all let me say that I did not invent this, that was Robert Straughn "The Father of Salt Water Fish Keeping".
In the fiftees this guy who was my mentor collected and kept just about everything except corals. His favorite thing for a tank was an undergravel filter but he didn't understand the principal of how it worked. He used it as a particle filter and didn't know or understand the bacterial aspect of the deviceAnyway, he also explored using Clorox or chlorine bleach to treat sea water. In his day and in my early days you could not easily buy artificial sea water so we just went to the sea and collected it. Here in New York where I live I used to collect it in the Long Island Sound. For those not familiar with that body of water it is between Connecticut and Long Island and it is fed in part from the East River which runs past Manhattan. It is not the best place to collect water because of a few factors. There is chemical pollution from the city run off, industrial run off from the factories, bacterial pollution from sewage treatment plants and paracitic polution from the red tide that occurs almost every year when the Sound gets too hot.
Not all of these problems can be fixed with bleach but organic, bacterial and paracitic pollution can. Bleach will not help with insecticides or metals so that water should not be used anyway. Of course we want to try to only collect pure water.
The dosage of bleach is one teaspoon to every five gallons of water. After 3 days the water needs to be airated and preferably run over carbon. If you don't want to use carbon then don't use that water for a week. Either way add chlorine eliminater at twice the dosage available at any pet shop.
It is very important that only "REGULAR" bleach be used. Any scents and your fish will die in about 10 seconds. Don't ask.
Now I know most people don't use NSW but there is another use for bleach.
If you have a tank of water where everything died from either a paracite, bacterial infection, flatworms, ich, fungus, the heartbreak of psorisis, whatever, you can still save the water. Bleach is just chlorine gas in water. If you left a bottle of bleach un opened, it would become fresh water as the gas evaporates. After the bleach does it's job, it evaporates leaving just pure water.
I have done this quite a few times with excellent results. Some of that water is still in my reef as my tank has never been emptied.
You remove any animals that are still living and add one cup of regular bleach to fifty gallons of water. You should leave in the rocks and sand. Airate it and after 3 days filter out any dead organisms (they will all be dead) and suck out tthe detritus with a canister filter. Add twice the dosage of chlorine remover and either run over carbon or airate it for a week. If by then there is no smell of chlorine, you can use it. I would test it first on some brave fish because I did once have an accident where I killed almost all of my fish. I used
"New Fresh Scent Clorox" bleach and in less then 10 seconds most of the fish were dying, some tried to jump out of the water. I did manage to save a few. Oddly enough the corals did not die but for a few weeks after, they had a nice fresh scent.
The first squid eggs that were successfully hatched, did so in bleach treated water.
When I started in this hobby everything had ich. I just thought all salt water fish naturally had white spots.
There was no copper so I used pennies. There also were no test kits so I lost a lot of fish. Sometimes the ich was so severe that the fish would start to get spots in the bag even before I put them in the tank. I think it was from osmosis. OK maybe not. But you know what I mean.
When the water was like that and nothing would live in it, I took out the bleach and treated the water. If it were not for bleach, I would have quit the hobby.
So to sum up. Please Don't do this. I do it but I am wierd. This is a thread of un orthodox practices, not necesarilly what you should do.
Someone once called me yelling that his fish died because I told him to put bleach in his tank, "with" his fish. I never said to do this to a living animal unless you want it dead, but fresh smelling.

 

[Paul B]

Unorthodox feeding methods
Again, I thought everyone did this stuff. OK maybe not but it was always common sense to me.
Like I said there was not always commercially available stuff to feed our animals. The hobby of keeping the animals started first, then the hobby about feeding and careing for them came about. This is about food that is maybe not available to everyone.
At one time or another I have kept everything available in the hobby except manta rays, I always wanted one of those.
Before we kept reefs many of us kept predator tanks. I liked triggers, lionfish, moray eels, puffers and especially anglerfish.
These guys are not especially difficult to feed but many specimins will only eat live food.
I could always get goldfish and guppies but it was always thought you should not feed these freshwater prey to saltwater fish.
In the summer I can collect saltwater fish for food but I don't like chopping through ice to collect saltwater fish in the winter so I came up with something that in my mind anyway I thought was better.
Most predators love guppies and goldfish and they are cheap so I had a tank with these fish in it and just before I fed them to my fish I injected them in their belly with fish oil. You knew I was going to get fish oil in this post someplace, didn't you?
Fish oil like cod liver oil is of course from salt water fish and very healthy for our fish. I figured if I injected this oil into a prey fish my predator fish would get the benefit of the salt water oil. It worked and whenever I have one of those fish that will only eat live fish, I fill the guppy or goldfish up with salt water fish oil. (I take the stuff myself every day)
I also inject live grass shrimp with oil but I don't think this is needed, I do it just because I can and I think the extra oil helps.
This also has another benefit but not so much for the guppy. The prey fish does not swim too well after this enhancement so the predator can catch it easier. Now don't be a Sissy, these are feeder fish that are going to be fed to fish anyway. I eat fish every day along with shrimp, clams, oysters and squid and I never really thought how that animal suffered before I ate it. I don't eat red meat so I don't hurt cows so it evens out.
Besides those shrimp you are feeding your fish were also happily swimming around minding their own business.
Another thing that some may find a little odd is feeding Plaster of Paris to fish. Don't re read that, I did say Plaster of Paris, the stuff your walls are made out of. OK not just plaster the way it comes out of the box. I do something to it first.
And I only do this for special fish like moorish Idols and maybe angelfish. Plaster of Paris is just calcium, you can eat the stuff, (but don't)
I also did not invent this but it was used many years ago, before we forgot some basics.
When I keep moorish Idols or any fish I want to get extra calcium into I do this. I mix a little Plaster of Paris and when it starts to set, I can ad whatever I want like banannas. Moorish Idols love banannas, I have no Idea why. I also add some vitamins and greens like nori, maybe a little flake food and fish oil.
The natural diet for Moorish Idols is sponge and in the sea that is al I have ever seen them eat. I found a sponge in New York that grows only on floating wooden docks and Idols love the stuff. They practically jump out of the water for it, but sometimes I ran out of this and needed something to fill in.
This Plaster thing, wnen set becomes the same consistancy as sponge and moorish Idols along with some other fish love the stuff. I never tasted it myself. The Plaster gives the fish needed calcium, the texture fools the fish and I can add whatever I think will benefit the fish.
I am able to keep moorish Idols for a while longer than many hobbiests do and that is, I think because I have spent some time diving with them trying to learn their secrets. In the sea I never say them eat plaster but that is only because Home Depot doesn't deliver to Tahiti.
I am sure everyone on here knows how to force feed a puffer that does not want to eat. But just in case, you just grab him, being careful not to get bit and being a puffer, he will try to puff up. So you then stick the food in his mouth with a toothpick. They don't puke too well so usually the food will stay down, but not always. Fish also don't have tongues for anyone who never looked in their mouths. Thats probably why they can't speak well.

 

[malulu]

very interesting read...
wow, blow my mind!

please keep them coming...!!

 

[TanksNStuff]

Interesting and entertaining. Keeping an eye on this thread for updates.

 

[Paul B]

Over the years I think I did a few things that most people think is odd for some reason. To me my tank is supposed to be like a part of a reef or at least a part of the sea so I add whatever I find in the sea that I feel will either enhance the feeling or at least be interesting. We all know what a real reef is supposed to look like but if you see enough of them you may get bored. Thats why I add some things that I feel "enhance" it.
After so many years I have had every coral, fish and aquascape and I don't want to get bored so whenever I am at the sea, which is almost every day in the summer, I search tide pools and drag my net through the shallow water. Besides shrimp I find bottles, crabs, snails, cans, chains and various flotsam and jetsom that I find interesting. Much of it of course I can't put in the tank but if I feel I can coat it in some type of acrylic resin or if I think it can live in the tank, I take it home. I don't take anymore hermit crabs or horseshoe crabs because I know they will not live, but snails, shrimp and codium seaweed I bring home. Codium is cool seaweed and is very common on the east end of Long Island where I live. The stuff lives about 5 months in a tropical tank.
The local mud snails and shrimp live forever and are free. I can collect enough snails to fill a 50 gallon bucket easily and I can collect enough shrimp in 5 minutes to fill a 5 gallon bucket, with no water, just shrimp.
I also collect tiny anemones and amphipods.
Those things are just for interest but the most important thing IMO is bacteria. I collect a little mud every time I go just for the bacterial diversity. Is it needed?
I have no Idea. Is it good for the tank? I have no clue. But to me it seems to work.
I don't know of anyone else who does that, but it is what it is.

1/4" rock anemone

Rock crab (very cool)

Grass shrimp. (even cooler)

Old bald guy collecting in a tide pool

 

[Paul B]

I am running out of un orthodox things to post about but I think just about everything I do is unorthodox and when someone comes to look at my tank, they seem kind of surprised. Everyone notices the bottles. I like old coral encrusted bottles (and chains)
Old rusty chains to me just remind me of the sea. Here in NY I am a boater and there are rusty chains all over the place in marina's and in shallow water. They came from ancient barges or tug boats, sunken shops or debris from bridge construction. Who says a reef tank has to be just fish and corals? I, myself never want to have a tank like everyone has, that would be boreing. I know I can keep animals alive, of course that is the first priority, but the next priority is to make it interesting.
I collected all of my rock in the Caribbean and Hawaii but after a number of years I wanted something new so I started to build rock. Eventually I developed the method I use now which is bent gnarly PVC pipe covered in cement. This produces a hollow rock that could be any interesting shape and being hollow offers increased area for bacteria to colonize. You also can't buy these interesting shaped rocks because it breaks in transit and we are left with roundish, boreing rocks. I never liked boreing.
I also collected most of the bottles in the sea but some of them are modern bottles that I "enhanced" by sandpapering them, then breaking them and glueing most of it back together. Then I smear on some cement and maybe some dead corals and barnacles. Those bottles look like they came off of Columbus ship. I guess it is un orthodox but I have always done it.
I would love to put a real anchor in the tank. The ones I have for my boat are about a foot and a half long but they are galvanized and I don't want to put that in but if I can find one an old one that is just iron, I will coat it with acrylic resin and re do the reef around it with it's associated chain. I think that would be interesting.
The most interesting tank I ever saw was many years ago in Manhattan in Aquarium Stock Company which was a huge aquarium store. In those days it was only freshwater and they had a large discus tank of about 300 gallons. In it was a real old toilet bowl, kind of broken along with all the associated plumbing and construction debris. It drew most of the oohs and aahs because of it's oddity. It sounds awful but it was anything but. :fun5:
Before and after "rock"

One of my older "rocks"

Structures like this supports my entire reef off the substrait.

Making a bottle

More PVC, hollow "rock"

Another home made bottle

How old is this bottle? Not very

I had to include this

 

[Paul B]

I don't know how all of you guys top off your water but being I started this thread I will get into it a little the way I do it.
I guess you figured out that I like to build and modify things. My top off system is totally automatic and I only have to touch it every year or so.
I hung this (blue) bucket from the ceiling in my workshop so it is higher than my reef. The water flows to the RO unit through an electric valve. As long as the valve is energized, water flows. From the RO unit below the bucket, it flows to the acrylic DI to the left of the bucket. From there it enters the bucket. As the bucket fills, it raises the float which is a film container connected to that pink string. The string is connected to an old thermostat mercury switch so that when the water rises, the float rises lifting the mercury switch which shuts off power to the electric valve and the water to the RO stops. The bucket stays filled.
There is also a tube coming out near the top of the bucket in case this arrangement fails and the overflow would go down a drain, but that has never happened.
There is a PVC hose running from the bottom of the bucket, over my ceiling about 25' to another acrylic container on the tank with more DI resins and from there to a float switch on the tank.
This arrangement is designed to only supply water to the tank at about a drop every 3 seconds. The tank normally only needs a drop every five seconds so in the event the float switch gets stuck (which also has never happened) it would take a few days before the tank would overflow and it would only overflow a few drops an hour.
Under the tank is a DIY overflow safety switch which consists of a wire from a GFCI receptacle. The pumps on the tank are plugged into that GFCI so if there is a leak, the GFCI would trip off, shutting down the pumps.
I am sure everyone on here uses the same system.

Float switch

 

[TanksNStuff]

I am sure everyone on here uses the same system.

Oh, yea, I'm sure too. (NOT!) Paul, I'm waiting for your book to come out: "How to build a better mouse trap".

PS, I've seen your rock/bottle work in your old thread but I don't remember seeing the 4-footed support thing. Is that just a bent rebar covered in concrete or something?

As always, enjoying your stuff.

 

[Paul B]

That is new. Iinstalled it a few months ago when I removed all the rock to re aquascape and do some cleaning. It is PVC pipe for the thick parts and acrylic rod for the circular part. Al of my reef is now supported by these "columns" or whatever you want to call them.
Here are some of the supports that you really can't see in the tank but they are there. You can see under the entire structure and it is something I have been striving for for decades.

 

[TanksNStuff]

Gotcha. Can you post a FTS pic of the bottom to show all these columns?

 

[Paul B]

I can't post a decent picture of that because, by design, you can't see those supports. It is hard to see in this (lousy) picture because it is dark under the rockwork but almost all of the main structure is off the bottom.