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From Cichlidae communique #206 – Reprinted from Cichlidae communiqué, publication of the Pacific Coast Cichlid Association. Interested parties are
invited to write: PCCA, Membership Chairman, PO Box 28145, San Jose, CA 95159-8145 for more information.
Adventures In Failure:
Benign Neglect
vs Over-Reacting
Text and Photos by Michael Larsen
This is a blog post I hoped I would never without any jokes or colour commentary. The female Convict guarding over the fry.
have to write. To my tester friends, this Yesterday, my 260 litre fish tank became a
has only peripheral relation to my testing ghost town. in the way of tweaking and meddling on my
career, but it’s something I’ve been deal- part, for years. That all changed Monday
ing with for the past several days, and it’s This tank has been up and running, in the 11th of November, 2013.
taught me a few things, and reminded me some way, shape and form, continuously,
once again of several things I thought I with one major exception (for a swap-out Wait, let me step back another few days,
already knew. Normally, I take a somewhat back in 2007 due to a ruptured seam) for to Saturday, November 2, 2013. That day,
self-deprecating tone with posts like this, 19 years. In that 19-year period, many fish I did something momentous, and poten-
but I’m really and seriously bummed about have come and gone, for a variety of rea- tially provided the catalyst that started this
this, so I’m just going to tell it straight sons (personal taste and interest, changes whole thing. On that day, I made a deci-
in water chemistry moving from soft, acidic sion to end a decade-long experiment. I’d
The tank before the crash. kept a breeding colony of Convict Cichlids
San Francisco to (Archocentrus nigrofasciatus) running in
hard, alkaline San that tank for that time, and it was success-
Bruno, etc). ful. In fact, it was too successful. I had run
out of tanks to house them, and shops
Generations of willing to take them (even for free; I was
fish have been born, flooding the local market with Convicts).
grown, given away, With no more room to put them, I decided
and repopulated to it was time to make a change. I kept
other tanks. It was the largest and longest-lived males, sepa-
a vibrant communi- rated out all of the females and juve-
ty of predominantly niles, and with a final “special delivery” to
cichlids, though it
has housed other
fish over the years
as well. To put it
simply, it’s run pret-
ty much flawlessly,
and without much
20 facebook.cichlids.org.au
