Unusual Aquarium Inhabitants
 

On this site i haven't heard of many unusual fish, inverts, or plants. Now i know there are people out there with unusual things in his/her tank. So i'll start and then poeple chime in.

It all started about a year and a half ago when i had a thriving community tank and then it all fell apart. I'll spare the details but it ended ugly with most of the fish dieing and others finding new homes:evil:. So i had an empty tank and had no idea waht to do with it. Near the end of the cycle i went fly fishing with a friend on a pond on his property. We both were talking when i caught a small-mouth bass fry, only about an 1" long. So he and i thought it was a cool idea to take it home for the tank and now i have 3 small-mouth bass and 4 golden shiners, and 5 natural crawfish, with a buch of small bugs and cool drift wood. i am talking to the fish and game department and they may allow me to raise brook trout, rainbow trout (like the one in my avatar) and/or atlantic salmon :-D. Trying to post pics but continue the thread.

~Cam

I've mentioned it in other threads before, but some day I'd really like to start a big tank with locally caught fish (I'm from Maryland). I think it would be really cool, and you never see local fish in fish tanks. Plus, I just like the analogues we have in the area to other common fish. For example, sunfish are really similar to the South American cichlids in many ways.

Great idea. You would need a very large tank to do so I would think.

I have always wondered about it too. Being in Colorado and having plenty of lakes and rivers, we have many species of trout and others. I have actually gone Fly Fishing before and caught a 6lb trout... nothing compared to what the pros catch, but it is my record. :-)

We used to go fishing at Estes Park when I lived in Longmont, Colorado. I loved going fishing up there.

When i was talking to the fish and game department in Mass they said the size of the tank wasn't a huge deal. It is actually the current that is important. You can raise salmon/trout/bass/sunfish or any minnow in a 30g or bigger you just need a lot of current even if the fish didn't come from a stream or river they need to be able to be constantly swimming even if it is in place. So you really need a powerhead or two for the fish really to thrive.

I wasn't going to do anything too large. Just a school of minnows, maybe some darters for the bottom, some bluegills and possibly some banded killifish. I think it would definitely be possible in something like a 55g, since the largest fish there are the bluegills and in the wild they only get to about 8".

most of the fish that occor locally to me are tankbusters(very big carp,eels and pike) i keep a small tank by with water louse and scuds(gammurus) as food i suppose they could count as unusal inverts
theres a local controled river/drainage system that contains small fish possibly minows or larger fish fry and more unusaly big leeches 6-7 inch long ones thogh i doubt leeches could be kept in an aqarium down to there feeding reqirements

I am not sure how unusual they are but i have some threadfin rainbows that I find quite interesting. I have six males and four females in 80 gal with five discus. Thus far the discus largely ignore their antics.