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5 gallon Aquarium

Slingshot Bob

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Wanted a fish tank, for Mrs Slingshot (OK, me too)

Thought on it a few days and went to Wal Mart and got the 5 gallon. A good set up. 30$ gets you a tank, lights and lid and filter.

After you buy all the extras (gravel, decorations, pump, airstones, splitters and line, extra filters) it was 65$.

We would need to drive (get a ride) 40 miles to buy fish.

I went 6 blocks to the river with a minnow net, got 8 minnows one is a "dairy cow". Have 6 grass shrimp (they are freshwater and don't grow bigger than one inch, great garbagemen)

Also have a "flounder". They grow as big as a silver dollar but are freshwater fish. (eyes on top, sideways mouth) Looks like a flying carpet when it leaves the bottom.

I could watch it for hours, a tank is mesmerizing.
 
I like fish tanks.... but they are deceptively expensive and annoying to maintain.

I can't count how many times I accidentally swallowed a huge gulp of nasty fish water siphoning the damn thing lol.
 

One thing to note: that sounds like it may be a bit too much for a 5 gallon tank. Depends on how your filtration, but that might be a couple too many fish/shrimp for your size. Make sure you do a 10 % water change once a week to help keep the ammonia/nitrite level down.
 

They are all small creatures. I used tap water, and the "start right" solution, it takes ten drops a gallon and removes chlorine and other contaminates. I thought about it after I set it up, my friend has well water. It has a really hi flow filter for a small tank.

I thought distilled water would be good? No! Devoid of nutrients and minerals.

These fish come from the peace river, not known to be very clean. A fella on the net told me the small flounder don't do well in a tank, he/she is still thriving 48 hours later.

When I used my bottom scraper for fossil hunting, they were a common catch. I will drag the grass tomorrow in hopes of a baby catfish.

If I put any other minnows, it will be those black n white spotted ones. About one in 50 are so colored. I will jettisone the common minnows as I catch the fancy ones.

I can see it now, 3 months from now I will have welded a 50 gallon stand from bed frames and have Bass and such! Better than addictions I used to have!
 
trblmkr said:
Or you could get a dog. My dogs lick my face when I come home every day. Our fish might do that, but when I stuck my face in the tank all I got was, wet.
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LOL, have a dog. Mrs slingshot is an amputee and elderly stroke victim. She can only watch so much TV.

When I was 14, I had a "pet" water moccasin. Not a tank you would want to have "face time" in!

I no longer feel the need for a captive pit viper, though it was fascinating!
 

a short article that might be helpful as you are starting this project:
https://www.algone.com/the-small-aquarium
 
justabubba said:
a short article that might be helpful as you are starting this project:
https://www.algone.com/the-small-aquarium
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Great read, thanks! I wont add any more guppies unless they are the "dairy cow" mutations. If I add one, the "regular" guppies will get a "burial at sea" or a transferr to the bird bath. I want to get a baby catfish.

I like hobby welding, bet it wont be long until I weld a 50 gallon stand from bed frames!
 
The number of fish allowed in a tank has more to do with the availability of dissolved oxygen than anything else. This is mostly a function of available surface area (though a dirty tank may also support more bacteria that lower available oxygen). A 10g upright hexagonal tank will support fewer fish than a typical rectangular 10g tank, for example. It also depends on the oxygen needs of the fish. "Mouthbreathers" like Bettas and Gouramis can take air from the surface and therefore require less dissolved oxygen.

If your fish are hanging out at the top of the tank and gasping at the surface, it may be an indicator that they're starved for oxygen and that the tank may be overstocked.

Of course, with a brand new tank, there may not be a sufficient supply of bacteria to keep things healthy anyway. I think the usual recommendation is to leave it running for a month before stocking, or to stock with "starter fish" to kick-start things (knowing that they may not survive long). You probably have some of the water from the stream in there when you transferred the fish. Hopefully that will help.

Have fun, and good luck to you. Smaller tanks may be easier to clean, but are actually more challenging to keep healthy than larger tanks, where changes in water temperature and quality are far more gradual.
 
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Ever do any forge-and-anvil work? I'm just getting a forge up-and-running. No good source for coal here, though, so I've been working on making charcoal. Well, I might be able to get coal, we'll see.
I made a false start in this direction a couple years ago so I've got a bit of an idea what I'm doing.
 

Cool. I like aquariums too.


Reddress is right to mention this. Might be too much for a small 5 gallon tank, at least without heavier filtration system keeping things clean.

Might I recommend an under gravel filter? I've had good luck with those and adding a hanging pump filter box type filter on the back
(I had fancy goldfish - so crap monsters! )
 
trblmkr said:
Or you could get a dog. My dogs lick my face when I come home every day. Our fish might do that, but when I stuck my face in the tank all I got was, wet.
Click to expand...

I have to admit. This made me laugh out loud!
 
celticwar17 said:
I like fish tanks.... but they are deceptively expensive and annoying to maintain.

I can't count how many times I accidentally swallowed a huge gulp of nasty fish water siphoning the damn thing lol.
Click to expand...

Just a suggestion, next time you need to siphon simply submerge the whole hose and put your thumb over one end. No need to suck anything.
 

No, just some cold forming and occassionaly a propane torch. Why not just make propane fired one?

I have an anvil and a 4 pound hammer, very useful. My Father is a farrier and has all the tools.
 
I bet the shrimp are pretty fun to watch. When I was a teenager I put a handful of crawdads in a tank and they were constantly moving things around and getting into stuff. They were busier than any fish I ever had.
 
Slingshot Bob said:
I can see it now, 3 months from now I will have welded a 50 gallon stand from bed frames and have Bass and such! Better than addictions I used to have!
Click to expand...

It basically happened to me. I was working second shift, would go to Meijers(think a nicer Walmart, only in Michigan) after work to cash my check and grocery shop after work when no crowds at the store. Started wandering by the pet section to look at the fish, ended up taking home a 10 gallon tank. 6 months later I had 3, the 10 gallon, a 29 gallon, and a 55 gallon. Really fun hobby that I wish I had time to start again.
 
MrPeanut said:
I bet the shrimp are pretty fun to watch. When I was a teenager I put a handful of crawdads in a tank and they were constantly moving things around and getting into stuff. They were busier than any fish I ever had.
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They are, they swim all over. They have tentacles twice as long as they are. I want a little crawdad, but they will probably kill anything they can. Not a big loss, just ride 6 blocks to the river and net more. I will go later today in hopes of a tiny catfish or more fancy guppies, the plain guppies are plentiful but...plain. They look exactly like a tiny mullet and they give live birth to tiny mini me's!
 

Mom says we used to throw rocks at the moccasins to chase them to the other side of the pond so we could swim. I don't remember that. But I'm not going to call Mom a liar.
 
trblmkr said:
Mom says we used to throw rocks at the moccasins to chase them to the other side of the pond so we could swim. I don't remember that. But I'm not going to call Mom a liar.
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You guys probably did it at least once. It's not like a snake is gonna be, "no, I'm not gonna take this, I'm going back to get those humans".
 
Slingshot Bob said:
No, just some cold forming and occassionaly a propane torch. Why not just make propane fired one?

I have an anvil and a 4 pound hammer, very useful. My Father is a farrier and has all the tools.
Click to expand...

I might, but I'm not sure if a burner from a barbecue, say, would get steel hot enough. You'd have to get oxygen into the mix, my guess, and then I'm looking at multiple rosebuds. I haven't spent a dime on this yet and I'm on a tool budget. We still have lots to do on the house, and vague travel plans, and the household CFO is, thankfully, better at managing money than the household maintenance department is.
 
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I was looking into making a propane fired furnace with a crucible for metal castings. I saw some good plans on the web, oxygen was not needed IIRC. Should be plenty hot enough, I would think. But then again, I was looking into aluminum casting.
 
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I've had two aquaponics tanks. Planters on top.

The oxygenation and filtration is amazing.

I had seven small animals in a three and a half gallon tank at one point. For a long time. Clear water, healthy fish. Biology took care of everything except occasionally cleaning up what the bacteria couldn't eat out of the gravel.

Its funny that every successful aquarist is really a bacteria farmer!
 
ecofarm said:
You guys probably did it at least once. It's not like a snake is gonna be, "no, I'm not gonna take this, I'm going back to get those humans".
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Dude!

My dads family from Texas killed any moccasins they found in their fishing holes.

One day they found that a pair had moved into the lake a couple blocks from my grandparents house.

They tried to use the lure my dad had that snakes always hit for some reason. But they kept getting off and becoming more aggressive. They were throwing rocks at them, etc.

My mom took us home as it escalated.

The last I saw both snakes were charging across the lake towards my dad and uncle, heads six inches out of the water.

They came home unscathed, no more snakes.

But moccasins can be aggressive. The most aggressive of north American venomous snakes if I'm not mistaken.
 
Slingshot Bob said:
I was looking into making a propane fired furnace with a crucible for metal castings. I saw some good plans on the web, oxygen was not needed IIRC. Should be plenty hot enough, I would think. But then again, I looking into aluminum casting.
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If I remember, the critical temperature for steel happens about 2,000 F, when it suddenly becomes non-magnetic for some metalurgical reason. I don't think straight propane would get you there, but I'd have to look into it.
Actually, I don't see me doing forge welding anyway, not for awhile. Red heat is enough for my purposes. I'm kind of looking forward to firing up the charcoal forge, though, and getting the feel of how it used to be. Time was, charcoal was the fuel of choice for a couple reasons, though coal is definitely the hottest and most efficient.
From what I've read anyway.
 
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