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PREFACE
I was thinking about keeping P. for quite some time, looking for any information available and, doing so, also finding my way to the P-P forum.
As I had no experience with such small blackwater fish, I decided to make first steps in this area when I found a Betta breeder in Leipzig / Germany. After some rather quick preparations at home (setting-up three 10L-tanks with a mix of rain and distilled water, elder cones and beech leaves I got 1.1 B. tussyae to start with.
Only a few weeks later I re-discovered a pet-shop I havent’t had visited for about ten years on the outskirts of Leipzig. And to my big surprise, this shop had some B. hendra in stock. So after only a month or so, I had two of the three small tanks inhabited with Bettas.
Around this time, Peter’s and Martin’s book arrived, giving me the input I had been looking for: I can only recommend bying this unique work.
And then everything went faster than expected: I had left my e-mail adress together with a wish list including not only several Bettas but also something like “all kind of Parosphromenus” at the shop, the guy in charge for the aquaristics department discovered P. nagyi on a distributor’s list, ordered ten fish – and mailed me as soon as they arrived (on a Thursday). I asked him not to sell any until I could check them on Saturday. So I had two days to prepare the thierd of my three tanks.
Then came Saturday – and I was nervous as a child around boxing day to see and get my first P. To be on the safe side with the species, I took “the book” with me to the shop. Ans what can I say? There were ten not to stressed P. nagyi swimming in one of the tanks. And from what I could see from the fins, it could have been 5.5. So I got me a net (At this shop, you are allowed to catch on your own!) and fished me what should be 3.3 P. nagyi. (I thought about getting all ten, but decided against due to the limited space I could provide.)
Back at home and after several hours of water mixing, all six fish went into the third little blackwater tank – and disappeared…
…just to be back at the front pane the next morning, taking the first food. Easy start in fact! 🙂
BASIC WATER CONDITIONS
no experiments so far!Bying distilled water and mixing it to rain water was okay for quite a while with the Bettas. But as only one rain barrell in a garden next to mine provided the neede quality (no bitumen roof, no decaying foliage), this was not feasible on the long run. So I decided to do the yob properly and get me (a) a R/O device and (b) a combined eletronical ph/TDS/Temp meter (Hanna Instruments).
raw tap water: pH 8.5, TDS >750µS
R/O water: pH 6.2, TDS 0.00µS
after treatment (with elder cones): pH around 5.8, TDS well below 30µSI think that’s okay for a start. – And at least my B. tussyae agree with me by producing a good number of
offspring! 🙂[quote=”Teunis” post=2684]…phosphate is of major importance to the world food supply, and we are running out of it.
but also the use of phosphate causes environmental problems. so why is phosphoric acid better then peat?
[/quote]Never really thought about the lack of phosphate so far. So thank you for your remark and reminder!
And you are right: There will always be a downside. (That’s why I raised this topic. And that is why I try to use as much rainwater as possible (not too big a problem with our small paro tanks, at least if you have a garden some distance away from the city.), collect alder “cones”, beech and oak leaves etc. on every walk, hike or bike trip :)…)
Hi bartian.
Thank you for the hint of starting with phosphoric acid. As I couldn’t really believe this would be possible, I just called my local pharmacy and to my surprise I can get 1 litre (unfortunately, no smaller packages available) of 96% sulphuric acid (though no phosphoric acid, but this shouldn’t matter) there without any obstacle. I only have to bring my ID as it is a hazardous good (“Gefahrgut” in German).
So I will have to refresh my chemistry knowledge from university to be on the save side and will start some pH-lowering tests with the tab-/rain-water mix I use for my tanks to see the effect.
