Sunday, October 28, 2007

Odds and Ends

Well I never thought time at home could pass so quickly. I have always either been in school or working. I starting working outside of my parents home when I was 13 on another farm. The longest I went unemployed was when we moved here and I didn't have a job for 5 weeks. I worked every summer, part time during high school, and many times I picked up work while in University doing marking. It has been a bit of adjustment getting used to being home. I am definately not bored, or feeling useless. I think it is just getting used to a new schedule in life! I have to say that I am very happy that my boy is a morning baby. I love mornings and he is up early. We have the best play time before his morning nap. Being a mom is very rewarding and I do looking forward to making another wee-spawn- hopefully a wee-spawnette

Here are a couple of random pictures from this week:


Hunter talking to Daddy while jumping in the jolly jumper:

This is the view outside of our house through part of our neighbours yard. They have a beautiful dog who loves the view from the top of his dog house. We have gotten more snow since this was taken.
Hunter is fascinated with the fish tank. We can sit there together and watch the fish for at least half an hour:


Now speaking of fish.... There has been a lot of tragedy on that front. I have gone from tonnes of fish down to 6. I took the female guppies out since they were being over-sexed. They lived in another small tank until they had their babies and recovered. During that time, all of the male guppies died!! I guess they thought with no women their lives weren't worth living and they didn't want to be gay. I put the females back in the tank and kept the babies in the small tank. Well all of the large females died. The would swim at the top of the tank for a few days and their tails would get droopy, then they would not swim well and eventually get stuck on the filter intake. The same symptoms have occured in all of my Mollies. I put the babies in the tank when I thought they were large enough, but no and they were eaten by everyone else. The tank is clear, the water is good, the live plants are flourishing....... SO WHAT IS GOING ON!!!
All that is left in the tank is: 2 placostamus, 1 zebra daniol (or something like that), 2 small female guppies, and one dying molly. We are going to Edmonton in November and I am going to buy some more fish. Any suggestions on ones that won't sex each other to death?

5 comments:

Rob, Tina and the boys said...

My sister is somewhat of a "fish expert" so I'm going to send her the link to your blog and get her input.

Matt, Kara, Hunter and Cavan said...

Thanks Tina!

Rob, Tina and the boys said...

Direct quote from my sister who is on the phone with me right now:
"Sounds like an amonia spike. She had too many fish in the tank and they were shitting and that caused the anomia spike. The droopy tails is a sure sign of this. Another sign of amonia spike is when they look like they are gasping for air. The solution to this problem is to do a 25% water change and in 3 days time do another 25% water change. And if you don't already have one in your tank, when you go to Edmonton buy a bubble stone and an air pump for it. That puts extra oxygen in the tank which helps prevent anomia spikes cause it moves the shit around. She also says to be careful you are not overfeeding your fish. Only put in enough food for your fish to clear out in 5 minutes. More than that will sit on the bottom of the tank and contribute to another spike. She also says her bill for consultation is in the mail. :) She also suggests for new fish to try tetras or gouramies (sp). I'm too lazy to google the proper spelling.

Aida said...

holy cow, i never knew guppies are quite a tricky species! i had to laugh at the "wee-spawnette" comment!! its too funny.

Anonymous said...

I used to have siclids (sp?). They are a territorial fish - so much fun to watch, lots of variation in colour, size and shape. But they would probably kill all your other fish.