sell me on fresh water

ok I'm a salty for the last 6 months. I love it and I'm not bad at it. I really like coral but I'm way better at the raising the fish but I'm working at it. I have never had fresh water other than gold fish and grommies one time I had an up side down catfish. But honestly want understand why fresh water is so good. put up some pics and tell me why you think fresh is better. I had a friend when I was yunger who loved chclids he had a trailer full of them he even breeded some kind of new one. Back then I was a drug addict and just didn't care about the fish but he had some good speed. I'm not a dope fiend any more and I'm deffinently really getting into the whole fish scene. If it not one addiction it's another!

Congrats on the sobriety! I'm 3 years sober myself. Glad to see I'm not the only one who swapped to the fish addiction!
Hmmmm sell you on fresh.... Well SW vs FW is basically up to the tank keepers.... The pros on fresh, less chemicals to buy, fish are cheaper, you can have plants..... I'm not the best person for this I've only has fresh myself, I could never afford to do salt unless I stocked it with whatever I could catch locally. Fresh is just a different world of fish all together.

for me it is all about the cichlids. there are so many to choose from and most can he housed in normal aquariums 4ft long. i love the vivid colors and the personality of the fish. the ones from lake Malawi are extremely easy to keep and provide the color of fish similar to salt water but at a fraction of the cost. i have recently gotten into the tangs and love their different body shapes and unusual behaviors. for great picks check out my site. www.holeyrockoftexas.com there is also some more info on cichlids there. also these videos are great!!!

https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=jewel+of+the+rift&search_type=&aq=f

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Cichlids are key!!! They are good looking, easy to keep, & dont forget smart. And if I am not mistaken the largest animal group on the planet Earth. If you have an addicitive personality (like I do!!!) fish are it. Salt is cool dont get me wrong, just not my thing. I like seeing fish breed & do their thing & thats not to hard with alot of cichlids. I could go on for a while, so for now welcome!!!

Fern wrote:

Congrats on the sobriety! I'm 3 years sober myself. Glad to see I'm not the only one who swapped to the fish addiction!
Hmmmm sell you on fresh.... Well SW vs FW is basically up to the tank keepers.... The pros on fresh, less chemicals to buy, fish are cheaper, you can have plants..... I'm not the best person for this I've only has fresh myself, I could never afford to do salt unless I stocked it with whatever I could catch locally. Fresh is just a different world of fish all together.

Holey Rock of Texas wrote:

for me it is all about the cichlids. there are so many to choose from and most can he housed in normal aquariums 4ft long. i love the vivid colors and the personality of the fish. the ones from lake Malawi are extremely easy to keep and provide the color of fish similar to salt water but at a fraction of the cost. i have recently gotten into the tangs and love their different body shapes and unusual behaviors. for great picks check out my site. www.holeyrockoftexas.com there is also some more info on cichlids there. also these videos are great!!!

https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=jewel+of+the+rift&search_type=&aq=f

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JACK D wrote:

Cichlids are key!!! They are good looking, easy to keep, & dont forget smart. And if I am not mistaken the largest animal group on the planet Earth. If you have an addicitive personality (like I do!!!) fish are it. Salt is cool dont get me wrong, just not my thing. I like seeing fish breed & do their thing & thats not to hard with alot of cichlids. I could go on for a while, so for now welcome!!!

Very vivid colors. Very active and most are fairly easy to keep. Don't get me wrong I like SW colors but the African Cichlids are not far behind. I have about 300 LBS of holey rock in my show tank with pool filter sand...when people come over they always tell me "nice saltwater tank" LOL But it's not.




















All these pics are actual pics of my fish besides this one below....It is a pic o stole from Deadman. I LOVE THIS PIC!!

what kind of fish is that????? i was one of those at pet land only thing is it had yellow instead of red.

LOL im just letting you know right now they dont have this at petland. If they do im getting in my car now. Yssichromis Piceata from lake Victoria...very rare. The only person I know that has them is Deadman.

Nice red emp coloring up. Where did he come from?

Very nice red emp.

African cichlids are the poormans saltwater...

JACK D wrote:

African cichlids are the poormans saltwater...

Try Buying a Wild Caught Zaire Frontosa or better yet Petrochromis Bulu Point and you'll never call them a poorman's salt water

I love the green lush green planted tanks with a dash of color. I love south American cichlids not so much the africans.

Fresh water is cheaper. Can be easy compared to SW. For me I really like plants. I would some day like a SW tank. But I don't have the money or time.

khrister wrote:

JACK D wrote:

African cichlids are the poormans saltwater...

Try Buying a Wild Caught Zaire Frontosa or better yet Petrochromis Bulu Point and you'll never call them a poorman's salt water

Agreed!

OK for the most part setting up an african tank is not that bad price wise. Unless you are talking crazy wild caught fish. Most common africans are easy to get. Is that better???

JACK D wrote:

African cichlids are the poormans saltwater...

LoL Jack.

SW and FW are very different and require different equipment.

For me, I personally like to breed my fish, get fry, move them to another tank, switch fish around. Most FW fish are hardy and can stand different water environments. So to a select few that only dab in common africans (like red zebras and yellow labs) you are right, salt may be a financial deterrent; but for the majority of us on the forums who are avid collectors of rare breeds of africans at different collections points across the globe, pl*cos, and other exotics... it's a choice of preference, not economics.

On a side, note...you never knew a little joking comment could get so much attention eh? lol

cant help you here, i went from freshwater to saltwater and i have never looked back. some try to say that there are some freshwater fish out there that rival salt for color IMHO this is false information (there are however saltwater fish as drab as freshies though). plants are another thing that gets drug into the equation, while it is true there are more plants fro freshwater ( i say this becasue most saltwater plantlife ia a macro algae and most fish will mow it down) there are however a few plants for salt so fresh winds this round. breeding fresh wins this round also because i personally have not heard of anyone breeding anything but clowns. now, lets delve on the cost thing, if one could breed salwater fish easily to sell then cost of fish would drop also so IMHO 1 reason for the cheapness of freshwater fish is beign able to breed them easier, the second reason is wal-mart LOL. basically it is preference as far as i am concerned if i were to keep another freshwater tank it would consiste of fancy tailed guppies, angel fish, neon tetras, and painted glass fish no other freshwater fish seem to tickle my fancy.

WOW!!!! guys I never knew that fresh water fish could be so colorful. what do I need for a small set up and how do I find fish like that? I thought that salt water fish were nice but thanks for opening my eyes!!

I can set up a fresh water tank for under $300 with a used tank. But still setting up and keeping it running is way cheaper not even talking about the cost of live stock.

John C. wrote:

WOW!!!! guys I never knew that fresh water fish could be so colorful. what do I need for a small set up and how do I find fish like that? I thought that salt water fish were nice but thanks for opening my eyes!!

Craigslist is a good place to start to look for a setup. I would do your research 1st and see what you would like to keep. There are soooooo many to choose from but It is not always best to just start mixing them all together. I would start with choosing what type of Cichlid I wanted...for example. South American, Central American or African.

Here are a few of my fish.