homemade cave?

[willieb18]

does anyone have any good suggestions on how do make any homemade caves for my fish. thanks ahead

[Happyfishdude:-)]

Get some rocks and pile them up in the desired shape and glue them together (just to be safe) with silicone sealant. Make sure the rocks are not hardness making ones that will alter yr GH or KH. This method has worked for me every time!!!

[t_chelle16]

An easy way to see if a rock will affect your hardness is to put a little vinegar on it. If it fizzes, don't use it, if it doesn't, it should be fine.

Are you planning on makeing a cave for the oscar?

-Chelle

[Tank]

Make sure your silicon is suitable for aquariums, a lot of silicons have an anti fungal agent that will poison the fish.

[willieb18]

yeah i am planing on making the cave for the oscar.

[t_chelle16]

I wouldn't do it then. Oscars are very large and farily clumsy fish so it would probably end up tearing itself up on the rocks. If you're going to put rocks in with oscars, it's best to just use fairly smooth ones that aren't really big. I wouldn't put any rocks in there that are larger than 3 or 4 inches tall.

-Chelle

[willieb18]

well what kind of decor, if any can i use for an oscar?

[t_chelle16]

Here's my tank (note that the only reason the pot is in there is because they've been showing some mating aggression and Sherbert needed a place where she could get away from Charlie)



With oscars, open space is best since they are large fish and need room to swim around. I suggest a few artificial plants anchored with fist-sized rocks and maybe a piece of driftwood. If you want to provide a place where your oscar can hide out, I suggest a terracotta pot (like Sherbert's) rather than a cave made of rocks. Pots have much smoother edges so the fish will be a lot less likely to get cut on it.

-Chelle

[willieb18]

will your oscar get inside that pot. i have one almost just like that at. also did you cut the botton out of it so the fish could swim all the way through. are the plants in your tank real for fake? i have never seen any fake plants that i like.

[t_chelle16]

Sherbert (the lutino) fits in the pot, but Charlie (red/tiger) doesn't, and no, I didn't cut the bottom out. It's a bit of a tight fit, but she can turn around. She used to hid behind the driftwood (it's leaning up against the back glass), but she kept cutting herself on it.

Here's a tip on artificial plants: Go to the craft dept of Walmart. They sell all kinds of artifical plants for a fraction of the cost of the ones at the LFS. Those cost me 87¢ a bundle. Just avoid the ones that have perfume or glitter. To get them to stay in place just bend the bottom of the stem over and place a rock on top of it.

-Chelle

[willieb18]

you have a very nice tank and that is a good idea to go to walmart. what is that shinny thing under the red oscar? i'm not really looking for somewhere for my oscar to hide i just want to have a nice looking tank.

[t_chelle16]

Thanks.

The shiny blue thing is just a shell (I like it because of the color). In general, you don't want to put shells in oscar tanks because they will raise the pH, but my water is fairly hard so the pH stays pretty stable.

-Chelle

[willieb18]

i have herd that you can get oscars to do tricks or get them to let you pet them. will your do anything like that and if so how do you get them to do it? do you have to train them like a dog

[t_chelle16]

I haven't trained my oscars to do anything so I'm not entirely sure how you would go about doing it. Keep in mind that petting fish isn't all that great for them since you can rub off their slime coat. And it's also not a good idea to encourage your oscar to jump because it can jump out of the tank.

-Chelle