The Best Stories Congratulations and Thank you!

[siptang]

Quote:
Originally Posted by ladyreefseeker http:///t/388649/your-best-aquarium-stories-featured-monthly#post_3429299
I suppose it could be a story of an experience on the board. Other examples would be:
~how your hobby has affected your family, spouse, or other pets
~something you had to fix
~a water change experience/ good or bad
~your teaching someone the hobby
~how your tank is therapeutic to you
~how a major catastrophe affected your aquarium(hurricane/tornado/flood)
Let's get it going!

There is no limit of the number of stories you can enter...or tell.
Fish are my stress relief, my comfort zone and my medicine for every day life.
I got into this hobby in college around 2003. At that time, I was under severe pressure of getting accepted for a transfer into a college of my choosing (after a year of hiatus) and my father getting into my case every day. (I already moved to the city anticipating that I would but that proved to be a costly mistake for both me and my parents. )
Any how, stress was getting so intense, I couldn't sleep at night for days and was getting sick constantly. I went to see the psychiatrist from school and they recommended a small fish tank for relaxation as well as exercise, proper diet etc etc. Luckily my room mate was into fish and other animals at the time and gave me a 10g tank with the whole set up. Went to the fish store and fell in love with all the vibrant colors and had me hooked ever since.
(I even remember the store's name. Aquatropics in Gainesville, FL lol)
She was right, it did calm me down, settle down and unwind. Something about corals swaying in the current and fish swimming around soothed my daily struggles.
I was able to do what I was supposed to and graduated on the fall term of 2005.
Ever since then, I kept a swf tank. First a 29g nano tank (10g was too little so took it down within a month and upgraded) so I can travel with it if I had to move then 72g bow front once I bought my house. Wife has and still is complaining that it's the first thing that I do when I get home but it has given me so much, I just have to make sure that my little friends are well taken care of.
Now I share my love with everyone that I'm close with. My father now has 29g hex tank that I set up for him which he stares into at night to unwind like myself and my pastor now has 140g tank at his house because he loved my 72g so much. Even my mom who hates all animals now loves fish and joins in on my dad when he feeds the fish at night and calls them her "babies".
For me, I love teaching people about the hobby and the joys of it. I also love getting fish as a baby just to watch the fish grow. Nothing is more rewarding then to see a baby fish grow into a majestic fish with different colors or shape. (red corris wrasse or mimic tang, queen angel for an example)
My love for fish was also had shared with my wife and my son.

For those of you guys who know me here know that I lost my boy to SUDS, March 9th of this year.
He fell in love with the fish and corals. He loved feeding it, how it would swim around his hand when he pressed his little hand against the glass.
He particularly fell in love with my clown trigger who had an awesome personality and knew who fed her and was constantly begging for food and he played with her constantly through out the day. Here are few videos of it. (Trust me when I tell you that my wife filmed at least 20 more of these)

When he left us, we were devastated and I honestly sat in front of the tank for hours weeping after my wife had fallen asleep.
Road to recovery has been slow because my life had turned upside down and torn apart but my fish tank has been helping me tremendously. Has kept me busy with more constant water changes, parameter checks, more additions and such to occupy my time and my mind. Also great people here at SWF. Can't forget about you guys.
My phosphate level was always around 2.5 to 5 but now I'm able to bring it down to 0.5 without any reactor.
Without it, I can honestly say, I might not be here with you guys today. That's how much it has helped me. Something about the swaying, little fish swimming around, blue ish light just works for me and I'm sure many of you guys can agree with that. Very therapeutic and definitely one of God's finer creations.
Thanks for reading and you guys have a great day.

 

[ladyreefseeker]

Siptang is the winner for the best story in October! Thank you so much for sharing! Please enjoy your gift certificate!

 

[ladyreefseeker]

travelerjp98 is Novembers Winner! Thanks for sharing your story!
Haha... this one is quite funny... more of a failure story.... but it was funny!
It was thanksgiving last year. Our house was perfectly clean. The table was set up beautifully. Guests were coming in a few hours. Our whole family was going around perfecting everything. We only host thanksgiving, no other holidays... so when we do, we really go all the way. Then I look at my tank, and it was a disaster. I hated the way the live rock was arranged, it was dirty, the gravel needed to be vacuumed, and it needed a water change. Now keep in mind that my tank is 6' long, so it is basically the centerpiece of our family room. So I take out my big water change bucket, and start vacuuming the gravel. I stood on a chair, looking down into the tank as I vacuum the gravel.... then I take a break and looked into the bucket in which all the dirt gravel was collecting in, and there was very little water in it. I was still standing on the chair. So I get down off of the chair, and my-oh-my, the whole family room was soaking wet... the area rug... the bases of the furniture.... EVERYTHING. Looking at my bucket, there was a crack on the bottom that I failed to notice.... SO.. Thanksgiving dinner was on the table. Guests were arriving in... by then... an hour. The floor of the family room was soaking wet. The tank was still a mess... not to mention that it wasn't even full of water. Well... let me continue. In my family, we love sitting out on the back porch area of our house after we eat meals.... to just chat and talk. But, I had to finish vacuuming the gravel. Obviously I was not just going to pour the dirty water into the family room. So, I decided to just let the dirty water pour out into the backyard. Well, when I was done... the backyard was soaked too. It was quite a disaster. Quickly getting towels out, well... we had thanksgiving... in not ideal conditions... surrounded by the smell of the ocean.
Hope you guys enjoyed reading.

 

[ladyreefseeker]

markc212 is Decembers winning story! Thanks for sharing!
Journeys to Reefkeeping are Fraught with Mistakes
I've kept fish for most of my life, but it wasn't until the recent forays into the SW world that I really invested in the process. I started the journey at 10 years old with a 10 gallon tropical tank. It's almost funny when you put all responsibility for maintaining a tank in the hands of a 10 yr old. I mixed bettas with guppies and a variety of algae eaters and tetras and weird catfish and angelfish and cichlids (when I had enough money) and mollies and barbs and sharks and on and on. I must've had 25 different fish in that little tank. Of course, cleaning the tank was fun! Mom or Dad would say, "there's too much algae on the tank. Clean it!" To a 10 year old, that means taking out all the fake plants, catching the fish with a net and putting them into a bucket (the fun part), then emptying the water (spilling it all over the carpet), taking it into the bathtub and scrubbing the sides with soap and water. Simple..... and disastrous. Strangely enough, I didn't always lose the fish via the cleaning. Then again, if it wasn't the cleaning, then it was the outright aggression, overfeeding, or plain bad conditions that eventually killed them. While I may have been the worst kind of aquarist at the time, I have certainly become more educated and continue to learn and grow in my advancing years. But, I will never forget that first night after setting up the tank with a few neon tetras, turning out the lights in my bedroom, turning on the fluorescent bulb in my tank, lying back in bed and seeing the wonders of the aquarium world open up for me. Aquarium keeping really is a journey, and it has the power to transport you to someplace you never imagined. Being part of that journey is a privilege that should be considered as such.

 

[ladyreefseeker]

Siptang has a winning story for January!!!
Alright, here is one more to get things going in this thread!
As many of you guys know from here.
I have a thing for a trigger fish. May it be the weird shape, looks, vibrant colors or it's unique personality, it's a great sturdy fish for any one in the hobby and I had my share of these awesome fish. Here is a story of my epic fail and how trigger saved me.
This is when I first moved into my house.
I had downsized my 72g bow front by giving away rocks left and right to make the move easier and also to give my big fish more room to swim. (I had an issue with over stuffing my tank) I left 3 big rocks and very small pieces and gave away all of my rocks. I only had like 4 or 5 fish at the time but BIG fish that always swam in front of you constantly begging for food. Any how, this was a time when I was still very diligent on up-keeping the tank and I decided to my rock cleaning. I got my center piece rock out which my wrasse and trigger constantly made mess of and I particularly love this rock because it looks a giant coral (had hard corals growing on it before it was cured and died off) and it has nooks and shelves like place where my emerald crab hides time to time. I took out the rock and put it on a little basin with very small water to just to wash off the debris off the tooth brush. As I was doing my center piece rock, my wife calls me and asks for a quick grocery trip and being a good... wait... let's rephrase, "smart" husband that I am, I gave her the final say in the matter which was "yes, ma'am" and left for the groceries to pick up whatever that she and the baby needed.
Fast forward close to 30 something minutes.
I come back home and head back to the tank, trying to finish what I started. I sit down and look at my tank and I notice something.
Something was missing... then it hit me.. my water puppy huma was gone! I looked at the two remaining rocks to see if she was hiding somewhere and couldn't find her.
Shifted the sand, fearing for the worst but nada. No trace of her.. Then something hit me and I went to the center piece rock that I was cleaning which was out of water for about 40 mins. and lo behold, there she was wedged in between the rock in between one of the shelf half dead. Panicking, I immediately put the center piece back in the tank. Pace around for a long time checking for her vitals every other mins. She didn't come out for several hours and I figured that I would have to take her out in the morning and give her porcelain burial but to my surprise and delight, she was out and swimming in the morning.
I was glad that my carelessness didn't kill the beautiful fish and people weren't kidding when they said if you kill a trigger due to a negligence you need to get out of the hobby.
She has been my longest surviving fish which lived through 2 ich out break, 1 month of static electricity running through the water, heater incident, bad batch of water and became part of my family. I was definitely a fan of this fish and would recommend to any one who has a fish only tank. (mind you, she will kill all inverts and create sand snow effect for you)