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Hi from a new Northern Irish member!

Sonsey

Sonsey

Seedling
Joined
22 Jul 2014
Messages
22
Location
N. Ireland
Hi folks,

After being away from fishkeeping for a loooong time the bug started nibbling at me again about a year ago, one tank quickly turned into two and I am now currently up to four lol :)

Over the past year I've come to realise that just keeping fish is one thing, but providing a beautiful and appropriate environment is quite another. It's because of this that I've been testing the waters of planted tanks but it was a fortuitous meeting with a prominent member of UKAPS who encouraged me to just go ahead and jump in!

A couple of weeks ago Alastair was in N. Ireland scaping some tanks for the opening weekend of a brand new aquatics shop in my town, he took the time on several occasions over the weekend to answer any noob question I could come up with, as well as showing me plenty of tips & tricks of the trade as he did them while planting the tanks. To say the man is generous is a vast understatement, that along with his enthusiasm for what he was doing as well as his endorsement of this site is what brings me here, thanks again mate! :thumbup:

My current plans for my four tanks are to keep one empty as an emergency hospital tank, another will be kept as it is now and the final two will get a new scape in the new year. I look forward to picking your brains and hearing your views as I get deeper into this, so I'll wrap this up by just saying "speak to you all soon"

Happy holidays everyone! :clap:

Regards,
Iain.
 
hi iain welcome ,where abouts in northern ireland is the new aquatic shop?cheers paul
 
hogan53 said:
Hi Iain
Welcome to the UKAPS gang and Merry Christmas!
hoggie
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Thanks Hoggie, Merry Christmas to you too! :thumbup:
paul2 said:
hi iain welcome ,where abouts in northern ireland is the new aquatic shop?cheers paul
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Thanks Paul, the new shop "Clearly Aquatics" has just opened in Bangor. They've specialised in importing top quality Koi from Japan as well as pond installations etc. for quite a while, and have now branched out into Tropical and Marine with the new shop. The Koi and Discus they had in store and ready for the opening weekend were stunning (along with quite a few community favourites), with more being added as the filtration properly matures (Apisto's etc.)

Regards,
Iain.

p.s Happy Birthday for yesterday Paul!
 
paul2 said:
Merry christmas Ian,Thanks for the birthday wishes,:thumbup:
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Merry Christmas to you too Paul, you're welcome!
Jan Larsen said:
Merry Christmas Ian, and welcome. Now go and make room for the next 4 tanks :)
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Thanks Jan, Merry Christmas to you too!

I don't have room for all the tanks now, let alone four more! lol ...one tank is an empty hospital tank only due to lack of space, not sick fish ;)
 
Yeah I am familiar with that problem. The not having room for tanks/tank as big as you'd like.
Can't say I or my daughter have had much problems with sick fish. We've had mass fatality once due to a filter problem and a couple of fish on fish violence episodes, one ending in a double homicide. But nothing much in the way of sickness. We do have a little hospital tank though, it's cleverly concealed in a cupboard.


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Welcome to Ukaps Iain ..... good to see more people from our wee country getting into the aquascaping game ..... was thinking I was alone over here when it came to the hobby. Hope you stick with us and get some of your tanks up on the forum. I'm from Omagh myself so not too far away. Was supposed to make it up to Clearly when Alastair was over but in the end I couldn't get off work. Gonna make a visit soon and check up on Alastairs work ;)
 
There are only 2 shops that sell fish in Omagh and that would be Jollyes and Happy Pets and Happy Pets would be the only shop I would consider buying from in Omagh. I would usually go to Grosvenor Tropicals or Exotic and maybe Clearly if they are good. All depends where they source their stock from etc
I would buy my plants online from the likes of Aquaessentials or similar, aslong as they are Tropica or Aquafluer :)
 
Thanks Brian I was in Grosvenor before christmas passed a few hours looking around ,some nice stuff,Have to try and get a saturday off work to get a run to exotic and may be clearly ,same as omagh jollyes or pets at home the only places to sell fish ,here in Derry.
 
Brian Murphy said:
Welcome to Ukaps Iain ..... good to see more people from our wee country getting into the aquascaping game ..... was thinking I was alone over here when it came to the hobby. Hope you stick with us and get some of your tanks up on the forum. I'm from Omagh myself so not too far away. Was supposed to make it up to Clearly when Alastair was over but in the end I couldn't get off work. Gonna make a visit soon and check up on Alastairs work ;)
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Hi Brian, thanks for the welcome.

I've noticed as well that there are not too many of us about, not too sure why that is but we do seem behind the times when it comes to planting our tanks, perhaps it's because there is such a strong Cichlid following here? Posting my own tanks will have to wait a few weeks as we are getting extensive work done to the house here, but once that is done I'll start a journal for each of the two new scapes I intend to start.

Brian Murphy said:
There are only 2 shops that sell fish in Omagh and that would be Jollyes and Happy Pets and Happy Pets would be the only shop I would consider buying from in Omagh. I would usually go to Grosvenor Tropicals or Exotic and maybe Clearly if they are good. All depends where they source their stock from etc
I would buy my plants online from the likes of Aquaessentials or similar, aslong as they are Tropica or Aquafluer :)
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Before Clearly opened here in Bangor all we had was a Jollies and a Pets at Home so I feel your pain. Surprisingly our P@H wasn't too bad a year ago, healthy tanks and stock with rarely a dead fish at all, unfortunately that has now changed with regular dead loss and multiple "tank is being treated" signs over the same old fish. I don't even want to talk about Jollies :sick: ...I'll still make the trip to Exotic and Maidenhead when I have the time but Grosvenor is no longer on the list since they started keeping Betta's in jam jar's, pretty disgusting IMO and not a place I'll be spending my money anymore. :thumbdown:
 
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Sonsey said:
Hi Brian, thanks for the welcome.



Before Clearly opened here in Bangor all we had was a Jollies and a Pets at Home so I feel your pain. Surprisingly our P@H wasn't too bad a year ago, healthy tanks and stock with rarely a dead fish at all, unfortunately that has now changed with regular dead loss and multiple "tank is being treated" signs over the same old fish. I don't even want to talk about Jollies :sick: ...I'll still make the trip to Exotic and Maidenhead when I have the time but Grosvenor is no longer on the list since they started keeping Betta's in jam jar's, pretty disgusting IMO and not a place I'll be spending my money anymore. :thumbdown:
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Yeah I seen that last time I was in ..... reminds of how the chinese keep their fish in some shops ..... in the bag ready to go ... not even in a tank!!

I am in the process of starting an online business in aquascaping and am presently sampling the market for products and will be setting up 120x50x50 optiwhite fireaq tank that I just got shipped from China along with substrate and 2 ADA style filters etc etc .... so will be doing a journal very soon
 
Brian Murphy said:
I am in the process of starting an online business in aquascaping and am presently sampling the market for products and will be setting up 120x50x50 optiwhite fireaq tank that I just got shipped from China along with substrate and 2 ADA style filters etc etc .... so will be doing a journal very soon
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Good luck in your future business endeavors Brian. I will certainly look out for your journal, I've never thought of importing a full tank from abroad, tbh I'm surprised postage costs didn't make it unfeasible for you!?
 
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