- What's up Fishtank People, Fishtanktv.com?
Dustin's Fishtank bringing it to you on a Sunday, baby.
How's everybody doing?
I hope you're doing well.
So we're deep in the Small Tank series.
I gotta tell ya, I'm having an absolute blast.
First we set up a five gallon,
then we set up a 10 gallon.
Tried to set up a 15 gallon,
but every pet store in town has given me runaround.
None of them have them in stock,
so we set up another 10 gallon.
So now I've got one, two, three tanks
with absolutely no fish in 'em.
But you gotta creep on it, folks.
You gotta take your time when adding fish,
but it's about time to add some fish.
So here, it's your Sunday.
It's your species Sun-,
then we're gonna bring you my one, two, three, four,
I got five on it, top five nano fish.
♪ I got five on it ♪
♪ Grab yo 40, let's get keyed. ♪
That's right folks, I got five on it.
Grab your tanks, let's get keyed.
Talkin' about my number five nano fish.
Now this is a fish that I've never actually kept before,
but I have caught them in the wild Peru.
Yes folks, we're talking about the dwarf pea puffer.
Now the reason we're talking about this fish,
I've never actually kept this fish,
but I feel like the Lion King 10 gallon right here
is actually screaming for a dwarf pea puffer.
Dwarf pea puffers come from India.
They're aggressive, puffers in general,
fresh, salt, brackish, whatever have amazing personalities.
So I really think that just a sweet little puffer fish
swimming around in here would be absolutely amazing.
One of the things to note about puffer fish is that
they are aggressive, and are not easy to keep
with a lot of other fish which fine,
because it's gonna be a 10 gallon species only
dwarf puffer fish tank.
Now, the puffer fish that we're talkin about
is actually coming from India
and stays small and is true fresh water.
However, yours truly has actually caught
freshwater puffers as well in the Amazon.
You can click the links around to see
where I did catch a wild caught puffer.
Truly awesome.
What I've been told is that the puffers,
they eat so much snail matter
that they need something to kind of wear their teeth down.
So if you don't consistently feed them
a ridiculous amount of snails,
you're have to go in and do dental surgery
on them and trim their teeth up.
So, dwarf puffers, my number five,
thinking about putting a little bit of a
puffer fish in here.
Let me know your thoughts, if I should puffer this thing.
I think it'd be ridiculous.
Let me know.
(hip hop music)
My number four nano fish,
we're talking about a apistagrammas, folks.
That's right.
Dwarf cichlid from South America,
in your face.
Loving the apistagrammas.
I fell in love in love with these fish
way back in the day
'cause they're great for a planted tank.
They are a cichlid, but they don't tear stuff up.
Like the puffer fish, these were collected in Peru,
however these were collected on the Nanay River,
a lower pH river, where we caught
a slew of apistagramma bitaeniata down there.
You can click the link and actually see a video
I took while I was collecting
these suckers in a puddle in Peru.
Totally and amazing time.
I've talked about 'em before.
You can't say Amazon and just think of
one river where everything is from.
The Amazon is made up of thousands and thousands
of different tributaries, pathways,
tiny little rivers little bit of cut off lakes, whatever.
Which bring you all kinds of species variation.
This is great because this is where apistagrammas come from.
That's why there's so many different varieties of pistos.
They're on their own little tributaries
and the separate bodies of water produce
unique types of apistagrammas.
Additionally, apistagrammas are easy to breed,
and, generally speaking, when a fish is easy to breed
it's easy to get a lot of sweet variations of them.
Enter apistograma cacatuoides triple red.
As if the name apistograma cacatuoides isn't cool enough,
check out this fish.
Love the long fins, love the red,
just a totally cool variation that's been developed
because these fish are easy to breed.
Note, apistos do like the lower pH though.
That's something you're gonna wanna watch out for.
Another thing to think about with apistos, however,
is they are kind of a shyer fish.
They do know they're roll, so to speak,
and I kept them in a 220 with rainbows.
The rainbows were big rambunctious,
like black lab dogs, if you will.
Just all over the place.
And they kind of out competed the apistos for food.
The apistos were a little too shy.
So definitely a great nano fish
'cause you wanna keep 'em in a small or more chill setting.
A little bit lower pH.
Where I collected them from, it looked like basically mud.
So, something to consider
when you are thinking about keeping apisto.
Too many types of apistos to list,
to do this species any sort of justice.
Another one I'm fond of is the apistogramma panduro.
I actually collected these, a few of these,
while we were in the wild, as well.
I also visited a wholesaler in Iquitos
ran by Edward Panduro, who this fish was named after.
A couple other varieties we're checking out
is the cacatuoides blue
and the trifasciata, as well.
Drop me a comment on your favorite type of apistos.
There are tons of them.
Apistogrammas, my number 4 favorite nano fish.
(hiphop music)
My number three, my top five nano fish,
totally switching gears from apistos.
Don't knock it till you try it, folks.
We're talking about fancy guppies.
That's right, folks, guppies, come on, guppies.
Super easy to breed, hearty,
they come in every single freakin' color of the rainbow,
it seems, and all kinds of variations all around.
The only issue that I even remotely have with guppies,
is sometimes if they're over bred so much
they have over long tails and they can't swim,
and I just feel sorry for those fish.
That said, this kind of breeding
has produced some really insane fish.
Guppies, you can get as fancy as you want.
Spend a bunch of money,
get some really crazy varieties that have been bred a bunch.
Or you can be that kid at the pet store
that makes the person pick out the feeder guppies
that have a little bit of fanciness on 'em,
so you can get some cool fish for only 10 cents.
Keeping guppies is super easy.
I found they like to be kept in
just a little bit harder water,
but they can live without a heater,
they can handle the abuse that a beginner might give 'em.
They can handle big water changes.
Like I said, they breed like crazy.
I like to breed them with floating plants.
I found a lot of floating plants
really seems to help guppies just get after it,
for lack of a better term.
So, totally having fun with some guppies.
And I think that guppies would look kinda sweet in here.
I don't know, let me know what you think.
Couple guppies swimming around here,
sitting on my desk, staring right at me,
swimming all around.
So, guppies, my number three of my top five nano fish.
(hop hop music)
My number two of my top five nano fish,
you gotta roll with the classics, folks,
you gotta roll with neon tetras.
Look, I been down to Peru, as I've said.
I've collected fish in the wild.
There's a bajillion types of different tetras.
Neon tetras are one of the top most colorful tetras.
There are other colorful varieties.
And I know, I hear what the cardinal people are saying
right now, "I like cardinals more than I like neons."
Look, do what works for you.
I will say this.
Neon tetras, generally speaking,
are easier to keep than cardinals.
Cardinals require a warmer temperature.
Neons can handle a little bit of lower temps.
They also like a little bit of higher pH,
unlike cardinals, which like the lower pH.
Generally speaking, most people have
more harder water than soft.
Me, I have harder water than I do soft.
I do not try to battle my water.
My water comes out a little bit harder
and I run my tanks a little bit colder.
Neon tetras are for me.
They're fantastic schoolers.
Rachel and I talked about this the other day.
When you get neons, folks, get a ton of 'em.
Add slowly, but get a ton of 'em
'cause you'll get this really crazy little behavior.
You can click the links around.
I did a video on community fish behavior.
But basically, when you have a ridiculous amount
of neon tetras together,
the behavior is totally different.
They can kinda like spread out and be all over the place
and have these tiny little schools battling back and forth.
Just super awesome.
I kep them in college.
Totally love 'em.
Neon tetras, fantastic beginner fish.
You can keep 'em in a small tank.
Like I said, no heater.
The only problem with neons is when they go, they go quick.
And speaking of not battling your water, this tank,
at one point, had about 100 of 'em in there
until my wonderful county decided to raise the
chlorine levels after a big rain storm.
That's a big tip, too.
If it rains hard, your city might be adding
more chlorine than you know to your water.
I didn't triple down my De-Chlor and I lost ton of 'em.
They went fast, folks.
I miss my neons.
Neon tetras, my number two of my top five nano fish.
(hop hop music)
And my number one, my top five, my top nano fish.
Number one nano fish is a betta fish.
Betta fish, Dustin?
Yes.
Betta fish, Dustin is saying.
And here's why.
Fist and foremost, I was a history major.
I love the history of these little betta fish.
They're named after the betta clan in,
like clan in the front, ♪ Clan in the front, ♪
let your feet stomp. ♪ let your feet stomp. ♪
They're named after a fierce warrior clan.
How cool is that?
Don't kid yourself.
That's awesome.
Also, they were so popular with the
fighting and battling and breeding of these things,
that the King of Siam, himself,
actually taxed and regulated the sale of betta fish,
and the fighting, which I think is pretty cool.
Now look, I don't think that keeping male betta's together
and watching 'em is even remotely cool.
Okay?
And obviously, as you know,
if you keep two male bettas together,
they will fight and battle, presumably to the death.
That said, that breeding and that popularity
of the fish is probably why we have
so many of them readily available today.
They're so easy to breed.
Betta fish, you can keep 'em in a small container.
The one thing with betta fish,
and I've lost some because of this,
is they do like a little bit of warmer water.
They like their water above 75, if you will.
I've seen 'em pound little critters out in the greenhouse.
This guy was actually out in the greenhouse with me.
So, betta fish, I'm lovin' 'em.
You can keep 'em in those little vases.
They prefer, at least two, three gallons.
They can almost run out of water,
as long as they stay moist they can live.
They're actually labyrinth breathers,
so they can breathe air.
So they can handle the abuse of of a beginner.
The only thing I really question with them
is just you gotta keep your temps just a little bit higher.
Obviously, don't mix males together.
But, betta fish, I love 'em.
And the thing that I love most about betta fish,
and it's the same thing I love about koi, is this:
You can get betta fish in any single variety you want.
Now I'm not saying you have to like all betta fish,
but I could see myself being that
creepy old man when I'm older,
where I just have a bunch of different varieties all around.
Because they've been bred so much,
you can get any color rainbow.
Same with koi, right?
Every betta fish could be unique, you know?
You could pick out that specific one.
Like this is the exact fish that I want for this reason.
I picked him out because that's the style I want.
You can pick out a white one if you want,
you can pick out a pink one if you want.
They come in all different varieties.
So betta fish are my number one favorite,
top five nano fish.
(hip hop music)
And you can see the clip here of me letting this guy go,
of course he's shy on camera the first time.
But I'm pumped to finally get a fish in here.
Note, this might not be the final spot for this guy.
I might swap him out if I do
find my hands on some dwarf puffer fish.
Do me a favor folks,
let me know your favorite nano fish and why.
Maybe I'm overlooking something.
I haven't really creatively been around
what to put in these tanks yet.
I've got the betta fish in here.
But he might move.
I also got the five gallon over here.
Not really sure, thinking the guppies,
maybe the black live births.
So I'd love to get your feedback, your comments.
Maybe like, "Yo dude, have you thought of these?"
And I'm totally missing something.
Yeah, get excited.
I got a lotta fun stuff ahead.
I got a couple colabs comin' up.
I've also got a fantastic fish room or village.
I didn't have enough time to spend at a while back.
So, if you like what I'm doing, subscribe.
Bottom right somewhere.
Everybody, have a fabulous freakin' week.
And tank on.
Later.
(hip hop music)