I have been keeping fish for over 25 year now and have been selling them for 20 years so you would think at this stage I would to think I can give advice on keeping them. With a little basic knowledge  you can keep them too. I’ll do by best to write this in plain English so everyone can understand. You can always email me with your questions or experience you have, my email address is gary@petworld.ie.

The basics:

• Know what you equipment you have and hoe it works.
• Water must be treated before use, use a water conditioner to remove chlorine and neutralizes chloramines.
• Water must be at the right temperature, ie down add cold water direct from your tap to you Aquarium or bowl.

I ‘ll start with the basic problems:

• Bad smell from your Aquarium or Fish bowl. You will only get a bad smell is something is rotting, 9 times out of 10 you are over feeding. Two much food goes in and is left uneaten, as this decays it cause a smell. Solution: Remove all uneaten food, its easy with a gravel cleaner. Change your water.
• Algae: There are three main causes of algae, the first is from direct sunlight shining on the glass, the second is the bulb used, be sure you are using a bulb that doesn’t promote this growth. A standard fluorescent tube will cause algae growth. The third and main reason is there simply isn’t enough bacteria in your filter to break down the waste, This is normal caused either by overfeeding or washing our your filter using tap water.

Medical research has shown that aquariums can be effective stress management tools; that is, reduced anxiety levels and lowered blood pressure can result from spending just a few minutes every day observing the steady, flowing movement of aquatic life.

There are 3 types of environments that tropical fish hobbyists can choose from: Cold Water, Warm Water, or Salt Water.

As a general rule, and I mean very general, you can have one inch of fish per gallon. If you have a 10 gallon tank, you can have 101″ fish or 5- 2″ fish, etc.

When you bring home your new fish, keep them in the bag and place the entire bag in the aquarium and float it for about 15 minutes so the temperatures are about the same to avoid shock. Open the bag, and let slowly let the water from the bag and the tank exchange. They should swim out of the bag into the tank. Do not leave the tank unattended during this process, as you may need to coax them out of the bag if you notice any gasping.