My “local tank” started as a slice of my surrounding harbors and bays, specifically East Hampton, NY on the east end of long island, complete with macro algae. The entire process is going to be an experiment.
This all started when my brother and I bought our nephew a 10 gallon tank and we put in some striped killifish and Atlantic silversides for him. I work for my local government and we do some seining and trawling roughly once and month for data collection. We would catch some interesting things and I would bring them over and put them in the tank. All of this sparked my interest in doing a full sized version. This is the account of the process as it takes shape and changes along the way.
This system is now a mixed reef and this is the account of it's changes along the way.
This all started when my brother and I bought our nephew a 10 gallon tank and we put in some striped killifish and Atlantic silversides for him. I work for my local government and we do some seining and trawling roughly once and month for data collection. We would catch some interesting things and I would bring them over and put them in the tank. All of this sparked my interest in doing a full sized version. This is the account of the process as it takes shape and changes along the way.
This system is now a mixed reef and this is the account of it's changes along the way.
Seining
Posted 05-27-2009 at 05:52 AM by Beaun
Its been a while since i have updated so I figured I would do such. My brother and I decided to go seining on Saturday to get some more local fish for the tank. So we got the 30 foot sein net from my work and headed east to Montauk (the far east end of Long Island). We went to one of the more secluded spots and dropped the net in and did a long sein. We ended up with a good catch and took out the better looking fish that we wanted. I ended up with 1 large silverside, 4 stripped killifish, 2 Mumichugs, and 5 juvenile bluefish (two of which have died). The bluefish (I think they are bluefish) are bout 1/2-3/4" and kili's (3-4 juveniles/small males and 1 mature female) are all about 1-2" and the silverside is about 4". I also picked up some more sand/grass shrimp.
After about a day they stopped crowding in the corner and started exploring the tank. The kili's/mumichugs will dive into the sand, head first, to about eye depth and then spit out the sand. Probably looking for something to eat. It is very interesting to watch because this is something you never get to see them do in the wild. It's impossible to watch them in the open water, but in the tank it's very intresting to see them behave in their natural way. The additions added a lot of movement to the tank, and it finally looks "full".
After about a day they stopped crowding in the corner and started exploring the tank. The kili's/mumichugs will dive into the sand, head first, to about eye depth and then spit out the sand. Probably looking for something to eat. It is very interesting to watch because this is something you never get to see them do in the wild. It's impossible to watch them in the open water, but in the tank it's very intresting to see them behave in their natural way. The additions added a lot of movement to the tank, and it finally looks "full".
Total Comments 1
Comments
-
Good stuff!
Posted 06-01-2009 at 04:17 AM by ReefSparky
