#13 – Discord Community Live!

FEAT. OUR FANS

4 years ago
Transcript
Speaker A:

Jimmy, jimmy, jimmy, jimmy, jimmy, jimmy jimmy. Guess what.

Speaker B:

What, Robbie?

Speaker A:

Jimmy.

Speaker B:

What?

Speaker A:

I just got off the phone with Robbie Chan. Right?

Speaker B:

No way.

Speaker A:

I got the scoop.

Speaker B:

What scoop?

Speaker A:

I mean, I hope we're not recording so people don't hear this, but on Blue Crown aquatics website yes. They're going to be offering a new product that they're making themselves.

Speaker B:

What is it?

Speaker A:

So you know how we have all this trouble with biological bacteria to buy bottle that gets sent to petco and freezes in the mail and it's worthless. It's worthless. It's not even the good stuff that you put in your fridge, right?

Speaker B:

Yes.

Speaker A:

He's making some super sauce.

Speaker B:

What?

Speaker A:

Right? Super sauces you have to keep in your fridge. And it's going to be good for about nine months.

Speaker B:

No way.

Speaker A:

Hola.

Speaker B:

When is it coming out?

Speaker A:

I'm not sure. They're trying to come up with some schnazzy names. So if you hear this, since we're totally not recording, send us a message on Aquarium Guys podcast on what you think a good name for biological bacteria in a bottle should be.

Speaker B:

Poop juice.

Speaker A:

Poop juice. That's what I want. Poop juice probably will get rejected, although we'd love it. So again, send your submissions. You can never tell us in the discord our email address or call it in saying, I think Blue Chronic aquatic should make poop juice bacteria crack. I say back crack, but that doesn't even sound better.

Speaker B:

But you know, I mean, there's a lot of never mind. There's a lot of drug addicts out there that probably like crack. And they would try it and says, hey, additional sales. I'm just trying to help.

Speaker A:

If you get in high in prime, maybe you can get high in this.

Speaker B:

Oh, people huffing on prime.

Speaker A:

Boy, oh, boy.

Speaker B:

There we go again.

Speaker A:

Recommended. Do not huff prime.

Speaker B:

Do not.

Speaker A:

So again, until then, because they're getting ready, right? This is an insider leak. No one knows we're the first ones to totally not squeak this out because we're not recording. But go to Blue Chronoquatics website and remember that they have free shipping using our promo code, aquarium guys. Free shipping. Holy crap.

Speaker B:

Yeah. Nobody else does free shipping like these guys right now. Also, we are giving away $425 gift certificates next week, correct.

Speaker A:

That is and you have just this week from when you listen to this podcast to the next time. And we're going to air this probably next Wednesday evening or no, next Tuesday evening because of the holidays, we have do a podcast ahead of time.

Speaker B:

That's right. Thanksgiving coming up next week.

Speaker A:

So you have basically until Tuesday around 02:00 P.m. Central to get your name in there. So throw it in.

Speaker B:

Throw your name in the hat. They're giving away $25 gift certificates, views, our promo code. You're going to get free shipping.

Speaker A:

Free shipping.

Speaker B:

Free shipping.

Speaker A:

They won't ship your pants, but they'll ship your shrimp.

Speaker B:

Ship.

Speaker A:

Your shrimp at Blue. Crown aquatics.com.

Speaker B:

That's right. And I'm sure they're really excited that we're doing that.

Speaker A:

So we have to talk about the charity, of course. Ohio Fish Rescue. He just put out a video today.

Speaker B:

What?

Speaker A:

Yes.

Speaker B:

I have not seen that.

Speaker A:

We knew about this about last week.

Speaker B:

Yes.

Speaker A:

The special city in Ohio has cited him with city violations of too much crap in his yard.

Speaker B:

What?

Speaker A:

So apparently he's got the space in the backyard. It's all covered. No one can see it, but apparently his neighbors complain about it. Anyway, so the city went over there and told him that he had to move his four wheelers, his snowmobiles, all kinds of the extra stuff from him evacuating, excavating, his pond. And it's just ridiculous the amount of work they had to make him do on top of this whole fish rescue process. It just puts a lot of more time and monetary pressure on them.

Speaker B:

Was that the city, or was it Delta Airlines?

Speaker A:

It was the city.

Speaker B:

Okay.

Speaker A:

But I would bet money that Delta was involved somewhere. schmaltz was involved somewhere.

Speaker B:

Thank you. Schmelto will frame you for murder if they can.

Speaker A:

I think that's a quote from John mulaney.

Speaker B:

It is. Let's talk about that for a second.

Speaker A:

No, we got to get back to Ohio Fish rescues need your help. Right. They had some people help from the community. They had a good friend of theirs come over with Bob katcher to move some dirt, but still, they need your financial support, Ohiofishrescue.com. There's many ways to donate, even buy a T shirt. But above all else, call them and tell them you love them.

Speaker B:

Tell them Robbie and Jim and Adam said we had to call you and.

Speaker A:

Say I love you in that big, rich's, mullet. Super, super sexy.

Speaker B:

Super sexy.

Speaker A:

Super sexy. Well, I think that's enough. We'll talk more about Schmelta and podcasts in the future, but let's kick that podcast.

Speaker B:

Let's do it.

Speaker A:

Guys, I just want to put a disclaimer that this is a live podcast, pre recorded, of course, but live with the community. They are using the headsets and microphones that they have on hand, so please forgive us for any pops, background noises, anything that we can. We did the best we could, and enjoy the podcast, guys. Welcome to the Aquarium, guys. Podcast with your hosts, Jim Colby and Rob dolson. Welcome, boy and girl, one and all, to the Aquarium Guys podcast. This is going to be a whopper of an episode.

Speaker B:

A whopper.

Speaker A:

A whopper of an episode. So before we go much further, we're your host. I'm Robbie olsen.

Speaker B:

I'm Jim Colby.

Speaker A:

And we're here to answer your questions.

Speaker B:

Yes.

Speaker A:

Tonight is the live Discord extravaganza. We're doing a community forum where we have some of our most loyal and favorite fans on Discord Live on this podcast, ready to spew questions at us. And above all else, tell Jimmy to never play the Diggery Do again.

Speaker B:

I can rock the digger play the diggery do. Oh, I rocked that thing.

Speaker A:

All right, so we're going to do a roll call.

Speaker B:

Of course.

Speaker A:

We have Adam, as you just heard.

Speaker C:

Hi, guys.

Speaker A:

Before we go down the long list of guests, we're so excited and frankly very nervous to have our wives along with us. So my wife is tanasa olsen.

Speaker D:

Hi, guys.

Speaker A:

She's got that soft, sexy voice, you know what I mean? And jen colby My voice is not soft and sexy. No, but it is sexy and sassy. And sassy. All right, go down the list of who we have right at the moment. We have Anthony. Introduce yourself, sir, with your name and tell us your favorite fish.

Speaker E:

Hi, my name is Anthony, and my favorite fish should be Julie the comas.

Speaker A:

And where are you calling from?

Speaker E:

I am in saginaw, Michigan.

Speaker A:

Fantastic. So let's do the roll call and continue like that. So next one is juju.

Speaker B:

Hello. My name is Jeremy. I'm from Pittsburgh. Unfortunately, right now I'm in Philadelphia. You're in Philadelphia.

Speaker A:

I'm so sorry. What's your favorite fish?

Speaker B:

African cichlid. Cicholid lover. laguna.

Speaker A:

All right. And the next one we have is Larry. Introduce yourself, sir.

Speaker C:

Hey, guys, this is Larry from California. Favorite fish? I got too many of them. Rainbows. how's that?

Speaker A:

Rainbows are the best fish. I have to agree with you, sir. And the infamous Mr. Pickle is back in the studio.

Speaker F:

Hell yeah. Mr. pickles from Canada. My favorite fish is Bristolnose pleco.

Speaker A:

Yeah, I thought you were going to say something like the dill pickle juice and you're just going to skip fish entirely.

Speaker B:

Oh, no.

Speaker A:

All right. And we got back now in the podcast. Arthur, introduce yourself, sir. Tell us where you're from and your favorite fish from New York.

Speaker B:

Favorite fish has to be my royal platco.

Speaker A:

Perfect. And we have nate with us tonight. Where are you from, nate?

Speaker G:

I'm also from Pittsburgh, and my favorite fish is recently I've been nerding out on Blue. Glorious.

Speaker B:

Ooh.

Speaker A:

Nice choice. So as an honorary aquarium guy this evening to help answer questions, we also have Robbie Chan early in the studio. How are you doing, Robbie?

Speaker H:

Hello. Hi, everyone.

Speaker A:

So Robbie is from Blue crown aquatics. He's of course, the best sponsor of all time and a shrimp king.

Speaker H:

Nope. Is the shrimp king.

Speaker B:

The shrimp king.

Speaker A:

He's so humble. Can you tell?

Speaker B:

And we're going to have Robbie on next week, correct?

Speaker H:

Yes. I'm honored to be there.

Speaker A:

Next Tuesday. We're going to draw for the prize. And this is the moment we get to tell you that we're going to give away $425 gift certificates to Blue Crown aquatics. Going to be drawn next Tuesday. So get your submission in according Guys Podcast.com at the bottom of the website. You'll see the giveaway link. Sign up.

Speaker B:

Get money, get free money.

Speaker A:

The best kind of money.

Speaker B:

That's the best kind.

Speaker A:

All right, so we have no subject for this evening. And we're entirely leaving it up to our guests for questions and topics. So I'm going to go down the list. But before that, you said you had a question, Jim.

Speaker B:

I have a question, and this one goes out to Robbie. Oh, no, not you, Robbie. Oh, the Cool Robbie.

Speaker A:

Okay, hold on. I'm rob's. He's Robbie. Can we just establish that? All right. There we go.

Speaker B:

Okay. The Cool Robbie. Back to that. Yeah. So we've got about 20 tanks of shrimp in our house. Can you explain the difference for our listeners, the difference between the neos and the other shrimp and about water quality, that sort of thing? I'm still struggling a little bit with some of it and stuff, but we've had some pretty good success with the Neil cart is.

Speaker H:

Okay, so basically shrimps come freshwater shrimp come in two types. Okay, what general types other than bamboo shrimp? Other than bamboo shrimp or mono shrimps or, you know, go shrimp, things like that.

Speaker B:

All you can eat shrimp.

Speaker H:

What we're really talking about is actually ornamental shrimp. Okay. Their subcategory is called neocaradinas and caradinas. Now, neocaradinas, they live in a very vast difference of water parameters. The caradina, however, they kind of require a little bit more specific, more acidic water parameter. And that's kind of like the major difference.

Speaker A:

Well, that would explain it. We have soft water. That's why you struggle with the other variety, right?

Speaker H:

Yeah. Neocher dena is usually you have the soil being inert it could be sand, it could be rocks, it could be gravel whatsoever, as long as it doesn't leach or it doesn't raise or decrease the PH level too low. And then usually meals are very, very good with tds and all that, I have seen some from 70 all the way to like, 500, 600 tds. So they can live and tolerate a lot of different parameters. Caradina is however, the PH is really anything less than 6.6 down to some people even have it at five something. tds is always hovering around between 110 or 100 all the way. It could be at 130 or some people even push it up to 150. Yeah. So it's kind of very rare. And the soil they use mostly are buffering substrate, which lowers the PH.

Speaker A:

So we had a question.

Speaker H:

Yes.

Speaker A:

Someone in the audience, I was curious.

Speaker G:

Where are they native to caradinias and neocaradinias?

Speaker B:

That's a great question.

Speaker H:

That's a great question. They actually came from mostly from Hong Kong in the streams up in the mountains. And then when Japanese guy, he actually kind of brought them over to Japan, and then he started breeding them, breathing them, and then all of a sudden Carradina came out where it's red and a little white. And then that's when everything kind of slowly started for the carrier dina's aspect. And then that's why people started to mass produce these. And some go as high as a.

Speaker B:

Couple of $1,000 time for an individual shrimp, correct?

Speaker H:

Yes. For each one shrimp? Yeah, I've seen some. Some shrimps go as high as $6,000 Us. Dollars for one shrimp.

Speaker B:

Holy cow.

Speaker A:

That's why they stopped selling on Facebook, because they thought it was drugs. And they're like, no more shrimp.

Speaker B:

No more shrimp.

Speaker A:

All right, let's get to the questions now. So I'm going to go top to bottom if that's good with everyone. We'll just do a round of questions. If we keep going, we'll see what time allows for. So, Anthony, what have you got for us? What do you want to know?

Speaker E:

In the last week or so, I've been to two pet stores that were completely run on undergraduate filters, and I'm just wanting to know what the disadvantage of that is.

Speaker A:

I'm going to pick on this one. Underground filters are commonly used in pet stores, and they're a fantastic cheap, cheap way of filtering. You don't have to worry about replacing sponges. And because there's a ton of rotation in the tanks, they need something more concrete than a loose sponge filter for the cycle to hold onto. So when they leave the gravel in there, it does collect all the waste. They do regular vacuums on the gravel, but they're in there more often than a normal hobbyist. They more or less stopped using undergraduate filters because they weren't getting all of the stuff out of the gravel. You leave some for biological bacteria, but easily a chunk of a dead fish can rot in the bottom, crap the whole tank out. And there's a lot of risk if you're not careful with how you use undergraduate filter. So pet stores continually are in the tank every day monitoring how the situation is going to a ton of water changes, and they just handle the cycle better. For a pet store that has a lot of rotation, it's the first time.

Speaker E:

I've ever seen it in the store, actually. And they're very dated stores, but it looked like it was working fine for them.

Speaker A:

So we have a large pet store in Forest Lake, Minnesota. It's a little north of the Twin Cities and very big store. Very well known in the state as one of the best pet stores in Minnesota. They use extensive undergoing filters for almost all their setups just because the amount of rotation they sell mass amounts of fish, and they need to maintain that cycle with the amount of moving of decorations, sponge swapping and all the other details.

Speaker B:

And they're very cheap to run, very cheap.

Speaker E:

It's got to be more surface area than a sponge filter.

Speaker C:

Really?

Speaker E:

Yeah, I've been debating on trying some.

Speaker A:

Might well give her a go. Just make sure to get a nice, nice vacuum on that gravel. All right, Arthur, how are you doing?

Speaker B:

I'm doing well, thank you.

Speaker A:

You want to know all the secrets?

Speaker B:

I have recently rescued a 14 inch Florida common pleco, and he's a little malnourished. My question, what would be the best. Right now, I'm just using hakari algae wafers, but I'm looking for something to give them a little bit more. Is there like, a decent high protein?

Speaker A:

You would recommend high protein for a playco? Oh, boy, that that's pretty difficult. Mastivo 14 inch massive oil would work really well. But I have trouble acclimating a lot of platos onto massive ore. They almost have to starve to get onto it. What I would do is just encourage whatever you can feed them to get started. But massive or is of course, the best protein solution for the size cup of their mouth. But I put wood in there as well. And then try to encourage putting pieces of the massive oil in the wood. If you can put it somewhere where they're going to be on, they'll attempt to eat whatever you put on it's a wide wind up.

Speaker I:

Couldn't you try to put it in like, half a zucchini chunk? Put some massive ore in that too? That's a good idea, because they should eat the zucchini pretty quick. And then as they're rasping away at the zucchini, they'll grab some of the massive bore too.

Speaker A:

Whatever works.

Speaker B:

Try that.

Speaker A:

Try them out. Sometimes even some playgoes, like I have small baby Bristol nose platos, they don't know to hit the zucchini, so I have that issue as well. So even with my zucchini pieces, putting them on wood works the same. So if they hit zucchini, put the food wherever they're hitting. Try to encourage and hide the food where they're at.

Speaker B:

I appreciate it. Thank you.

Speaker A:

All right, juju. What's up?

Speaker B:

What do you guys think the biggest problem facing the hobby today is? Holy cowta.

Speaker A:

No kidding.

Speaker B:

Schmelta Airlines. For God's sake. Let's spend two and a half days on that.

Speaker A:

No, I'm kidding.

Speaker B:

I've mentioned this before and stuff. I just had a conversation with my friend ty yesterday, and he is an aquarium tank maintenance previous store owner. And he was just saying that the aquarium, freshwater aquarium is coming back and saltwater is kind of dwindling right now, is what he's telling me. But what concerns me is that I've been doing this for over 35 years, and from what I'm seeing, the kids I mean, we have Mr. pickles on, and he's a young guy from Canada, and he's one of the few people that I know that are coming back. He's going into the hobby, and the young kids now just want to do video games and play on their phones. To me, I think some of the biggest issues we have is just trying to draw people into the hobby. And so that's when we started this podcast, and that was kind of our thing, is that we want to encourage people to do it because we love it, of course, and we just want people to join us. And when I first started doing this over 30 some years ago, it was all secrets nobody wanted to tell you how to to, you know, breed your your discus or breed your breeder and old placos because they they saw you as competition. And what we're trying to do is we're trying to draw a group together, which I think we're doing a very good job of encouraging people and trying to help out the younger generation. There's a few problems that we have with fish, like the large plecos that seem to bother a lot of people in the hobby. But my personal problem that I have is that I really want young people to take over this hobby, because, let's face it, everybody that we all know and love, jack watley, just passed away this year, and we had Mr. Jim Kitchen on, and he's having some medical issues, too, at the Plea Co King. And we need people, young people, to step up and take over this hobby and put it in the right direction.

Speaker A:

So just to go a little further into that, we're trying to research some people we can bring on for different topics. And one of the topics we're researching is killer fish. Trying to find some experts on that subject. It's filled with nothing but 60 plus year old gentleman. I don't mean to pick on them. It's not an old joke. It's just filled with people that have been doing the hobby so long, and it's not refreshing. They're not reaching out and bringing younger audiences in, either because, I don't know, it's a pierce thing, or they just don't have PR people to tell, hey, this is a fun, cool thing. So when I show people that you can have, like, a packet of seeds like you do get on your spring to plant flowers, you can do that with fish, and their mind explodes. So it's a great subject, great type of fish niche. No one's in it.

Speaker B:

Look at this, too. Rob. We just had this conversation with our friends over in West fargo, North Dakota, and Nancy and Jeff owned the Tropical Fish Shop. Wonderful place to get cichlids. Jeff, his buddy and him were into kilifish, and his friend just died. And Jeff was talking about getting rid of his killy Fish because he used to go to the killy Fish conventions with his buddy. And it was a bonding experience. Like, some people go deer hunting, some people go to nascar together. My wife and I, we go to concerts together. It's just a bonding experience. And once you lose those people, you're kind of lose interest.

Speaker A:

Yeah. If I didn't have you, I wouldn't be in this hobby.

Speaker B:

Jimmy that's right.

Speaker A:

Yeah. So hopefully that answered it. Gave you something at least.

Speaker B:

I love you, Rob. Wow, that was sick.

Speaker A:

Quit touching me. It's inappropriate.

Speaker B:

A lot of size.

Speaker A:

All right, Larry, we got to keep rolling here. It's getting weird. So, Larry, what you got for us, man? Normally, I have so many questions for you. If you guys don't know. Larry is a rainbow fish enthusiast. In this last couple of weeks, he's been sending a lot of pictures on our Facebook group, and he has a massive collection. But what do you have for us?

Speaker C:

Shoot somebody, ask away the best thing to start. Otherwise I've actually been in the hobby since shoot the late seventy S. I had a store in the late eighty s. I closed that down and ended up doing some breeding. Got out, came back in, decided to get into the rainbows more. The wife, she's right here. Like, yeah, whatever you're doing, keep doing it. It's pretty good. Yeah. We're connecting with more and more and more people, but I'm one of those stickers that you got to keep them pure. If you're going to let them spawn in your tank and they're not going anywhere, I'm okay with that. But if you're going to end up selling or giving it away to somebody else that doesn't realize that they need to be pure, we have too many of them going extinct out in the wild. There's a few of them that I have that are very rare. Then I have more coming. Yet I sure wouldn't like them to get messed up in the hobby.

Speaker A:

Rather than a question, then I have something for you then, if it's fair, Larry.

Speaker C:

Sure.

Speaker A:

So you told me that you're a part of an aquarium society, and that's how you got a hold of this podcast. Is that correct?

Speaker C:

Yes, actually. Okay, so that brings up another good one. Yeah. I was asked to be a speaker up in Oregon at a club. So my wife and I went up there, and the one gal that asked me to do that, she had gotten a hold of you through some other person and asked me to join in. So it was definitely through a club, and I thought that was pretty neat. So you're actually the willamette Aquarium society? I'm a member of the sacramento Aquarium Society here in California.

Speaker A:

Just for the listening audience. What is the activities and what are your guys'intentions for your aquarium society?

Speaker C:

The experience of being able to have anything from auctions to hosting the aca. Any of these other big guys, Gary lang, they come and they do speeches, they'll be speakers, they bring fish. They get people excited to bring items in, auction it off. You can get some top quality fish. You can get to know people that are in the industry that you'd never even know they existed. It's an amazing, fun thing. Some people are like, oh, yeah, I'm just here to see what I can get cheap. There's so much more. We're going to be hosting the aca coming up this next year and here in sacramento, we would love for you guys, anyone to join in. It's open to everybody. It's huge. So there's a lot of pleasure in meeting people that do the same thing and getting questions answered literally, a networking.

Speaker A:

Event for your favorite hobby. What I'm going to do then is we're going to move on to nate. So before I let nate answer his question, I first have to pick on him. So we found out that when nate joined Discord, he didn't tell us until it's night. But if you listen to some of the first episodes of the podcast, we talk about some of our first reviews. We are so excited on Apple podcasts. And we so picked on a gentleman that was nice enough to give us a really high review called Vegan cyclist 420 and found out that nate is none other than that vegan cyclist.

Speaker B:

We hammered on him pretty hard, actually.

Speaker A:

We did. And yet he's still our fan. That's how much he loves the spot.

Speaker B:

In the way I see it, I think he's just trying to find out where he lives so he can kill us both. I'm just guessing that that's just me.

Speaker A:

Poor nate. So, nate, do you have any repercussions for the smackdock that we've given you?

Speaker G:

No attacks needed. I actually am not vegan. Truly.

Speaker A:

It was all a joke all along.

Speaker G:

But glad you guys got a good kick out of it.

Speaker A:

We all got a great kick out of that one. That was amazing. So, you got anything for us, buddy?

Speaker G:

Oh, I actually have a good question. Last night, I got a good deal, and I ended up bringing home 55 and a half gallon aquariums.

Speaker B:

Whoa, whoa.

Speaker A:

50 individual, five and a half gallon.

Speaker G:

Aquariums, screen lids and, like, fake plants for each one.

Speaker B:

Wow.

Speaker A:

So what you're saying is you're making a fish, a mini fish warehouse in your basement?

Speaker G:

Yes, my parents basement, of course.

Speaker D:

How did you get those home on your bicycle?

Speaker B:

My wife steps up and slams them.

Speaker A:

Wow.

Speaker B:

That was me.

Speaker A:

That was a good one.

Speaker B:

That was good.

Speaker C:

It was a moped.

Speaker B:

I see peewee's. Big adventure, probably. So where did you buy these at?

Speaker G:

I found them on craigslist. Every day I'm dedicated, I search aquarium on craigslist. I scroll through everything, look for anything new, and I finally scored the deal. So it was more it was like 53. It was five and a half gallons, 810 gallons, two twenty s and a twenty nine. Me and my buddy drive down there. As soon as the guy texts me back, I'm like, I'll be there tonight. And I drive down, I pick them all up. And it took truckload and then an entire CRV filled to bring them back.

Speaker B:

Oh, my God.

Speaker A:

And note that those CRVS can hold, like, 18 clowns. I'm a smart car owner. I know exactly the capacity of clowns.

Speaker G:

You would not fit in a Smart car.

Speaker A:

Is that a fat joke? That's awesome.

Speaker B:

You know what? When you've seen what was that, Tommy boy? Fat guy in a little coat. That's Robbie in his Smart car. This is hilarious.

Speaker A:

That's it.

Speaker D:

His Smart car run away from him.

Speaker B:

Oh, okay. We're going to post that on video, too.

Speaker A:

I hate you.

Speaker B:

All this.

Speaker A:

You don't bring wives on because they'll hate you or hurt.

Speaker B:

Let's bring this up just real quick. So, Robbie sends us a video. Not that long ago, he put in a video system in his house, and it shows his driveway, and he sent this to us. And so we watch it, and it's, like, three minutes long. We're going, this is stupid. Robbie comes out and looks at his car, and he passed his pockets like he forgot the keys or something. I don't know.

Speaker D:

He got into the car.

Speaker B:

Yes, he got into the car and got out of the car and went back in the house, left the door open, and the car rolls away into the neighbor's yard.

Speaker A:

I had to get my hat before work. I didn't want people seeing my terrible hair. I'm not as beautiful as you.

Speaker D:

It wasn't just into the first neighbor's yard. It went into the second neighbor's yard.

Speaker B:

With the door open.

Speaker A:

Okay, and here's the thing, right? My Smart car. Straight piped. Because of amazing joke my mechanic decided to play on me, and you could hear this thing for four blocks, so it's just idling through two yards, and no one caught me.

Speaker B:

Yeah, it sounds like a chainsaw running out in the wood.

Speaker A:

And the car is so small and light, it didn't even really leave tire tracks in the yard. So I got away with the whole thing.

Speaker D:

The best part is that you were looking at your phone and so concentrated on it, you didn't even see that the car was missing.

Speaker A:

Yeah, it was important. I think I was reading, like, aquarium forms. Who knew?

Speaker B:

And then he sees the cars missing. He looks up, he goes, and he takes off running across the fridge yard.

Speaker A:

Okay, is that a fat joke?

Speaker B:

No, it's not.

Speaker A:

That's a fat Albert joke.

Speaker B:

No, we don't know who Fat Albert is.

Speaker A:

Oh, please. That was your childhood.

Speaker B:

Okay, we got to get back to it.

Speaker D:

I don't think I've ever seen him move so fast.

Speaker B:

It was funny. And we're going to post that, too.

Speaker A:

Oh, my God.

Speaker B:

Yeah, we're going to post it.

Speaker A:

Nate, I blame you for all of this.

Speaker B:

All right?

Speaker A:

It was all my fault.

Speaker B:

So, you get all these tanks. What were they using them for?

Speaker G:

They were breeding crested geckos. It was a guy that was pretty well off, and he was teaching his kids about business, and he individually tanked each one.

Speaker I:

No, that makes sense.

Speaker G:

He told me they tear each other apart. But anyway, long story short, he had them all, and he was just trying to unload them. I picked them up for all $100.

Speaker B:

Oh, my goodness.

Speaker D:

Wow.

Speaker B:

Good job.

Speaker G:

Stole them.

Speaker B:

What's the hell of a deal.

Speaker A:

Wait, did he still have the crescent geckos?

Speaker B:

Oh, Adam, no.

Speaker G:

They sold them all off. He was teaching his kids about business, something. He told me they all pay taxes and stuff.

Speaker H:

Blah, blah, blah.

Speaker A:

No, he released them in his house so they'll forever more be there and breathe. Teaching could see it.

Speaker B:

Teaching him business. Here's how you lose $10,000.

Speaker G:

He did have a sweet tank. He had like a 380 with a couple of stingrays.

Speaker A:

So he was a pretty nice guy.

Speaker B:

So what's your plans with the tanks?

Speaker A:

Wait, before that, did you tell him about the podcast since he has stingrays? Wow.

Speaker G:

I did not tell him about the podcast. I still have his number. I'll let him know.

Speaker A:

All right, you have to let him know because we're congratulating him on giving you such a great deal. He needs to know this truth. So what's your thing?

Speaker G:

My question is, what should I do with the tanks right now? Budget is kind of tight. I'm definitely not setting them all up. But I want to set up probably about ten. What should I put in them? What's the stocking?

Speaker A:

All right, let's all take a round of this. But I'm going to take the first round and say that you should put, you know, shrimp and all them, each type of variety from Blue Crown aquatics. Already thought about that. Already thought about that. We know a guy that will get you a deal, right, Robbie?

Speaker H:

Of course.

Speaker B:

There you go.

Speaker A:

And free shipping using promo code. Aquarium, guys. But yeah, what else should he put in there, guys?

Speaker C:

I think he should breed some bettas.

Speaker A:

I think Big Rich just woke up in the middle of the slumber.

Speaker H:

Crayfish.

Speaker B:

Crayfish.

Speaker A:

I like this take.

Speaker G:

Let's go through let's go through the list of take turns.

Speaker A:

All right, so we got crayfish so far. I got a pen and paper. Crayfish.

Speaker B:

Are you talking like Mexican?

Speaker C:

Bettas.

Speaker B:

Bettas.

Speaker A:

Bettas would be great in a five gallon tank.

Speaker G:

I thought about that. I thought about importing bringing some in.

Speaker A:

But the question is, is Robbie going to be boarding in and getting some in? I can see. There we go.

Speaker D:

What about 511? The tetras?

Speaker A:

I don't know if they need more space.

Speaker D:

Actually, they would.

Speaker A:

Yours got real big.

Speaker D:

They did.

Speaker A:

So you should look them up. It's a very weird niche. tetra species that you don't see often a lot in the trade. You said 511 hyphen tetra?

Speaker D:

Yes, the Hyphen 511. My favorite. With my disc.

Speaker B:

With their disc. So my question is, are you looking just to keep fish? Are you looking to breed and make some money or no?

Speaker A:

Lose some money? They already did economics on this with the kids.

Speaker G:

Yeah, my my parents are convinced I'm only going to lose money, so I'm looking to try, though. I'm looking to try. I'll breed anything.

Speaker H:

Breathe some $6,000 shrimps.

Speaker B:

There you go. Breed ten of those and tell your parents to bite it.

Speaker A:

Well, there we go. Otherwise, you guys can message on discord we can put up a pole. I'll have pickles get on that. Right? Pickles. I would do hell, yeah.

Speaker I:

I would do Bristol mosquitoes and German Ramsich.

Speaker A:

German rams would be perfect for five gallon one pair per five gallon tank?

Speaker I:

Yeah, that's it.

Speaker B:

Do all the rams, the Long finn, the Gold, the bolivian wild ones.

Speaker G:

I don't have many big stores around me. I don't have a way to move a lot of them. Where would I move them at?

Speaker A:

Well, you'll have the private message us after, and we'll get Robbie to hook you up.

Speaker H:

All right.

Speaker B:

I used to always worry about overproducing, and in this day and age of the Internet, it's funny. You could put out something such as simple, like, you went and found all these tanks. You can put something out there saying, hey, I've got 300 rams. You'd be surprised how people just come out of the woodwork in your area and seek you and buy them tada.

Speaker A:

So, last one, I have a station with scarlet battis.

Speaker G:

I do own scarlet battles.

Speaker A:

There you go. They're fun, they have colors, and they're really finicky to eat. So just keeping them alone in a five gallon seems nice.

Speaker B:

How about pea puffers? I also own pea puffers.

Speaker G:

I already got two set up. I got the pea puffers and I got the baddest.

Speaker H:

Wow.

Speaker B:

I have a customer, this Nancy and Jeff we've talked about in West fargo. She buys 175 pea puffers from me every two weeks. And fargo, North Dakota, is a nice size town, but that's a goddamn a lot of pea puffers. And what she does, just to give you a little advice, she has a multiple pricing. So you get one at this price, three at this price, but ten at this price. And she has people that come in and say, I'll take ten all the time.

Speaker A:

That's all.

Speaker B:

She sells her shrimp, too.

Speaker A:

They're only people that get 55 gallon tanks. That's what it is. Just a lot of that happening in fargo.

Speaker B:

Yeah.

Speaker A:

All right, so I think that brings us to the infamous no, really famous Mr. Pickles. Okay, what's the big question, bro?

Speaker F:

Okay, so I bought this cool plant that I thought was really cool. It's called cryptocorn retrospiralis. And I put it in my tank, and they ate it. And the first day I got it.

Speaker A:

They as in my ballast sharks and.

Speaker F:

I don't know, maybe something else. I'm not sure, but that's not the point.

Speaker A:

The scientific term crypto, corn, whatever, Villalis, is really romane lettuce. So that's on you.

Speaker B:

Wow. You're very helpful tonight, Rob.

Speaker A:

I am. I'm all about helping the pickle.

Speaker F:

So they ate all the leaves, and there's just the bulb left with the roots. My question is, will more leaves grow? Will the plants grow back if I don't put it in a tank where things will eat it?

Speaker A:

Yes, they absolutely can. But they probably can only handle that so many times getting mowed to the bone.

Speaker B:

Yeah.

Speaker F:

No, I took them out of the tank, and I put them in my shrimp tank. So they shouldn't Get destroyed there.

Speaker A:

Just watch. Your shrimp will eat it.

Speaker D:

Keep coming back.

Speaker B:

Yeah. My wife has A discus tank in our home, and we have one bristol's placo in there. It's pretty good size. And he digs up the bulbs.

Speaker D:

He's an ass.

Speaker B:

He rolls them around like a bowling ball. But once you push them back in, they pop back up pretty quickly, same as we have medicare lace bulbs in there.

Speaker D:

Gascar lace.

Speaker B:

There we go. And they are beautiful. They've died off several times and then pop back up Two months later.

Speaker A:

They're very finicky to water qualities. I think the only really good way to get lace, if you don't just see A perfect one in store, is doing bulbs. You can't order those really online that.

Speaker C:

Well, and they don't like salad dressing on them that much, you know?

Speaker A:

Yes.

Speaker C:

Quit doing that.

Speaker B:

And then the water gets kind of slimy from the salad dressing.

Speaker A:

And just stop dressing your tank. Pickles.

Speaker B:

All right.

Speaker A:

So we went through once. Who else has a question or a topic for us?

Speaker F:

Okay, if nobody's going to say anything, I have one more short question.

Speaker A:

Do it. Pickles sure.

Speaker F:

Okay. So I noticed These things in my tank, and after doing some research, there's hydra in my shrimp tanks. And I'm scared. What do I do?

Speaker C:

What type of fish do you have?

Speaker F:

I have shrimp, which they'll eat the baby shrimp, I was informed, and they'll also eat the baby guppies. So I took the baby guppies, and I'm raising them in my fry box or whatever you call it. So only the shrimp Are at risk? Yes, but I still want to find a way to get rid of them, and a lot of the ways to get rid of them could be dangerous to shrimp. So that's why I want to know what you would do.

Speaker H:

I use a product Called z one made by SL aqua. It's kind of like A dog dewarmer type, but I use it in very small dosage. I see that that actually Helps out a lot. And also I do a lot of water change. I do put in some fish, something that eats, like, microorganisms like that. Then, yeah, they just go after it and just consistent water change. Weekly water change about 10%, and then I usually Have no problems after that.

Speaker A:

Would something like a panda loach go after that?

Speaker H:

Robbie you know what? Maybe I've seen panel loaches go after anything except for shrimps. I don't know why. I put in my panel loaches with some of my high end stuff, and they don't bother him at all. They just kind of like, oh, hey, what's going on? I'm eating. It seems like panel loach has been pretty gentle with shrimps overall.

Speaker F:

Okay. Have you ever heard of this stuff called polina? Zero.

Speaker H:

Yes. It's very similar to the sr aqua.

Speaker F:

Will that work?

Speaker H:

That will work, but in very small dosage. So just be careful. Kind of measure it. I would do the recommended amount, but slightly less than that. Just slightly less?

Speaker F:

Yeah, that's what's available near me.

Speaker C:

Okay.

Speaker H:

And then water change. Make sure you water change, like, two days later.

Speaker F:

All right, thanks.

Speaker B:

And would you do like a 50% or like 75%?

Speaker H:

I would do like 10% to 20%. Because that's small. Frequent shrimp. Yeah, because whenever you put any medicine or you want to tweak the water, I don't stress out the shrimp. And it's always best to do light water change a little bit at a time and then slowly drip, acclimate them back in. Then you're all set. Then they won't feel a thing.

Speaker B:

So that's why that's good advice, because when you said partial of the dose, I was thinking 50%. I would have done 50%. That's why I asked.

Speaker H:

You mean like dosage? Oh, sorry. I thought, like water change.

Speaker A:

Oh, no, he meant water change.

Speaker H:

Okay. As far as water change goes, 20% is good. As far as the dosage goes, about 80 or 90% of the recommended amount.

Speaker B:

Usually that straightened me out.

Speaker A:

Just a little less than recommended.

Speaker H:

Yes.

Speaker A:

Perfect. So anybody I got any other questions for us? We also have remember why it's for embarrassing stories.

Speaker E:

I'm dying to know everybody stance on hybrids.

Speaker A:

So when you say hybrids, what do you mean?

Speaker E:

I'm going to say, does anybody have different feelings about OBP cogs compared to flowerhorns? I mean, are they the same thing to you?

Speaker A:

Not at all. To me, generally, if I see this giant thing with a tumor out of its head, I don't think OBP cock.

Speaker E:

But, I mean, it's a hybrid, I guess.

Speaker A:

So is a pit bull or a pug. And they're ugly just the same.

Speaker B:

Yeah.

Speaker G:

Did your flower one have a nice cock?

Speaker E:

Huge one.

Speaker A:

I am not censoring that that is accurate. If you want to look it up, go to Google. That's what they call them.

Speaker E:

And that's how it's pronounced correctly, too, I found out.

Speaker A:

I want to go to a festival or flowerhorn convention just to hear people talk about their beautiful, bright color.

Speaker E:

The biggest show in the world was today at sips.

Speaker B:

Seriously? Because people pay tens of thousands of dollars for these different flowerhorns, and the.

Speaker E:

Stuff I seen was unreal.

Speaker B:

Yeah, they are gorgeous. I personally couldn't spend that kind of money on a fish. But people do, and that's why everybody is striving to breed these hybrids, and it's just because of customer demand, unfortunately. I used to get a really cool fish that used to be called an angel ram, and it was a cross between an angel fish and a balloon ram, and I can't find them anymore. I thought they were the most beautiful things in the world, and I had people that loved them or hated them. And our friends over in North Dakota, they won't sell you a GlowFish for the first three or four years. When GlowFish first came out, they didn't want to do it, but they finally gave in to popular demand. And then, of course, when Walmart stepped out of the picture here just recently, all of a sudden now people have got nowhere to get their fish but at a pet store in fargo. And so now she starts carrying GlowFish, and she goes, I hate them, but I'm not going to tear away their money. And I think that's the bottom line is if people are willing to buy them, people are going to breed them. Well, I think going back to our conversation earlier, glofish brings kids into the hobby. Yeah, I totally agree. And I know I've said on this podcast many times that as much as people badmouth Walmart and how much they don't like Walmart, what they did for the young kids is where else are you going to go see fish? I mean, mom and dad go into Walmart every day and week. Kids always ask to go over there and not be the best place to buy your fish. But yet you're introducing that to these children. And that's what you need to do. You need to encourage these kids to come out and buy some of this stuff.

Speaker E:

So I'm kind of worried about the distribution chain now, too. Once Walmart is gone, they were drawing the distributors into the area, and now they're gone.

Speaker I:

Walmart distributors out.

Speaker A:

See, that's why we have stuff coming up, like the smaller independent stores that are trying to spread love online. We have Adam. You have a friend in St. Paul that has recently started an aquarium shop within the last few years. A little more information on that example.

Speaker I:

Oh, you're talking about phil's.

Speaker A:

Absolutely.

Speaker B:

Yeah.

Speaker C:

Okay.

Speaker B:

Yeah.

Speaker A:

Shout out. We got to do appropriate shout out here. Come on now.

Speaker I:

Okay, so I just know it as Phil store.

Speaker A:

Phil store.

Speaker B:

You don't even know his name, man. It's his good friend Phil.

Speaker A:

It's his friend Phil. He's going to hate you after this podcast. I should tell him.

Speaker B:

Don't tell him. So Robbie and I met Adam just recently down at that store. We were down in Minneapolis. Robbie and I went down to buy some koi at a koi show, and Adam and his wife were in town, so we all had lunch. And then we went over to Phil store, and it was a prettyamed waters, tamed waters, and it was a pretty god named cool store. And what amazed me is you go in there, and the only thing he had that was normal was freaking neons. Everything else was totally off the wall.

Speaker A:

And I think that's the attraction.

Speaker I:

High end stuff, right?

Speaker E:

We had a very successful store in our area that was like that just special order, high end, oddball stuff. And he survived for about ten years.

Speaker B:

Well, when we were there, phil was filling orders to go out online. He had a big bunch of boxes sitting on the counter. Didn't he remember that he was doing both?

Speaker H:

He did.

Speaker B:

He was doing online stuff, plus he was doing that. And you got to find your niche, and you want to become that destination store. That where people drive 100 miles to come see you. We go to Forest Lake quite a bit. And where else do you go and.

Speaker I:

Find one of the top stores? I'd say it's Forest Lake and Tamed waters for me.

Speaker B:

Right. And where else do you go and find 25 stingrays of all different sizes, shapes, and flavors?

Speaker A:

You know, so I think that's the thing going forward. I mean, Robbie, have you turned away people going up to your warehouse, buying, wanting to buy shrimp?

Speaker H:

No, no, we actually welcome them, and we actually invite them to come in because we want to teach them the proper way of cycling and really take good care of the shrimps, or else we won't even want to sell to them. Oh, your tank is not ready. Okay, go home after it's ready and cycle. Bring the water here. We'll check it for you, and then if everything's good, then we'll sell you some shrimps.

Speaker B:

And that's a responsible thing to do, and that's what we all need to do and help encourage people so they can get it done right.

Speaker A:

And I bet money you do that service for free testing that water for them, don't you?

Speaker H:

Exactly. One of the things about us is we're hobbyists by heart. So we're in the business of shrimps, and we're not really trying to make a big buck with all the efforts and work that we put in. Really, I make more on the outside of this business than inside. So to me, it's really about getting them what they need and what they want and then seeing how their eyes just opens up. I have my first clutch of babies look, and that's the enjoyment of why I'm in the shrimp hobby.

Speaker A:

So we had the question, one of the beginning questions from you guys that what's the most harmful thing to the hobby or most concerning thing? And I mentioned Delta or Schmelta airline schmelta. Well, if it's really how it's showing that the businesses that are succeeding now are smaller, specialized stores that do focus online as well, to have both the online sales and their local area sales as well. The only thing preventing that type of business model working is the schmaltz of the world.

Speaker B:

I hate schmelta. Will frame you for murder just for fun.

Speaker A:

Again, we mentioned that because it's a bit that John mulaney, the comedian, does. So check it out. youtube.com. Just type in John mulaney Schmelta Airline.

Speaker B:

Schmeltzer, and you'll find somebody that dislikes schmelta more than we do. They're really the worst. Yeah, I've been doing this for 30 years. And it wasn't, what, three months ago when had the gal behind the counter in tears because I drive 75 miles to pick up my fish. And she goes, I'm done for the day. It's 03:00 in the afternoon. And I said, well, whose else is going to give it to me? I'm the only person that can do cargo, so you'll have to come back tomorrow. I said it's. Live fish. It's $1,500 worth. And she goes, I don't know what to tell you. Well, before we got done, security was over there telling me to calm him down, but I got my fish and I made her cry.

Speaker A:

And then the next week I show up and I just thought, he brought a bouncer.

Speaker B:

Exactly. And actually, we were out of there probably in about five minutes, that time.

Speaker A:

So who else has a question or topic?

Speaker B:

So let me ask you guys that. You're in the business, but you're also hobbyist. Does being on the other side of the fence affect the way you view the hobby? Has it made you less interested or more interested?

Speaker A:

It makes us smarter. It makes us so that we don't spend an epic amount of money on frivolous things, such as getting the latest Led light set or Reef light set. We know how to do things diy, and we have a more refined taste of what we know we love. Robbie knows he loves shrimp. Larry loves rainbows. Jim loves angel fish. You know your niche because you've had a taste of everything.

Speaker B:

You know, the first time I went down to Florida, and I've said this on the podcast before I went there and went, expected to be wowed. And we go out to it was a true fish farm. And they are using the stainless steel edge tanks from the 50s with a slate bottom. And they had, and I'm not exaggerating, probably seven or 800 tanks just for breeding. Tiger Barbs, they had all these tanks set up. And what they did is every Monday they would bring up the tanks. They were empty. They'd fill them full of crick water. They went down to the creek, to the creek, and they pumped a bunch of water, which was real soft and acidic, they told me, and they brought it in, filled the tanks. And in the back of the warehouse, which was just a greenhouse, they had all these tanks, and they're all full of female barbs and male Tiger barbs. They put one male for like five females in there, and they would leave them in their Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Wednesday. They pulled all the eggs out. They pulled the fish out when they pulled the eggs. They leave the eggs in there for two days. And then on Friday, they would rinse out the tanks, turn them upside down and start over. On Monday, they're producing about 80 to 100,000 Tiger Barbs out of a greenhouse. And it was so simple, and they did not have I'm not kidding you, they didn't have $5,000 invested into the building. And on the tank, you'd swear the.

Speaker A:

Amish were doing it.

Speaker B:

Oh, it was so old fashioned. And I said to the guy, Why do you use all these old tanks? He goes, they hold water, don't they?

Speaker C:

Okay, no metaphrames.

Speaker B:

Yeah, exactly.

Speaker C:

So whatever happened to the diatom filter?

Speaker B:

Man, I wish I knew.

Speaker I:

Okay.

Speaker A:

We have listeners. What's a diatom filter for people that are my age?

Speaker I:

It is an old filter, and it basically polishes the water, and it scrubs the water. I was probably one of the last people to know besides Jam of my generation.

Speaker H:

Okay.

Speaker I:

I'm, like, one of the last people of my generation. We had one at my store that I found, and they have a tendency to explode and fill your water with diatoms, so they're not the best for things.

Speaker A:

Thank you for accurately telling us why they went away forever.

Speaker I:

That's why they went away.

Speaker C:

Was that the vortex? vortex? Brand.

Speaker I:

Yeah, I think so.

Speaker B:

Whisper came up with a pretty good one called A Diet to Magic.

Speaker A:

Yeah, there's a bunch of spin offs they still have for people that want to use them, but that was the big thing, is they explode.

Speaker B:

Yeah. I used the Diet to Magic, which was like a back behind filter, and that worked out really well.

Speaker C:

You can use the marineland, the internal ones with diatomaceous. Earth hot magnet kind of a mess.

Speaker B:

Yeah, it's just a lot of flipping work. It's easier to do a water change sometimes.

Speaker E:

And I found out there's different grades of diatomaceous earth who don't just buy the stuff off ebay.

Speaker B:

Yeah. When you open up the bag and you breathe it in, and you've got coal miners lung for the rest of your life, that's terrible stuff.

Speaker A:

All right, who's got another one?

Speaker C:

Good topic would be, like, what happened to all the old stuff? How about silent giants? Oh, jeez.

Speaker A:

There's one podcast that we're working on because there's a list of podcasts, and we've gotten some fantastic feedback from email from you guys on Discord. We have an entire dedicated chat channel in Discord just for ideas, but we want to do a history of fish. I've talked to a couple of episodes that the tropical fish hobby essentially started around the 1920s, 1930s, but we'd like to get into what's that timeline look like. What changed? What was the going thing? What happened in 2001 that stopped all this shipping and started monster? Companies like smelter and all this hate just really go over just overall history of the aquarium hobby, the modern hobby as we know it.

Speaker B:

I really like to get I buy goldfish from a couple of different goldfish companies over in North Carolina. South Carolina the one thing that they had, and I still am kicking myself to this day that I didn't buy when they originally started back, like with the they shipped goldfish in a milk can with and the milk can like an old fashioned, probably 25 gallon metal milk can. And they would take a big chunk of ice and put on top of the milk can, and the top of the milk can was vented. And so as the train would quickly clack down the road, they'd have 1000 goldfish or whatever they put in this tank, and then the ice would melt and go into the water and keep the fish cool and stuff, and they would get to their destination. And I think when they started doing that, they're selling to wolvers. If anybody remembers Wolver's stores, they were cleaning out an old warehouse and they offered for sale for like $20 a piece. And I thought, what a great nostalgic piece it would have been. I saw it on the email on Monday. I called them on Wednesday and said, hey, you still got me those left. She goes, no, they went so quick. It's unbelievable. And I still kicked myself to this day because you look it up online and you can see these old things that they use and it's fantastic.

Speaker A:

I would eat a shoe for a Victorian era aquarium on top of that.

Speaker B:

Yeah. Or pay $2500.

Speaker A:

They do remakes now for about that price, right? Yeah. So I see here we have a post in Discord from Anthony. We see a lot of here. What are those magazines? Tell us a little about what you got.

Speaker E:

They are the monthly mailer from the clubs in Detroit, and they're from the late sixty S to early 80s.

Speaker B:

Those are cool.

Speaker E:

They had a whole box of hundreds of them, and they were giving them away for free. And I should have took the whole box, but I felt guilty.

Speaker A:

That's absolutely awesome. So you can check this out going in our discord. According guyspodcast.com, we have a lot of pictures on here. Pickles has been doing a fantastic job of updating our fishboard. That's also on the website, so check that out. But that is a collection of history, sir.

Speaker E:

It is still in publication, and it still does come out every month.

Speaker A:

Wow, excellent.

Speaker E:

That's motor City Aquarium society's Journal.

Speaker B:

I have boxes of digital tropical fish hobbyists. I don't know if anybody remembers tropical fish hobbyists. That was out for years and years and years and that was that still out? I don't know. It was a monthly publication. Is it still going?

Speaker C:

I don't think it is. I think I heard their website no.

Speaker B:

Longer they're no longer there. And that's how I found Steve rubiki with Angels Plus. Back in the late 80s, we found.

Speaker A:

An advertisement on him for like 92. It was like one of those side put in things in no magazine where you could just write up and order it, send it back to him.

Speaker B:

Yeah. And back then he would answer the phone when he called steve, but now he's so busy, he wants everything done by email. We had him on here busy, and he was so gracious with his time and his knowledge, and we talked to him after the podcast, and he goes, it's just nice to see people excited about the hobby. And Steve has been doing it for, what, 40 some years? And talks about how he works seven days a week and Christmas and his birthday. He's still working. There's a lot of people that are dedicated to this hobby, and my hat's off to him. And if we can pull people together and educate and help each other out, I think we got the world by the balls, guys and gals.

Speaker C:

Absolutely.

Speaker G:

I always thought that was the beauty of the hobby, is there's so much information out there, and it's not that everything's already been solved, but the fun part of the hobby for me is just learning. You always get to learn in this hobby.

Speaker B:

Yeah. What was really interesting is when we're talking to Mr. Jim Kitchen, the pleco king, the thing that blew me away, when he says you have to have the right size pleco cave, but here's something that I never in a million years would have thought of. He says if you don't have the correct clay to make these caves, they can't breathe. And he holds the female in there till she suffocates. Not in a million years would have ever thought a fish would suffocate in a cave, but he doesn't want to let her out until she has those eggs. And he says once he found out the typical the right clay to use, and he actually has these caves made just for himself, he said that's when he started having success, and he shared that secret. And I'm just going, holy cow. That kind of breaks the door wide open to a lot of cool things.

Speaker A:

It's those tiny tips that are hidden.

Speaker E:

Totally blew me away.

Speaker B:

Yeah. And there again, Jim, what a wonderful guy. Thanks again to him for helping us out and stuff. And I just hats off to these guys that are helping us out, and it's just humbling, really.

Speaker A:

I'm going to get you a tissue. Don't worry.

Speaker E:

The generation gap.

Speaker B:

Yeah, exactly.

Speaker A:

All right, what else we got, guys? I think we got room for, like, two more questions.

Speaker F:

Not necessarily, actually. Yeah, question kind of tie into the hybrids we were talking about before. What do you think of man made fish?

Speaker A:

Okay, so when we say man made fish, like the glow fish, it's essentially done in the lab crossed. Is that what you're talking about?

Speaker F:

Well, not necessarily just the GlowFish, but other fish that were bred to have, for example, the bubble eye goldfish. You know what I'm talking about?

Speaker B:

Yes.

Speaker F:

The one that has, like, the sacks on his eyes to make them swim weird. Or like, the parrot cichlid that has the mouth that can't close. You know what I mean?

Speaker A:

That one's pretty terrible. It seems like torture. I'm on the fence about it. When you see a bubble eye goldfish, you just look down and like, oh, God, what did they do wrong? They asked, can we not? Should we? But they're very popular and I think goes to the same point we had before, is it does get people into the hobby. However, we need to make sure they're ethical. I think glow fish, however, made in a lab cross with jellyfish to make sure they have color. It's still done with egg. It's done humanely. The things that I think are the absolute worst are fish modifications. I've seen people just like you would take an animal and try to cut off their tail to make them cuter, to modify fins, scales, or purposely stunt them to get a different body pattern. Or the worst one, which you mentioned on the podcast before, is tattooing.

Speaker B:

Tattooing. That's the one that kind of gets me.

Speaker I:

No, bat rays has got to be one of the worst ones.

Speaker A:

Batrays what's?

Speaker B:

The batray batman.

Speaker I:

Apparently. I've been on the stingrays places that I'm at. They will cut the discs of baby stingrays to make them look like bat wings, even though they're sometimes born that way. They will literally cut that out and then put a bunch of healing stuff in there to make them heal up because bat rays are worth more money. So they will disfigure all of these, like, Matoro stingrays or whatever to make them look like bat rays. And then they sell them for a higher price.

Speaker B:

Totally.

Speaker I:

And that's probably one of the worst things you could do to them because they're going to I mean, it's like torturing the fish.

Speaker B:

Yeah. And then when the tattooed fish first came out, they're tattooing I love you for valentine's Day hearts. You could order them to say, Marry me, Jen. You could get all kinds of stuff.

Speaker A:

I'm waiting for one of our listeners just to put something like stop playing the digger redu and then put that on a molly and send it to you.

Speaker B:

You'd have to send several because didrio is a big word. You have to use more than a molly. Maybe an arijuana. Oh, no, don't maybe in arijuana. Yeah. rob's had some problems with arijuana.

Speaker A:

So I'm more focused on how ethical it is to get that modified fish versus is it modified? Because they'll always modify. You'll have gene selection, just like dogs. It'll happen. But are you harming the animal to do this right?

Speaker C:

I feel you are with some of the goldfish because when you're shortening them up, you're also crunching down their internals so it's harder for them to digest. Their swim bladder always an issue. That's why they've always got swim bladder issues. Yeah, I have a problem with it.

Speaker B:

And then you throw the goldfish on an airplane and you take them up at 30,000ft, bring them back down, and I get goldfish all the time. I like to sell larger arandas. And anyway, you'll always get two or three that are swimming upside down.

Speaker C:

Yeah.

Speaker B:

One thing I have learned from a friend of mine, you can feed them duckweed, and they love duckweed, and that seems to help them tremendously. Correct. The swim bladder issue. Don't ask me why. I don't know, but they told me.

Speaker I:

This out the skin too.

Speaker A:

No, just give them the plant that Mr. pickles put in his tank.

Speaker B:

There's nothing left that's already gone.

Speaker A:

All right, guys, one last question, and how dare you for keep making this so controversial?

Speaker F:

I apologize.

Speaker G:

All right, I got a question for the wives.

Speaker A:

Awesome.

Speaker B:

Oh, no. Excellent.

Speaker G:

How do you guys feel about the hobby?

Speaker A:

Better yet, how do you put up with us?

Speaker G:

How do you put up with it?

Speaker D:

I like all the tanks. Exactly. The hard part, the easy parts of fish.

Speaker A:

Oh, yeah, we got Mrs. Larry in the podcast.

Speaker B:

She stepped forward and threw a punch. I love it. Right in the hand.

Speaker A:

All right. No. Let's hear Mrs. Larry.

Speaker C:

That was her.

Speaker B:

Does she have a first name?

Speaker D:

When I get home, I go to my fish room first, and then it's, oh, yeah, by the way, Larry, I'm home.

Speaker B:

You've got your priorities right?

Speaker D:

I don't know, about an hour I've been spending time with the fish.

Speaker A:

I love it. So what do you keep?

Speaker D:

Priorities, right? Priorities.

Speaker A:

It sounds like that you're just as much in the hobby as Larry is. So what do you keep?

Speaker B:

What?

Speaker D:

Do I what?

Speaker A:

What do you keep?

Speaker D:

Oh, I teach high school special ed kids.

Speaker A:

No, what fish do you keep? She was telling you the same one.

Speaker D:

The same one? Yeah.

Speaker B:

Is that where you met Larry?

Speaker D:

No.

Speaker B:

My favorite are the angels, my friend.

Speaker A:

All right, so the better part is, I think what we have Jen and tanasa left will say that Jen does some of the hobby with Jim. She has her own discus. Is that correct?

Speaker D:

Yes.

Speaker A:

All right, so to NASA, I think you're the oddball here as a person that really doesn't have a hard face in the hobby. She's a crafter at heart. That's where our podcast studio is. How do you put up with me?

Speaker D:

It's hard.

Speaker A:

It's hard. It's real difficult.

Speaker D:

It is.

Speaker A:

Especially when I come and say, how are you? And I'm wet from the elbow down.

Speaker D:

Yeah, I get wet for weird reasons.

Speaker A:

And not for that reason.

Speaker B:

Wow.

Speaker A:

You heard it here. eww, you're gross. I just want to kiss you got to, like, wipe yourself. That's fish fish crap.

Speaker D:

You smell funny.

Speaker A:

You smell funny.

Speaker D:

But I really enjoy the aquariums. I enjoy we have a couple of placos right now that they are having batch after batch after batch. jab at gym.

Speaker B:

Bite me, I can't raise plecos. So I gave him a robbie, and he starts producing them left and right.

Speaker D:

And I enjoy getting the babies out of the aquariums. And we have my favorite fish, but I can't say what kind it is.

Speaker A:

You can say what kind it is?

Speaker D:

We have dojo loaches and they're illegal.

Speaker I:

In Minnesota, so they're not, are they?

Speaker A:

They are illegal in Minnesota now as of four years ago. But we purchased ours beforehand and we have the receipt to prove it.

Speaker D:

We do.

Speaker A:

So we're grandfathered in four years in one day.

Speaker B:

And they are the size seriously, they are the size of a banana. banana.

Speaker A:

We got them in and she called them her cheetos because they're bright yellow dojo loaches. And now we have a couple of extras that we got from our rescue. It was a rescue. We got them at the tropical fish shop. So shout out to Nancy. And I brought them home and she giggled.

Speaker B:

Love them.

Speaker A:

And she calls them her penises. I do, because they're giant.

Speaker D:

Have fun freaking people out. I'm like, hey, Anthony, come see my penises. I looked at me like, what the heck?

Speaker B:

And they are the last time I was up there, they were all kind of laying in the java moss or whatever you have up there.

Speaker A:

It's the crap you give me.

Speaker B:

I don't know.

Speaker A:

Oh, that was mixed with java moss, I think.

Speaker B:

Right. And they're doing the jiggly jiggly like they're getting ready to breed in there.

Speaker A:

Yeah, they were breeding. We're about to do they start acting.

Speaker E:

Odd when the weather changes.

Speaker B:

Absolutely.

Speaker A:

Okay, fun story. When we first got these, we had a thunderstorm that rolled in after day three. One shot out of the tank because we had it in the kitchen. Shot out of the tank and landed on the table. They're squirrely as hell before storms.

Speaker B:

Yeah. And still, even with angel fish, when they breed, I keep track of all the weather also. And I used to go from, like, two or three spawns a day because I had 50 pairs. And all of a sudden we'd have a down pressure come through and all of a sudden I got 1518 spawns and everybody stuff that has spawned five days earlier, but they spawned again just because of the weather.

Speaker A:

We went over this, all right? It's because you're playing lionel ritchie.

Speaker B:

Not lionel ritchie, Mark.

Speaker A:

Guys, we got to play a clip right here.

Speaker B:

That's the way it should be.

Speaker A:

Was that not a nice clip?

Speaker B:

That was a nice clip.

Speaker A:

That was a great clip.

Speaker B:

Yeah, I like that.

Speaker A:

Yeah, it was sexy.

Speaker B:

That was sexy.

Speaker A:

It was sexy. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. pickles. You didn't need to hear that. We'll put it in all right before we leave. So jen discus right.

Speaker D:

Love my discus.

Speaker A:

Are they still breeding?

Speaker D:

They're working on it. They're getting a little feisty in the tank again, but it's always like the ones you don't want to breed together.

Speaker A:

Oh, that one's ugly.

Speaker D:

Oh, no, I have an Indian one in there. Dot Indian, not feather.

Speaker A:

Oh, thank you. Okay, you got to clarify.

Speaker D:

Yeah. He's got a little black dot right on his forehead.

Speaker B:

Yeah. We got a bright orange discus. Oh, beautiful discus. And she was returned to the pet store up in fargo because it had a black dot on its forehead. And that's the only reason the gal brought it back, because it wasn't perfectly orange all the way around.

Speaker A:

So I think the answer to your question is, how do I treat it? So we have to go in with this. And this is for everybody listening. If you have a wife and you're wanting to try to get in the hobby, get them in the hobby, and it's so much easier for you. ain't that right, Larry?

Speaker B:

Yeah.

Speaker C:

No, you don't buy another fish. So you know what you do? You go and get the placos and this is and they don't see them.

Speaker A:

There you go.

Speaker B:

Or you buy her a fish and go, hey, honey, happy birthday. I've done that. Sometimes it's easier just to apologize, tend to get permission.

Speaker I:

Yes.

Speaker A:

All right, well, I'd like to thank each and every one of you that joined the podcast tonight. This was fantastic. We might have to do this in the future. It was fun having an open forum. We love you. And we did not expect the amount of support. We didn't expect to have a pickle on board. It's been overwhelming for us. The podcast is definitely blowing up, and we hope to grow this do live stream sessions with you guys. We're trying to look into investing camera equipment, and we just want to utilize this podcast to share that community with people that don't have aquarium societies. We want to have one nationwide, worldwide aquarium society through a podcast, and we appreciate it. And last bit, we thank people like Robbie Chan for supporting us financially and making this happen.

Speaker H:

No problem. Thank you guys for having me.

Speaker B:

Thanks. And and listen, next week here, we're going to have Robbie on. I believe we're going to record Tuesday night because of the holiday Thanksgiving. Yes. And I just want to say something. It's Thanksgiving next week. And what I'm thankful for most this year is that we started this podcast not even, what, 1012 weeks ago. We've had an overwhelming response. And that first week we had maybe 40 or 50 listens.

Speaker A:

And now we're pushing 1000 a week.

Speaker B:

Pushing 1000 listens a week because of you guys.

Speaker A:

Wow.

Speaker B:

We thought that we would probably hit 5000 listens by two years. Two years. And at the rate we're going, we're going to hit it before the end of the year. And I did some math, and I think we're looking at doing 10,000 listens here, probably within by March or April.

Speaker A:

And that's if we don't have change in growth and you share with your friends as podcasts.

Speaker B:

Right. So from the bottom of our hearts, I want to thank you, guys. Encourage all the young people in your lives and even the old people in your lives to get into the hobby. And let's all share and have a big aquarium blood fest.

Speaker A:

And we're going to see if we can get people like big Rich to do a slice of raw turkey to feed to a catfish in honor of this all the hell be fun.

Speaker B:

Yeah, there's nothing more fun than watching Rich get beat up on an aquarium podcast.

Speaker A:

All right, guys, I think that's it. Thank you again, and let's kick that outro.

Speaker I:

Thanks, guys, for listening to this podcast. Please visit us@aquariumguyspodcast.com and listen to us on spotify, I heart radio, itunes, and anywhere you can listen to podcasts.

Speaker A:

We're practically everywhere. We're on Google. I mean, just go to your favorite place, Pocket casts subscribe to make sure it gets push notifications directly to your phone. Otherwise Jim will be crying into sleep.

Speaker B:

Can I listen to it in my tree house?

Speaker A:

In your tree house, in your fish room, even alone at work.

Speaker B:

What about my man cave?

Speaker A:

Especially your man cave. Yeah, only if adam's there no with feeder guppy.

Speaker I:

No, they're endless.

Speaker B:

You imagine loving Frank sucking mother frank.

Speaker A:

Well, I guess we'll see you next time. Later.

Episode Notes

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