Well, I got my tank under control and went and picked up my fish. They are very entertaining! I have been enjoying watching them out- manuever and browbeat each other till they finally settled where they wanted to be.

I didn't have alot of shells in there so I tried to get them separated so they would not fight. This is how it went:

I am calling them north, south, east, and west until I come up with something better.

North came out of his shell and decided the shell next door was better, he moved in. He might not have liked the pink paint on his old shell. What guy would?

East came out of his shell and was set upon immediately by north and west, who seem to like each other (neighborhood thugs) poor east was afraid of his own shadow. I moved him waaay up north where none of the fish go. He is in fact exiled. We will call his corner "Siberia"

west enjoys her original shell and is the only fish who has not moved. I think west is a girl. the shell seems too small to me though. (in the fish world it's probably the equivalent of a studio apt.)

south came out of his shell after a looooonnnng while. In fact I thought he died. nope. just lazy. he did not like his shell and tried one closer to west. West did not like that and chased him into the hole in the tufa rock where he stayed for a while, and then probably missed the closeness of his shell. He moved into a shell on top of the tufa rock that is actually closer to west than where he was previously, but his being north of her does not seem to bother her. He is up higher. I am calling his house "The Heights"

Everyone is busy guarding his or her respective home and buffer zone. At last there is peace in the valley.

These guys are fun!!

Congrat! oooh sound interesting! and fun. really cute.

creatures they are for sure! Sounds like they are all getting a case of "nextdoor envy" breaking and entering at random into each others homes. Hilarious. Those thugs- better watch them. So East got the cold shoulder (Siberia )And clever little West staying home all day..its a dangerous street to live on!

They sound heaps of fun Rach and we would love a pic sometime (especially that pinkish shell- sounds wild). Congrats on your new little dwellers.

Thanks!
There have been developments overnight: North has decided that he is envious of South's shell and wants one of his own. The trouble is: the only other shell that looks like that is in Siberia right next to poor East. They are both up there now showing off their "i'm mad at you" stripes.

It will be interesting to see who wins the face off.

I need more shells and a longer tank. I am thinking of buying a 20 long........real lonnnnnnnnnnnnng.

O.k. I don't want my little fish to stress ..so I moved the coveted shell from siberia and placed it back where north's original shell was, and then I figured the heater may have been too close to the shell and that might have been why north wanted to move. so I moved the heater. Lo and behold everyone stayed in their positions all day. I did see north go back up to Siberia and show his colors (just to keep him in his place, or nyah nyah him about the shell) and I see west has been eyeing the purple shell that was once south's. could she be planning a move?

They have all been doing basic housekeeping chores such as sweeping away the sand in front of the door. They are landscaping too. This makes me think they are finally happy.

will west move into the purple shell? will north and east ever get along? What's up with south? stay tuned...

O.k. here is a photo of the tank so far. I did buy a 20 long today to give them more room it will be quite a project to switch them. THe filter fell down today which prompted East to move back to his old shell but he still claims Siberia and will chase anyone who goes over there. West has been in the South shell. North has dragged his two shells together and doesn't seem too interested in claiming Siberia now.Shell dwellers

They look so cool! Sounds like they provide you with heaps of entertainment!

Hee Hee! I am not sure if they provide me with great entertainment or..A) I am easily amused. B.) Have no life at all. or (C.) BOTH!!
Today Siberia belongs to North. I put a new shell in and it was immediately claimed by East. West has taken the unclaimed shell that used to belong to South.
South still has the hole in the rock and is guarding it well.

Oh my goodness they look so cute and .....active!!! I didn't know they could have sand like that, it looks so nice 'n comfy!!
(But you know what they say about building your house on sand )

I was amazed that they actually move the shells around! I have also read somewhere that they will sometimes fill the openings of the shells with sand so no one will go in them.
the female will dig a huge pit around one shell and it will be the nursery, she lays her eggs there and guards them and all of the little ones will stay in that shell until they are big enough to go looking for shells of their own.
A male can have a harem of females in his territory. They are so fascinating! Everyone I have talked to on other fish forums says that they are prolific breeders and will build a colony in no time. So I got the 20 long and I am setting it up this evening when my honey comes home with the stand.

Here they are in their new tank:shell Dwellers I don't know who is who anymore because they abandoned their old smaller shells the moment they got a look at the nice roomy ones I put in there. I didn't see it happen!

I have found out that they are curious about me. I have them right next to where I sit on the couch and I have looked up many times to find a little row of faces looking at me all lined up close to the glass. When I move they all dart into their shells!

Oh well now you've done it. I may NEED some. They sound like so much fun!
Carli

Well, I have finally figured out who is who. It was because they may change their shells but they did not change their personalities. who's who

I got lucky with west because She never really totally left her shell, South is still unconcerned with anything going on, north and west both still hate poor East. East has been digging quite a hole. You can see it in the photo. I think the poor thing wants to go to China, and get away from North who is menacing him.

They move the sand in mouthfuls They suck up a big mouthful and go to where they want to put it then spit it out. I thought they did it with their tails!

East is burying the thermometer! It's funny how south and west get along, and west and north but no one likes poor east.

I like your tank setup. The sand looks like a very fine grade. Have you had any problems with sand in your filters?

Looks like a nice tank Chichey, I always wanted to get some shell dwellers. They are fun to watch!

I rigged the filter to keep the intake away from the sand, but of course some fine grit is getting in. the impeller is turning kinda rough. I can only filter so much out. I am doing maintenance on it more often.

Thanks Aquaman, they sure are fun to watch, especially when they are digging. It's cute when they spit it out. I have learned that the edges of the pits they dig are the edges of their territory.

I also found a source for the shells. Pet stores sell these shells for 2.99 ea. for Hermit Crabs. Amazon.com sells them in bags of 24 for 9.00 They are sold in the gourmet food area to be used for escargot.

I purchased some ciclid salts for trace elements, and some buffer to help me keep the ph stable for my little guys. They seem to be doing o.k. I haven't noticed any change in them since I put it in, but it makes me feel better to know that they are now in water that is ideal for them.

what I have learned lately:

They don't like floating food. They are very skittish about going to the surface at all. so the extra food pollutes the tank. They are not fond of the crumbles either. The only food they seem to like is the forzen brine shrimp. I will need to find some other food to give them more diversity. The only time there really is no territory is when they are feeding. Too busy I guess.

I learned a good lesson about poop: get it out of the tank before they bury it. They move alot of sand. They like alot of crevices in their living space. Right now east is digging another hole-to-nowhere that is covering up poop that collects in the back of the tank. He is creating a crevice under a shell that is not usable for living.

I still have not figured out the relationship between south and west. their territories seem to overlap, yet they do not fight and are often close to each other. They also do very little digging. There is a ridge between west and north and west will be quick to defend it if north is too close to it. South never defends anything. I am thinking they might be a mated pair and that is why I am seeing no little territorial disputes.
For a brief period west, north and south were "nodding" at each other alot. Maybe this is some kind of a mating dance?
I wonder if any of the shells has eggs in it??????? I have not seen any signs of fry.
It's great learning all this about my little tenants!

Great lookin tank Chickey!

Mating for shell dwellers usually involves the female clearing out a shell and then dancing at the mouth of the shell until a male swims by. She'll swim in, lay her eggs, then leave so the male can fertilize them. When the fry are born, they'll stay at the mouth of that shell. The females generally care for the young, the male will guard the shell, if he's not distracted by anything else.

Just some more information for ya :-)

that is so cool...at first i thought you were talking about hermit crabs or snails...

What a trip! That was fun!!

I had to do a water change for my little tenants so I took a picture that shows their territories
territories the green arrows show the shells they have moved from recently. the red arrows indicate the shells they currently live in. The red lines show the ridges that are formed by all the digging. These are the borderlines.

I thought I would c&p this post here. It is the OMG Babies topic i posted seperately. I thought I would put it here so the whole story is together.

OMG Babies!
I was feeding my little tenants and saw something moving...at first I thought it was another brine shrimp floating by, but NO it was a baby!!!
Hooray my shellies have done it! They are living in the shell with mum right now and there seems to be only 5 of them. Probably the others didn't survive because I had no idea they were there and didn't give them proper food. Too sad I am thinking I should go buy something for them.

Well, at least now I know who the female is! It was South all along. I thought it was West, but then West had a growth spurt and got bigger than South. The only way to tell sexes is by size: the females are smaller.

The babies are spry and quick and look exactly like adults, there's no yolk sac and they behave just like the adults. Already, you can tell they are territorial. I will try to get a photo, but they are so small I don't think it will be worth it.

The nursery

The babies stay in the nursery area, it's a small area outside of the mouth of Mom's shell. She dug out all of the sand in between the shells to make little crevices to move around in. Mom can stay out of sight and move between the shells and check on her little ones.
Two of the babies hover like mom over the nursery, but the other 3 are still hugging the bottom and are very hard to see. Pop comes over from time to time to check me out, I now have rigged up a magnifiying glass so I can see the little ones better. I have discovered that they are not so much interested in me as they are suspicious of me

The two babies I can see well are almost transparent. they are really just bellies with eyes and they appear to be snapping at small bits in the water. That's good, it shows they are eating. I bought baby fish food and put some in the nursery area, unfortunately, both Ma and Pa seem to enjoy the baby food. Pop is allowed to come and go in the nursery, but the babies avoid him.
hopefully, I will be able to get a photo soon.

Well I have done some reading and looking around on the internet and I have discovered that the babies I saw had to be at least a week old because their egg sacs were gone, and now the babies are gone! It seems that now that they swim and eat they are no longer sticking close to home and mumsy is no longer hovering over the shell. The parents are not so interested in territory invasions anymore. They are far more tolerant of North and East's little forays onto their turf.

I have only seen one or two of them for days. I continue to drop food in the nursery and wait for them to come out of hiding. I can't be sure I am seeing the same two fish or different fish on different days. They look good though. It is very likely that they have adopted their own shells and are keeping a low profile. There are lots of little nooks and crannies they can hide in. There could very well be more than just the 5 I saw!!

There could also be more than one spawn in there. From what I read: the female can lay eggs every 4 weeks. I have been watching the female and taking note of what she does. I saw a video on the net that showed mating behavior between the shellies and I have seen my girl "enticing" the male. She is looking around at the shells again as if trying to choose one.
I saw her lay across the opening on her side and flutter. The male came down and fluttered on top of her for a few seconds and then swam away. She is not hovering over that shell but she is sort of in between it and her own. I don't know if she laid eggs or not.

I am no longer worried about cleanup in the tank. Those little ones move very fast and aren't likely to stick around with all that disturbance. I am just careful around the mouths of the shells. I also am not worried about Daddy eating them- he had the opportunity one day and seemed to know the difference between a brine shrimp and baby, even though they looked about the same color and size.
I can't wait until they are bigger and start to hover up where I can see them better. Then I will know how many survived.

Mumsy has demonstrated what seems to be a strategy for finding buried food. she swims in the sand! It kicks up a big cloud of sand and she snaps at the food that is loosened up with it. smart girl!

East is working on re-excavating his pit after I disturbed it to clean the poops and food that collects there. It is his lot in life to live in the toilet of the tank the current in the tank deposits alot of the waste in his end of the tank. I have to get it out quick or he will bury it. On the flip side- he also gets alot of the drifting food.

Something else I read about my Shellies: They don't like water changes so experts recommend small weekly water changes but there are additives like the trace elements and the salt. It is hard to measure it for less than 5 gallons. I am thinking of getting a big rubbermaid tub to keep treated water in which will simplify the process. I don't like the thought of trying to measure salt for each small addition. There would be a real danger of salt creep.
I do their water changes very slowly, and I shut off the filter when I am ready to add it back. The sand gets kicked up alot with just putting the water in. I solved the problem by putting a board over the top of the tank and placing a bucket full of temp. matched water on top of it. I start a siphon with a piece of airhose and just let it trickle in. I then fill the bucket with more water as it goes down. The trickle doesn't disturb the fish and more importantly: it doesn't disturb the sand. I can leave it alone and go do whatever I want until the bucket needs to be filled some more.

I have seen a baby coming out of his own shell!! He adopted a shell near mumsy that is pearly on the inside. He is the only one I have seen.

Mumsy is hovering over the shell she fluttered in . I think she has eggs there. If the male goes too close she gets in between him and the shell. There are alot of articles out there about shell dwellers and they say that the female lays eggs in the shell and the male goes in after her and fertilizes them. I think that is not true. I think what I saw was the actual mating that took place at the mouth of the shell. The eggs would have fallen inside, and Mumsy is now guarding and tending them.

East and North are busy re-excavating their pits. It's funny! East is throwing his sand into North's pit.

I had to do another large water change. The nitrates were quite high. I am not sure if all the additives make the test results look different, but the fish will not mind the fresh water.

Good grief Rachel. You are fast becoming the resident internet expert on these fish!! I think you have just about covered all the questions and then some that we might ever think up to ask you I find it totally captivating and look forward to more diary extracts. There is so much I had no idea about, and imagine seeing a whole new kind of breeding like that- puts the milt on eggs theory in the dark ages

I so LOVE the set up. It reminds me of a museum archive. You know where you cant open the lid but they have all those cave people tools or whatever inside. Beautiful. And totally fascinating. Can't wait for some close ups with the new camera. Your Shelldweller Place is on my dramas to watch check list.

Thanks! I was hoping I was not boring anyone with all my posts. It's fun discovering their little ways, and I may be totally wrong about why they do what they do. They are so secretive! I would love to know what's going on inside those shells! They are like little spies...ducking in and out of doorways and carrying on little clandestine meetings.

Where are my babies!!! It drives me nuts!

Boring? Not at all! I keep checking back here to see what's new with your crew. Verrry interesting. I think I said this already but I love the diagram of your tank showing each of their territories. Keep the posts coming.

Thanks! I will keep updating then!

I have been reading more, and I have read that some folks have witnessed the parents eating babies!!!! Now all of this ducking in and out of shells has taken on a more sinister note. They may have been munching on their offspring, and my one little baby in the pearly shell has vanished. I think my diagrams may soon include sad little chalk outlines and police tape around the shell.
Poor babies! All this time I thought they were happily living in new shells! They must have been eaten. It didn't make sense to me that I couldn' t find them.
If I see a new brood, I should take them out shell and all. I need them to survive because I need more females. I only have one. If she should die, I would have trouble finding another one around here. I also have 2 bachelors in my tank who need companionship. The only trouble is: if I take them out, will they be able to go back in?

From what I have read: babies can move around within the colony, they are allowed to go from nest to nest. When they are big enough they will start to defend the colony. I also read that when females are scarce, you get monogomous pairs like I have, but when females are abundant, you get harems. One male may have several females in his territory. He will mate with all of them.

Stay tuned!

Maybe the babies are just hiding really well?? Fingers crossed that they pop back up.

Yes, your posts are very fascinating! At first I thought your little shell dwellers were some kind of crustacean lol. These are very interesting fish; I've never heard of them before. Where are they native to?

They are native to Lake Tanganyika in Africa. They inhabit the empty shells of Neothauma snails that fall to the floor of the lake. They are also the smallest ciclids in the world. The males won't get bigger than two inches.

The Shell Dwellers have to have shells to live in or they get very stressed and can die.

I am glad you find them interesting! They are fun to watch, and I hope they give me some more babies soon (and don't eat them) I want to get a good colony going.

This is a really interesting series of postings!!! Like Comet182, I'd never heard of fish that live in shells, and I've enjoyed the territory diagrams and your funny descriptions!

What fun!

I finally got my new camera! My very first video is of East coming out of his shell. It's not very good and it's short. I have alot to learn about the settings, and my battery died.

Anyway here it is: East's Movie


I wanted to mention something about my Dwellers: They can change color! actually they darken. Whenever they are threatened or are too close to each other they show their colors. They get darker and shimmy back and forth to menace each other. They are often aligned head to tail when they do this. Now that I have the new camera, I hope to get some good movies of them showing off, moving sand etc...

Everybody is doing well in my little tank, but there are no babies to be seen. Mumsy looks fat though so I am hopeful that she is planning a family again.
The boys are getting biiiig. Mumsy's Boytoy is not the biggest boy in the tank. I am wondering if he can be pushed aside in competition for the only female. No one has shown any interest in her though. but North is testing the borders alot. He's kinda teasing him.

I think it's time to give them all names. I am having too much trouble remembering who is who.
Mumsy will stay Mumsy unless I find her eating her babies then she will be-- Mumsy Dearest.
Her Boytoy will be Ricky Martin (silly, I know. I thought it was tacky to name him Jeffery like I wanted to.)
North will be known as Brad because he is in a pit . Maybe I will find an Angelina for him someday.
East will be Eastwood in honor of Clint. I will try not to name his mate Sondra. I'm sure there are still some bad feelings there.

Big Bru-ha-ha in Dwellerdom yesterday. So much for tidings of comfort and joy. They fought on Christmas.
It all started when Eastwood moved over Brad's Pit. This happened right after a water change. Brad and Eastwood fought for an hour at least, the whole time being observed by Ricky and Mumsy. Ricky had sinister motives: He waited until Brad had sent Eastwood packing then he swooped in to fight poor Brad who was clearly exhausted. So Brad had to fight for another hour.

They are vicious little nippers and engage each other by locking mouths. It's a tense situation. A miniature face off. At one point in the fight, Eastwood had Brad by the belly. That's when I tapped the glass, I had visions of disembowelings and I was having none of that. the ref called time out. It didn't last long, they were back at it after a little rest in their shells.

Eastwood was hiding in his shell, but every now and then he would come out and join the fray, so at one time there were 2 guys on poor Brad who at the end of it all somehow landed in Mumsy's territory in the corner. He wasn't moving, and for a while I thought he was killed, but I could see his gills still working so that was reassuring. Still, he stayed there for hours while Mumsy gave him a hard time.

I don't get her role in this at all. She watched and did nothing until Brad ended up in her corner. Then she started to nip him. Poor Brad was too tired to even care. Then Ricky, seeing that his foe was close to his girl, started to fight him again. At least he tried to....Mumsy wouldn't let him get close!! She was nipping Brad and then defending him! Weird. Brad slinked home in the middle of the night and seems to be doing o.k. today.

There have been some changes. Eastwood is back in his old shell and seems to have a small injury. it could be from a nip but it is more likely to be a scrape from the tufa rock, it's very rough. He seems to be o.k. but I will watch him for changes. Brad is kinda tired looking and staying near his shell. Ricky.....has moved from his home shell and is now faaaaaar away from Brad.
I guess Brad taught him a lesson about disturbing his neighbors. He is still Mumsy's boy, but now he is much closer to her.
Maybe he wants Mumsy to protect him.

I do not know what brought all of this on! Maybe it was something that was inevitable , or maybe I disturbed some all-important border with my somewhat thorough sand cleaning ( I knocked down the ridge between Brad and Ricky) I think they are going to have to re-establish their borders. There are currently some minor skirmishes between Eastwood and Brad, but it seems kinda halfhearted.

I got some of it on video (praise be to the camera) I identify everyone for you. When you watch it, you will see how they menace each other side by side. You should notice their colors too. Look at Mumsy and see how light she is then you will see how bold and dark the boys are! That is the darkening that I was talking about in my last post.

Shellie brawl

This little clip is during a pretty tame moment. Oh.... and you can hear my Honey singing some yodely song in the background!

Oh no! I hope everything settles back down for ya.

i saw that...i hope everying settled down too..

I'm so sad about the babies!! That is so unfriendly : I was hoping to see how they got their own shells.

They seem quite aggressive these shelldwellers that mouth lock fight was very dramatic but most amazing to me was the Botticelli dweller hovering in front of the large shell behind, just ignoring them. He was like "those neighbours are always at each others throats, the best thing to do is ignore them " He ( that wasn't Mumsie was it ) made me laugh

I wanted to ask you something I'm curious about. You have a lot of shells in there (more than before!) and I wonder what impact that has on your pH in there. It must be higher than your goldie tanks with no shells.

The nerve of that guy huh? Actually he was waiting for the outcome of the fight.

When Eastwood was back in his shell, He attacked Brad who was already tired after fighting off Eastwood. Brad fought him off though and now Ricky(Boticelli) has moved his home shell to one that is far away from Brad, and closer to Mumsy.

If you watch the video with sound, you will hear me name them all. Without sound: Mumsy is the one farthest to the right. At one point I pan over and Mumsy is by the brown striped shell, that is her home shell. It's a little hard to see her at first.

They are violent little guys. Very aggressive at times. But once their territories are established, they are reasonably happy.

At this moment they seem stressed. I had put some prazi in the tank and I am wondering if it has affected them. I have a couple of threads out there on ciclid forums asking if prazi is o.k. for them. It is supposed to be safe for all fish.

They also have expressed a dislike for the food they are being fed. They spit it out. I will have to go get new food for my mental patients (I mean,, Fish). The tank needs to be cleaned again from all the uneaten food. I hate to disturb them.

As for your question about the PH: The tank is currently at 8.2 which is what it should be for ciclids. My PH out of the tap is 7.4 so I have to put in additives to raise it. My KH with the additives is awesome! It takes 11 drops on the kh test. I can't remember what that works out to, but I know it's rock steady.

The Ph product is meant to work with Ciclid salts. The salts have to be in the water before you put in the Ph product.

The shells in the tank, and the tufa rock don't seem to make any difference at all. Before I put the fish in the tank I experimented with the rock and argonite substrate. The water was extremely cloudy and days of filtering it didn't help. ( I switched to sand to clear the water). The PH was at 8.3 initially but it did not hold steady there. It kept falling. I don't know why. So I use the chemicals, it's easier.

My Goldies get baking soda. It moves the ph up temporarily to 7.6 and then It goes back to 7.4 (tap) but the KH stays at about 89.5 (it is 40 straight from the tap-yikes-) . Not great, but I do alot of water changes anyway. I was considering trying the cuttlebone, but I like the measurability of baking soda. It means all of my tanks will be exactlly the same, and I can reproduce that same water without error.

It has worked well for me. I just wish the KH was higher.

BABY SIGHTING!! I have seen a baby! This is not one of the last bunch, it is too small. Must be a new batch! I know where he hangs out and now I am looking for others. hopefully they did not eat the rest. How exciting!

OOOooooh!! Is there any way you can parachute him to safety?

Second baby sighted in the same shell!!! WOOT!

ooooh I want to get them out of there! I am torn as to what to do. I wrote to some people on a ciclid forum and they said I should just let it go. One woman said that they will sometimes eat the first few broods until they realize they are babies.
My feeling is: I should take them out and let them grow up in another tank. When they are bigger I will try and determine who's who and put the females back into this tank. The females would be claimed by the males whereas a male would have to fight very hard for his own space.
I just don't know. I'd hate to lose them but if I remove them, I am taking them out of the community that they would otherwise grow up in. If they are males, I would never be able to put them back in without subjecting them to bad fights.
Another thought: section them off from the rest of the tank but leave them in. use some kind of divider just until they are big enough to be off the menu.

Yes a division sounds good. I'd hate to see them all eaten

They may have already had a nosh. I only saw 2.

I feel a song coming on (and Biggles doesn't feature in this one )

Something about Mumsy Dearest and Hannibal? I might have to re-name Ricky.

I wish I could get a photo of these babies! The shell they are in rests on it's side facing me (where I sit) I can see the inner whorl of the shell, and right at the very top of it: 2 tiny sets of eyes looking back at me. (this can only be seen with a magnifiying glass.)

The babies are more active today, they have hovered a little high. I am concerned for them!

BABY SIGHTING!!! I have seen a third baby!!! gotta go and have a look! this one is not living in the same shell!!

I had to pinch myself there for a second. Yes it was indeed a third baby. I looked inside the shell and both of the little ones were inside and the the third was still outside. He disappeared into a crevice, I have no idea where he lives. I have not seen him again.
Mumsy is enticing again. I am wondering now if she will kill the babies to protect a new brood? out of all the spawnings you would think something would survive!!

Brad is getting pushy. he is attempting to stretch his territory to include the pink shell, which if I am not mistaken was his original shell. I would have to read back to find out.

Claiming this shell is putting him on the border of Mumsy's territory which is blended with Ricky's. Whenever they see him over there they both go over and everyone starts bowing. (Oh, excuse me, I thought this was my shell. Pardon us, we will have to ask you to move along now.) So far, Brad has been going back to his pile. Then, slowly, slooowly slinks back over to the pink shell. He is politely hustled along when discovered.

Here is a little diagram of what is going on: click here

The green area to the right is the area that Brad is trying to claim. The green arrow in ricky's area shows his old shell and the red, his current. (He wanted to get away from Brad). The red arrow in Eastwood's territory show the shell he is currently occupying, the green is the old (he ran home after the fight.)

I didn't mark them, but the group of shells in the upper right hand corner are where Mumsy is planning another family.

I had a nasty shock when I came home. I got out the magnifying glass, and went to look at my babies. Imagine my surprise when I found myself eye to eye with Mumsy, just emerging from the babies shell!!! Oh No!!!
I kept watch for a while and saw 1 set of tiny eyes staring back at me I don't know if the second fish is still there but I am hopeful. =whew=

Yep! second fish is still there annnnnd the third fish has given himself away, I know where he lives now and he is still alive!!

I am going to prepare a small tank and get them out of there even though I really don't have the room to run one more. I can't bear the thought of losing them!

There is alot of tension in the tank today. Brad is still testing the border and Mumsy and Ricky are uneasy. They usually face the side of the tank because of the small current that flows off the side. Now they face away so they can both keep eyes on Brad.

Ricky is a bit rattled by his presence, He's been giving Mumsy the "Come Hither" look

Come On! you can't just start telling a story and never give it an end!

(in other words, We love your posts too much for them to go away!)



J