On my way home from visiting my friend in Milton Keynes, I got a phone call from a lady who looked after the house when my mum and I were away. She told me that the filter on my fish tank has stopped and she can't get it to start working.

I have litrally just come back and had a look at it, and the little turny thing that helps the flow of water won't turn smoothly. i cleaned it and everything, and did the filter pads/clay ring-thingys, so I have a bacteria friendly, clean filter... but that's no use if the friggin thing won't stay on for longer than 20 seconds!

The whole thing also decided to stop about a month ago when I was camping with a load of college friends, but my mum eventually got it working.

My tank is 28.04 Uk gallons and has a decent amount of fish in it.. including some fairly water quality sensative fish.

~PLUS~ I simply lifted the hood up when my Rainbow snakehead launched itself from the water and chowed down on my finger. I then had to catch it from floundering/walking around on the floor where it again tried to bite me...
Evil >_>



Sympathy please <3

oh dear.I have had a fluval 4 running for 20 years with no replacement parts.Bought a brand new fluval 2 for another tank and it packed up within 2 years.Things ain't what they were.

mine is a fluval 104, my dad bought it when I was much younger for our tiny 37 litre. It's worked fine untill now ): I don't have any fish like khuli loach which like to make filters their home, so nothing of the fish kind living in it..
so sad! And I need to buy a filter the same size or bigger because when i move out i'm planning to expand to a 4 ft tank D: EXPENSIIVVEEEE )':
They really do make things last less to get more money, don't they?

I'm very jealous that you have a fish tank full stop! When I left my ex and was homeless, I naturally had to leave all my tanks, fish and equipment there. My love is mostly Siamese fighting fish - of which I bred and concentrated on Dragons and breeding healthier big finned types and had a few Thai imports. I do like a good community tank though and had one 37 uk gallon community with the worst filter, ever. I was forever sorting it out, replacements, cleaning etc and it drove me mad! I think if I was going to set up a community tank again, I'd buy an old, second hand filter from another fish keeper and recycle it instead of using the ones available at the moment. Or stick to my hard-work but most rewarding fighters, who I don't use filters for (prefer still waters and prevents fins ripping) and instead get daily/every 2 day water changes.

Aww, i would hate to leave my fish tank behind anywhere D:
Nah, I couldn't do without a filter with my tank ): (found the same one on ebay for cheap!!) it's my snakehead's play thing, he loves darting across the inlet stream and he tried to catch the bubbles!!
Here's a few pics to show you what my tank looks like nowa days




My friend has an 8 ft Marine tank (it's AMAZING!!) and i've nabbed a pic from his Facebook for you to see

It makes me happy just looking at it, don't know about anyone else

Naw, big tanks need the filters but since the Siamese are solitary fish and require little space (though more than most are lead to believe), 50% water changes daily/every other day are good for them.

Your tank is great, I'm very jealous! I love sand in tanks, makes everything look more natural I think and sooo much better for live plants. I love live plants in tanks too, with the right lights for them, they look fantastic - not so great when they bring in snails though!

And that marine is fantastic! I'd love one some day.. when I'm rich lol!

Yeah that's what i'm doing for the moment (: It's tricky though, my tank is just under a shelf with a vivarium on, and is also at the end of my bed, so there's little wiggle space xD

yeah I love the sand! Gets bubbles though, I have to shuffle my fingers through it to get rid of them, and all the wile getting bitten ): I only have 1 snail in my tank xD The fish get rid of any small ones. I don't mind them though. I've never seen snail eggs so meh lol

It is amazing! He got the tank for free, and he has a lot of fish related contacts which means he gets stuff for free or extremely discounted

wow your tank looks great! i wanted sand in mine tank but stuck with gravel.
What fish is it you have that bites? would love to stick one in one of the tanks at work to bite the students

I had gravel in my smaller tank, then i mixed it with sand, UBER natural looking! I still have a little bit of gravel in this tank, but the small bits you can see looks really nice! mixed in with a few larger pebbles and stuff (:

Rainbow snake head

any of the snake head species are fairly confident, and love attention! They eat anything they can- the basic rule is if it's half it's length, it will get eaten. The rainbow snake head gets up to 20 cm. Seriously, if you don't tickle him he nibbles >_> he's made me bleed before, not a lot, but still! and it's only 9 cm D:

By the way that picture does him no justice for his colour!!