Monday, April 26, 2010

The Fish Shack

Several years ago I had my first fish tank in Florida. It was just simple 29 Gallon freshwater tank with whatever fish I thought were neat to have at the time. I must admit, I thought it was normal to buy new fish every week since a couple always seemed to die. I found out the hard way that some fish just don't get along with others very well, and a Oscar is a good way to rid your tank of any smaller fish.

When we decided to move out of state we got rid of our tank and just planned on having another one later. We finally moved back to my home state of Iowa and settled in. We talked about getting a tank again but didn't want to by fish at Walmart 45 minutes away or drive an hour to a pet store.

Luckily for me one day I got a call from my mother, she wanted me to pick up a feeder mouse for my younger sister's snake. She told be about The Fish Shack in Manchester is where to get them. I was surprised that I never heard of this place before, so I stopped in after work one day to get the mouse and was amazed at all the tanks and fish he had there. I remember telling my wife about this place close by that has tons of fish.

A few days later my wife and I stopped in together to look around. We decided then that another fish tank was in our future.

The First tank was a 37 Gallon setup. After talking to Bill, the owner of The Fish Shack, I added an under-gravel filter to the tank and I must say it worked great. Here I had read so many places how these filters were old school and don't work all that well, but with some advice from Bill, mine did wonders for my tank. We would stop in weekly to pick out a fish here and there to stock our tank. Bill and his staff were always helpful and friendly for someone only spending a couple bucks here and there on some fish.

Several months later we ended up buying a house and a couple more tanks for the new house. We had a 60 gallon and a 72 gallon bow front. We were going to set them up as soon as we moved into our new home. Stopping at The Fish Shack and seeing his Saltwater tanks got us talking about setting up our own.

Moving time came and we soon found out our new home just didn't have the room for 3 tanks. So we decided to setup the 72 bow front and keep it freshwater. Within a few weeks though we figured that if we were going to have just one it should be a reef tank.

Following Bills advice, we setup the 60 gallon tank, and 6 weeks later started to slowly stock it. Before I knew it we had a well stocked 60 gallon reef tank and Bill even found a guy to buy my 72 Gallon Bow front. I enjoyed the tank so much I really wanted more. My wife and I decided to buy a 125 Gallon tank from Bill to replace the 60 Gallon. Once it was setup, The Fish Shack was almost a daily stop. 

Just stopped in today a got a great deal on a new coral.(picture below) Check back as I will try to offer some in depth information on my tank setup, fish and corals.

  

1 comment:

  1. My brother wants to get into marine biology. He's been volunteering at the hospitals to take care of their aquariums and other areas. I'll have to pass your blog onto him. I'm following you from Follow Me Back Tuesday

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