Hi folks,

I was wondering whether it was possible to keep native uk freshwater fish in tanks? And how easy this was?

I've thought about getting a fish tank and I actually find the idea of keeping roach etc more appealing than goldfish or tropical fish.

Is it possible? Do they survive well? Or is it not worth it?

Cheers

PS. Forgot to mention gudgeon? Love them!

[ 02. September 2005, 04:47 PM: Message edited by: bingo ]

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Hi Bingo ..

I have seen tank setups containing native English fish, and usually it is not a pretty sight !!

Fish such as Roach idealy need fast running clean water, which is very difficult to achieve in a tank setup.

They will survive in a still-water tank .. but they will not be very happy in there !!!

Very difficult .. but not impossible !!

I used to keep a rudd, and he was fine. Had tench and mirror carp also

You may have problems with keeping the water temp low enough for some fish.

Hi,

Its not hard at all providing you do a few things.

Size of tank - I would suggest a decent sized tank, somthing mabey around 4ft x 1ft x 1ft would be great, bigger even better !!

Creating flow - Use a number of powerheads at one end of the tank.

Vegitation - I like to keep my fish tank natural, using live plants, natural colours stones and rocks.

Filtration - A nice sized external filter mabey somthing that turns the water twice over an hour.

Anything else you would like to know either post it here or pm me.

Of course there are a number of ways to do things and this is my way lol, other may have there own opinions.

Joel

I used to run an 8x2x2 tank and fish such as roach thrived in the higher temperatures its just like the canal in summer when you get high water temperates and very little water movement just like shallow lakes thefish do alright if everything in the tank is balanced coarse fish will give you years of enjoyment its just when they get to big you can run into problems unless you know some one with a very large spot to put them .

I had a group of 6 roach in a small tank(2ft) in my garage but moved them last year to my koi pond were they have continued to grow and have doubled in size and are now around the 15-20cm size well worth keeping if you have the room.

I kept a pike for some time in a 6 foot tank, it soon out grew the tanks and ended up back in the same river it was caught.

Went from a 8 inch fish to nearly 18 inches in about six months, had plenty of food and fed well every day.

I kept a pike too, from a couple of inches to about a foot long. Unfortunately, the lid was not tight fitting and it managed to jump through the gap. To be honest, pike are fairly boring fish to keep. Being an ambush predator, they tend to do nothing when they aren't being fed.

I've also kept roach, rudd and stone loach successfully.

One of these days, I'm going to have a really big coldwater native tank. Not in this house, no room for another fish tank, but in the next one. I've seen some fantastic tanks retailing for about a grand but obtainable for more like 600 which would be big enough to have something approximating a UK pond community. I'm thinking small carp and tench, rudd, roach, gudgeon and sticklebacks, and enough room to grow a dwarf lilly or three...

mr. wiggly said that roach usually live in fast flowing water. they don't, they normally live in still or slow moving water and can be kept in tanks so so so easily as can rudd and many other course fish. gudgeon are also so easy to keep as are carp and many other fish. they just need normal filters and oxygenators. i kept my tench ( golden and green ) in tanks for years before putting them in my ponds and they have grown on to a few pounds and were good and as easy to keep as any tank fish and imo easier to keep than most tropical fish. some fish such as pike, perch, barbel, trout,char,the common bullhead and grayling require more expertise/effort/equiptment. Most other fish i can think of are easy to look after so long as they don't outgrow the tank. i have kept minnows and they have been so easy. no probs and they are better for the enviroment as should they escspe or somehow end up released or have their eggs trabsferred they can't become invasive in the way in which certain fish like the top mout gudgeon and sun fish have become.