Hi everyone, I always feel a little funny about these introduction threads, but here goes.

After my disastrous first experience with fishkeeping in the early 90s, I was reintroduced to the hobby around 1997 and have been keeping various numbers and sizes of tanks and types of fish ever since. I started out with some basic community tanks, then had Oscars for several years, and then became interested in shell dwellers. At my height, I had about eight tanks, mostly small tanks of shell dwellers, but got a little bit burned out about a year and a half ago and seriously scaled back to two (now three) tanks.

Right now, I have a 75 gallon tank of 7 mixed Malawi cichlids. To be perfectly honest, I don't even know what some of them are -- after the aforementioned burnout I decided I didn't want to obsess over species for awhile and just wanted have a tank full of interesting fish I like to look at instead of discussing the intricacies of one species vs. another. Heresy, I know, but I'm enjoying them very much. In that tank I also have four yo yo loaches and a Synodontis eupterus that has been around since the community tank days, along with a convict cichlid that was someone else's castoff and didn't have anywhere else to go. (More heresy!!!)

I also have a 20L with a small colony of multifasciatus (shell dwellers), one of my absolute favorite fish. Nothing else in there with them.

Then I recently started up a 10 gallon for a betta. I've never had one before, so it is a new experience for me.

I've recently started to recover from my burnout and getting more involved with talking about fish, online communitites and such again. To warn you, I will probably drive some people crazy, because I have a bit of a hands-off approach. I keep up with my water changes and other tank maintenence, but I am not an obsessive water tester and don't believe in a one-size-fits-all approach to fishkeeping -- just so you know where I'm coming from in the future should I ever hand out advice. But I am also always open to other people's opinions and can agree to disagree about things when needed. ;)

What an introduction. Sounds like you have a LOT of experience with fish keeping.

You know one thing that I have learned since I have been keeping fish, more often than not, what works for one person will NOT work for another. I am a prime example of that. Haha! The big thing is to find a routine that works for you and your fish, you know?

BTW, welcome to the forum!

Thanks, I am liking this forum so far, though it is young. The atmosphere is a little more relaxed.

And I agree with you about what works and what doesn't. With very few exceptions, I don't think you can really say something "always" or "never" works or should be done a certain way.

You know, I'm starting to believe that we all start out that way... :D It's good to have you here Red K. I'm glad you like the forums so far.

welcome!

lol i am just starting out so i hope you are wrong SM sounds like you have been into fish since i was a baby very impressive :)