How this Geezer did it in the beginning

[Micki]

I have said before but i will say it again, I really like this thread, more the side tracking than the fish tanks The fish tank stuff is good too...

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+1! I think there should be a Paul B forum for just talking about your life! Your Granddaughter will sometime pass some of your stories on to her children and Grandchildren! You sir, are a very interesting man to listen too (or in this case read) and learn from. Thank you and keep it up!

 

[Paul B]

whats the worse species you ever mixed together?

A manta ray and a fancy guppy. Never got along.
But besides them I did put 6 brackish water bumblebee gobies in my reef. They live about a year but the rest of the reef fish just looked at them wierdly and knew they were from a different neighborhood.
I once added a tiny mandarin which got eaten before he hit the bottom. He was spit out but didn't survive. More recently I added a male watchman gobi when I had an old pair of breeding watchman gobies, big mistake. My old male beat the heck out of him and he never wanted to come out to eat after that and he died.

You have some ugly fish stories that are quite funny!

Most of them are ugly, I like ugly fish. Angelfish and tangs don't do it for me, I just find them too common. I prefer clingfish, pipefish, scooter bleenies, mandarins, flounders, sea robins, sharp nose puffers, long nose anything and in general anything that is not the typical fish shape.
Girls I like good looking, better looking then me for sure. :inlove:

I like oddities.
This burrfish I collected

OK, maybe not her

 

[Micki]

YUK! She makes me throw up in my mouth a little! How long did you have your sea ponies? Did you keep them in your reef?

 

[Paul B]

I collected those ponies here in New York so they are street smart. As you can see by that picture, the female is transfering the eggs to the male, and she dropped a few.
I raised the babies and a couple of more hatchings. The adults were in my reef in a screened in portion that took up about 10" of one side of the tank.
To feed them I used my "Seahorse and Reef Fish Feeder" that I invented and patented.
(no, I don't sell them any more)

http://www.breedersregistry.org/Articles/v4_i3_paul_b/paul_b.htm
They lived and spawned for a couple of years on nothing but brine shrimp that I raised on yeast. So much for the theory that you can't keep seahorses on brine shrimp.

OMG, Wow, what a coincidence. I have the TV on behind me and they just had a story on the news about a whale shark that hangs out under fishing nets and sucks the fish out through the net.
That is exactly how my feeder works and also how my baby brine shrimp feeder works.
I am astonished that that whale shark is smart enough to go online and learn how to eat like that from my invention.

I have to go for a hearing test now, WHAT DID YOU SAY?
No really, but there is almost nothing wrong with my hearing, I need to renew my Coast Guard Capt. Lisense and they want you to be able to hear so I have to get the paper filled out.
For the test they make you sit in the front row of a Lady GaGa concert and see if you can hear Twiggy in the last row whispering something about how she once ate an M&M.
It is a tough test. :hmm3:

But so far I can hear and I can see perfectly.
After that I will go to my boat and while I am there I have a frayed rope in the water that is loaded with amphipods and about 10lbs of sea squirts. The squirts don't live in a tank so I throw them back where they move into my engine intakes and I just take the amphipods to dump in my reef.
I will get hundreds of adults and uncountable babies.
The boat in the marina

And if I collect too many, they come and pick them up.

 

[Paul B]

I just thought of a lighter Army story. (I am waiting for my wife to come home from work, one of us has to work:lol2
After Basic training me and my friend Marty went to Ohio because we had a 1 day pass.
There was this Ohio State Fair we heard about and we figured we would go and try to meet some girls.
I don't remember how we got there but we most likely hitched. We got to the fairgrounds in the middle of the night and between us we may have had a buck so we looked for a place to sleep. Usually we would sleep in a doorway or bus depot but we were in this fairgrounds and it was pitch dark. There was no one there and no one at the gates so we walked in. I found a bench to sleep on but Marty kept walking in the dark and I forgot about him as I fell asleep.
A few minutes later I hear this blood curdling screem and I could tell it was Marty as he flew past me. Me, not being stupid also ran. When we stopped I asked him what happened. He told me that he found a place to sleep that he thought was a mound of grass or a garbage bag. Then it moved and he ran.
Later, when we went back there was an elephant there like in the cartoons with a chain on his leg. Marty tried to sleep on I guess his leg but the elephant didn't have a sense of humor and got up. True story.
I haven't seen Marty in many years but I bet he is deathly afraid of elephants. :fun5:

 

[KafudaFish]

That there just made the best quotes thread (because of the elephant obviously).

 

[Fish Biscuit]

Paul thanks for sharing your stories, fish & otherwise. This has been quite entertaining!!

It's funny some of the things you do starting out because you don't know any better. When I was a kid we had a 10 gallon freshwater tank filled with about 40 fish at one count. Our black mollies & fancy guppies spawned on a regular basis. I had a pleco that would swim to the surface belly side up when I would come over to the tank so I could pet him.

There are a million opinions & a million ways to do something & it might not work for everyone. I questioned my friend that got me into SW about a QT & his answer was that everything has something, it depends on how big of a risk you want to take. If your fish are healthy they will be fine. Having a little 12 gallon cube at work I don't have room for a QT so my risk of losing the tank is not as bad if I had the 300 gallons I sometimes contemplate selling the horse for.

 

[Paul B]

if I had the 300 gallons I sometimes contemplate selling the horse for.

Michele, i don't have a horse to sell (I have a house) and unfortunately I don't have room for a 300 gallon tank. Well I have room but being I am married I would be sleeping in the thing if I got it.
I miss those days of breeding mollies and guppies. Ten cent fish are not that bad if you lose some. I remember getting all excited when a fancy guppy had babies, until I found out that you can't stop them from having babies.
Even with freshwater I went for the oddballs. I liked elephantnose fish (for some reason I am thinking about elephants a lot today) freshwater flounders, figure 8 puffers, lungfish, leaffish, tiretrack eels, knifefish anything odd.
I mean I had kissing gouramies, platyies and all the common fish but I get all googly with wierd fish.
Fighting fish were cool to breed as were tilipia who are mouthbreeders.
I think at one time I had 14 tanks, you have to raise those babies someplace.
One of my favorites was this lungfish that I got for my Daughter for a science project. I don't remember what the project was but the fish remained in my spare freshwater tank for 7 more years until I gave him to a fish store. He was my last freshwater fish.
Another cool animal I had for a while was this giant mantis shrimp. I used to dive here in NY a lot and we were diving at night for lobsters and in my beam of light I saw this big thing run past me and into a hole in the mud. I was about 30' down and the visability was about 3'. I (stupidly) stuck my hand in the hole (I had diving gloves on, it is cold here) and I pulled out this 7" mantis shrimp that my Daughter named Ralph.
I brought Ralph home and put him in the tank I had left over from that lungfish. That thing lived a couple of years and was very entertaining.
He would come out of his burrow (can) and do somersaults while he grabbed his food (clam) Very interesting animal but you only see them here on night dives.

 

[Fish Biscuit]

Well Paul, if you want a horse to sell I have a feeling he may be tied to the mailbox tonight. With the high temps we've had here riding has been inconsistant & I'm not looking forward to the next 5 days of arguments with an off the track thoroughbred. I wish this was another week for late hours at the Shedd Aquarium, I'd go do that after work instead & have a few martinis down the street after they close.

We never had any interesting science projects like that when I was a kid. I wish we would have. Not much you could find out by us but a neighbor found a few salmanders & ended up keeping them as pets. I think kids today are getting jipped, there is so much to do outside. We never wanted to come in, our curfew was when the street lights went on. You would've had to pay me a small fortune to stay inside & watch tv or play video games.

I like the interesting fish too, my yasha is back to hanging in the cave with the pistol again. I haven't seen him since I increased flow in the tank a few weeks ago so perhaps this is my punishment. I don't need to come into the office & him out in the open holding a sign that says "Good Morning Sunshine" but it would be nice to at least see a face once in a while. The pistol/yasha pair are Ben & Jerry so maybe they are just busy making ice cream.

There are some absolutely beautiful fish out there but I can't see spending half of what my horse cost & he was cheap. I just want a nice little fish with personality. My tailspot's new hang out is a piece of pvc I have around a mushroom because the flow was making it unhappy. He's spent the last 2 hours off & on taking sand out of the pvc & spitting it out 4 inches away from the new hang out. I'm trying to get a picture but my timing is off.

I keep forgetting to say congrats on the new granddaughter. She is adorable, I'm sure the crying will stop once she gets her own reef tank. Great job on her bedroom too!!

 

[Paul B]

Michele your horse would not be running much here today, the thermometer on my car read 101 degrees.
I live a few miles from a horse track and a friend of mine owns a race horse. Horses never interested me much, I guess here in NY we rarely rode them.
I did take my wife once to a dude ranch (Not for me) and they put her on a horse that they said was the tamest animal they had. As soon as she climbed up on this thing it did a Lone Ranger and took off at full speed. (he was an old cowboy, just go with it)
The guy had to run after her on his horse to stop him. My wife's experience on a horse was riding a wooden one on the carousel at Coney Island.
We don't do horses anymore. :hmm2:
Speaking of horses, when I worked to re build the Plaza Hotel in Manhattan, I used to watch the horses and buggies across the street in Central Park. Once I saw a Policeman on a horse and the horse stepped into the sewer grate and fell down with the cop on him. The horse could not get up because he broke his leg. The cop shot him there in the street and they came with a front end loaded to carry him away. The police in the parks here rids horseback or on bicycles. I feld really bad for that horse, and the cop.

I was going to go to my boat today but I decided 101 was a little too much and I shampooed the rugs yesterday and covered it up so it will be very steamy when I open her up.
Kids today are gyped. We didn't hardly watch TV because the very few shows that were on were basically for adults and there was not much for a kid to watch.
There were no computer games, computers, cell phones, I Pods, or I Pads or any other Is. The only Eyes we had were in our head.
But we had IMO much more fun than todays kids who basically don't do anything outside. A few play sports but thats about it and for the most part you need a bunch of other people for that and you can't just go and do it in less you have enough people.
We did play stickball, horseshoes, softball, and that kind of thing but my thing was going into the lots (I lived in Queens NY so we didn't have forests there) and building stuff or catching things. I loved collecting dafny (but I can't spell it) or tad poles, salamanders, snakes, turtles, frogs, toads and anything else that was odd. Of course I had to have containers all over the place to put these things.
I remember once I was in the park with a friend of mine and it was near the Fourth of July. I was all dressed up in a suit and tie because I just received Conformation.
We rented a small rowboat and were rowing on the lake. A few of our friends yelled at us to come over near the side of the lake so they could show us something, so we rowed over there.
Then they started throwing cherry bombs at us. We tried to row away and almost made it but one cherry bomb went off under the boat and put a huge hole in the bottom of the wooden boat.
We sunk. Fancy suit, good shoes and all. The lake was only a few feet deep and we were able to walk to shore to our hysterical friends.
We all ran home because we were afraid we would have to pay for the boat.
After what my Mother did to me from seeing my new clothes and shoes all ruined, I would have been better off paying for the boat. :hmm3:

Another cool thing I remember doing was walking through storm drains.
In that park the lake drained into a storm drain. Storm drains generally have gratings on them so kids like us don't go in them. I forgot how we got in but we did. We walked for an hour or two and had no idea where we were. We could hear cars above but those drains go on for miles and empty into the sea. There were ladders all over the place that led up to manholes but they were all in the middle of the streets and the streets in NY are crowded with cars. We finally found a quiet street and all 3 of us had to climb up to lift the manhole cover. That was very cool and we had a nice story to tell the kids at school who all later wanted to try it, so for a while we did tours of the storm drain system.:wavehand:

 

[CliftonArbogast]

Kids today are gyped. We didn't hardly watch TV because the very few shows that were on were basically for adults and there was not much for a kid to watch.
There were no computer games, computers, cell phones, I Pods, or I Pads or any other Is. The only Eyes we had were in our head.
But we had IMO much more fun than todays kids who basically don't do anything outside. A few play sports but thats about it and for the most part you need a bunch of other people for that and you can't just go and do it in less you have enough people.

Not to upset parents and people with kids that are spoiled but who does the spoiling? :worried2:Babies are born with the same ten fingers and toes as they have been for generations. :lmao: I think the parents are the ones doing the coddling and stepping in when they cant cut it in school. My kids play most of the day without the TV and get more entertainment out of tools ( where did my saw go :headwallblueand putting things together and taking things apart than toys that come pre-assembled. How many times do parents yell at kids for breaking something instead of saying, "neat, i didnt know that a radio looks like that inside. . . . now fix it or help me fix it!!! "

I will get off my soap box and read so more. Great thread, keep it coming.

Next tour of the sewers, count me in. Give me a little warning so i can find the Statue of Liberty and take that right.

 

[Micki]

Hey, I have one of those feeders! I didn't realize there were ponies in the water in NY, very cool! How often do you see them now? Would you mind to send your extra "pods" in that truck my way? :lolspin:

Poor horse and cop. The cop could have been hurt as well, he was lucky.

My brother owns a horse farm. My 13 year old niece and 6 year old niece do barrel and pole horse racing. They are both listed in the top of the state for their age and the 13 year old is also listed in the top ladies division in the state. Every time I ride it seems like I end up on the ground... :hmm4: My niece is going to give me "real" riding lessons the end of this summer. I refuse to ride and land on the ground in 100 degree weather! :hmm5:

Amy guys and fairs and ELEPHANTS OH MY! :spin2:

I'm a country girl, I'll pass on the sewer tours!

Oh and I do think kids miss out on using their imagination these days. It's too bad really... One of my favorite activities is laying on the ground with my grand kids looking for pictures in the clouds! Everyone should try it, it's fun!

 

[Paul B]

Not to upset parents and people with kids that are spoiled but who does the spoiling?

That is 100% true and parents wonder why their teenager won't listen. My wife never lied to out daughter. If my Daughter was doing something we didn't want her to do and my wife said she would get punished, it was never an idle threat. She got punished. If you kep saying that you are going to get punished, and nothing happend except you keep saying it, the kid will be spoiled and know that your threats don't mean anything. It is simple.
When my Daughter was old enough she had to buy her own car with her money that she made working. None of daddy's money went into it. I checked out the car, but it was 100% hers. She also bought her first house completely on her own. Lawyer, closing, everything and I am extreamly proud of her for that. When I got my first car and house, I did it the same way. If I didn't have the money for a car. I had to walk, great incentive. I also think it should be illegal to buy a kid a car.
I paid for my wedding, and we had a big wedding that I had to save for a few years for, all of my salary from the Army went to pay for it, My Daughter had a much larger wedding than I had and her and her husband also paid for that. Thats what jobs are for. Can't get a job? Rake leaves, shovel snow, paint houses, wash cars, pull weeds, etc. There is money all over the place out there. Just let them get off their lazy you know what, put away the stupid I pad and work. I always had money and I still do. I always made more money when I was out of work. :fun5:

and stepping in when they cant cut it in school

Then get left back and do it again like we had to do. :thumbdown

My kids play most of the day without the TV and get more entertainment out of tools

My Daughter to this day rarely watches TV. She doesn't even know how to turn it on.
But she has a very good job and makes twice as much as I ever did.

I will get off my soap box and read so more

No, get back on there :wavehand:

I didn't realize there were ponies in the water in NY, very cool! How often do you see them now? Would you mind to send your extra "pods" in that truck my way?

I can collect them near the end of the summer on the south shore with a 20' net. I can get al the pipefish I want but not too many horses. We also get lookdowns, lionfish, butterflies and plenty of other tropicals.

I'm a country girl, I'll pass on the sewer tours!

What are you? A Sissy?

Well, girls never wanted to come with us and we didn't want them to in those days. Now when I ask a girl to come in a sewer with me I also don't have much luck. I don't know why

 

[Micki]

I can collect them near the end of the summer on the south shore with a 20' net. I can get al the pipefish I want but not too many horses. We also get lookdowns, lionfish, butterflies and plenty of other tropicals.



What are you? A Sissy?

Well, girls never wanted to come with us and we didn't want them to in those days. Now when I ask a girl to come in a sewer with me I also don't have much luck. I don't know why

That would be cool to see and possibly collect a few of those fish!

A sissy indeed and a classy one at that! :spin3: I guess if the girls wont go in the sewer with you now, then you are hanging out with the right kind of girls!

 

[Paul B]

I guess if the girls wont go in the sewer with you now, then you are hanging out with the right kind of girls!

Yes I guess you are correct.

 

[Paul B]

I guess if I went out with the girls that would come into the sewers with me, I wouldn't have one of these.
Well I may but certainly not as cute. :wavehand:

 

[Paul B]

I just had to change one of those exhaust fan motors in my crawl space in the attic. Today it is cool but it has hovered around 100 degrees for a week or so. Today was a good day so I crawled up there to remove the thing. When I was building the roof of this house I was much younger and I could crawl up there with no problems. Now, I still get to that spot but not quite as fast. And it also used to be easy to contort into the space to get to it. I can still contort, but un contorting takes much longer.
I got the thing out and the bearings were seized as I knew they would be. Those fans are now made "elsewhere" and are next to useless when it comes to longivity.
I went to 5 places to get a new motor because they all want you to buy the entire enclosure with the mushroom cap and all. I am not that stupid and managed to find just the motor and install it. I did an autopsy on the old one and repaired it but it will not last very long so I will use it for some future invention rather than risk installing it in the attic and having to replace it again next year.
Like everything else, those fan motors used to be made well and last for 20 years or so.
They are also not cheap, $70.00 for a 1/20th hp motor that a few years ago was $20.00.:furious:

As I was going from place to place for that moter, I also visited 3 LFSs because I am almost out of blackworms. No one has them. This has never happened, a blackworm shortage and I hope they get them in by tomorrow.
I can't run my reef without live blackworms. :headwally:
I have enough left for about a week then I will have to get out of the hobby, sel everything on E Bay and take up a new and exciting hobby like stamp collecting or bungee jumping. There is almost the same thrill in both hobbies. :worried:

Anyway last night I was up again in the midle of the night so I checked out my tank with a flashlight. Besides the multitudes of tiny snails I also have quite a few 3/4" slugs that I have never seen before. I am sure they are slugs and not nudibranches and slugs are all vegetarians.
I know many people mistake slugs for nudibranches but that is like saying Rosanne Barr looks like Christie Brinkley. Totally different animals. Slugs are as I said are vegetarians and have internal gills. Nudibranches are usually brightly colored, are carnivorous with special diets and have feathery, external gills.

 

[Fish Biscuit]

I don't know about that Paul, based on what you wrote Paris Hilton would be considered a nudibranch. Quite honestly I think she is more of a slug dressed in nudibranch clothing. :lol2:

 

[Paul B]

Maybe, I never met her personally. But I have met quite a few "Dips".
I wonder if she would come in the sewer?
This Sunday my wife has to go to a shower so I am on the boat myself, unless I can convince some of my friends to come out.
I will just tie up with the other guys whos'e wife's are going to the same shower.
It sounds like a collection day so I will have to bring buckets.
I guess you don't do much collecting in Chicago.
Speaking of Chicago I may have to go there soon. We may get a factory there to make something for us and if that happens, I will go there to show them how to do it.
Maybe I will see you crossing the street or something.
I may even check out the storm drains to see if they are as cool as the ones I knew from my youth. :strange:

Have a great night :wavehand:

 

[Micki]

I guess if I went out with the girls that would come into the sewers with me, I wouldn't have one of these.
Well I may but certainly not as cute. :wavehand:

What a sweetheart!!! I love Papaw and granddaughter pictures! Well, in New York you may not be call a Papaw but in Ohio we do. Looking forward to seeing pictures of her as she starts growing up.