A big banner for Chinese New Year at Qian Hu

Qian Hu (仟湖) has been a frequent place we went when we first started off our fish rearing hobbies in January 2007. In fact, that was where we first kicked off our hobbies after spending hundreds of dollars on the fish tank, cabinet, filter, pebbles, fishes, fish food etc. Not exactly a cheap hobby yay? ^^|

Back then, it was easier to devote time and effort into the aquariums as Darius wasn’t born yet. After he arrived in our family in July 2008, less time had been spent on the fishes and they were slowly but surely getting neglected.

It was until recently after Catherine had highlighted on the plight of the fishes/tanks that got me wanting to do something about them, especially with Chinese New Year coming. It wouldn’t be auspicious or sightly if we were to have mismanaged tanks in our home.

Filters were cleaned, water was changed, new plants and fishes were bought as part of the revitalisation process. Our main planted tank is now looking fine with fishes like angel fish and guppies swimming about happily.

Angel fishes in our tank

As for our goldfish tank, I had bought another two to accompany the lone one previously remaining in the tank. Unfortunately, all three of them died within a week. One of them must have had some diseases and caused all to be infected. A careless mistake on my side for not quarantining the newcomers first.

Alas, we didn’t want to leave the tank empty so after doing a 100% water change, the tank should have become disease-free again. With that, it’s time to move on for us to get some new fishes to fill the tank.

After some reading up, we decided to get fishes from the Cichlid family. We thought they have beautiful appearances and interesting behaviour so it would be nice to add them to our aquarium.

With that, we went down to Qian Hu on Saturday and get some fishes from them. It has been a long time since our last visit and it would be a good opportunity to let Darius see more fishes. Furthermore, as Catherine will be introducing fishes as her next topic to Darius in her Tot School, this trip would aptly act as a relevant excursion prior to the lessons.

Timely exposure for Darius

We took a cab down to the place, which was situated near Sungei Tengah Road off Kranji Expressway. The place wasn’t as crowded as I had expected, as probably it was a Saturday. Sundays, commonly more of a family day, should see more visitors.

Though some of the fishes did catch Darius’ attention a little, this did not last long as he started to wriggle his body while we were carrying him, attempting to get onto the ground so he could run around. Catherine was helpful to volunteer herself to follow Darius around while I concentrated on choosing the fishes we would like to get.

It took me quite a while to do so as there were plenty of choices available, despite us already decided on the Cichlid family. However, even within the family itself, the fishes consisted of different shapes, colours, sizes, behaviour and prices so it wasn’t easy to determine what we wanted.

Many different types of fishes and aquatic animals can be found there

Meanwhile, Darius was running around happily while Catherine followed behind him. He just simply couldn’t resist exploring big, open spaces and got himself perspiring after roaming around.

Darius just couldn't keep still ^^|

Meanwhile, I was unable to make a decision on the fishes yet, so we decided to take a rest at the cafe for some ice cream before proceeding on. We tried to let Darius taste some of the ice cream but unlike other kids, he did not like them and rejected us when we tried to give him more.

Cafe at Qian Hu

Proceeding on, we finally decided on getting the mbuna species, which had nice colours and finage. They originated from Lake Malawi in Africa and lived in a rocky habitat.

As they are territorial, I’ve decided to overstock our 2-feet tank a little to prevent focused aggressiveness by any of the fishes. So we bought 3 fishes for each of the colours, totally up to 9 cichlids. I had a hard time netting up the fishes though as they were all very agile. *sweat*

Adding another packet of fish food for them, we foot our bill and left the place.

When we reached home, we acclimatised the fishes by floating the plastic bag of fishes on the surface of the water for the water temperatures to synchronise. After releasing them later into their new homes, they appeared to be fitting in well and we enjoyed seeing them swimming actively around.

I did notice two of the fishes were a little malnutritioned though, as their bellies were a little sunken. Hopefully they would become healthier after having their fills in their new homes.

Interesting fishes to view and observe

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