SEPTEMBER 2004 MEMBER SPOTLIGHT - BARB NEWELL

[DarkDiscus]

Okay everyone (and especially Jack!) here's this month's interview with Barb!

She is going to add some nice pics for us all as well!

Hope you enjoy!

Q - So. Barb, please tell us all about yourself - from the beginning to the present day. Don't forget to include how you got into tropical fish and how you came to get into the addiction!

A - I was born and raised in Niagara Falls, Ontario Canada. I then moved to Toronto in 1989 where I lived for 7 years, then settled in Burlington which is about half way between Niagara Falls and Toronto. I was married for 10 years, now divorced (that’s all I’m saying about that!!! ). I have two wonderful kids, Brian and Krystal. I work for a large international software and health consulting company. I’m responsible for and manage the entire financial end of the company. I was their very first employee 15 years ago and I’m still there. I am able to do most of my accounting work at home day or night, that enables me to be home to feed the babies.

I have ALWAYS loved animals, specifically the challenge of training, breeding and love raising the babies. From my earthworm, snail and potato bug collections as a young child, to many turtles, goldfish, an iguana, a capuchin monkey, budgies, dogs, cats, even a horse. I trained the monkey, showed my Doberman, even tried to train the cat (unsuccessfully). I owned an Appaloosa mare for 12 years and took part in many English jumping competitions. Animals have always been a big part of my life.

I also love photography as most of you must know, but don’t have too much time for it.

As far as fish go, I kept goldfish when I was young, then didn’t have fish again until 4 years ago. My son decided to buy a fish tank for his room. It took him a while to convince me to let him get a fish tank. He got a 20 gallon tank, some platys, swordtails and tetras. I found that every spare moment I had I was sitting in front of his tank watching his fish. I loved it. I decided to get a tank for myself, one 33 gallon tank. I started with guppies, lyretail mollies, swordtails, sailfin mollies, platys and dwarf gouramis. Soon, I had 10 gallon tanks all over the house with my baby fish, the sweet stench of infusoria brewing in buckets in the basement to feed my dwarf gourami fry. If you’ve ever made infusoria, it smells like rotting garbage.
My son and daughter were not impressed.

Two and one-half years ago, I saw a tankful of brown discus in the lfs. I thought they were beautiful, magnificent, peaceful fish. The fishroom manager told me not to buy them, he said that they were impossible to keep. That was it. I decided that I was going to keep discus. I bought my first discus from an importer in Toronto in January 2002, I was inexperienced and knew NOTHING about keeping discus, medications or discus health. The 6 blue diamonds and 5 cobalts that I paid $1,100 for were imported, never quarantined, then sold directly to me (I found out later). The fish were sick from the moment I put them in my tank. I searched on the internet for information/help and found Simply Discus and Al (Brew). Al helped me daily through this nightmare (thanks Al), as did many others on Simply. After 6 exhausting, grueling months of a discus medical crash course... treatments, antibiotics, anti-parasitic medications, formaldehyde treatments, pp dips, pp baths, salt baths, tube feeding panacur, the amazing MC (Mat ) triple dip . I lost 10 of the 11 fish despite my efforts. I was pretty disillusioned with discus to say the least. I sent a couple of fish to the University lab, they had intramuscular nematodes, worms living and multiplying in their flesh, organs and in the end, in their gills and there was not a medication that could kill them. After this experience, I swore that I’d never, ever buy another discus again. The guy in the fish store was right! That was the beginning and end of my discuskeeping. 6 months of hell, a freezer full of dead fish, an empty contaminated tank.

Then...... Cary Strong sent me an e-mail one day saying he would send me free fish because he didnt want me to leave the hobby this way. Honestly, I think he was tired of listening to me complaining about my dead fish! I told him no, used every excuse in the book why I couldnt have more fish he told me it would be different this time and asked me to contact him when I was ready to receive them. After a few months and a lot of thought, I called him, he sent me 7 very beautiful healthy discus. A new beginning.

Q - That's pretty cool! Cary to the rescue! So how did you get into breeding?

A - I didn’t really plan on breeding, it just happened. After the first wigglers and attachment I was hooked. I find breeding both challenging and rewarding, I love watching how the parents interact with their fry, and I love watching the babies grow. The hardest part of breeding for me is culling. I know it’s necessary and I do it, I just hate it. It bothers me every time I have to cull a baby fish, I hope that it never becomes easy for me.

Q - What were your major obstacles involved in setting up as a breeder of discus? Quality of stock, water issues, space and location?

A - My main frustration/obstacle has been trying to learn how to build racks and a water system. Water changes were painfully slow, it was taking hours to do them. This past summer, my son and I worked on a water system. It was a trial and error experience. With a lot of help from Mario (Turkis) who kindly drew plans for me, then faxed them, and many others on Simply, we managed to get a system together. Now we’re building racks! That’s another story.

Q - How many fish? Tanks? Pairs? Young?

A - Currently, I have 20 discus tanks, 3 angel tanks, 2 albino bushynose pleco tanks. I have approximately 80 adult discus, and 400 fry ranging in age from one day old free swimmers to 3 months old. Pairs - I have pairs forming all over the place in the community tanks. My golds have paired up and are spawning, my red checkerboards have paired up, my ocean greens (thanks for all of your help and advice Ryan (Dkarc@Aol.com), my green male is getting better), my rose red x red snake pair, I have a new pair - blue turq x cobalt blue. The blue diamonds, white butterflies are working on it.

Q - What strains do you prefer personally? What’s your best seller and which fish would you keep for yourself? Have you developd any strains on your own or do you work with and enhance existing strains.

A - I like my red checkerboards. They’re very large, vibrant beautiful fish and they have unique personalities. My ocean greens have been my best sellers. I have not developed any strains.

Q - How do you keep maintain your fish? Do you have a large fishroom and/or how many holding tanks do you run? What sort of filtration do you use?

A - My entire basement is filled with tanks, staggered all over the place. I’m working on that. When it is done the breeders will be in one area, fry in another and community tanks in another. I do a bit at a time. When I began, I never dreamed that I’d end up with a basement full of fish tanks, discus, angels and plecos. Sometimes, it gets pretty overwhelming.

As for my Filtration, each tank is kept separate from the rest, I use AquaClears, sponge filters, and hydrosponges.

Q - Water, do you treat it? What is the ph and hardness?

A - I used to age and heat my water for 24 hours in 6 reservoirs. I am now experimenting with running my water through two carbon filters then directly into the tanks. I’ve been doing this for 8 weeks now and it seems to be working, the fish don’t even twitch after an 80% water change. I’m lucky I guess, my ph out of the tap is very close to my ph after aging my water for 24 hours. My ph is 7.6, kh 5 - 6, gh 8 - 9.

Breeders - I use ro/ tap mix. Conductivity 70 - 80. I keep my breeders in tap water, when they start picking at the pot and shaking, I do a large water change with ro to lower the conductivity. I keep them in that mix until the fry are free swimming, then slowly change back to tap water.

Q - What do you feed your discus?

A - I feed frequently and a large variety. I feed homemade beefheart, Hikari bloodworms, Hikari brine shrimp, Tetrabits, Plankton Gold flake from Brine Shrimp Direct, Brineshrimp flake from BS Direct, Tetra Cichlid Flake, flake from AngelsPlus, shrimp pellets. I’ve changed my beefheart recipe from beefheart, bananas, peas, spinach, wheat germ, cornmeal, shrimp, garlic, flake, vitamins to beefheart, garlic and vitamins. I find it clouds the water with all the additives.

Q - What is your most exhilarating moment with breeding? Any incredible speciments, special strains or individual fish, funny shipping stories, whatever.

A - I guess my most exhilarating moment with breeding was when my first wigglers hatched, they were my ocean greens. I called everyone I knew, I was SOOOOO excited!!!! I stayed up all night, watched them and photographed them. Bugged the hell out of the parents.

I also had one very special fish, Julie, she died March 9, 04. She was the lone survivor of the original 11 discus that I got. She was a real fighter and survived for some reason. Because she lived alone in her tank (I couldn’t risk mixing her with other fish), we (my son, daughter and I) spent extra time with her, sitting at her tank. She became quite a pet.

Q - What is your most frustrating moment with breeding discus?

A - Hmmm. Let’s see. I can’t say there’s a lot of frustration breeding, I keep the tanks clean and they spawn. Jack (DiscusKC... this is for you!!) What I do find frustrating is trying to make them stop spawning. I have a pair now that I don’t want fry from for a while, they’re in rock hard water and still spawn weekly, get about 10 wigglers hatch.

Q - How do those in your life feel about discus and/or the business of breeding?

A - The time I spend with my fish takes time from them. At first they were resentful and thought I was crazy, now they know I’m crazy! Seriously, they are now very supportive and help me a lot. We actually work on the fish together often.

Q - Do you have any thanks or credit to give for your success with discus or breeding? Any mentors or colleagues who you think deserve some kudos?

A - This is a really hard question, there have been so many people who have helped me and been there for me from Simply Discus, thank you to all. I can’t mention everyone because I know I’ll forget someone, so I’ll just mention two, if not for them I would have quit keeping discus long ago.

Al (Brew) has always been there for me. Always! If not for Al walking me through that first six months, and the months following I think I would have gone insane. I was sending him messages every day, describing the horrid deaths that were going on here, worms crawling out of their gills, their eyes, their mouths...... He hung in there with me til the end, supported and guided me, never criticized me for my decisions. He has continued to be a friend, I have the world of respect for him and am glad to know him. Patience.... when I ask the same question 4x, he patiently answers 4x. Thank you Al.

Cary has become a very good friend. He motivates me to keep going on the bad days when there’s just one water change too many, or a flood, or illness, or too many things to do and not enough time. If not for Cary, I would have quit after the first experience. He has helped me at 3am when I’m in the midst of a crisis, he always seems to know what to do. Lucky for all of us, he willingly shares his knowledge which, if I end up knowing 1/4 of what Cary knows about breeding, health, disease, meds, etc.. etc... I’ll be thrilled. He’s given me a lot of excellent advice, he’s taught me a lot about a lot of things, he’s a good listener and he’s strives to be honest, even when some people don’t like it! Way to go Cary!!

Like I said, thanks to all of you who have helped me with my many, many questions and problems.

Q - What do you see as the future of discus keeping?


A - I see more and more hobbyists getting into it, breeding and enjoying these magnificent fish successfully (in other words... becoming addicts like the rest of us). Now that there is so much help and support, more can enjoy keeping discus successfully.

Q - Can you think of anything I left out that you would like to bring up - either personally or discus related?

A - Just one thing, what do I think is the key to successful discuskeeping and breeding?

In my opinion, I think the key to successful discuskeeping is.... Buying HEALTHY fish from a breeder who is willing to offer support/help once you get the fish home. Cleanliness, clean tanks, lots of water changes. Frequent small feedings, variety of foods including beefheart, bloodworms, flakes, pellets AND lots of TLC and attention, you gotta love them to do the things we do for them!!!

[oodi]

Barb,

Glad you didn't give up, after that initial experience!

Judi

[Jeff]

Thanks guys. I like it. ;D

[lkleung007]

As always John, an interesting read...Thanks!!

Barb,
What an interesting ride over the past 4 years. I think many of us can relate to some of the things that you have experienced in this hobby...here's to many more spawns.

Regards, Lester

[Dkarc@Aol.com]

Awesome interview! Glad to hear the ocean green male is doing better Barb

-Ryan

[henryD]

John--- Great job as always.

Barb it was nice to learn a little more about you. I can really relate to some of the hardship you have gone through. Glad you hung in to the end.


Ok enough of the nice stuff...Where is our pics???? Just kidding...

What is your total capacity at the moment? How many tanks do you have? Also how long does it take you to do your daily maintance? Any tips for those of us who have individual tanks to help speed up w/c?


Henry the pest..

[Ardan]

Good Job John!

Barb, I must say you have come a long way in just a few years!

I didn't realize you had so many tanks and so many discus 8) 8)

How about some pics?? I know I've seen some, but would love to see more! ;D

[April]

great spotlight. and finally..a girl..and a mod..and a canadian. got all those spotlights wrapped up in one month..from Barb.
keep going..we need canadian discus around.
waiting for the pics. ;D
next can you come to Vancouver and set up my fishroom with automatic wcs for me? :P

[Carol_Roberts]

Great interview. ;D

[Barb Newell]

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[Barb Newell]

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[Barb Newell]

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[CARY_GLdiscus]

Come On Barb,


I KNOW YOU HAVE MORE PICS THEN THAT!


WE WANT MORE! ;D

Your Friend Allways
Cary Gld!

[Barb Newell]

Hey Cary :-*

I'm trying to upload them.....

Barb

[April]

i'll take that blue heaven off your hands. nice fishie. of course they all are..but that one..i want.