The Fish in Our Aquarium
When I was young we loved having pets. One of the pets we particularly liked best are aquarium fishes. Our aquariums started out small. We initially had a fish bowl with a goldfish in it. Like all excited pet owners we started decorating our fish bowl with sand, pebbles and plants. Of course we did not realise it then but we were overcrowding our fish bowl and suffocating our goldfish.
Our goldfish eventually died. It was painful. I think all people feel sad when their pets died even small fishes. Did not dampen our resolve however of having fish pets. Over time we gradually increased the size of our aquariums. From a simple fish bowl we now owned a cabinet sized aquarium.
Like many aquarium owners we bought the latest technology we could buy to keep our aquarium clean and the fishes alive. As our aquariums grew in size also so are the number of fishes and variety we kept. We had goldfishes, angel fishes, fighting fishes, janitor fishes and even shrimps.
As these fishes grew the problem of feeding them increased as well. We usually feed our fishes only fish pellets and fish flakes. We also buy plants which some of the fishes would munch on. However we were also advised by our pet store owner that fishes also eat other fishes especially the small ones.
He says that fishes need to eat small fishes also in order to continue growing. Excited by this information we bought our first batch of small fishes which our pet store owner supplied. These small fishes were very small. They average about 2 centimeter in length. They were specifically sold by fish shops as food for much larger aquarium fishes.
When we first put these small fishes in our aquarium the fishes in our aquarium began behaving differently. The bigger fishes started going after these small fishes. The small fishes in turn would group together in one corner of the aquarium or would hide themselves in the many decorations in the aquarium.
Being a young child I would pity these small fishes as they play a fatal hide and seek game with the bigger fishes. Occasionally I would see the not so pretty sight of small fishes floating upside down and sideways on top of the aquarium with bite marks in them. At times I see the same sorry sight at the bottom of the aquarium.
Many times I would see the sight where the big fishes would suddenly dart towards the school of small fishes hiding in one corner of the aquarium. The small fishes would disperse all over the aquarium and as they disperse all over the aquarium the other big fishes would also dart towards individual fishes scurrying along.
At times I would see big fishes successfully take a small nip at a small fish who happened to be in a vulnerable location inside the aquarium. It happens to big fishes as well. I would see a big fish be bitten by a much larger fish. It is always a sorry sight when you see a big fish like an angel fish with torn fins as a result from being bitten by other fishes.
On rare occasions I even saw some of the bigger fishes actually munching on the small fishes which are already inside their mouth. The small fishes would sometimes be halfway inside the mouth of the big fish but are still struggling to escape. Most of the time however the small fish would already be dead even before they get devoured by the big fish.
Like many people after a while we became used to our aquarium. Our aquarium no longer occupies a large piece of our life. There would be many instances when an entire day would pass without us even checking on our aquarium. However we never failed to regularly maintain our aquarium and feed the fishes.
Nevertheless everytime we checked the big fishes in our aquarium were growing even bigger. Some were as big as 10 centimeter in length. Occasionally some of the big fishes would die for some reason or another and like always they would be upside down or sideways in either the top of the aquarium or at the bottom.
As more of our big fishes stayed alive and grew even bigger the more we would buy small fishes for them to feed on. There would be instances when we would buy a batch of small fishes one day and the next day they would be half gone! As a result there would be many instances were would have to buy more than one batch of small fish as fish food.
This went on and on. We got used to buying a lot of small fishes that they began to occupy almost a third of our aquarium. The big fishes seem to have gotten used to them as well as I do not see much of them going after the small fishes. Perhaps the big fishes were now so heavy or overweight from eating fish pellets, fish flakes, seaweed and of course small fishes.
Thus we almost achieved a balance in our aquarium. We stopped buying many batches of small fishes and only bought a batch every now and then. Our big fishes maintained their sizes relatively. The danger of our big fishes being not adequate in size for our cabinet sized aquarium dissipated.
This went unchanged for a long time until one day we decided to buy again a new batch of small fishes. The small fishes looked like any of the batches we bought except for one which stood out from the rest. It was as small as the other ones but its distinct dark orange colour at its abdominal area made it stood out.
No one in the family including me took any special notice of it. We have been used to seeing fishes that are different from the rest of the fishes in the batch. Initially we hoped that these fishes that stand out will grow to beautiful aquarium fishes but they either turned out to be ordinary food fishes or are eaten along the way by the bigger fishes.
As time went by the number of the small fishes we bought diminished in the aquarium. I also noticed that the fish with the dark orange colour in its abdomen was still alive. It has slightly gone bigger and was very active in the aquarium. Unlike the other small fishes in the aquarium it tends to get out of its hiding place from time to time.
After a while almost all the small fishes in the aquarium were gone. The small fish with an orange colour in its abdomen however was still alive. I began calling it “Shark” because it seemed to be a very tough fish that was able to survive in an aquarium that was almost full of big fishes.
We bought a new batch of small fishes and its the same story. Almost all the small fishes in the batch would get eaten except for Shark. Shark was growing bigger too with each new small fish batch we put in the tank. It was also very active in munching on fish pellets and fish flakes. Shark became my favourite fish in the aquarium.
The story repeated itself with each new batch. Shark would not only survive but grow bigger in the process. After a certain time compared to the other small fishes Shark was one of the biggest of the small fishes. He has started to chase after the small fishes. At first I thought it was only trying to protect its territory but I noticed it was an aggressive fish.
To make a long story short it started nipping at the other small fishes in the aquarium. Its stature as my favourite fish in the tank disappeared after I consistently noticed how aggressive it was towards the other small fishes. The other small fishes even back away whenever it was near their presence.
A few more months passed and by now Shark was half as big as the big fishes in the tank. It was about 5 centimeter in length by now. Not only is it going after the small fishes but the other big fishes too. Occasionally it would dart at a big fish and nip at it. The other big fishes which were docile simply shook themselves and went away.
The more aggressive big fishes would go into a nipping match with Shark. In the end the big aggressive fishes and Shark would go their own way after their nipping matches. One thing I also noticed now that it is bigger is that it was not a cute aquarium fish. It looked ugly. Imagine a fish with the face of a bulldog. This is how I would describe it.
Months again passed and it has grown as big as the other big fishes in the tank. This is when the fishes in the aquarium suffered a very bad fate. One morning I noticed a big fish in the aquarium floating sideways. It has several wounds in it and the wounds were deep. It would seem that the floating dead fish was attacked by several fishes.
There were many aggressive fishes in our aquarium so we cannot pinpoint if one or several fishes attacked the now dead fish. During the day the aquarium was normal with the fishes displaying the same everyday activity they do. Fishes were nipping at each other but not unlike the wounds we say from the dead fish.
Almost everyday in the morning there would be another dead big fish with the same fatal wounds floating at the top of the aquarium. But again during the day it was impossible to detect which fish or fishes was doing it. It seems that the fish murders were happening at night when we were asleep.
The attacks grew more vicious. The big dead fishes do not only have deep wounds now but their entire stomach areas have been devoured. Sometimes even the eyes would be devoured as well. Little by little the number of the big fishes in the aquarium slowly dwindled until there were less than five (5). Shark was one of them.
Shark was now very aggressive. It would dart from one corner of the aquarium to the next. It seems our aquarium was now too small for its tastes. All the other remaining fishes big and small was getting out of its way. By this time we concluded that Shark was the fish killer. It was the most aggressive fish in the aquarium by a large measure.
Soon afterwards all the big fishes suffered the same deadly fate. Only Shark remained the big fish in the aquarium. By now it was 15 centimeter in length and 10 centimeter wide. Our fish food budget doubled. It seems to have an insatiable appetite for fish pellets, fish flakes and small fishes.
It also began munching on many of the things in the aquarium. For example the plastic air tubes in the aquarium were full of bite marks. Did I forget to mention that Shark has a very sharp and big set of teeth? It was also very menacing looking. It was not the type of fish that one could proudly display in their aquarium like goldfishes or angelfishes.
It was also getting increasingly very big for our aquarium. When it darts from one corner of the aquarium to the next it would disperse the water so much that waves would form on the top of the aquarium. At times it would disperse water so much that water would spill from the aquarium into the floor.
I did my research on Shark and found out that we actually have a PIRANHA for a pet. It figures. The aggressiveness, the huge appetite the dead giveaway of the large and sharp set of teeth How can we have missed this? After this we took special care to stay away from its sharp teeth while feeding it.
Eventually one morning we found Shark floating sideways at the top of the aquarium. No bite marks whatsoever. It must have been the end of its life and it died of natural causes. My mother decided to cook it. It has a neutral taste not good but not bad either. For us it was an expensive fish considering the cost we have to put up to raise it as a pet.
Every so often a thought comes into my mind whenever I think of Shark. Where did it come from? The pet owner sourced his supplies locally and not overseas. This means that somewhere out there is a body of water like a river where piranhas live and are being harvested as fish food.
However in the long time since this happened I have never seen or heard a news where people where attacked by piranhas in the country of the Philippines which is located in Asia. As far as I know piranhas only inhabit the Amazon. The piranha we have may have been smuggled and accidentally mixed in with regular aquarium food fish. Aquarium owners beware!