Angels Plus April Newsletter

Angels Plus Home Page Newsletter : April 2009

Happy Easter!

Please enjoy as our gift to you...
A FREE 3oz Flake Food of your choice with any $20.00 or greater dry-goods order from now until the end of April.
Enter code EASTER09 in the Comments section during checkout followed by the Flake of your choosing.

Medicated flakes and the Custom Blend are excluded from this offer.
Substitutions of the flake may occur depending upon availability.

Live Help is a Click Away

As a special benefit for our newsletter subscribers, we will offer exclusive access to online Help Sessions to answer any questions you have about general fish health, breeding and care. You will have access to the Help Sessions through this link only “Newsletter Help Session” It will tell you when we are online to begin the sessions. Clicking on it during the times of the scheduled sessions will allow you to chat with us. We will schedule help sessions monthly.

This month's Help Session is scheduled for:

Monday April 20th 9:00PM Eastern

Help Sessions last for at least an hour.

April Special

Just for our newsletter subscribers...

Try our Color Bits with Garlic and Paprika now at 20% off! Treat your fish to these tasty bits, loaded with color-boosting Astaxanthin and Paprika and the parasite-fighting power of all-natural Garlic. You'll see an improvement in the color and health of you fish!

To get the discount, you must add the special to your cart from this link. Color Bits Special.

Aquarium Temperature And It's Effect On Fish

Often times aquarists assume that a particular species of fish has to be kept at a certain temperature in order to do well. We've found a couple good reasons to deviate from this practice. You too may find this useful in managing your breeding operation. First, you have to make sure to keep them within their temperature tolerance range. Most would be very surprised to see how wide this range can be when care is correct.

You Could Be This Month's Winner!

As a newsletter subscriber you are automatically entered in our April drawing for a $75.00 coupon good on any fish order. The drawing will be held at the end of April.

Absolutely no purchase necessary--just sit back, relax, and you could win free fish!

Winner is not obligated to receive the free gift. Winner pays shipping cost. Winner is not obligated to spend the entire $75. Don't want or have room for $75 worth of fish? There is no minimum order, just keep in mind that the coupon is one-time use only. It won't carry a balance if you don't spend it all. Coupon is good for 90 days from the date issued. You can only win once in any 12 month period.

Bob Orlowski is the winner of our March drawing for a $75.00 voucher from our Fish Store. You could be this month’s winner!

Keeping fish in the lower range of their temperature tolerance will allow you to stop a pair from spawning and save it for a later time when you may need the spawns. Keep it warm and it will keep on spawning even if you can't use the eggs. We use this technique to keep back-up pairs in prime breeding condition and ready to go if we need them. They seem to pickup right where they left off before you cooled them down.

The age of the fish can also be greatly increased when kept in the low end of the range. We've experienced life spans that are 3 and 4 times what you would normally expect when fish have been kept cool for long term. Fish grow their whole lives, even though growth slows down quite a bit as they age. Fish that live 3 times as long as one kept warm, will eventually get larger. So, even though it will take longer to get them to a large size, the maximum size is usually increased. Like most hatcheries where the room is heated, we have tanks on the bottom rows in the corners, that are naturally quite a bit cooler. We put extra adults in those. The fast growing juveniles that we want to grow up quickly are kept in the warmest tanks and breeding pairs are usually in the mid-range tanks. This sorting allows us the best use of the tanks we have.

You have to be careful though. At lower temps, their food requirements are drastically reduced. Overfeeding in this low range is very common and will wreak havoc with their health. It's not really an immune system problem, but a husbandry mistake that leave most people thinking that fish should not be kept cool. As an example, we've had angelfish in the upper 60's and lower 70's - long term with no trouble. We even once discovered a spawn with a pair at 68 F. However, at this temp they barely need to eat. Their metabolism is surprisingly low. They can easily go two to three days between light feedings. You may want to experiment with these techniques, just be careful and very observant.

We'd love to hear from you! Is there a topic you would like discussed in a future issue of the Angels Plus Newsletter? Let us know and we will do our best to meet your requests. Email us.