Old topic I'm sure...Sunnies & Bass in home aquarium?

[Alan]

Can someone who knows about this, either bump up the link or reply with it? I did a search but cannot find it.

I have a 55 gallon and am considering converting it to have some Sunnies and crappies in it, and maybe a bass. Is this legal in MN? Do I trap the fish myself, or get them from a store?

I know there is a thread on this somewhere...help.

[2x4]

Here are the regs from the MN DNR. There are a couple of loopholes.

Transporting Fish

• Except while on the body of water where taken, live fish may not be

transported in a quantity of water sufficient to keep them alive unless the

fish are bait minnows or the person is authorized to do so by the DNR.

• Transport of fish for display in a home aquarium is legal under the

following conditions:

– Game fish purchased from an authorized licensee transported with

the necessary documents (such as a sales receipt).

– Anglers 16 or under may transport legally caught largemouth bass,

smallmouth bass, yellow perch, rock bass, black crappie, white

crappie, bluegill, pumpkinseed, green sunfish, orange spotted

sunfish, and black, yellow, and brown bullhead. No more than

four of each species may be transported at any one time, and any

individual fish can be no longer than 10 inches. At no time may

water from infested waters be transported.

[goblueM]

I wouldnt put bass or sunfish in it. They tend to bully other fish, and then you just get beat up fish that get sick and die. Go seine some native minnows and suckers! They are very pretty, easy to maintain, and you can put more fish in your tank.

Spottail shiners, darters, logperch, red sided dace, longnose dace, all the redhorse species, carpsuckers... the list is endless. They utilize all portions of the water column too, your tank will look awesome!

[Bohonk316]

They sell fish at Robbinsdale Farm Market. Bass,Northerns,Sunnies etc.

[shortfatguy]

I had a muskie in my aquarium until he commited suicide. Came home one day and he was dead on the floor. He must have went after a minnow on the surface and came out of the water hard enough to knock the lid open. It was pretty cool to watch him attack minnows!

[Alan]

I wouldnt put bass or sunfish in it. They tend to bully other fish, and then you just get beat up fish that get sick and die.

There are no other fish in the tank. It's empty. I want to set it up to put sunnies and crappies in it.

[polarsusd81]

They sell fish at Robbinsdale Farm Market. Bass,Northerns,Sunnies etc.

So where would one find said market. My son's birthday is coming up and my buddy is getting him a tank and I was planning to set it up with the fish. I definitely want to go with game fish as he is infactuated with them. He will be two in a couple weeks and he says all the fish names, bass, crappie, waweye, unny, muckie, persh, nordern, minnow, catfish, he is getting more and more of them down every week. Having them in the tank for him to look at will only make that infactuation grow. If you ask him what his favorite fish is, he says waweye and crappie in either order.

[DTro]

I have one at home with some gills, channel cat, bullhead, crappie.

You can do this legally two ways. Buy them from an authorized retail store (Aquatropics in Crystal is/was a good one), or have someone under 16 get the fish for you.

The latter is much cheaper as the gamefish can be as much as $20 or more a piece.

[MuskieMojoTackle]

I have one at home with some gills, channel cat, bullhead, crappie.

You can do this legally two ways. Buy them from an authorized retail store (Aquatropics in Crystal is/was a good one), or have someone under 16 get the fish for you.

The latter is much cheaper as the gamefish can be as much as $20 or more a piece.

I believe that the under 16 person also have to live in the house where the fish are kept to make that legal, dont they?

[DTro]

Yes, I'm pretty sure of that.

So I guess my question is that what if that person lived with you for a short time period or has now turned 17?

Have to get rid of the fish now?

[MuskieMojoTackle]

Yes, I'm pretty sure of that.

So I guess my question is that what if that person lived with you for a short time period or has now turned 17?

Have to get rid of the fish now?

yes, I think technically you would have to get rid of them. If a CO stopped by your house and sees your fish you better either have a receipt or a person under 16 living there...that's my guess

[Nick Kuhn]

Yes, I'm pretty sure of that.

So I guess my question is that what if that person lived with you for a short time period or has now turned 17?

Have to get rid of the fish now?

I don't think that will be an issue. My guess is the law is there to prevent illegal stocking more than illegal aquariuming (yep, I invented a phrase). Because what if you bought it and lost the receipt. I'm fairly certain the law only applies to transporting the fish, not if they are kept in your fish tank.

And actually they're easiest to catch without harming when they're about an inch long. They come up extremely shallow on calm nights (<1 inch of water sometimes), and you can just scare them into a clear container. A lot will die from that size though, as not all are genetically fit to survive.

[goblueM]

Alan, what I'm saying is if you put bluegills/sunfish and bass in there, they beat each other up in most cases. And other fish. They're just ornery in aquariums

[Ryan_Johnson]

I had a 75 gal. tank last year and grew some bass. I bought 2 from a pet store, and they were about four inches when I got them in February. I fed them little feeder minnows at first, but it didn't take long for them to start sucking down crappie minnows. They weren't really active and I didn't have a tank heater and they still ate a pail full of minnows every week. They grew to about 10 inches by October when I moved and gave them away. Watching them eat was a thrill! I put in little crayfish occasionally, and they were always a little scared at first. Once one of them realized what it was, they would slam straight into the rock bottom and eat it.

I tried putting a sunfish and a crappie in there with them. The sunfish was mean and ran the tank for a week until it left. That thing had the other fish stacked up in the corner all the time. The crappie was never all that exciting. It stayed stationary and let the minnows gather around it. When one would get right in front of its mouth, it would suck it in quick.

I'd recomend going with an all sunfish tank or a mix of other species. The bass and crappie didn't have any problems together. Just make sure the other fish are bigger than the bass or they will try to eat them.

[Sonicrunch]

I went with Jack Dempsey's. The look alot like bluegills, act like bluegills, and are a quarter of the price. They are readily available at any aquarium place. No DNR issues either.

[Sonicrunch]

I had a muskie in my aquarium until he commited suicide. Came home one day and he was dead on the floor. He must have went after a minnow on the surface and came out of the water hard enough to knock the lid open. It was pretty cool to watch him attack minnows!

Unfortunately the Esox family is pretty lame unless they are eating. I have a friend who has a gar. It just sits there, motionless.

[Tom7227]

I've done this for over a year.

The first was a bass, a couple of sunnies, four crappies and a perch. A scoop full of crappie minnows every 4-5 days. IT was a lot of fun to see who got to them first - and usually it was the perch. The problem came up when the bass decided he was top dog. Killed the perch, then the sunnies, and then he rolled over himself.

A big issue is setting it up and then maintaining it. I spent about $200 for the hood/light and the filter for the 50 gallon setup. I didn't bother with a heater because it never gets that cold in the house. I was told to set it up and run it for 20-30 days before the fish were put in. Well water and our city water (no chlorine) have really low oxygen levels and you also have to wait for the right bacteria to develop. You also need a brush to clean the algae on the inside every couple three weeks - just use the one that you steal from the wife - she won't care.

My mistake was first to not have the light on long enough and the plants started to die. That raised the nitrate level in the water and that killed off all the fish. I also didn't clean it enough and there was too much [PoorWordUsage] built up on the bottom. Had to get one of those siphon deals with the large tube and then the hose to clean it out. I was told to change about 1/3 of the water ever couple of months during this cleaning process.

Refilled it with crappies and sunnies and somehow something got into it and all the fish died again. It looked like some sort of virus or something as they got white slime on them and died. I bleached the rig and flushed it 3-4 times and have had some crappies and sunnies in it again for a couple of months.

Be sure not to overload it. I think 6-8 fish is the max for the tank I have.

It is a lot of fun to watch how things develop and how the fish relate to each other and the bait. One of the crappies seems to be trying to nest right now but I haven't seen any eggs on the gravel so I don't think it's going to work.

[AceintheHole]

I have a Large mouth Bass and Gar in a 55 gallon tank. One rules the top of the tank and the other the bottom. They are both about 3 years old now.

[MinnesotaMongo]

I had two bass in a 50 once. One kept on jumping out of the tank at night. I would race downstairs, in the basement, and put it back in.

Finally - after about the 10th day of continuous suicide attempts - I heard the familiar sound of a fish flapping on the cement of the basement.

He went to "sleep with the fishes" that night....

[fasternu]

A good rule to follow with an aquarium is 1 inch of fish for every gallon of water. This will help keep all the fish alive longer.

[RB98SS]

Back when I was a kid, I had sunfish, crappies, bass, perch, and bullheads in a 10 gal aquarium. I had them for years and they grew very little. It may have had to do with the size of their environment and the fact that I fed them lunch meat. They would eat anything. I did learn that feeding them bologna wasn't a good idea though. The glass got all greasy.

[CrappiesNCats]

we had a perch in college. we fed him goldfish from walmart. a bucks worth of goldfish last a long time.

[Tom7227]

Probably the best advice is to go and spend some time, and a few dollars, at a pet shop. I mean a real pet shop, not one of the mall types with the national names. I have have received a lot of information from a small operator on White Bear Ave. north of Highway 36 a few doors down from the coffee shop on the west size of White Bear. Help with what was needed to get going as well as help when things were going south.

[Sonicrunch]

Agreed.

The aquarium shops owned by aquarium enthusiasts are your best bet. They know their trade well.

[MuskieMojoTackle]

Originally Posted By: dtro

Yes, I'm pretty sure of that.

So I guess my question is that what if that person lived with you for a short time period or has now turned 17?

Have to get rid of the fish now?

I don't think that will be an issue. My guess is the law is there to prevent illegal stocking more than illegal aquariuming (yep, I invented a phrase). Because what if you bought it and lost the receipt. I'm fairly certain the law only applies to transporting the fish, not if they are kept in your fish tank.

I wouldn't count on that.