Tropical Fish Forums

[badisbadis101]

Okay, I have found a healthy population of beautiful sunfish that I would like to add to my backyard pond. I do not, however, want to introduce any diseases, and of course I want them to survive. Assuming I could obtain them legally, etc, what is the best procedure to adjust newly caught wild fish to captivity, as well as to insure that diseases are not brought with them?

[UncleWillie]

What kind of species do you have? In many states, the keeping of sunfish (or any gamefish for that matter) is illegal. However, I won't tell anyone, I want to have a sunfish tank one day, too . There is no sure way to make sure no pathogens enter you system. Do you already have fish in your pond? You can acclimate them just as you would a fish to your aquarium. A good salt bath could always be a plus before introducing them. If you have a disease like black spot, it will not hurt your fish. It only has black spots, but does not affect health or behavior.

[FISHBOY3]

If you had a large enough aquarium or a large trough of some kind that was fish safe I would fill this with the water where you will catch your fish and add the fish to this. you willl need a filter in the tank. Okay once the fish have adjusted to this life in a tank start changing the water in small amounts with water the same as in yoiur pond. If you do this gradually the fish should grow acustom to the conditions. The other benifit of doing this is that you will be able to watch the fish for any signs of disease that occur and is just like quarantining new fish.

Now the harder part might be adjusting the fish to a diet of flake or other food. while the fish are in the large tank Try to feed them the food that they wuold normally eat. You could go to where you collected the fish and use a fine mesh net and scoop it through the reads. you should find small insects and little shrimp which your fish will eat. once they are eating these try and feed them some frozen foods while adding the live foods to the aquarium. now once they
accept frozen foods offer some dried foods when you feed the frozen food and see if they will eat this.

[Butch]

Make sure check out the Texas laws for keeping the gamefish in pond before fishing the sunfish out. But there are commerical vendors that sell sunfish that you can obtain them legally. Just check out NANFA (North American Native Fishes Assocation) forum.

[SDSuperChargers]

I've kept bluegills and sunfish I have caught locally here at the lakes and creeks here in San Diego and kept them in an outdoor pond with koi and also with some cichlids in my indoor tanks.
They all get alone fine and are very smart!
Will even eat live food from you hand, not bad for a wild fish that is tamed

[Barchef]

Yeah thats an interesting idea, I've been thinking of wild caught things too. Does anyone know if you can take wild aquatic plants from new jersey to another state, I need to check out the laws, fish too, because theres this fantastic lake that I'd like to keep fish and plants from, very interesting fish there, but of course I want no legal trouble...
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[UncleWillie]

Each state - and many times, each county - will have their own rules/regulations/laws on taking animals from the wild. Most require collecting permits, unless you are a fishing liscence holder and are keeping baitfish. Do not take this as any legal information - I highly recommend finding NJ laws or contacting your region's DNR, game and fish, whatever.

In most cases, taking of plants from a pond or lake is actually a good thing. Some plants become overgrown and become a nuisance. Also, the collection of inverts is usually permited (for feeding you fish etc.), but many crayfish are endangered or protected, so look into that more. You will find keeping natives is very fun and it is nice to learn more about and show your friends what kind of fish live in your area.

[Barchef]

I think I'll just keep those locally over there, while I still have a place to live there, once I don't I can always just re release the fish into the lake.

In any case I'm definately looking up those laws, I'm wondering if all the states I would fly over would apply their laws too though...

I don't think they will as long as I don't make any stops...
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This sig is now severly outdated and will remain like this until I find something worthy to put here. Sorry.

[Jacko]

[Barchef]

Even if its so close I can do water changes with the water from that particular lake?

(running water lake)
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This sig is now severly outdated and will remain like this until I find something worthy to put here. Sorry.