One thing led to another, and my little 20 gallon daydream suddenly transformed into the 55 gallon monster aquarium for sale in the ad.  As i was to learn, the tank/stand/hood is hardly half-past done. After repeatedly prying open my miserly fist, and waiting agonizing days as packages traversed the continent, the tank was finally equipped for life support:  It was time to add some fish!

The problem of finding a pet store in a new city is not something that one usually thinks about, but suddenly i was thinking about it a lot.  After combing the internet, i visited Boston Tropical Fish and Reptile to get some hardy starter fish.  To get the nitrogen cycle started off in the tank, eight zebra danios and a pair of red wag platies followed me home, along with my first real aquatic plant, a Java fern.

To make a long month short, three danios and the male platy ("Red") didn't make it. RIP, moment of silence for the brave pioneer fishes...

Now it was time for the puffers  A bloke on Usenet had a pod (six) of freshwater puffers that were terrorizing his peaceful community tank, and wanted to sell ASAP.  Only problem, said bloke lived in Chicago.  No problem, a google showed, just ship in styrofoam via USPS priority.  Amazingly enough, it worked!  A few days later, the Reign of the Puffer began. 

Since then, i have added other plants (Java Moss, Ambullia, Anubias sp., "Green Hedge", etc), some ACEs and some driftwood.

To see more about the puffers, click here, and for the otos, click here.

• 2 Platys ("Motley" & "Mickey")
• 6 Amazon puffers ("Mr. Skeleton", "Paleface", et al)
• 3 Oto cats
• 4 zebra danios

• 1 'Red Wag' Platy ("Red")
• 3 Oto cats
• 4 zebra danios
• 1 tasty plant (Bad otos, bad!)