Not Enough Hours...

I've read around the net that the hobby of fish-keeping can be extremely time consuming, particularly in the beginning, but once you're setup and running smoothly, it should take you no more than, on average, 10 minutes per fish per day. Therefore, Junior with the solitary goldfish in an unassuming bowl requires only 10 minutes a day to feed clean and maintain his pride and joy.

Someone with 18 fish is supposed to need three hours a day. Doesn't quite work, does it? If I had 18 tetra in a single tank, I'm guessing it wouldn't take much longer, on average, each day than Junior with Goldie.

Betta can be a totally different kettle of...you know what I mean.

Each Betta male must be housed separately, unless you go down the barracks trail and house them in shared water, but even then, you still have to clean and maintain individual spaces within that shared system. Some females can be housed together in a sorority, but not all. There will still be times girls need to separated as much as the boys.

Then there's the quarantine tanks (QT). QT is required of any of your fish become ill, or for new arrivals (imports or local fish shop (LFS) buys). I seem to have had someone in QT most weeks since I started this hobby for one reason or another.

Then there is the spawn tanks - looking after the male and female in the beginning to ensure neither are overly damaged. Watching dad doesn't begin snacking on a full nest. Then caring for up to hundreds of fry. And doing this in multiple tanks at a time!

But before you get to any of that: sourcing tanks, figuring out how and where to store your aging water, which pump and filtration system are you going to use, lighting, barracks, beanie boxes, plants (real or silk), substrate (gravel, sand, bare - what about different choices for different tanks?)...and the billion more choices you will have to research.

And then there's photography. Can you take a good picture? Know how to set up a camera for macro shots?

Or, you can take a breath, relax, and enjoy your single male Betta in his wonderfully aquascaped nano tank - you know what a nano tank is...what about what aquascaping?

To begin with, this hobby, just like every other hobby out there, has a steep learning curve for the budding enthusiast. But persistence pays and slowly...very slowly...things will get easier. They may not lead to extra hours being available in the day, because you'll always find something else to fill the new time you make, but you will get more joy and pride from your accomplishments - even if it because you have a happy and healthy male blowing a bubblenest in his five litre tank with silk plants.

There is one thing for sure, you will have many moments when you take a step back and survey your work with pride and remember why you started all this fishy business in the first place!