# House of the Seven Fishes



## astrummortis (Aug 15, 2016)

Well, it's been a while! A good month or more, but I'm restarting a new journal. I'd planned on keeping the old one but it seems I can't edit thread titles and, well...the fish the journal was named after ended up not being male, so we're starting again. 

We've had some developments. First! Seven fish, which is our cap. We have room for all of them (Five are in the bedroom, > no shame!) and two are on a shelf in the kitchen. 

Now we have 5 boys and 2 girls. Xu Liang, Botros, Tora, Morgen, and Archimedes are all males; Xu Liang (Shoo Lee-ah-ng) is a turquoise/yellow butterfly delta, Botros a royal blue king plakat with red fins, Tora a koi marble plakat, Morgen a pearly white delta with white dragon scale (my wife's dream fish!), and Archimedes is a blue dragon scale delta with this cool black headplate. 

The two girls are Xi Zhi (pronounced Shee-Jee; she was previously Guang Ci) and Shirisae. Xi Zhi is red DT juvenile girlie with pretty black spots on her fins. Shirisae (Shee-ree-say) is a dark blue crowntail. She's pretty small but bigger than Xi Zhi, so maybe a late juvenile. Or maybe just a female; I'm not clear on how big girls usually get.

Here are their tanks! We spent 7 hours yesterday putting together Shirisae's tank, themed like the Phoenix elf she was named after in our books: 









We spent a part of that time setting up Xi Zhi's tank. Xi Zhi was a special case. We got her as a very small baby, a couple days before we lost our white baby crowntail and were TOTALLY devastated. Xi Zhi spent a whole week hiding away in her little pagoda. She only came out to eat and was clamped, and I was pretty sure she wasn't going to make it. Then about six days in she finally started swimming around, and we happened to get her a big 5 gallon tank. She felt much better! But had stress stripes constantly. 

When we lost the first crowntail girl, who died of dropsy, I looked down at Xi Jhi and saw her scales were raised ever-so-slightly. We were in such grief and my wife was so upset that I couldn't tell her we might lose the other, so I treated her quietly but saw no change in her scales at all. 

Well, it's two months later and her scales look the same, but she's very active, she's hungry, she's affectionate and social, and she's...uh, did I forget to say HUNGRY?? No bulging eyes, and her stomach area looks a tiny bit larger than what the males are proportioned, but then again lots of pictures of girls are like that, too, so I don't know. UGH. Will monitor her constantly.

Anyway, yesterday we moved her from her 5 gallon to a 2.5 and she's lost her stress stripes. She doesn't only beg at the glass, she's exploring her new little place. Super cute, and we could keep her filter cartridge as she just moved from a 5g minibow to a 2.5 










NOW FOR THE BOYS! (ALL CAPS BECAUSE THEY'RE ALL SO MANLY)

Xu Liang is the baby (so please ignore the title above!) He's a little dancer, always wanting attention, always swimming around, and has this lovely purple body. His tank isn't really themed; it was the third one we did so we didn't really know what he needed except stuff my wife liked  










Botros is the King. Or rather, a king. He's currently battling an ich infection, but seems to be recovering after treatment and 3 days of 88 degree temperature. Totally active, eating, pooping, fighting the constant battle against the filter like normal. Just with little white spots. I think he'll get through it, but damn. Just one more thing, right?










Tora! My little tiger fish <3 his koi pattern started much more sparse, but now he's got this lovely dark orange base with black stripes, PLUS a white edging around his beard and he literally looks like a tiger in cat form. I LOVE it. Tora means tiger, if anyone was wondering  He's got a river theme:










Here's a new guy!! Morgen just came into the house last week. My wife had been looking for a pearly fish for a long time, and he just happened to be sitting on the shelf last thursday so uh...well now there's a seventh fish. Sigh. 

He's the first one with artificial plants. Took over Xi Jhi's tank, which got completely drained and hot-water-scaldingly scrubbed. He's got new substrate and everything. No house, since he likes sitting in plants so much, and he's got TWO dragons, because he lives in the dragon garden. Rawr!










And finally...the ever-secluded wizard fish. We've heard his story of magic and anti-socialness before. I have bright red pajama pants I wear a lot. He hates them. He hates them hard. 










There's the reintroduction!! Thanks, guys


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