My Arowana and little fish as house pet

Pearl Arowana

Scientific name : Scleropages Jardinii 
A fresh water fish native to Australia and New Guinea 
Chinese folks traditional belief: Bring luck and take away evil or ill fortune.

I wrote this story in memory of "Wilson", our home pet, an Australian Pearl Arowana who lived with us for 25 yrs. 

There were many photos and videos of him before, but I don't know what I did to my phone, all the pictures and videos of him, stored in the phone, were gone, now I'm unable to retrieve them back. Fortunately my son still has a few which are good enough for remembrance. 

Australian Arowana look very alike the Asian Arowana but can be distinguished easily.  The Australian have pinkish spots arranged in a crescent shape around 7-8rows of  the scale's edges. They have about 25-32 scales in the lateral line while Asian Arowana has less, ie, 21-25 scales and has less marking.

Honestly, when I bought the fish in 1994, I didn't know anything about Feng Sui, good fortune or what  ever belief people have for arowanas. I also didn't know it's a well known aggressive fish, among all the Arowanas. In the early days, it was so small, only 3-4 inches long and so innocent, peaceful looking fish, so who would have thought it's an aggressive one, yet "Wilson' never showed that behaviour.

 I only came to know about the Arowanas aggressive behaviour 10 years later, when I happened to visit a fish shop and saw a similar huge pearl Arowana on display. I was sharing my interest with the shop assistant when she  told me, her hand was once bitten by an owner's 2 feet long Arowana while she was feeding it.  I thought she was joking since we had not experienced our Arowana behaving badly, even before he passed away of old age.

At that time, I also wasn't aware that Arowana's do not like the company of other fish. There was one time, I bought 3 angel fish, thinking Wilson would be happy to have company, but regretted it the next day, because they were all gone! Haizzz! Likely to be in Wilson's stomach. Naughty Wilson!

Since then , we let him be as a Lone ranger which he seemed happy to be, for years

During his time with our household, we had moved his home 3 times.

Initially, in 1994, he stayed in a small 10" size plastic container like this.

 As he got bigger, we moved him to a bigger glass tank of  24" x 12" x 12' .

Finally, he was transferred to his 10mm thick glass tank of  4'x2'x4' as his  permanent home in 1996.

Wilson's permanent 4' x 2' x 4' home

We named him "Wilson", not bothered if it's a male or female. For no reason , "Wilson" was the preferred name after we watched the movie "Cast away", starring as Tom Hanks and his football named "Wilson". It's a sad Survival story, Tom Hanks was in the FedEx cargo plane that crashed , trapped on an island for 4 years together with his friend, a football!  Of course everyone thought he was dead, including his long time girl friend. It's a touching and sad movie with the ending, telling us, no matter what, life goes on and we have to move on.

7.2.2017  -   Wilson in his pearly appearance 

Like a soldier in his glowing golden bronze armor with pinkish spots, on the edges of it's scales, as well as his tail though a bit darker in color.

Our Arowana, "Wilson" was a fussy pet and very particular with cleanliness.

If the tank was not washed or cleaned every month, he would go cranky, hitting the tank and splashing water everywhere.

His tank was connected to a sump system which is an excellent filtration for big fish.

We added 3-4 tablespoons salt to the clean tap water every time we changed the water. We can't change the entire water in the tank. We need to withdraw approximately 1/2 the tank,  then refill clean tape water. Add anti chlorine and clear solution. These are good enough to make the water in the glass tank look very clear and healthy, enjoyable to look at.

Clear water solution 

The waste water contained lots of nitrates so we reused it to water our plants in the garden which makes our plants very happy😂 

Arowana has high metabolic rate. They eat a lot to keep up their growth. "Wilson" love crickets , insects, live worms or frozen blood worms. 

Wilson's regular food-Hikari brand

Feeding: once a day is good enough, approximately a soup spoonful of pellets. They are fussy eaters and  will refuse to eat if the brand of fish pellet is changed.

Belief: The death of Arowana are often interpreted as noble sacrifice that takes away any ill fortune on the household who cared for it. 

25.12.2009

Initially we thought, "Wilson" is just a fish, but we found he could recognize family members. He would come near the glass when you place your hand on it. 

Whenever my son changed the water, Wilson would swim towards his hand and sometimes stayed still for a moment so my son could stroke it's body like any other pet😂. We had a ladder just for this job.😁 🤭 Wilson is friendly but not to strangers. 

At one time, a contractor brought some workers to do some repairs in our home, without warning, "Wilson" kept hitting the tank until we used a flat bedsheet to cover the whole tank. 

Another incident, in the middle of the night, "Wilson" hit the tank so hard and jumped OUT of the tank, pushing the tank netting covers and landed on the floor. This resulted him to  injuries with a broken, split fins and dropping scales from his body. We were woken up by this strange phenomena. We managed to put "Wilson" back into the tank. Thankfully, his injuries healed as time passed. The next morning, we heard our 3 neighbor's apartments on the same floor with us, were all broken in, while ours was not disturbed. Was this a coincidence? I heard from a friend of mine that Arowanas may commit suicide!!!! if they fear of a new environment. So, a thief will not easily steal Wilson!

Wilson happy being the Lone Ranger for years until the day he died. Unfortunately we had pink lighting in his tank in this picture.😜

23.9.2019.

Wilson showed signs of old age.

He couldn't see properly because he kept trying to catch the fish pellets, but kept missing them. That's when we noticed both his eyes has Cataract! 

His color grew darker, just like a human being when the heart and lungs have problems, our skin color is cyanosed due to lack of circulation failure. 

At this time, he can't even bite his usual favorite fish pellets, yet he's hungry; when he got the pellets into his mouth, he would spit it out. Poor Wilson! So we got him live worms, which he was happy with and able to eat them. The day came when he was so ill, had not eaten for a month or so. So sad that the following day, ie 6/10/2019 he died.

An elderly "Wilson" - much respected for what he meant to our family💓.

7.10.2019 - "Wilson"  funeral - For cremation

"Wilson" was gently wrapped in a clean cloth and placed in a box by my son, then cremated.

My son was the most affected. He loved Wilson so much that he even tattooed his arm with the picture of "Wilson".

Saying Goodbye to Wilson

Few weeks after Wilson has gone for good. His tank now left empty.

Missing "Wilson" 😭

A few months later, I tried to get some baby koi and gold fish to fill the tank again but it wasn't the same any more, so we transferred these fish to our pond in our garden home and continued leaving the tank empty for a while, in fact, for almost a year before we sold it off.

 I may have bought "Wilson" but my son was always the master for him,😂 until he left to work abroad.  Then "Wilson" was under the care of my hubby. He, too started to have a special bond with "Wilson". When "Wilson" passed away, we were all so sad and missed him dearly. My hubby looked at the tank blankly as if "Wilson" still around 😢

Took a while for all of us to accept that "Wilson" has really gone forever.😢

He was with our family for a long, long time.

8/8/2021 - bought a new Little aquarium and some little fish.

My friend, Veronica said....Last time one big tank, one big fish. Now one small tank, so many small fish. Life is a blessings!

 It is, indeed !😀🙏Amen

Of all the tiny fishes, our favorite is one that we called a Little "Houdini" ie, a white sucker fish with red eyes. He keeps hiding! Very rarely, he would come out like that! That's why I took the opportunity to take this photo.😂

My current cute little aquarium with a few tiny fish in it. 

The tank may be small but it can still bring a calm, peaceful state to our minds, while sitting on our settee.

In spite of this beautiful new tank, we still miss our "Wilson", but we must move on. And this is the only way I can think of.

Thank you for reading🙏

Reference:

Pearl Arowana

Scleropages Jardinii

Houdini