The Goldfish

 

Planting Goldfish in the Water Tanks

The Goldfish

         Johnny Davis worked for several summers on Earl’s ranch.  He was the son of one of Earl’s cowboys.  He was fun to work with and his favorite hobby soon became an asset to the ranch.

         Johnny loved fish.  He had several large aquariums at home where he had collected a large variety of both fresh water and salt water fish.  He had a particular breed that was quite fun to watch.  It was an Oscar.  An Oscar is a meat-eating fish and has an incredible appetite for goldfish.  Johnny kept a large tank filled with goldfish for this very purpose.

         A goldfish was dropped in with “Oscar” and he would proceed to chase it around until he could snap it in half with his razor sharp teeth.  It was an interesting game of cat and mouse.  After many years of sick amusement, Oscar died.  Johnny was moving on to college and decided to deposit the remainder of his goldfish in a large drinker at the ranch.  That was nearly forty years ago.  The descendants of those fish remain there to this day.  The cows are quite lucky that it was not Oscar who was left behind instead of the goldfish!

         The fish thrived in the algae, weedy, bug-filled environment and soon proliferated into a numerous host.  If counting was possible, I’m sure there were over a thousand.  The drinker would shimmer in a gold flash when the drinker was approached.  Many oddities also developed from inter breeding and inbreeding.  There were regular fish, black and white fish, fantails, double tails and bubble-eyed fish.  One day I found an eighteen inch goldfish which had jumped from the drinker, proving that the grass, or water in this case, is not always greener on the other side of the drinker wall.

         Some of the fish were trapped and transferred to nearly all of the forty wells on the ranch.  It provided color and entertainment for bored cow-kids.  But best of all, the fish cleaned the tanks, keeping them moss and weed free.  Johnny had unknowingly brought us years of clean tanks and drinkers by saving a few fish from the jaws of Oscar.