Natural aquarium

[lpiasente]

Is there any pics of an aquarium set up like their natural home? I would really love to do this for my discus. Do they live in tannin stained water?

[AHC]

Yep. Black water. There is photo floating around of a guy from sweden, i think. He's set up his tank like a cave. Its very, very nice.

[lpiasente]

Oh gosh Aaron,you mean I have to search for it?????? :lol:

[AHC]

hehehehe sorry. I bring hope for now. :lol:

Ive seen at least 2 tanks set up like one would find in the wild. I'll be damed if i know where they are now. Im thinking they self destruct once viewed as i havent seen them in a while.

When youve hit a swedish cave, one part no plant, two part plant - you will find what your looking for ..... now wheres that cryptologist? I guess those that have seen the tank im thinking off will decipher. :roll:

[lpiasente]

Looking looking

[AHC]

TA DA! found the one i was thinking of. Here is one example which, IMO is a pretty sweet natural setting. Id prefer the tank without plants but it still looks amazing either way.

What do you think?

[peppermintman]

Looks great...

[lpiasente]

Oh my god the bottom one is awesome and a goal of mine to have a tank set up just like that. I will have to wait until the kids leave home and stop wasting all my good discus keeping money on silly things like food, clothing and education. :D Do you think that is mangrove roots in there? maybe I can start looking for wood like that now. Thanks for looking for it Aaron I searched for hours. I got offered some wild greens yesterday for $150.00 oh god it was hard to knock them back :boohoo but I know right now I am not ready or set up to take them. When I can set up a tank like that one I will have some wilds.

[lpiasente]

I'm looking at it again :D . Do you think that my fish would be happier in a tank like that? Or do you think as they are tank bred they are just as happy with their current set up.

[pink66]

What a nice tank set up..

If you consider that discus are kept in everything from a BB to a jungle, i think that alot of the time it is how we wish to present the tank that seems to guide us.. the fishies seem happy as long at the water is good and we feed them :lol:

just quietly i would kill for a tank that looked like that. I wonder how the cave look was achieved?

mmmmm. maybe a future project :D I will add it to the list :roll:

Aaron, do you have the link these pics came from and did it have info on "how" it was created. (sorry always questions :) )

[pink66]

What a nice tank set up..

If you consider that discus are kept in everything from a BB to a jungle, i think that alot of the time it is how we wish to present the tank that seems to guide us.. the fishies seem happy as long at the water is good and we feed them :lol:

just quietly i would kill for a tank that looked like that. I wonder how the cave look was achieved?

mmmmm. maybe a future project :D I will add it to the list :roll:

Aaron, do you have the link these pics came from and did it have info on "how" it was created. (sorry always questions :) )

[lpiasente]

I have seen something similar for a tree frog set up. Cerinally not in the detail this one is.The rocks were all siliconed to the wall. It looks like they are also on the supports as well. Just a guess.

[AHC]

Yeah its pretty amazing. Despite a long search, I couldnt find the thread this came from again so i dug around my computer files (which are very extensive work files) and finally found the pictures that i kept for inspiration. Clean water is a priority for the fish to be healthy and in turn, happy. A set up like this can only make them feel much more comfortable and 'discus like', if that makes sense, then in a BB.

Some dogs still have that instinct to hunt, bury, snif out etc after many, many, many years of breeding. I guess id personally like to believe that tank bred discus still have ancient or amazon river instincts. Discus hate moving shadows. Perhaps a bird of prey looming about? So if my shadows makes them a little skittish id like to think its a safety instinct - flight over fight kind of instinct. Of course there is the question if you were to pop a tank bred discus into the amazon river, would it survive?

I remember Merrilyn asking the guy if he minded telling us more aboout how he made the tank. He didnt reply with details but he may have listed it on a local forum to himself. The roof and rock im assuming is a latex mould made specifically for the tank. Its a winner.

[AHC]

PS. thats not to say your fish are not happy. I bet they are. But if they lived in a tank like this, they would be extra happy lol.

[Boyam]

Wow i wonder how the swords grow so healthy in the small amount of light? must be very strong light.

amazing tanks. prolly a bugger to clean though with all the "roots" hanging from the hood. than again the only tanks easy to clean are BB, lol.

[lpiasente]

I have big swords in my tank and a low light level and they are doing very well, even shooting off baby swords.

[AHC]

yeah swords grow in low light.