Ultimate Marine Aquariums

Saltwater Dream Systems and How They Are Created
By Michael Paletta, Microcosm, T.F.H. Publications (2003)

Ultimate Marine Aquariums by Michael Paletta is a compilation of detailed reviews on the tanks of 50 very experienced reef tank keepers. The reef keeping hobby has made some tremendous strides in the successful keeping of LPS and SPS corals over the past decade. If you want to learn how to setup a tank like the pros then this book is for you. By reading Ultimate Marine Aquariums you will start to notice some common trends that these tanks employ such as very high lighting levels, the use of sumps and very brisk water circulation. Each tank profile has nice photos, a 2 or 3 page overview and the detailed specifications are listed. What's really interesting to read is the section on what each hobbyist would have like to have done differently.

The detailed specs in each profile include:

The Tank - size, designer, when established, the sump and any architectural details.
Circulation - pumps and wave making devices used.
Controllers - temperature controllers, fans, heaters and chillers.
Filtration - skimmers used, mechanical filters, uv sterilizer, reverse osmosis and deionization, carbon (if used), live rock, sand, and plenums (if used).
Lighting - photo period, lighting controllers and whether they used natural sunlight.
System Parameters & Water Chemistry - temperature, specific gravity, pH, Alkalinity, Calcium, Nitrate, Phosphate, nitrate reducers, water source, salt mix used and the maintenance schedule.
Livestock - details the inhabitants in the tank, fish, invertebrates and corals.
Feeding - how they feed the tank occupants.
Notes - lists problems overcome, what the owner likes best, other successes and visitor comments.

About the only improvement for Ultimate Marine Aquariums would have been more pictures for each profile. Don't get me wrong here, the pictures are great, just having more would have been nice. It would have been cool to create a website for this book with updated statuses and photos on each of the tanks profiled.

Ultimate Marine Aquariums is for those wanting to know what the pros are doing and how they do it or to get some ultimate setup ideas. Overall we give this book 4 stars .

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Visitor Reviews and Comments

From: Caitlin
My husband and I were looking for inspiration when setting up our second saltwater aquarium. It's a big one at 240 gallons and we definitely needed some good ideas on rockscaping and equipment. This book was simply fantastic for us. Not only did we get some really good ideas on how the tank would look, but we also got some new ideas on equipment that some of the pros that are detailed in this book are using. I agree that it would be really neat if there was someplace to go to read more on these tank setups or even see pictures of what the look like today. Thanks.

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