CastleGrayskull
- #1
Hey folks. So I just got 3 phantom red tetras and 7 neons for my daughter's 20 gallon and while I was out, I picked up a ten gallon that I'm water testing overnight right now.
The plan is to create a biotope that will basically use all of the stuff from one of the local lakes I have in town. I want to take a chunk of native Texas waters and put it in my aquarium.
So first and foremost, I'd like to ask for basic suggestions on setup.
Here's the general plan:
1. Substrate - I'll probably take substrate straight from the lake and rinse it to get rid of as much of the cloudy particles as possible and use that as my aquarium substrate.
2. Decoration - It might wind up being a blackwater tank because I plan to use any natural decorations I can find including rocks, wood and plants I find in the water. That will be the whole of my decor. All natural, wild-found decorations.
3. Water - I'm of two minds here. I'm tempted to use the water straight from the lake but I don't know if that would be a good thing or a bad thing. It's already alive and fish live in it so it seems, more or less, healthy. The lakes nearby seem to have good water testing done with high marks. Or I could just use distilled or even tap water but my tap water is very hard. Open to suggestions here.
4. Occupants - Not sure here! I took a bit of algae from the lake and put it in a jar. I was going to use it to feed my shrimp in my 20gal but didn't. I noticed some rather big daphnia, or at least what appear to be large daphnia (perhaps 1cm) as well as small.. what appear to be snails and other small creatures. Anyway, depending on the water I use, I might use very small (since it'll be a 10gal nano) fish caught from the lake itself or maybe something store bought that fits the water parameters.
5 Filtration - I don't know if I'll need it. Maybe a small sponge filter or undergravel?
So I'd like some opinions on this. My goal is to take a chunk of local lakes and put them in an aquarium. Would I even need filtration if I put enough plants in? What water should I use?
A note on fish and size possibilities: Seeing as it's exceedingly hard to find information on specific non-game fish found in my area, I may catch a wild non-game fish and have it outgrow my tank. If I do, I have considering just putting it back in the same place I got it from unless the species is invasive. Basically let it live a happy life in a tank and if it grows too big to be healthy for it, I'll release it and catch new one and document what I find.
All of this will be well documented, as well. The main point of that is because there seems to be precious little information on doing what I plan to do!
All suggestions welcome. Thanks!
The plan is to create a biotope that will basically use all of the stuff from one of the local lakes I have in town. I want to take a chunk of native Texas waters and put it in my aquarium.
So first and foremost, I'd like to ask for basic suggestions on setup.
Here's the general plan:
1. Substrate - I'll probably take substrate straight from the lake and rinse it to get rid of as much of the cloudy particles as possible and use that as my aquarium substrate.
2. Decoration - It might wind up being a blackwater tank because I plan to use any natural decorations I can find including rocks, wood and plants I find in the water. That will be the whole of my decor. All natural, wild-found decorations.
3. Water - I'm of two minds here. I'm tempted to use the water straight from the lake but I don't know if that would be a good thing or a bad thing. It's already alive and fish live in it so it seems, more or less, healthy. The lakes nearby seem to have good water testing done with high marks. Or I could just use distilled or even tap water but my tap water is very hard. Open to suggestions here.
4. Occupants - Not sure here! I took a bit of algae from the lake and put it in a jar. I was going to use it to feed my shrimp in my 20gal but didn't. I noticed some rather big daphnia, or at least what appear to be large daphnia (perhaps 1cm) as well as small.. what appear to be snails and other small creatures. Anyway, depending on the water I use, I might use very small (since it'll be a 10gal nano) fish caught from the lake itself or maybe something store bought that fits the water parameters.
5 Filtration - I don't know if I'll need it. Maybe a small sponge filter or undergravel?
So I'd like some opinions on this. My goal is to take a chunk of local lakes and put them in an aquarium. Would I even need filtration if I put enough plants in? What water should I use?
A note on fish and size possibilities: Seeing as it's exceedingly hard to find information on specific non-game fish found in my area, I may catch a wild non-game fish and have it outgrow my tank. If I do, I have considering just putting it back in the same place I got it from unless the species is invasive. Basically let it live a happy life in a tank and if it grows too big to be healthy for it, I'll release it and catch new one and document what I find.
All of this will be well documented, as well. The main point of that is because there seems to be precious little information on doing what I plan to do!
All suggestions welcome. Thanks!