Aquarium Styles from Schmeg.com

   

Aquarium Style Choices:

Fresh water tropical ideas -
Imagine the Amazon, with tangled roots, Amazon Sword plants swaying, impressive Angelfish or Discus (Amazon Cichlids) swimming in between the plant stems, with a school of 100 or more tetras darting too and fro as a school, adding life and beauty. Finish off with catfish and/or loaches on the bottom and a few hatchetfish on the top.

Or for beautiful fresh water color - you can't get closer to Salt water color than with a community tank of assorted African Cichlids. A carefully chosen tank of mutually agreeable (i.e. they won't kill each other) African Cichlids can be a wonderful sight to behold without the high fish equipment and maintenance cost and time of salt water aquariums.

Or if a smaller tank is what fits your decor, consider a tank filled with colorful guppies, platties and/or swordfish with catfish such as albino cory's on the bottom.

If the extremely colorful betta's are your choice, we recommend a customized apartment block. Bettas are often kept (to their discomfort) at room temperature in tiny bowls that should be cleaned daily or more often. While it is true the betta's will often survive in this environment, they will neither thrive nor, according to careful observers, be comfortable. Having a apartment (or condominium) design with each of the sections sharing water allows heating to a comfortable level and proper cleaning while showing these beauties off to their best.

Another colorful choice would be the Killifish. There are two general categories, the annuals and the perennials. Sounds like plants don't they! The annuals only live one summer, breed as the water is almost gone, lay eggs that need to be kept moist (not underwater) for several months, and then "planted" in a tank. Some of the varieties of Killifish might better be called "Kill" fish - they like to be the only fish in the tank and will fight to the death. (Why is it that most of the really pretty fish like to kill each other?) Fortunately there are many varieties of this colorful fish that are more peaceful and do not have to be dried out at the end of summer.

There are hundreds of options that are practical in the tropical freshwater world. They range from the low cost, friendly and easy to feed, to the not very friendly (but still beautiful to many) piranhas. With Fresh water aquariums you can choose between a very natural look all the way to wildly unrealistic with neon gravel and unlikely ornaments, all depending on your preferences. If you want more ideas, here are some selections by geographical area

Cold water tropical ideas -
Brightly colored, oddly shaped, graceful goldfish. Large and colorful Koi. Great if you want to allow your guests to feed. While the choices here are a lot more limited, remember that, unless you want many tanks, you only have to find the choices that make you happy!

Salt water fish ideas -
The always popular lionfish (with the right companions - fish too big for it to sting and eat), brightly colored shrimp, dancing anemone fish in golds, reds and browns, with or without the anemones. This is the Rolls Royce of the aquarium world. The brown anemone fish looks like the rich interior of leather seats in an antique Rolls Royce - who would have thought that brown could be such a vibrant and beautiful color. If bright supersaturated color is what you want and cost is not an issue, a salt water fish tank is the way to go.

If you want a smaller tank and are willing to deal with fussy eating habits, there are a couple sizes of seahorses that make for extremely interesting tanks. Because they don't swim very well, they need fairly small tanks. The pygmy varieties do best in a 5-10 gallon (20-40litre) tank, the larger varieties in a 10-30 gallon (40-120litre) tank.

Salt water reef ideas -
The beauty of live rock. The majesty of marine invertebrates. The slow - but real - growth of corals. Animals that look like plants. The high cost of a reef tank comes with a very high reward to the viewers.

Brackish water ideas -
Your brackish water tank doesn't have nearly as many choices as tropical freshwater or saltwater, but the choices that do exist are worth the showing. A centerpiece of many brackish water tank will be the Archer fish - which will shoot down the food you give it on the side of the tank above the water line. Some people have set up targets 2 meters (6') or more away, when the Archer hits the target (they seldom miss) they are rewarded with a favorite treat. Leave the tank open and you may find them shooting at you to get your attention!. Mudskippers - fish that live a large portion of their life out of water, wallowing in mud, climbing trees. The brackish water tank affords many other strange and unique fish including the extremely mean figure 8 puffer fish.

A fairly large fish Anableps sp, when available the so called "4 eyed fish" is a livebearing fish that can grow to 30cm (12"). It works well in a fairly long narrow tank, with a good deal of the tank above the water level. Feeding this fish can be done on land.

Indoor Pond ideas -
Beautiful highly colored Koi will be the feature attraction in most of these ponds. Bread for viewing from the top Koi are available in a wide range of color patterns and price ranges. Of course the more expensive ones are generally the most pleasing to the eye, and many of the more expensive ones are only available by making a trip to Japan (Oct/Nov being the best time of year due as the fry are big enough to get a good idea of their characteristics but small enough to have a very high probability of surviving the trip back.)

Outdoor Pond ideas -
Our winters are cold! But you didn't need to be told that! If your pond is deep enough, overwintering can be done in the pond keeping the filter systems going and an airhole through the ice to prevent suffocation, or as part of our maintenance, we can overwinter your fish, lilies and other plants in a cold (but not freezing) temperature controlled environment that keeps your fish at their best for re"planting" in spring.

Great General ideas for all tanks. Incompatible species and unique tank designs -
With almost all tanks a large tank is more effective, stable and safe than a small tank, but what to do about fish that are not compatible? The solution in many tanks is to have a divider that keeps the fish separate, but through a variety of options, have the water flowing through all sections. This gives a large water mass but keeps the incompatible fish away from each other.

If you have space for a large tank that is going to be against a wall an effective choice is to put a piece of glass about 2/3rds to the back of the tank. In the front of the tank put larger fish and plants, in the back of the tank put smaller fish and more delicate plants. Now, this may sound wrong, but the effect is one of depth.The "far away" fish are small and this makes the tank look deeper than it really is. Of course, if you want the small fish in the front and the large fish in the back, there is nothing wrong with that either, but we would probably move the glass to be only 1/3rd to the back in this case.

If you have space for a large tank that is going into a wall there are other options to visually separate the back and sides of the tank from the viewer, giving the tank an immense look while hiding all the equipment out of sight.

There are lots of other specialty tank options. For a living room, consider a coffee table tank - a particularly nice option is a hexagonal coffee table. Because the corners act as a visual barrier, this allows a large water mass to be easily broken up into 2 to 6 sections. Ideally the water will flow between the sections, but if your desire is to have salt water in one section, brackish in one and fresh in a third, that can be done by placing solid glass between the incompatible sections.

For a corner, consider a triangular or L shaped tank - this is another design that allows for a very effective visual barrier. Or you might want 2 tanks with the equipment hidden in the corner.

A tank built into a book case with equipment above or below in the cabinet works nicely against a wall or as a room divider.

What about hiding equipment? This one is fairly easy. It all depends on what tank design you want in general and whether you care about hiding the equipment or not. Heaters can be hidden in the filter, filters can be hidden behind tree roots or behind a backdrop.

There is an infinite number of choices, let your mind wander, or let us help you think up effective solutions for you.

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