Applying saltwater knowledge to freshwater

[Ardeus]

After a long time away from freshwater, I am currently setting up a 100 gallon tank for shelldwellers from Lake Tanganyika.

Here's the tank, fully aquascaped (it's just sand).



The question is: do I even need a filter? Before having a reef tank, the question wouldn't cross my mind.

The fish population is going to be just 4 small fish. Won't the sand provide enough biological filtration?

 

[Waters]

Technically, no......the hardscape and sand would be enough. I have a small nano freshwater tank that has nothing but tetras that has no biological filtration other than the hardscape. Are you going to add any frontosas (or any other large cichlids) or sticking to the smaller guys?

 

[Ardeus]

This tank was conceived to be the opposite of a reef tank, just the 3 neolamprologus ocellatus and a dwarf altolamprologus compressiceps Sumbu to make sure no fry survives. (Why do I have the feeling my plans will fail?)

No rocks, just sand a few shells and 4 fish with interesting behaviors.

I saw them in the same habitat in the Lake and I'm trying to recreate that environment.

 

[Waters]

Very cool....make sure you post some pics once it is set up.

 

[Ardeus]

I will... but it's just a tank with sand a a dozen shells.

10 years ago I had a similar tank:

 

[Ardeus]

I thought about getting one of this for this tank but at 1190 eur... lets don't and say we did.

 

[Waters]

That is actually pretty easy to create though for much cheaper....unless that is fake moss? It would look cool as a tank centerpiece. You can do some cool stuff gluing branches together. I did something similar with my piranha tank...although admittedly not as cool as the pic you posted.

 

[Ardeus]

I thought about it and I went looking online for pieces of wood that I could put together, but I could never come up with something as pretty as that tree.

They use cladophora, which is an algae, not a plant. It grows very slowly and can adapt to a variety of conditions.

The guy just asked me how much I had available and I told him that I wanted to pay the 1190 eu, but not now :)

After having seen that tree, I would not be willing to settle for something less pretty.

So, just plain sand it is.