Aquarium for a black tip reef shark

[Adeesh Yuvaraja]

Hi, so i'm from India and I'm planning to build this new aquarium for my family's new house, it's always been a dream to house a couple of black tip reef sharks and i feel i've gained enough experience in the hobby to take the step. My plan is to build an aquarium with a length of 25 feet, a depth of 7 feet and a width of 11 feet. I'm not sure how many gallons that is but i hope it'll be adequate for a 3-4 foot reef shark, once it grows to its max size i've made arrangments to re homie it to a public aquarium near by. Is the size of the aquarium enough and what kind of filteration would be required and for such a large aquarium how can we regulate parameters such as salinity as its easily done in a smaller reef tank by a autotop off. I'm all in to spend as much as its required to give the best care for these animals so would be great if i could get some help in learning about them and their other important requirements i might have missed

 

[bobnicaragua]

I would study up on public aquarium shark displays.

 

[Adeesh Yuvaraja]

I would study up on public aquarium shark displays.

I have approached my local public aquarium regarding this but they're aquarium is over 1 million gallons so they're suggesting some of those techniques they use wont apply and they're located right by the ocean so they also use that ocean water which i can't. Any idea where i can contact public aquariums in other places?

 

[ShakeyGizzard]

roughly 14,400 gallons

 

[ShakeyGizzard]

I have a lot of experience with black tips but not keeping them in captivity. They are jumpers and seem to tolerate semi brackish water at times. Your 14,400 gallon tank is going to a big one to cycle.

 

[OrionN]

I imagine that water supply for water change is a must. No water for water change/or place to mix this volume of salt water, then this project is a no go.
There are large aquariums that do not have access to ocean water, these have to either truck in water or mix water. You need to come up with a reasonable estimate regarding the amount of water change you need. Can you get this amount of water or mix this much water. Also important is how this much SALT WATER discharge impact the filtration of the local wastewater management filtration system. Dump this much salt water to a fresh water filtration system can have a huge impact. Flush them to the environment can kill a lot of plants and animals in the soil.
Do your diligent research before building or else it will be a huge money pit that result in a huge eye sore.

 

[Ernie Mccracken]

Something like that definitely requires professional help. If you have a deep 7 figure budget, Red Fin works with projects of that scale and I believe in that part of the world. The "cheap" way to keep big sharks like that is to buy as large of a round pool or aquaculture tank as you have space for and source used commercial equipment. Definitely not feasible for someone without a lot of experience.

The Finest Luxury Residential & Commercial Aquariums

RedFin is a premier builder of luxury residential and commercial aquariums. Our expert team designs, installs, and maintains breathtaking aquatic environments that elevate any space.

www.red-fin.com

 

[Adeesh Yuvaraja]

roughly 14,400 gallons

Will that be enough? I can go a bit more on length if required

 

[Adeesh Yuvaraja]

I have a lot of experience with black tips but not keeping them in captivity. They are jumpers and seem to tolerate semi brackish water at times. Your 14,400 gallon tank is going to a big one to cycle.

Ohh, Anyways it will be in a closed building so i'll take extra care to cover up the aquarium so that they don't jump, its good they can handle semi brackish, but i really want to make sure the salinity or any other parameters stay stable. Yeaa! Cycling is a big part and ig needs a lot of patience

 

[Adeesh Yuvaraja]

I imagine that water supply for water change is a must. No water for water change/or place to mix this volume of salt water, then this project is a no go.
There are large aquariums that do not have access to ocean water, these have to either truck in water or mix water. You need to come up with a reasonable estimate regarding the amount of water change you need. Can you get this amount of water or mix this much water. Also important is how this much SALT WATER discharge impact the filtration of the local wastewater management filtration system. Dump this much salt water to a fresh water filtration system can have a huge impact. Flush them to the environment can kill a lot of plants and animals in the soil.
Do your diligent research before building or else it will be a huge money pit that result in a huge eye sore.

Its also an important thing i should educate myself on, the other day i was looking up at large saltwater mixing stations in public aquairum but that seems feasible to do but a bit expensive but if that's the only choice then i should invest in it, however i can truck the water from the ocean, ocean is not too far away, just far enough that i can't literally pipe it through but my concern is what if the seawater is contaminated with something or has some kind of disease causing pathogens in it. That's my only concern and if i can do anything to avoid this situation im ready to do it. In terms of discharge of water fortunately or unfortunately the water here in general is very salty so we have a private desalination plant in our home and a water purification system so we can basically make the water drinkable again.

 

[Adeesh Yuvaraja]

Something like that definitely requires professional help. If you have a deep 7 figure budget, Red Fin works with projects of that scale and I believe in that part of the world. The "cheap" way to keep big sharks like that is to buy as large of a round pool or aquaculture tank as you have space for and source used commercial equipment. Definitely not feasible for someone without a lot of experience.

The Finest Luxury Residential & Commercial Aquariums

RedFin is a premier builder of luxury residential and commercial aquariums. Our expert team designs, installs, and maintains breathtaking aquatic environments that elevate any space.

www.red-fin.com

Thank you for suggesting them! I'm ready to spend close to that but i did contact them previously for another 1000 gallon reef we built inside our home as a display aquarium but they weren't responding, ig its a different country and they're in dubai so i ended up building it myself with assistance from a local fish store. In terms of experience , I've had few saltwater aquariums previously with the largest being this 1000 gallon one which is certainly not this big but the biggest aquarium i have is a 3000 gallon freshwater aquarium which is totally another thing, and much easier ig. I can get help from any local fish store nearby and the public aquarium nearby. I myself am studying bachelors in marine biology right now so hopefully that helps a bit, but this shark aquarium is such a underexplored thing with very little information online so i dont want to jump into such large animals without proper proper research

 

[areefer01]

Schedule, scope, resource, budget, and plans. As already noted above if you can't sustain the water then the project never leaves the paper. Simple as that.

There is nothing DIY or cheap on a project of this size. Look at any mini public aquariums that wealthy hobbyist have in their home, the staff required to maintain them, and the equipment. If that isn't something you or your family can manage, and I mean no disrespect in this, then again it doesn't leave the paper.

 

[OrionN]

Monster Build - My home 21 feet long concrete aquarium

Hi all, I always dreamt about a big aquarium so we designed the aquarium first and create a house round it. That's how it all started more than one year ago. Last week we poured the concrete. I wanted to share this with you. Filtrationroom is located in the basement. Access to the aquarium by...

www.reef2reef.com

 

[ShakeyGizzard]

Ohh, Anyways it will be in a closed building so i'll take extra care to cover up the aquarium so that they don't jump, its good they can handle semi brackish, but i really want to make sure the salinity or any other parameters stay stable. Yeaa! Cycling is a big part and ig needs a lot of patience

I don't recommend brackish water, would use saltwater that is recommended by someone with experience with keeping black tips in captivity. I made the statement because they can be found at times semi-brackish water.

 

[_cpate3_]

If you pull this off you’d better make a build thread, I’d LOVE to see it

 

[ShakeyGizzard]

Will that be enough? I can go a bit more on length if required

I have no Idea, the black tips can get up to 6 feet I think. This is one build for the professionals

 

[Jekyl]

@Jay Hemdal may have some valuable input on this as he has run many large public aquariums.

 

[Doctorgori]

wow, you will need to sell tickets

 

[Jay Hemdal]

Hi, so i'm from India and I'm planning to build this new aquarium for my family's new house, it's always been a dream to house a couple of black tip reef sharks and i feel i've gained enough experience in the hobby to take the step. My plan is to build an aquarium with a length of 25 feet, a depth of 7 feet and a width of 11 feet. I'm not sure how many gallons that is but i hope it'll be adequate for a 3-4 foot reef shark, once it grows to its max size i've made arrangments to re homie it to a public aquarium near by. Is the size of the aquarium enough and what kind of filteration would be required and for such a large aquarium how can we regulate parameters such as salinity as its easily done in a smaller reef tank by a autotop off. I'm all in to spend as much as its required to give the best care for these animals so would be great if i could get some help in learning about them and their other important requirements i might have missed

That works out to be a bit shy of 15,000 US gallons. Unless it is a round tank, that would not be enough space for a pair of adult blacktips. They reach about 50" in captivity.

Jay

 

[Adeesh Yuvaraja]

Schedule, scope, resource, budget, and plans. As already noted above if you can't sustain the water then the project never leaves the paper. Simple as that.

There is nothing DIY or cheap on a project of this size. Look at any mini public aquariums that wealthy hobbyist have in their home, the staff required to maintain them, and the equipment. If that isn't something you or your family can manage, and I mean no disrespect in this, then again it doesn't leave the paper.

I can definitely do with the budget, and i have a bit more room for expansion, in terms of resources, water won't be an issue but fitleration equipment, i need a source to get them. I already do have a couple of people to manage my aquariums and my other pets so I do have people who can take care of it incase im not home and help me out when there's a big water change. I'm all in to get every possible equipment needed to keep them healthy. Just need a place where i can get some of them. I'm defintely not going all diy with this, if there's an option to get products made of R&D ill always go for them.