mirror back

[Mark3]

I was just wondering, why have I never seen a mirror back tank? Is there a reason that there is never a tank with a mirror back... I think it could look nice instead of black or blue.

Just a thought in case I build another tank.

 

[SteveSTL]

I had it on one but it can cause problems - the fish see themselves as a rival and end killing themselves while trying to attack the glass/mirror. And you have to keep your glass clean or it just gets covered with coraline and defeats the purpose of the mirror.

I it for a while because it makes the tank look bigger and gets more light into various nooks and crannies but ultimately decided 2 panes of glass was enough to clean and didn't want to continue with the 3rd. (I never did have a problem with fish attacking themselves but have heard about it from a friend's friend's brother's uncle's sister)

 

[redfishbluefish]

Some fish might not find it so amusing. They will think there is another one of themselves in the tank, and might attempt to fight with the mirror.

I had a yellow tang that was misbehaving and I attempted to distract this tang by putting a hand-held mirror up against the tank. But the only thing that did was attract my longnosed butterfly to show that he was ready to fight, with the dorsal spines fully showing. It was amusing.