Caution! Extremely Opinionated Posting!

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DeeDeeK

Seeker of Piscean Wisdom
Apr 10, 2009
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I've been away a lot but I haven't quit writing and thinking about aquariums. So I thought I'd write about something which has been nagging me since I ever first kept an aquarium.

Here's a bit of a VERY rough draft, really more of a treatment of the idea - I'd like to work it up into something pretty big, lengthwise. There's tons of material to cover and this is just a start.

I was curious what people might think about the ideas presented in it - not really looking for a close reading.


Aesthetics and the aquarium.

An important part of, and oft unrecognized part of keeping an aquarium is the aesthetics of it. Ironically, a great number of aquaria are kept as decorative pieces. The example I cite is the classic aquarium, undersized for the large goldfish kept within. The gravel of this tank is artificially colored and treated with a covering of epoxy. Often there is a box filter stuffed with charcoal and filter floss, powered by an air pump; sometimes the air pump drives an airstone as well. There is a sparsity of artificial plants, usually with scratchy-edged, plastic leaves. Sometimes the water is cloudy, sometimes not. Sometimes the box filter is replaced with an under gravel filter, also powered by the stream of air bubbles provided by a humming, vibrating air pump. The example with an under gravel filter smells less, if at all, than the box filter variety. There may be fake coral or even an old-fashioned diver and a treasure-chest which opens and closes as it fills and empties of bubbles from the air pump.

To me, this is abomination. That poor fish! That (usually) garish and ugly gravel, unfit for biological filtration. Those ugly and pointless plants! The hum of the air pump and sound of nonstop bubbling! That homely and none-to-effective box filter! It all adds up to kitsch-art and unethical fish-keeping.

Not that is impossible to create an attractive and healthy tank with such materials, with smaller and happier fish.

The practice of aquarium or fish keeping can be a hobby, a pastime, a craft, a way of having a conversation piece of just a bit of kinetic "art"(a different use of the word "art" is just to label a decorative object, as we all know). Or, it can be an enriching activity raised to an art and/or a spiritual practice, with its roots in some of the most fundamental instincts and emotions which make us human. It can enrich the aquarium-artist and it can enrich the aquarium admirer/contemplator.

I say let's throw away ALL the epoxy-coated, unnaturally colored gravel, decorative air-bubblers, stop breeding those awful deformed fish call "ballon," like ballon mollies, balloon blue rams, etc. and let's get those people with those really big, spartan, show-off tanks - like 200 gallons and stocked with a huge arrowana, freshwater stingrays, huge oscars, maybe a piranha, and some other big flashy aggressive fish (the kind of fish which a real man's man keeps)(no offense, men. I exaggerate to make a point and it's easier to paint the picture of a stereotype and knock it down than to be realistic sometimes [just listen to politicians on the campaign trail as they topple straw man after straw man]) to donate them to public aquariums or simply to cook and eat the fish. Poor things, swimming around in a completely unstimulating environment, over crowded, and stressed out constantly. Check out youTube and you can find video footage of such travesties proudly displayed by folks I feel very sorry for, who are missing out on the more subtle and healthy parts of life as they are drawn to flash and smoke, to stimulating but beyond that not very interesting practices, and complete lack of aesthetic sense. Crowding together a bunch of large, predatory fish, choice being driven by an appreciation of power, viciousness, sleekness, size, and being exotic in a little rectangular body of water with glass walls is the opposite of art, spirit, beauty, nurturing, and all the deep and warm emotions.

To nurture our spirits and their lives, so evoke the deeper emotions, and to seek beauty, rather let us keep our fish and other aquatic beings in comfortable quarters. Choice in stocking levels is an ethical, aesthetic, and practical practice. Overcrowded fish look overcrowded, at least to one who knows fish. Generally, such fish are less healthy and presumably less “happy,” which I am unsure the meaning of when speaking of fish but surely means something good for them. Practically, too many fish can exceed the tank’s capacity to the point where the fish gasp at the surface and eventually just die. So a start is good stocking. Another fine element is good aquascaping - landscaping in miniature underwater. Nice plants, arranged attractively and in ways the fish can make use of in natural (or natural - like) ways are a great way to aquascape. Choice pieces of driftwood, stone, and attractive substrate (stuff on the bottom like sand, gravel, etc.) arranged artfully and with care for the needs of the fish and other denizens of the tank are another. So, place these elements together with adequate filtration, light, and warmth in an attractive, simple tank and we’ve got a pretty darn good fish tank. Further attention to details, understanding of formal art, landscaping, fish behavior, lighting, and so forth can bring it to the level of high art. I direct the reader now to the internet where she or he can look up “Amano design aquariums ADA” and “Dutch aquariums” to see some examples of aquaria which occasionally rise to such heights.

Whether high art or a casual hobby, aquarium keeping is an act of keeping and hopefully caring for living things, a behavior which has been part and parcel of the human experience for tens of thousands of years at a minimum. Love and nurturing of living things has been close to the human heart for far longer than civilization has existed; it is part of what it is to be human.

It only makes sense to approach aquarium keeping with an awareness and due regard for its place in our makeup. A poorly kept or inhumane aquarium may be the result of ignorance of the skills and techniques required for a competent practice OR may be the result of lack of care for the denizens, possibly because their misguided aesthetic concerns outweigh their humane - ness. I say that aesthetic interests expressed without regard for the medium used (fish, plants, oil paints, stone, anything used for an expressive purpose) is in some way ugly and reflects at least a part of the artist’s inner nature - perhaps revealing sickness or imbalance.

Regardless of the relative health and humane-ness of their aquariums, the aquarium and the act of keeping it feed your mind and essence and if you believe in such things, soul and/or spirit. Just as the messages you receive from your peers affect you, just as the things you tell yourself affects you, your choices and actions send a message to your subconscious which affects you. This is all partly dependent on your understanding of these things,

We must decide whether to feed our bodies nutritious food, since everything we eat affects and changes us in some small way. So we must decide which messages we wish to tell ourselves about ourselves - nobody would sit down to a repast of actual dog sh*t, so why, when keeping a fish tank, should we ask our minds and hearts to feast on something which, metaphorically, is the same thing?

My words may be harsh but if you have a strong reaction, negative or positive, it may possibly be that some truth within them resonates with your own inclinations. At any rate, the choice is yours.

An alternate choice is to establish and care for an aquarium which is uplifting in some way. The metaphor of the dog sh*t repast holds; we may choose to feast our eyes and minds upon something delightful to see, interesting to think about, humane in nature, and nurturing to those creatures and plants living within, thus nurturing the aquarist, who lives without. By nurturing life, we nurture ourselves with its growth, health, and the spirit with which we imbue it

This writing is for me a further expression of nurturing the mind and spirit. I hope you will be affected by the wonderment and love I both find and express in keeping aquaria such that your awareness, pleasure, and benefit, as well as (of course) your aquarium keeping are all enhanced. It is my humble wish that you find this of interest and use to yourself and the aquatic wards of which you are the steward. Elements of Style

The first aspect of the aquarium which strikes the casual viewer may possibly be the only aspect. This is the visual aspect, the composition of various visible elements which may or may not consciously register on the person observing. The appearance of the aquarium, naturally has a powerful impact on any sophisticated observer as well.

There are a great many decisions to make about a good number of elements which are generally visible, which it will be useful to review:

The tank itself

visible aspects of the filter system, including currents’ effects upon objects

in-tank heaters,

hooded, suspended, and other lighting

substrate

stones, wood, ceramic, and other “landscape” elements

flora

fauna


Before addressing the items in the list individually, let us think about style. One could say that every tank has a style, even if it is merely the result of a naïve or unconscious approach to aesthetics and the functioning of aquaria. Style is a manner of expressing something, and each aquarium is the expression of a complex mélange of elements. Prime amongst these elements is mindfulness, the aquarist’s awareness and attention to all the other ingredients of that mélange. This is not so different from what a gourmet meal expresses.

The emphasis of an aquarium or any other mode of expression need not actually be mindfulness of course. It can emphasize the grace of fish and certain plants, color and design, idealized “nature” scenes, formal aquatic gardens, anything. Nonetheless, it is the aquarist’s mindfulness which sits at the apex of all other elements comprising the aquarium. While an aquarium may or may not have a style, mindfulness is that “personal style” which we all have, in a sense setting the style with which we express formal styles (or lack thereof). For example, we can have a careless and clumsy style or an overly uptight style of keeping the same formal style of, say, a nature scene aquarium. Some people imbue all they touch with grace seemingly while others grandeur, slovenliness, love, or total disregard, to name a few. These are styles affected by our mindfulness and our emotional makeup.

Formal styles can be learned but only the mindful and the heartfelt artist can transmute approach, technique, and manner into art. By growing in mind, heart, and spirit, things everyone is born with, we all have a path to higher ground, accessed in art: in the present case, expressed via aquaria.

First Things First

The first thing you need for aquarium keeping is an aquarium, a glass or acrylic watertight container large enough to hold sufficient water, substrate, and fish to suit one’s taste. This is not simple! The are many shapes and proportions to choose from and most of them are gauche. Shapes lending themselves to attractive and humane aquaria are two things: simply shaped and of reasonable proportions; reasonable proportions being a ratio of dimensions defining a three dimensional space which serves as the foundation of and frames the visual and material composition of the aquarium well and also providing a humanely sized and appropriately shaped space to meet the needs of whatever fauna may be kept within.

One fairly safe bet is the rectangular solid - a cube or more rectangularly proportioned transparent box. There are a limited number of facets through which to see the contents of the tank, therefore an easier time composing the aquarium for viewing from all angles. Another, slightly riskier choice is the cylinder; too tall and narrow in proportions and it looks absurd and the optical distortion. More complex or extremely shaped tanks provide awkward spaces to compose within, create kaleidoscopic optical effects, and distract the eye from the pleasures of what lies within even if a satisfying composition has been achieved. A fine wine is a fine wine regardless of the bottle but there is a certain aesthetic and functional aspect of good wine bottles which contributes to the storage, pouring, and ritual of wine drinking which a plethora of naïvely a gaudy bottles only detracts from. As with aquaria, fine wine comes within a fairly limited number of bottle shapes for a reason.

Fortified wines like Thunderbird, “Mad Dog” MD 20/20, Sisco, etc., and cheap, sweet wines like the liebfrauhmilch, Blue Nun, come in ugly bottles. And who serves them as table wines or has them at tastings? None. In my day I chug-a-lugged more than a few of those wines with no more ceremony than the passing of the bottle - which comes in a handy size and shape just for such - amongst friends which is actually a nice example of ergonomics and aesthetics. So what sort of aquarium can we expect to find in a visually distracting tank? It will depend on the mindfulness of the aquarist responsible, to which we already have a clue in his or her choice of a gaudy, distracting container, sometimes compromised for functional uses or bizarre decorative purposes (such as a picture-like wall hanging). This is not to say it is impossible to develop a fine, sensitively expressive aquarium in these sorts of tanks, just that it would take a remarkable sensibility and mindfulness to accomplish this. The effort and unlikeliness of success make this a poor choice for most aquarists as well as holding no advantage over simpler shapes.

Some things to look for in a cuboid (that is to say a shape with six faces each of them at right angles to one another) tank are attractive proportions conducive to the scheme you desire to implement. Frequently this is a “display” aquarium, where as much as possible, depth and perspective are denied and fish and plants are emphasized in a panoramic format, wide, not very tall, and with the from and rear panes quite close (this is often called shallow but we shall avoid using this term in favor of more awkward wording to avoid confusion with the other meaning of the word) to one another. Proportions one might expect to see would be approximately 4w x 1l x 1.5”h, as expressed in generic units. 48”w x12”l x 18h”, in the 48 gallon neighborhood, 48w ”x13”l x 20” h being the standard 55 gallon tank’s dimensions. In my opinion this is a great format for keeping small fish, 3” long at most. Several thickets of vegetation or complexes of driftwood or other materials to break up space, especially spaced to encourage small fish to stay together in schools to maintain visual contact, and to provide shelter for the shyer fish and crustaceans would be one potential, with any tall elements confined primarily to either end or towards the back. Composing as for a broad landscape but with either no or very compressed perspective will work best.

However, a tank with closer width to length to height proportions lends itself better to expressing the three-dimensional nature of the aquatic environment.
 

Fishfriend1

Fishlover Extraordinaire
Dec 11, 2009
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wow, i only made it through half the post(sap with ADD here:)). I think that those people who use fake plants are missing something, but i can't care for to many real plants. As for the filter/air-stone noises well, i think the fish can get over it. In the wild i can almost guarantee that its not silent. Streams make sounds, oceans make waves with sound, wind makes sound, everything makes sound. I think that they can actually be happier with a constant, unchanging sound VS a ton of small, changing sounds that are never the same twice. Just my 2 cents.
 

Slappy*McFish

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I once thought about setting up a 'tacky' tank just for kicks with the intention of making it outlandishly garish as humanly possible. ;) Gotta love lasers, bubbling divers/clams and a RC submarine. Neon colored 'clown vomit' gravel would be an absolute must-have.
 

Star_Rider

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of course there is the back to basics, bare bottom, 6 sided aquarium with nothing but a light and some sponge filters for those who like to breed fish like ...Discus(for example)
 

excuzzzeme

Stroke Survivor '05
Your opinion is one that many share, unfortunately not all. In the beginning I used artificial everything and in pictures could fool many. I longed for a more realistic auqascape environment that I felt was more in-line with the fish I kept. It simply wasn't possible. So, though the intent and desire was there, ability was not. In such cases, are we to deter one from keeping aqualife since in our opinion it is crass? Doing so would actually stymie the growth of the hobby you love.

The perception of what constitutes aesthetics is as varied as are the hairs on your head. Sometimes, in order to get to the ideal environment, you need to do what you can handle. You may not attain the purposeful and environmentally correct aquascape that you would like, but you might come visually close.

There is no manner of fishkeeping that would create an exact replication of nature. How close or how far from it we set up our systems should not and cannot be the same for all. Howver, if we are the "true" hobbyist, or the hobby "purest", we would then have a responsibility to teach what we know and foist our opinion as being sacrosanct. That is neither realistic nor possible.

With owning multiple tanks and being a member here for multiple years, I am slowly learning methods of tank decoration and care that would be more harmonious to the fish than when I began. The same could be said for those that keep goldfish in bowls and create unnatural hybrids; they need to be taught a greater appreciation of the lives they care for. It is a lengthy process and every person has different values.

I think your sentiments are wishful and fanciful thinking and at the same time are the same as what many of us think and feel about the hobby, though we may not verbalize it to the degree you have. That certainly does not make you wrong.

Teaching and safeguarding responsible husbandry is the requirement (or should be) that the more advanced hobbyists should shoulder. Teaching, as opposed to alienating newcomers, is a difficult and delicate barrier to overcome. At the end of the day if there is money to be made, all the teachings are for naught.

So dream the ideal dream and know that you are not alone in the dream. If at the end of the day you have reached just one person with just one idea or lesson, the day is a complete success.
 

cellodaisy

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Jan 11, 2009
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I once thought about setting up a 'tacky' tank just for kicks with the intention of making it outlandishly garish as humanly possible. ;) Gotta love lasers, bubbling divers/clams and a RC submarine. Neon colored 'clown vomit' gravel would be an absolute must-have.
Just be sure you stock it with glofish. ;)
 

Juice

KillaOJ
Jan 4, 2009
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I guess my DIY volcano is a bad idea then...:huh: lol
 

Chrisinator

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Sep 27, 2008
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I think sometimes artificials stuff look pretty nice. For people who don't have the money to keep corals, they could resort into using fake coral in order to make their tank more natural.

Also, I think everyone has a little bit of being a "kid" in them, thus we sometimes buy stuff that seems that only the kids would buy and decorate the tanks. I would certainly buy some colored gravel for my bettas in order to contrast their colors.

But nice little posts! I actually read most of if in one shot! LOL
 

Sploke

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Oct 20, 2005
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What I read is "everyone's tank should be an individual expression of art!" and then "but that art has to adhere to X parameters".

Personally, if someone wants blue gravel and pink plants and bubbling treasure chests, whatever. I am not yet convinced that a "garish" display like that really has any effect on the quality of life of the inhabitants, as long as the biologically important stuff is taken care of. Bubble/box/sponge filters can be perfectly adequate methods of filtration, and are often employed in breeding and growout tanks, usually setups that require optimal water parameters. Many of these tanks are also set up as barebottom, so a biologically diverse substrate, while perhaps beneficial, is certainly not required, and the needs it fulfills are easily satisfied in other ways.

While I see the point you are trying to make, and in part agree with you, I don't agree that driving the point home in the name of art or aesthetics makes any sense. By its very fundamental definition, art is subjective, and thus using that to paint a broad brush stroke between what is good and what is bad just doesn't make sense.

Rather than trying to convince people to take an artistic, aesthetic, or enriching approach to fishkeeping, I would rather spend my time helping those same fishkeepers understand how to satisfy the basic needs of the organisms under care, i.e. nitrogen cycle, fundamental photosynthesis, how things like ammonia and TDS levels actually affect a fish biologically. In my experience, I have found that once a fishkeeper gains that level of understanding, the "art" of the tank as you define it, follows on its own more often than not.
 
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