coldwater marine tank.

T

tim watson

AC Members
Nov 27, 2002
47
0
0
38
sydney, aus
has anyone ever done this... i've never done any kind of marine aquariums before, but can this be done??
the water in my area is quite warm with some quite nice looking fish and crabs... etc
thanks. tim
 
well, i mean about 19 degrees celcius (that is the temp of the sea around here). i was thinking mabye of a few crabs, snails, little rockpool fish, shrimp and such.
can it be done?
 
yes it is not a problem and in fact most Australian Seahourse tanks are not heated since they come from cold regions.

The water in southern oceans near Melbourne are around 15 - 20C and they are fairly abundant with interesting creatures.

However, check your local fisheries rules. In Victoria, it is illegal to collect anything up to a 2 meter depth in a tidal zone which pretty much excludes most if not all the interesting areas.
 
I've kept a number of temperate marine tanks - usually coastal marine species from New England, which don't require a chiller if kept in a unheated basement...

I wrote an article about this for the local aquarium society. There is an online version here:
http://communitytank.aaquaria.com/articles/nativemarine.htm
(granted, the fish info won't apply...)

19 or 20 C should be pretty easy to recreate at home... a cool basement or airconditioned room should work (or you could buy a chiller...)

I find that coastal and eustarine fishes can handle a much wider range of temps than fishes that live in deeper water, so I tend to collect fish in about 3m of water or less.

a_free_bird73 has a good point about the legal issues - that might be the limiting factor...

I would highly recommend a skimmer, and high oxygen levels in the tank -- other than that, I find marine temperate species pretty easy to keep...
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
AquariaCentral.com
Top Bottom