Jump to content

Blackwater Biotope


evilknieval69

Recommended Posts

This is my 'Blackwater biotope' tank which is home to my two Uaru. They also have a male keyhole cichlid as a friend as he doesn't like my other fish. The tank is in our spare bedroom so has hardly any traffic past it, and does not have a light on it (i put one on for the photos)

A few bits of driftwood keep the water stained brown, and i put some very dark peat water in every now and again to realy darken it up, which they love. Tank is almost 3 foot long, and is farely high which the Uaru like. They will be going into a bigger tank soonish, with loads more driftwood! excuse the floating DW, it hasn't water logged yet. looks pretty cool though lol. water is way darker in real life, but doesn't seem very dark in the photos

BlackwaterbiotopeSmall.jpg

Blackwaterbiotope2Small.jpg

Suggestions, comments, criticism welcome. sorry about the crap photos/reflections etc :oops:

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Snookie they are a little over 4 inches at a guess. probably around 11 cm or so.

Anthony, would love a BIG tank for them, and yea it would look wicked setup like that, but i will be limited to a 4 footer unfortunately. It will have a sand substrate, heaps of driftwood and a few rocks.

I was reading a magazine not long ago and it said that blackwater streams have exactly that (sand, lots of wood, dark water, few rocks) so i will be replicating one as close to nature as i can.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Meh, may aswell post them here

This is a photo of them still in the bag when i got them

UarusSmall.jpg

And this is one of them a couple months back

P1020260Small.jpg

Anthony. no they are not a breeding pair. they are way to small to breed yet anyway. They are almost impossible to sex, and the only sure way to sex them is if you see them laying eggs, then you can see which is female. The breeding pair that these ones came from are absolutely BEAUTIFUL fish, and i get to see them on friday! I will take the camera with me and see if i can get some photos of them.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Beautiful fish, good tank!

Suggestion - I'd be inclined to stand some of the driftwood up to get a little more height in the tank or find a taller tangled root piece that would give some narrow roots for the fish to interact around, higher up in the tank.

Do uaru like to stay amongst the roots or free-swim above?

I love the look of the wood floating - great shape to it! :hail:

Link to comment
Share on other sites

looks good evil. stuff it full of driftwood and it will look really good. If you remember my 4ft freshwater tank I setup a few months back I had a few choice bits of driftwood, have a look for some like that, it will really help create the look you are going for

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Anthony, they get to like 30cms max i think

Foxglove, thanks. I want to get some wood standing up higher too, but i have run out of wood to put in there :lol: I need to go find some more. a tall tangly root like piece would be perfect for this setup. My uaru like to hang together near the floating driftwood, so im guessing that they prefer to stay around the wood. They do come straight to the top when i feed them though.

David, agreed that it needs to be stuffed full of wood, but as i said, i have to get more lol. Yep i remember your tank; that wood was awesome, and would be perfect for a blackwater biotope tank.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I love the look of the wood floating - great shape to it! :hail:

Yea those pieces actually used to be connected, and they had a perfect cave right in the middle for catfish (bristlenoses) but i had to move my GBA trio from one tank to another, and the male would not come out of the hole, no matter what i tried he wouldn't come out, and the only way i could get him out was to break it in half (which was easy to do, and didn't harm him at all as it broke off around him) I couldn't put the piece into the new tank either because it had heaps of algae on it that i didn't want in the new tank. So alas, it is now two pieces :lol: Did that make sense?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

A good site about blackwater biotopes

http://www.planetcatfish.com/shanesworl ... cle_id=177

It seems that i was partially wrong. Theres two parts to a blackwater stream/river. The river bank which is sandy, mulmy, full of roots/wood etc, and the centre of the river/stream which has heaps of stones and rocks and large boulders

Another cool link

http://apisto.bravepages.com/AMAZONIAN% ... rticle.htm

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

Loading...
×
×
  • Create New...