The Size of the Tank and the Inhabitants

An ornamental aquarium can have from 1 to more than 1000 liters of water. For several reasons, the most common are those between 10 and 200 liters. Any clean recipient can be used to house the fish; even so, for aesthetic reasons, the advisable is to use a glass or transparent acrylic recipient to make easy the visualization.

Here go some factors that I consider important to help in that decision:

1 - Where the aquarium will be placed. It is advisable to set up the aquarium on the top of a piece of a solid furniture (or other appropriate structure), in preference in a place that doesn't get direct solar light, and to a height of the ground that is pleasant to the people who will look at it.
2 - As larger the fishbowl, more expensive it will cost, and also the equipment that is going inside of it.
3 - As larger the fishbowl, easier to stabilize its biology.
4 - A small fishbowl is easier to clean.
5 - I have some basins of 20 liters or more in my back yard that are good enough to house some of the more resistent species of fishes.

The amount of fishes and the species chosen for inhabiting also influence in the decision of the size of the aquarium. If the intention is to choice between big species of fishes, the space for them to inhabit should be larger; while to set up a more varied, even so smaller group of fish, or to shelter just some elements of some small species, a fishbowl with 10 liters or more of water may be enough.

To know a little more about the species of ornamental fishes someone can read a good book on the subject, to visit stores of ornamental fishes, or some other addresses in the Internet that are directed to the description of species.

It is very wide the variety of species of fishes that can be considered as ornamental. The fish vary with relationship to the size, aggressiveness, feeding, demands about the quality of the water, temperature, etc. In this work I will give a small description of some more common species, that I recommend for the beginner. For those interested in species that are considered more demanding I recommend, before buying the fishes, to learn about the specific needs of the species and some concepts related to the quality of the water, like pH, soft and hard water, and other things that can influence in the maintenance of those fishes.

Guppies: they are small fishes that can be found with several colorings. They are extremely resistant, they eat of everything, they are not very demanding with the quality and temperature of the water and they reproduce easily, even in the beginner's hands. The feeding can be based on comercial dried food easily found at the fish stores. For the reproduction it is necessary that the aquarium has plants so that the offspring can hide. The females doesn't place the eggs, they incubate them internaly, so the offspring is born already swimming.

Goldfishes: they are found in several forms and very atractive colours, the aquarium to shelter them should begin in 30 liters, they are not very demanding as the diet and they don't need any control of temperature of the water. They accept comercial dried food, in preference the ones that are special for goldfishes, and they also like a lot vegetables, as cooked lettuce placed once in a while in the water. They can grow plenty, reaching more than 10 centimeters when adults.


Blue Gourami (Trichogaster trichopterus) and Colisas (Colisa lalia): they are not very demanding about the quality of the water, even so a temperature below 18 degrees Celcius can be fatal. It should just be chosen initially one of the species and, being taken into account the final adult size, to choose a aquarium where they are "roomy" (in the minimum 12 liters for each 3 cm of length of the fish, being excluded the tail). They are not very demanding in respect to food, accepting comercial dried food easily, even so, to do them happy, it is advisable to give live food sometimes, or meat based fresh food prepared for fish. The reproduction is gotten easily when a couple is just maintained in an aquarium, with the advise that the female should be removed from the tank after the posture, because the male (which is responsible for the eggs) takes an extremely aggressive behaviour in relation to her. Those species make a nest of bubbles in the surface of the water where the eggs are laid. It is under the care of the male, and also the newborns. When the offspring reachs 4 days of life, the male looses its interest, and must be removed or it will eat the small fishes.


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