# Does my aquarium qualify as "el natural"???



## essabee (Oct 11, 2006)

I have a 72”X36”X24” tall aquarium, built into the eastern wall of my room. East of my room is an open terrace. The floor and the three sides of the aquarium is made of granite sheets, ¾” thick and insulated with 1-1/2” polyester-foam sheet. The top of the aquarium is 30” high, aluminum framed clear glass on the three terrace sides, wall of my room on the fourth side with a vertical door. The roof is a RC projection. The roof and the wall portions are covered with white glazed tiles, and the back of the vertical door is mirrored on the aquarium side. I am situated right on the tropic of Cancer latitude, so summer is 14 hours daylight, and the sun pours into my aquarium for five hours a day through the windows onto the water surface of the aquarium.

Initially I used to get a lot of algae, but after the plants started to grow I do not have any algae problem, on the other hand I feel sorry for the pair of golden suckers in the aquarium.

At present I have merely two 48” florescent tubes for evening viewing. The front half of the aquarium floor is used as UG filter, I extract the water through river sand with the help of two power heads, and the water is returned through perforated ½” PVC pipes, blocked at the ends and situated at the rear bottom of the aquarium.

The rear half of the aquarium floor is walled off with a 3” high glass strip. I had put in 1” of lateritic top soil mixed with rock phosphate and covered with 2” of unwashed river stand. The rear is planted with some crypts, ludwiga, cabomba, wisteria, and a portion walled of with strips of glass is a mass of screw vals.

Would this aquarium qualify as “el natural”?


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## schaadrak (Aug 18, 2006)

Wow.

I don't know about El Natural (although it sounds pretty close), but with granite slabs, white tile, mirrors and terraces, it sounds Pimptastic:hat: 

Any pictures?


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## flagg (Nov 29, 2004)

essabee said:


> Would this aquarium qualify as "el natural"?


It depends who you ask. I am a purist so my response is "No" because it does not have any soil and that, to me, is the "main ingredient" so to speak, in an "El Natural" tank.

-ricardo


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## essabee (Oct 11, 2006)

The rear portion has soil all right. What I did was put 1.5" lateritic soil, the normal soil of this region, laced with gypsum and calcium phosphate, as the soil was poor in Ca, S, and P2O5, according to my soil test kit. I have covered that with 2" of river sand to prevent it from fogging the water. All my plants are planted on the top of it. I also have schools of Tetras, (neons, rummy nose, penguins, glow light, congo, lemon, phantoms, sharpae,) and Danios (Zebras, leopards), white clouds. I also have several varieties of the smaller Botias, and of course Corys. I have also a pair of deep yellow sucking algae eaters whose ID I don’t know.


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## rhinoman (Oct 11, 2006)

Are your Tetras forming seperate distinct schools?


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## bpimm (Jun 12, 2006)

In my opinion your tank is a El Natural variant, it may not be 100% true to form because you don't have the whole bottom covered in soil. but then I have CO2 on my soil tanks and I consider them an El Natural variant also.


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## Kelley (Aug 27, 2006)

Your tank sounds so cool! I would love to see pictures!


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## essabee (Oct 11, 2006)

The neons have a school of their own and swim in the foreground half-the time, the glowlights have a school but stay generally at the plant line, the lemons don’t school but they do something like a game of tag amongst themselves, the phantoms and sharpaes are mostly loners and come together very seldom. When I had the four angels (I got rid of them because they grew big and I feared for the little tetras) the penguins used to form a tight school, but now they mostly occupy the upper mid-water in a loose group. All the danios school together in the upper region, so does the white clouds. The botias are botias sometimes playing in groups, sometimes giving dramatic performance of death. The corys, expect for an old survivor of an earlier aquarium, go about their business without caring for any fish or man. The old survivor, an albino cory, would sometimes come to the front when I am sitting there and seem to be making eyes at me.

I wish I could take pictures and post them to you all but not having ever used a camera, and my dismal results as I try to get the hang of the digital I have bought would make you all wait for some more time, although John N was very kind to me sending me the step by step method to post pictures.


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## sb483 (May 29, 2006)

essabee said:


> (neons, rummy nose, penguins, glow light, congo, lemon, phantoms, sharpae,) and Danios (Zebras, leopards), white clouds...and of course Corys.


Now _that _is a lot of schooling fish 
I wonder how many of them school together, and how many school with their own species. With that many varieties even they have to get confused sometimes.


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## flagg (Nov 29, 2004)

essabee said:


> The rear portion has soil all right. What I did was put 1.5" lateritic soil, the normal soil of this region, laced with gypsum and calcium phosphate, as the soil was poor in Ca, S, and P2O5, according to my soil test kit. I have covered that with 2" of river sand to prevent it from fogging the water. All my plants are planted on the top of it. I also have schools of Tetras, (neons, rummy nose, penguins, glow light, congo, lemon, phantoms, sharpae,) and Danios (Zebras, leopards), white clouds. I also have several varieties of the smaller Botias, and of course Corys. I have also a pair of deep yellow sucking algae eaters whose ID I don't know.


Oh, oops, my bad, missed that the first time. I think I just read it as laterite, as in you had added a little to the gravel. In that case I agree with bpimm that it is a "variant".

-ricardo

EDIT: Oh, and by the way, in no way do I mean that in a disparaging manner. Whether it's a purely el natural tank, or any variation thereof, is neither here nor there. Many people use different variations of the el natural approach with success. For example, in my 20 gal grow-out tank I have a huge potted amazon sword that's doing quite well. During the summer I set up a small outdoor pond with plants potted in soil and capped with gravel. I think both of those could be considered el natural variant (granted, less el natural than most tanks...) -rv


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## Jane in Upton (Aug 10, 2005)

Gosh, I'd say it's an El Natural, with an UGF twist!

You must have made this yourself? The terracing sounds great - does it keep the Vals contained, or do they invade other areas? The only thing I was a bit surprised about was the gypsum - that much sulphur could be problematic (in terms of creating H2S, which is toxic) but it sounds like its not an issue for your tank. 

I'm intrigued by the UGF portion - is this section planted, and if so, with what? 

I don't understand the "roof is an RC projection". Does this mean the roof near the tank allows some light in? My apologies if this should be obvious, I'm not sure what RC is. 

This sounds like an impressive tank, and you've got a lot of interesting ideas at work in it!

If those golden sucker fish are Plecostemas (I know I didn't spell that correctly), and you're worried about them having enough to eat, you can put in a SMALL bit of lightly cooked vegetable such as zuchinni squash for them. If they're the albino form of the "chinese algae eater", they actually prefer to scavenge fish food when they get older, so they're probably getting enough to eat. 

-Jane


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## schaadrak (Aug 18, 2006)

Some plecotomas' like to eat driftwood also. They won't eat enough that you'll have to keep putting a new piece in every month, but I believe it aids in their digestion.


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## essabee (Oct 11, 2006)

Jane in Upton said:


> Gosh, I'd say it's an El Natural, with an UGF twist!
> 
> You must have made this yourself?
> I build all my aquariums myself, I love to.
> ...


Thankyou for your comments Jane, we hobbyist thrive on enthus created by our achievement and interest shown by our fellow hobbyists.


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## essabee (Oct 11, 2006)

schaadrak said:


> Some plecotomas' like to eat driftwood also. They won't eat enough that you'll have to keep putting a new piece in every month, but I believe it aids in their digestion.


I do have some bog-wood, collected them myself one summer low from the botton of a new (ten year old) dam. Hard work cutting under water level. The two of them suck at it, but I thought they are searching for algae. You think they eat it? Or only new wood like drift-wood, which is only part of float-sam?


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## mahamotorworks (Nov 7, 2006)

You tank sounds really cool. I know when I finally get to a house that I will keep. I am building a fish tank into the wall. I know as it has been mentioned before we would Love to see some pics of it. I can only vision so much.

MAHA


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## Jane in Upton (Aug 10, 2005)

Hi Sujoy, 

it sounds like your fish are Plecostomus. If you think they're hungry, they will eat zuchinni. Boil it for about 2 minutes to soften it up. I think they also like spinach. If you can find it, I've read they will also eat dried seaweed, like is available from a Japanese or Korean grocery. Careful of the "sushi" types - some have sesame oil in them, just dried seaweed is what to look for.

Aha! now I understand the explaination of the roof, thanks! That sounds lovely with the casement windows - I like the description of the flashes of lightning scenes. And I think its very interesting how you've integrated a portion of UGF into the setup. 

And I like your idea of creating curved acrylic to make the terraces. I don't have a hot air gun, but I wonder if submerging it in boiling water would be hot enough to make it maleable?

Your tank sounds lovely!
-Jane


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