Ask MetaFilter questions tagged with aquariums

What do I do with a 240 gallon fish tank?

yehaskel — Sun, 18 Nov 2007 19:14:23 -0800

What do I do with a 240 gallon saltwater aquarium? My wife and I will be moving to a new house in a month. Said house looks great, and there's a massive 240 gallon fish tank in the living room wall. It actually looks really nice, but it's pretty dirty and gross so we asked the current owners to empty it and have it professionally cleaned.

Questions arise in trying to plan for the future of this thing. I have no idea what realistic options for us look like.

A little about us: neither of us really care enough to put much into tank maintenance. We just want it to look pretty and have swimming things in it. Yes, we will love the fish.

So I have a few questions that I'm hoping some of you know the answers to:

1. Once professionally cleaned, can the tank be used for freshwater fish?
2. Freshwater vs. saltwater - overall, which is the easiest to maintain? By easy I mean not having to do a lot of stuff and still pass inspection.
3. How much do you think the fish people charge to come out to your house, clean up the fish poo, and do their thing with the fish tank?
4. How often do they need to come?
5. Starting with an empty240 gallon tank, how much should I expect to put into it just to get it fish-ready (gravel, plants, the little treasure chests that blow bubbles, etc.? Just ballpark.

Thanks in advance for any advice to help us through this fish situation.

Help for a Goldfish Killer?

maryh — Fri, 01 Jun 2007 21:08:31 -0800

Oh god, I've murdered my son's goldfish. Poor Mike, Jim and Poopy, I never meant to cut your lives short. Aquarians, please help! I know nothing, and I mean nothing, about keeping a simple aquaruium. I am a fish killer, pure and simple. My son's aquarium holds 10 gallons and has a (irksomely loud) filter motor, we fed the fish sparingly, and tried to keep them occuppied. I suspect some of the chemicals we added to the tank were just too much-- I added a teaspoon of Auqusafe, but there were a couple of other 'sample' additives, too.
I want to start over but I want to do it right this time. Goldfish! Holy cats, how hard can that be?

For the aquarium enthusiasts

mjao — Sun, 05 Nov 2006 08:15:58 -0800

I knew that there were beautiful fish, but I was blown away the other day when I came across an aquarium in a restaurant which boasted the most amazing, glittery, neon, tropical fish. I can't believe how cool real-life Nemos are! (Clownfish.) What are the names of other, mesmerising tropical fish? I'd like to do a websearch. It just amazes me that there are so many varying types of fish. Do any of you have a fondness for one in particular? Are there any resources on the specific "personalities" of certain breeds of fish? My brother has always been a fish-nut, and tries to tell me about the personalities of his fish, but he keeps ugly ones such as cichlids that I am not interested in. I also have a marine biologist friend who is quite taken by particular types of fish; one in particular, he believes has a type of extrasensory perception (it is a long, thin black thing.) I'm taken aback and quite curious about the "features" that certain fish have evolved to possess.

Also, is it legal to buy clownfish, seahorses, etc? Is it legal to buy coral or sea anemones or sea cucumbers? I'm quite aware that the initial setup for tropical fish is quite expensive, but how expensive? (I live in Australia, but I can easily convert US$ to AUS$, etc.)

Quiet Aquarium Filters

about_time — Fri, 27 May 2005 13:41:07 -0800

My aquarium filter, an aqua clear 500, makes a lot of humming noise. Do you know of a very quiet filter (maybe one of those external ones?), or do you have suggestions for making it less noisy?

Should I turn off the light in my aquarium overnight?

crawl — Tue, 27 Jan 2004 08:19:40 -0800

Should I turn off the light in my aquarium overnight so my fish can "sleep"? Or is that just stupid? My theory here is that in the ocean, the sun goes down at night so it should be natural for fish to be in the dark a certain amount of time each day. I tried to search on Google, but couldn't find the right combination of search terms.

UK Educational Marine Life?

humuhumu — Wed, 14 Jan 2004 03:14:04 -0800

Finding more than Nemo: aided by innumerable viewings of Finding Nemo and the Little Mermaid, my three-year old's fascination with the aquatic world continues, fuelled by a lovely trip to the small-ish but very impressive Mote Marine Laboratory while in Florida a few months ago. However: we're in the UK, where - despite being surrounded by water - good quality aquariums seem rather thin on the ground (sic). Can anyone recommend good places of this kind (educational, subjects well looked after)? Is the London Aquarium good?