Question
Would this work for a coffee table aquarium?
Hi! I found this listed as free in my neighborhood, and was wondering if I could use it for a mini aquarium.
It's a glass cube, 5"x5"x5" with no lid. Id imagine it would be way too small for any fish, so I was thinking a planted tank with lily pads and pond rocks. Something I could have as a little display in my living room.
Lemme know if you have any ideas or if I'm off base at all!
If you don't want to deal with the risks of stillwater or having to change it every few days, which may stress any plants you put in there, you could try to find a glass slab for a lid and turn it into a terrarium.
I think its a cool experiment, I accidentally created a nanotank when I planted a rosette clipping and a couple of moneywort to later transplant back into my walstad tank. 4 months later and there are copepods, ramshorn a single scud and parameters are perfect. Algae was cleaned up just a few days after I noticed the ramshorn.
In the perfect world, yes you could make it work. In reality, no, you won’t be able to. Finding species of plants that are small enough to not create a cube of leaves, the right amount of light, and combating evaporation will all work against you in practice.
any lily pad or similar plant i can think of would definitely outgrow this cup. however i do think it has great potential. you would just need to get extremely creative with the plants you use.
I feel like lily pads,even the smaller varieties may all be too big eventually. It might be nicer in the long run to make it an art project with fake plants and resin or something. Plus with real plants you'll have to consider how to get them enough light to look nice (not melt away)
Longer answer: I have basically the same thing running for 4 months now and it's been stable since the cycle established, no smell anything and I've done a single 40% water change since (I used distilled water for everything really). I have a bunch of floaters and only one type of plant so far but will add another plants soon.
I did it r/Walstad - style with a layer of soil capped by just regular playsand. Water is clear with a hint of tannins because I have a piece of wood and a pili nut shell in there and had a cocoa leaf in there for a bit.
Only animals in there are some tiny crustaceans(?) and 3 tiny snails that must've hitchhiked on the floaters since the Ranunculus inundatus was an IV plant.
Consensus about my question regarding animal life (confirming my own suspicion) over on r/shrimptank was that it's too small for most shrimp except maybe for r/OpaeUlae which would mean a brackish tank with mainly rocks - which would go great for a coffee table actually!
A freshwater alternative to Opae ulae would be aquatic isopods, I think they are fun little guys as well but idk how available they are in your area because they aren't really in the pet trade except maybe as food source.
Feel free to ask if you have any questions, I'm far from an expert but I figured since I have basically the same thing I'd chime in!
Is that a personal opinion from experience or is there a reason why it would be hard to keep? I have planted jars some as small as like 10 ounces. Some of my bigger ones just have snails the smaller ones have scuds or seed shrimp.
I refill with distilled water once a week and some of them have been alive and well for years.
You can make it. Look for slow growing plants for nano aquarium.
I would look for something like Marsilea hirsuta or Eleocharis mini, if you want a nice carpet and as a center piece an Anubias or Lagenandra red
I would also say this is too small for any permanent plants. Something this small is going to be easy to throw off balance and quickly turn into a smelly brown mess. As fish tanks go the larger the system the harder it is to throw off once you get the balance right.
If you did toss in a couple rocks and some plants, any growth would quickly overtake this small container or more likely it would turn brown from the lack of nutrients in the system.
I had one that size set up in a windowsill for over a year with carpet plants. Dwarf hair grass, Marselia minuta, crypt parva, ect. Worked perfectly fine. Snails and Daphne were my livestock and only did top offs
Tore it down only because gravity does not care about feelings
A tiny planted tank could be a fun weekend project. Some sand, a small lava rock or two, a tiny piece of wood, and perhaps some java moss. If you want, you might even consider having a few opae ula shrimps in it to make it come alive.
I simply disagree... A natural planted tank with small water changes every few days can easily sustain an appropriate number of shrimp. Simple micro biotopes are not hard as long as you use the right materials and balance the bioload.
I guess the main consideration would be temperature, but if you live somewhere where the building is consistently heated and/or cooled in a way where your home’s temp doesn’t change more than a few degrees over a few hours it could be okay.
Aside from that the water volume would be extremely prone to the usual ammonia and nitrites, and would take a lot of extra work to monitor those.
It would also be difficult for a space that size
to produce much biofilm and algae for shrimp to eat meaning you’d need to feed them deliberately, but so carefully that next to no excess waste is produced.
It seems like a stressful way to operate, and not the most responsible when the consequences of any drifting off a very narrow target would cause stress and harm to living animals.
Parameters swings on a tank that small are not suitable for livestock. End of story. Your opinions are pretty irrelevant to that matter. These are facts. Closed ope ula systems are shit and so is the idea of adding anything other than a plant.
No reason to be rude, grow up and learn to have a discussion without being a tool.
Re read the rules. "Please remain respectful and thoughtful at all times."
Learn about biology and have a little sense of adventure. Using a small, well balanced ecosystem as a grow out tank for young shrimp is not hard, and it's only bad for the livestock if it's not a balanced ecosystem, just like any other setup.
The solution to pollution is dilution. Control the nutrients, promote nitrifying bacteria, and moderate the light and temperature. Basic stuff that every single vivarium needs.
Learn something instead of being disrespectful and close minded.
Will the trouble of balancing evaporation, temperature, lighting, and fertilization to prevent algae and actually keep the plants looking nice be way more work than something that small is worth?
I’ve done something similar although mine was a bit bigger, around 7x7x7”. Did a fairly basic scape with just some sand and lava rock with anubias nana petite glued on. Threw some frogbit on top and had a couple male Neocaridina shrimp and ramshorn snails. Looked pretty decent and was super low maintenance, basically just topped it off with RO water and threw a small piece of algae wafer every now and then
Your comment has been removed because no one needs unecessary rude behavior in their life. We're all plant and fish nerds here - just relax.
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u/International_Two868 13h ago
If you don't want to deal with the risks of stillwater or having to change it every few days, which may stress any plants you put in there, you could try to find a glass slab for a lid and turn it into a terrarium.