Decor for a tall tank

Heppo

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Hi, I have a 90 gallon tank that was custom made to fit in a wall between two rooms. Approx 30” tall, 48” wide and 18” deep. African cichlids are in it now.

What do you recommend for decor that will balance giving the fish places to hide, allowing easy cleaning, and still letting us see the fish? Right now they ignore some fake plants and just hide behind the filter intake.

I was thinking some kind of rocks, or wood, though I had a bad prior experience with wood tinting the water and being difficult to control algae. I figure rocks would be easier to clean but I’m open to suggestions.

thankyou!
John
 
I had a tank used as a divider about 8 years ago now. It was for African Cichlids. I used limestone rock piled in the center up to 6" away from the top and maintained a 3" around all the edges free of rock to facilitate glass cleaning. That only left 12" of space for the rock pile so it was quite narrow. The fish could go through from one side to the other using various tunnels created, but they mostly swam around the outside. I also mounted the filters on the ends of the tank so that the view wasn't obstructed. I was concerned about the weight of the rocks but nothing every happened. I don't know the terrain where you live but I collected the limestone from recent forestry road construction sites where the limestone was corroded into interesting shapes. My tank was only 18" tall so for your tank the weight and stability of a central rock pile will have to be assessed.
 
for a tank that tall, it's going to be a bit hard to find a way to create a less empty feel.
if i had a peninsula room divider african cichlid tank, i would have a grey-black rock pile descending from the side that is touching the wall, going all along the bottom. you can add some curved, aquarium-safe piping hidden in between the rock formations for cover if need be. i don't know if wood would be a good choice, but if you want, you can add some root-like manzanita branches sticking out from the piles of rocks.
as for the upper area, you can add hornwort or other floating plants for visual aesthetic, periodic shade, water oxygenation, and as a supplement to aid your filter. the great thing about low maintenance floating-type plant species is that they are cheaper to maintain than artificial plants and can be planted anywhere in the tank (whether it be top or bottom) and will still do well.
 
If you are interested trying to build something, you could laminate pieces of foam to fill a portion of the hard space available to you in the tank. Then carve the polystyrene foam to form caves, tunnels etc in the foam. Then fiberglass the whole foam structure with epoxy resin, using chopped strand would likely be the easiest to work with. Then using well washed and dry gravel or sand mix this with a clear epoxy resin to form a sandstone like finish over the entire foam and glass structure. Once the resin has cured you can carve out most of the remaining foam and use acetone to dissolve out the bits you cannot get too. The epoxy can cure to a non toxic solids, polystyrene foam is non toxic, and the Acetone can be washed away. I personally haven't done this but do know that the lost styrene method is used to prototype and build kayaks in a number of locations. If my current home had harder and more alkaline water I would have tried that, but my water is now very soft and acidic, so I have moved away from African Cichlids. Please be aware that this is an idea that I thought about but never implemented, there may be issues yet to be discovered.
 

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