Tank In Direct Sunlight

[john starkey]

We don't have any tanks in direct sunlight right now, I'm just curious to know how well it would do w/ plants.
We're going to be moving some time this year, and I thought it would be nice to have a planted tank in front of a window that gets alot of sun or in a sunroom. It would be the only light it gets.

Just wondering if anyone has a setup like that and how it's working out? Pictures would be great as well *winkwink* hehe

I have a picture in my head on how it would look.. lots of aquatic plants, with nonaquatic growing at the top and just plants cascading down the sides of the tank looking all nice and lovely heh.


So yeah, any info on how yours is working out, how you manage to keep it clean (of algae), how the plants are doing, etc etc etc would be greatly appreciated!

Hi Amunet, regardless of what others may think in my opinion you will have lots of algae problems, my next door neighbour has her tank in direct sunlight and spends most of her time cleaning green spot algae off the glass, regards john

 

[Liam]

I have kept a tank in the garden the last two summers. It gets just water changes and diy Co2 and some trace ferts. It gets the sun directly for about one and a half hours in the afternoon. London water has lots of nitrate and other nutrients so I expect the plants get well fed. The tank is a four footer. I used some garden soil and some JBL root balls with gravel and sand for the substrate. I had minimial algae the first year which was much more sunny, last year there was some thread algae but not much. By 6.00pm the water gets as bubbly as champagne. As soon as the direct light hits the tank on a very sunny day the plants start to pearl. Most of the plants are fast growers but the crypts and java ferns grow very well too. Here a few pics of the plants, you can see that they are algae free. The fish do fine in the jungle with the extra room and water, lots of fry survive too. I really like the summer tank and will be doing it again this summer.
My worry would be how hot it might get where you are in summer.

 

[Amunet]

Wow, those pics are beautiful Liam.
It really lifts my spirits that a tank in direct sunlight will work for me
We'll see when that time comes

 

[Nim]

If you are willing to inject CO2 and follow the EI method then a couple of hours of sunlight may not do any harm. As an experiment I had a tank on a window that got direct sun for a couple of hours every day and following the EI method, I never had any problem. However when I tried the same on a tank that was out on the patio getting direct sun for 5-6 hours, it flipped over in a week and I had to discard all the plants from it.

Nim

 

[Amunet]

So pretty much... a couple of hours of direct sunlight will be ok, but more than a few would cause major algae problems.
So if a tank gets say... 4 hours of direct sunlight... and is in shade the rest of the day, not total darkness, it would still get some natural light.... would that be enough or would I have to get a light for it?

 

[Nim]

Since you are getting plants and planning to go slightly hitech with CO2 then the tank will need lighting as much as a normal high light planted tank does. 4 hrs may be a bit too much I think but it might be worth experimenting and seeng how it goes but in any case you will need to provide atleast 10 hrs of good lighting to it. 2-4 hrs of very strong lighting does not compensate for 10-12 hrs of good lighting.

I think I read some time ago that Amano's tanks get extra metal halides for a couple of hours in a day to replicate the nature but I could be wrong. I have not gone that deep into Amano's setups.

Nim

 

[Amunet]

Alrighty.... this is some very helpful info *nodnod*

Thanks everyone so far for responding

 

[Gouken]

definetly the plants love it the moss that i have on some of the driftwood pearls crazy when sunlight hits it and for awhile after, the bulbs that i planted in it grow within a few days of putting them into the substrate aswell.