The Natural Aquarium

[Magnum Man]

They are normally posted in threads on the forums… I may have had that happen 20 years ago, and I associated that with a tank crash…

From asking, are you saying that the anaerobic bacteria pockets in the substrate are ok, or safe for all fish??

 

[10 Tanks]

Hm... I live in the northwest US, in salmon spawning country, and I've never seen an Aglaonema growing here. They're not native (it is called the Chinese evergreen, after all). It's a subtropical species that's notorious for its intolerance of cold temperatures. Apparently they get damaged by the cold starting at 15C (59F), which is a comfortable spring/summer temperature in many parts of the northwest. Don't know how they'd survive a winter around the mountainous salmon spawning rivers up here. The forests here are dominated by large evergreen trees and shrubs, and very many ferns, and they handle the salmon just fine. I'm not sure where you learned that Aglaonema is a major contributor to nutrient uptake from dying salmon runs, but whoever told you that misled you, or didn't have their plants straight. I suppose there could be small rogue populations of Aglaonema here or there, but the understory plants here are not easily out-competed, so I would be astonished if a cold-intolerant, small, subtropical species was able to invade our dense forests.

That said, I'm sure it makes a fine aquarium plant, but as others have pointed out, there are plenty of other options that are just as good.

Hello. There's a book out called "Never Change Your Fish Water Again". In it, the author specifically mentions the Chinese Evergreen that grows in the northwest part of the US. It's one of those plants that due to their large size can literally remove all three forms of nitrogen from the tank water. I've used them numerous times in tanks and they really do maintain very livable water conditions for the fish without routine water changes. It's entirely possible this is a perennial that flourishes during the more temperate months in this part of the country similar to those we have just about anywhere else.

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[WhistlingBadger]

And what happens when you see too many bacteria pockets in deep stagnant substrates?

But seriously...hydrogen sulfide can build up in anaerobic substrate. I don't think it's a common problem, and it isn't something I worry about, even with my deep, dirt substrate tanks. I haven't done the science and I'm really just guessing on that, but some writers (including Walstad, peace be upon her) consider anaerobic zones to be important to the overall ecosystem. Plant roots will keep deep substrate from going toxically anaerobic, and a fairly thin substrate (less than 3") probably won't go anaerobic in the first place.

 

[WhistlingBadger]

Hello. There's a book out called "Never Change Your Fish Water Again". In it, the author specifically mentions the Chinese Evergreen that grows in the northwest part of the US. It's one of those plants that due to their large size can literally remove all three forms of nitrogen from the tank water. I've used them numerous times in tanks and they really do maintain very livable water conditions for the fish without routine water changes. It's entirely possible this is a perennial that flourishes during the more temperate months in this part of the country similar to those we have just about anywhere else.

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Doesn't sound like a book to be taken seriously. The Pacific Northwest, as @Seisage noted, is covered with huge forests with thick understories of ferns and other plants. If introduced Chinese evergreens exist there at all, I can't see that they would have any effect whatsoever on the ecosystem. I'm sure they're great in an aquarium, though, and I would add some to mine if they weren't so big. I have to keep my paludarium covered, so I'm limited to dwarf ferns, mosses, and such.

 

[GaryE]

The book seems self published and out of print. I couldn't find an ISBN number for it. I tend to think it isn't the Pacific Northwest tropical plants doing the filtration. It's more likely magic Sasquatch hair tangled in their roots.

Some groups of fish are aware of pockets in the sand. I've read research that suggested dwarf Cichlids from both west central Africa and South America steer their broods away from such spots, and take them to the higher oxygen areas of the tank.

 

[10 Tanks]

Hello. Me again. Apparently, the plant started out in Asia, but grows in the more temperate parts of the US as well. It is a perennial and can be grown outdoors in temperatures that stay in the lower 60 degree range. Like other perennials, it will grow back as long as part of it survives in the colder weather.

It's a very interesting plant and does well totally submerged in a fish tank. The interesting part is, you start it with the leaves above water. After a few months, you can submerge the plant. The leaves that were above the water begin to yellow and die off. I just remove them when they begin to die. New leaves will start to grow and are fine being submerged. Never heard nor seen that with any other plant.

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[Seisage]

Hello. Me again. Apparently, the plant started out in Asia, but grows in the more temperate parts of the US as well. It is a perennial and can be grown outdoors in temperatures that stay in the lower 60 degree range. Like other perennials, it will grow back as long as part of it survives in the colder weather.

It's a very interesting plant and does well totally submerged in a fish tank. The interesting part is, you start it with the leaves above water. After a few months, you can submerge the plant. The leaves that were above the water begin to yellow and die off. I just remove them when they begin to die. New leaves will start to grow and are fine being submerged. Never heard nor seen that with any other plant.

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This feels like a stupid thing to argue about in a thread about aquariums, so I won't continue after this, but all advice I've come across says that Aglaonema can only be grown outdoors in the USDA Hardiness zones 10-12, which are the subtropical areas of the US, really only limited to smallish areas of southern Florida, Texas, and California. The plant cannot survive temperatures much below 50F. Not just perennial die-off, full death. In the northwest, our winter temperatures regularly dip down into the 20s-30s. Even lower in the montane rivers and streams where salmon often spawn. Much of the spring and summer is below 60F in certain areas as well. I couldn't even find anything online that mentioned Aglaonema dying back in the winter and then re-growing as a regular part of their life history. They're evergreens, which don't tend to do that.

Anyway, I guess my point is that there almost certainly are not wild populations of Aglaonema here, for many reasons, and that even if there are a few individuals who somehow survive, their contribution to dead salmon nutrient uptake would be negligible at best. I do think that book has misled you. It's always good to keep in mind that just because something is in print, doesn't mean it's correct. It's fine to assert that the plant is a great plant for aquariums. I'm sure that's true! They seem like a fine plant for nutrient uptake, but there's no need for fantastical tales of Aglaonema fields growing by pristine salmon rivers to justify that fact. Let the plant stand on its own. It's a lovely houseplant.

 

[10 Tanks]

The book seems self published and out of print. I couldn't find an ISBN number for it. I tend to think it isn't the Pacific Northwest tropical plants doing the filtration. It's more likely magic Sasquatch hair tangled in their roots.

Some groups of fish are aware of pockets in the sand. I've read research that suggested dwarf Cichlids from both west central Africa and South America steer their broods away from such spots, and take them to the higher oxygen areas of the tank.

Hello Gary. The book wasn't published by the author, D Crosby Johnson. The publisher was Dog Ear Publishing out of Indianapolis, IN. Their website is: dogearpublishing.net

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[GaryE]

The company Dog Ear Self Publishing went under in 2020 because it was not paying out to authors, among other complaints. I don't doubt there are brilliant self published works, but I think anything even remotely scientific has to have peer reviewers who are also fact checkers. It was a rigorous system, and one that really caught out things like the error we've sidetracked into discussing.

That said, I like what my Chinese evergreens are doing in the one tank they've taken in. I like what all my terrestrial plants rooted in the water are accomplishing. It's an excellent support for regular maintenance, and one more of us should use. I like finding more options as I go along.

But they are only one part of the unnatural aquariums we have.

 

[Lanpenn]

This seems to be an interesting discussion. In the case of brine shrimp, the species I try to study and find out (mainly Artemia sp.), the natural environment is a hypersaline lake, most times being endorheic, so the only route is by evaporation or percolation. Probably by the fact that ammonia and nitrite become less toxic by increasing salinity, artemia is extremely tolerant to nitrogen levels that would kill even more resistant aquarium fish.

 

[10 Tanks]

Good morning. The book is an interesting one. I've read it several times and review it when I want to put together another "Terraphyte" tank. I've had to immerse the evergreen plants, because there's a type of calcium that's toxic to pets. So, if you're interested in setting up a no water change tank like this, if you have cats or dogs, you can't set up this tank with the leaves above the water line.

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[StevenF]

However, the plants will deplete the minerals in the water, and bottles of ferts aren't natural.

in calfironia if you go to the source of our water (the snow in the mountains you will find lake with no plants or fish in them. The water ism too pure. If you decend out of the mountains you will start to see algae but still no plant.s Once you get to Sacramento you enter the delta most of the rivers drain into. It is there that you will find aquatic plants and a lot of fish birds and wildlife. The rivers have to travels a long ways for erosion to add the nutrients plants need Fertilziers are basically bottled erosion.

After a time in the delta the water drains oIF ut the ocean. So the deal water gets a continuous water change. Then in the ocean the water evaporates and then rains or snows in the mountains.

IF you set up an aquarium and fill it with RO or distilled water and add fertilizer no plants will grow. Wh? Most fertilizers don't have all the elements plants need to grow. The manufactures of the fertilizer and found an easy way to save money. Don't add calcium chlorine nickel and copper. These are typically in the tap water which in some places is so bad people don't want to drink it. Capper pipes add copper to the water. Chlorine is added to kill bacteria. And calcium it typically present in tap water. So you fix that problem by making a customer fertilizer. Plants are now growing. so you add shrimp snails and fish.


Now you have a new problem the animals are not reproducing and or are sick. why? Animals have different nutrient requirements than plants so the custom fertilizer doesn't work because it doesn't have the animal nutrients that your RO water lacks. What are the animal nutrients Iodine, lithium, sodium, bromine, Selenium, cobalt, chromium, Vanadium

 

[StevenF]

Hello. There's a book out called "Never Change Your Fish Water Again". In it, the author specifically mentions the Chinese Evergreen that grows in the northwest part of the US. It's one of those plants that due to their large size can literally remove all three forms of nitrogen from the tank water. I've used them numerous times in tanks and they really do maintain very livable water conditions for the fish without routine water changes.

The DNA that exists in all living things is made up of carbon hydrogen oxygen, nitrogen, and phosph=ous (phosphate) When a plant is growing it will consume ammonia, urea, nitrate and nitrite. because of the nitrogen in these moledcules. But the key is the plant needs to be growing. Unfortunately many people had difficulty getting any plant growth due to nutrient deficiencies. So if the plant is not growing it will not remove nitrogen.

Also a water change are not only about removing nitrogen. it is also about removing arsenic, uranium, mercury, and strontium. Although plants and animals don't need these toxic elements some inadvertently ks present in all living things. So every time you add water to a tank or add food toxic elements well get in your water. And without any water changes will build up over time to toxic levels. It is easy to see this in nature. Go to death valley. During the last ice age death valley was a lake with slightly salty water and fish. Now it is a salt flat. Some of the original fish are found in very salty and hot water area the drains into the valley. Another place to look is the salted sea in california. Formed when a levee failed 100 year ago allowing the flooding colorado river to flood a dry lake bead. For decades after the that the lake became a popular vacation spot with good fishing. However now the lake is slowly drying up and and occasionally there is a massive fish die off. Tourists now avoid the area due the smells and high hight dust levels.

 

[GaryE]

When I started with aquariums as a kid, I wasn't exactly surrounded by nature. My fish came from stores, and my local river was seriously polluted (it's now not too bad). Somehow, I didn't connect my tanks to nature. I got good at predicting the spots where I could fish for that fish or this fish, and usually knew what I'd catch in a new spot from looking at it. Every fisher learns that. Aquarists? Not so much.

Now, I look at every body of water. I notice how few (if any) fish I see in standing water. I look at where plants grow, where algae and slime abound, and where the fish are. I've caught aquarium fish in Canada, the US, Mexico, Honduras, Belize, Guatemala and Gabon.

When I drift in my kayak over bass nests on lake shallows, the fish don't care as long as I don't paddle. I can't watch them for long, because I usually drift at a fair speed. Lakes have currents and solid water movement. When I've fished in streams (for me, fishing is just for aquariums, I gave up sport fishing years ago) sometimes the water almost knocks me over. I'm a big 6"3, 220 pound man. The movement in even still waters (which apparently run deep) is considerable. Our world is in movement.

I go on long walks with my dog, and as we pass the many local streams, creeks, lakes, etc, my fishtwisted brain says "that would be a barb habitat", "this would probably have have lampeyes" and such. I'm in Canada, with different fish and plants from what we keep in tanks, but the water looks the same. The habitats (when they aren't frozen...) are variations on the same habitats in warm places.

The first thing we should do when we want tanks is go for a walk near the places the smaller local fish live, if there are any nearby. But the funny thing here is the natural aquarium will appear horribly unnatural. Still waters? Lethargic fish? Where is the water movement? Where is the constant exchange of water, and the flow?

Even Bettas - I have a friend who used to work in southeast Asia, and she took go pro underwater video of several Betta habitats, including Betta splendens. There they were, Betta males defending tiny territories in swampy shallow ponds full of grasses and plants. You could see other fish in the deeper distance, but not close enough other than to say they were small. The ponds covered acres of land,and even they had water movement. The short finned bettas were in the grasses, so their bubble nests wouldn't get broken by the breezes rippling across the open areas. They adjusted to movement that was there. In dry season, the locals said the ponds shrank to smaller and shallower areas, and most of the Bettas died. That's the part we emulate in our tanks!

Our tanks can only be fake nature. We really should have constant flow complete water changes several times an hour aquariums. We can't do that for practical reasons. With filters and water changes, we can try to get as close as we can. It's a bit of work. We can dream of a natural aquarium, but somehow I think it would be 30 feet long with a huge shallow reservoir filled with bog plants and the water circulating at speed. It would also have one small fish per 50 gallons. And we would need indoor rain.

I can't see that being popular.

 

[Oldspartan]

When I was a much younger man a good friend and I spent a month, give or take a day, for three consecutive summers hiking the High Peaks of the Adirondack Mountains. We lived off what the land provided, mainly fish, cowslip, mushrooms, wild onions, water lily and an occasional racoon, rabbit or squirrel. We were often hungry.

I learned much about the natural world, often without realizing it.

The most important lesson, one only recognized in hindsight, is that people cannot imitate the natural world in artificial surroundings. The second most important lesson, again in hindsight, is that we should not want too. What we do, whether on a farm, an aquarium, or our suburban homes is bend nature to meet our needs whether for production, aesthetics, or any other whim our minds can conceive. All of these endeavors require a level of technology, sometimes simple and sometimes complex. The result always leads to unintended and often unintended consequences. We then hope more, usually a little more complex tech alleviates the problem we ourselves created. On and on goes this cycle without end.

As I learn this hobby, I see the same cycle of unintended consequence rearing its head that we encounter raising both gardens and terrestrial livestock. The diversity found in nature is lacking and that leads to imbalance. The best we can do is continually take artificial means to alleviate the downsides that our wants or needs create. It is a battle we will never win, only mitigate, I think. And the cycle goes on and on.

The brook that runs through my land teems with life and each organism contributes to the wellbeing of something else even when we as people view a cause effect as negative. The state saw erosion in the land next to the road in the early 60's. Erosion that was caused by the very road they wanted to protect. They planted bamboo a non-native plant. It has spread wildly and is now labeled invasive. It is exactly that and we now spend many days each year cutting it back. The plant has caused the brook to change, and not for the better. Last year we donned hip boots and cleared a 30-foot area of the pestilence. Used to catch lots of brookies, now just a few that seem stunted.

The cycle is evident in the aquariums and rears its ugly head quickly.