Fishes & Plants

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We have fishes and plants at home on and off. Some pictures here.

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This is the first version of my fish bowl, and a few pic of one of the up-side-down catfish.

This setup lasted about 1 year.

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The second version of the fish bowl was setup in spring 2006, and still going strong ecologically as of today. But now does not look at clean and nice as these pictures.

The main change is the use of aqua soil (about 5 liters of ADA Amazonian) that allowed more variety of aqua plants.

This is a very low maintenance setup. I only need to add water every few days, drop some food every few days. No filter, no air pump, no water change. The external energy inputs are the light on top that provided energy for the plants and as heat source in the winter, and the occasional drop of fish food. Oxygen and other nutritions are recycled within the system.

This bowl has a sucker fish and a shrimp who eat algae and do not require special feeding, and a molly whose job is to clean up the layer of film if the water is still and to eat any larvae. I have the sucker fish and the shrimp since day one, and the molly can live about one year.

The fishbowl is inside the guest toilet which has very limited sunlight.

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Encouraged by the resilience of the second setup, which is 3 years old and still going strong, I decided to setup another similar one outdoor in the balcony. The bowl is ceramic and bigger than the glass bowl I already have. With more soil and larger volume of water, the eco system should be more stable. The only unknown is how well the fishes can withstand the winter months.

My plan is to plant something that will grow out of the water. I was hoping to find some mini water lilies, but have not yet able to source one that is small enough. So in the mean time I planted two types of plants that supposedly would grow out of water.

This picture also introduces the orchid I have in my home since 1999. It was a gift from the interior designer. After the initial flower bloom was finished, we just sort of kept it in the balcony and never paid much attention. My kids may occasionally water the orchid. And from my memory, the orchid had flower perhaps every spring.

When I setup the outdoor fishbowl, I just sort of reorganized the place so the orchid is one top, fishbowl at the bottom, with some extra space to keep other plants.

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An update on the orchid and the fishbowl.

The orchid started to flower today. And I can see the plants in the bowl also are taking roots and growing since planted on 17-Mar-09. The bamboo like plant and the one with mushroom like leaves are capable of growing out the water.

The short plant with smaller leaves can grow to carpet like if given enough sunlight. I probably will take out the moss at the back, as they will grow fast and crowd out the other plants by blocking sunlight from reaching the bottom.