My fish room/thread for all the help one may need!

[JBeehler]

I am looking to build out a gallery style fish room, consisting of anywhere between 12-20 tanks. The area is 10.5’x7.5’ with only three walls as it is in the family room of our basement.

I have 1 125gallon aquarium for a fahaka puffer. And will have 2 rolling ponds similar to serpadesigns design at 27g. 
 

the rest of the tanks I am not sold on yet. Wanting to keep tanks under 15” front to back to go down side walls. Leaning towards UNS 60s, 60u, and 60e for main tanks and using 30c for a few smaller tanks for keeping some small CARES killifish and the likes. 
 

main goals: colony breed 3-4 strains of guppies, and ponds will house single strains of rice fish. Anyone want to take a stab at how they would lay it out?

[Guppysnail]

That is a fabulous room. It will look stunning when finished. The first thing I would look into before putting anything in the room is more electrical outlets if possible. I never ever have enough outlets and end up daisy chaining strips. It does not look good at all if your are concerned about optics. 

[JBeehler]

On 7/7/2023 at 1:34 PM, Guppysnail said:

That is a fabulous room. It will look stunning when finished. The first thing I would look into before putting anything in the room is more electrical outlets if possible. I never ever have enough outlets and end up daisy chaining strips. It does not look good at all if your are concerned about optics. 

That’s a valid point. My plan was to install outlets in stands and plug stands into outlets. Each section of wall has an outlet thinking I will have 4 more “stands” and each stand will have outlets for each aquarium. 
 

Almost all the smaller tanks will be ran off of sponge filters. I assume I do not have enough tanks in mind for a linear piston pump?

[JBeehler]

Just wanted to keep this updated. The tank plans have changed. I will be resealing some leaking spots in our new to us large tank for the fahaka. And we settled on UNS 60t/u for the other tanks. Adding what the stands will look like for the smaller tanks and picture of the replacement for the 125g

[Rube_Goldfish]

Wow, look at that tank! I'm jealous and you're just getting started! I don't have a fish room, not really, but if I was designing one, I think I'd want it to be plumbed with a sink to make water changes easier. Additionally or alternately, you could have a barrel of dechlorinated, aerated, appropriately-heated water ready to go, too, tucked into some corner.

What are the dimensions of that big tank? Where did you get it?

Edited August 7, 2023 by Rube_Goldfish
Added questions about that cool big tank

[JBeehler]

On 8/7/2023 at 6:36 PM, Rube_Goldfish said:

Wow, look at that tank! I'm jealous and you're just getting started! I don't have a fish room, not really, but if I was designing one, I think I'd want it to be plumbed with a sink to make water changes easier. Additionally or alternately, you could have a barrel of dechlorinated, aerated, appropriately-heated water ready to go, too, tucked into some corner.

What are the dimensions of that big tank? Where did you get it?

The big tank is a 270 gallon “touch” pond. It’s 6.5 feet long, and 44” wide at the “circle” and 21” tall. It was a display at a now closed local fish store and the new fish store finally let me get it from them. They have 1 more the same size and 2 170g ones that are just the “circle”.

[JBeehler]

Here is the stand completed and setup. Still have to contain the wires, plant them and get them stocked. This is the first of 4 of these stands for the room.

[Rube_Goldfish]

On 8/11/2023 at 10:42 AM, JBeehler said:

Here is the stand completed and setup. Still have to contain the wires, plant them and get them stocked. This is the first of 4 of these stands for the room.

That looks great, even at this early stage. I'm looking forward to more updates!

[JBeehler]

Well I am slowly trucking along on this with slow progress. The large tank is in cycling/leach ammonia/floating wood to try and sink it. I replaced room lighting over the tank with track lighting so we can have ferocity down pendants with grow lights. Replaced the light switch with a smart switch so I can have the lights in a timer. I still need to get the lights hung (waiting on pendant adapters for the track light) waiting delivery of the filtration and wave maker for flow.

have a couple uns posters to hang. (always looking for more fish related posters for the room)

also have a mini pond in this room and 2 40 gallon stock tanks with fish awaiting the setup of the big tank to be complete.

[JBeehler]

We have lights!!!! Ditched sun sun canisters for oase biomaster Thermo 600s. Will add a cross flow wave maker to get water movement to the end of the tank. Just need to add rocks to weigh down the wood(attached to light diffuser panel under all the sand currently) and sand to cap the dirt sand mixture. Fill it up and finish cycling!

[H20CultureLabs]

Exciting! Following along this great looking build!

[JBeehler]

We have fish in the 270! We did a 100% water change cleaned up the water, dropped in 3 sponge filters from cycled tanks, shut down one of the 40 gallon stock tanks housing fish for this one, and added them in here. Current stocking is 20 leopard danios and 20 kribensis chiclids. Also planted a few swords and added anubias. We have a couple more pots of swords and crypts to plant from the pond. Going to order in some more uncommon swords and bolbitis to add into this tank!

[anewbie]

On 8/7/2023 at 2:13 PM, JBeehler said:

Just wanted to keep this updated. The tank plans have changed. I will be resealing some leaking spots in our new to us large tank for the fahaka. And we settled on UNS 60t/u for the other tanks. Adding what the stands will look like for the smaller tanks and picture of the replacement for the 125g

 

 

I'm sorry i had trouble picking out the right bit of text; what is the above item - is it a produc tor something that was custom made and how large is it ?

It looks really neat esp with the potential for an island in the middle and it doesn't look too tall; perfect for a colony of borelli 😉

 

[JBeehler]

On 12/18/2023 at 9:48 AM, anewbie said:

 

 

I'm sorry i had trouble picking out the right bit of text; what is the above item - is it a produc tor something that was custom made and how large is it ?

It looks really neat esp with the potential for an island in the middle and it doesn't look too tall; perfect for a colony of borelli 😉

 

It is a Dutch aquarium systems tank from some time in the 90s if I had to guess. It is 270 gallons. 33” wide on the narrow run and 44” wide in the big “circle” 6.5 feet long and 19-20” deep. 
 

it was a display tank at a local store that closed down. 

[JBeehler]

The Squish, our fahaka puffer, has been added!! Immediately went to hunting and now we will get him grown out as fast as possible!

[JBeehler]

[JBeehler]

So the big tank is looking good but tannins are gonna be the death of me. Viewing 6 feet to the back of the tank any amount of tannins make it difficult. I am going to grab a carbon reactor for this tank. I have read enough to know I don’t want to run carbon 24/7 but is there a “safe” range to cycle it on and off without stripping everything out of the tank?

[Colu]

Great project a nice big school of Cory's would look great in that tank 

[JBeehler]

We have 20 or so emerald Cories in there.  There has been one mishap between squish and a cory. We will see if it is a continuous problem before we add more of those. The rest seems to get along great so far though. I am running a carbon reactor on the tank 24/7 for another week and then will switch to having it turn on with the nearby co2 regulator to try and balance the nutrients without stripping everything for the plants.

[JBeehler]

Been running the co2 reactor for a week and a half straight now. Running brs carbon Rox. Supposedly last longer. It’s slowly clearing up. Ordered the second biomaster Thermo 600 for the big tank. 

Also picked up a UNS 90P to upgrade our spotted Congo planted tank from the rimmed 40 breeder they are in. Need to build a mid century modern stand for it to match the direction the basement room is going. 
Squish, the star of the tank, has been killing off the Cory cats. Surprisingly the kribensis and him don’t mind each other. The long fin danios have been getting some tails nibbled here and there but all are active and healthy. 
 

Fahaka puffers can be mean!

[Schuyler]

Squish looks so proud of himself. At first I just say a picture of a happy round fish so I liked it but then I read that he's a murder machine and now I'm conflicted.

Do you plan to move the corys out? Are any even left?

[JBeehler]

On 1/10/2024 at 10:33 PM, Schuyler said:

Squish looks so proud of himself. At first I just say a picture of a happy round fish so I liked it but then I read that he's a murder machine and now I'm conflicted.

Do you plan to move the corys out? Are any even left?

There should be 17 or so left. They hide out under the wood and rock work.  Basically have one shot to chase after one and then have to try again tomorrow. They out run you around this tank.