Aquarium Book Favorites

[Jack Anderson]

Hi fellow plant nerds, looking for some aquarium book recommendations. My name is Jack, been keeping planted tanks for almost 6 years. I love researching fish and plants on the internet but I’d like to expand to books. I totally get that there is unlimited knowledge on the internet, but I’m a sucker for having a hard physical copy I can look at and feel and interact with. I’ve got Walstad’s book, I have Knott’s book, but I’m really looking for a book that has ton’s of in depth info on aquarium plants, but any book recommendations will do. 
P.S. enjoy this photo of one of my pygmy corys (just ignore the clearly deficient val leaves😂)

[ange]

My blanket recommendation is going to be George Farmer's Aquascaping: A Step-by-Step Guide to Planting, Styling, and Maintaining Beautiful Aquariums for the photos alone. It's also likely the most accessible out of my recommendations. The next book that's moderately accessible and I would recommend is The Ocean at Home: An Illustrated History of the Aquarium by Bernd Brunner. It took what I initially knew of the hobby's history in England to the hobby's history in the world.

If you are interested in the history of fish in general, I highly suggest The Rise of Fishes: 500 Million Years of Evolution by John Long and Discovering Fossil Fishes by John Maisey. I'm hugely sentimental to books on prehistoric life from the 90s and these are my two favorites on fish. A book on modern fish that I found very interesting was Fish Locomotion: An Eco-ethological Perspective by Paolo Domenici. They aren't the most accessible of books but they're amazing for learning about how far the nature in our homes has come as well as what's going on on the inside. There's another book (I believe in German??) that was a phenomenal reference for fish disease but the name isn't coming to me at the moment and I unfortunately do not own it.

Of the books that are more difficult to get, you may be able to find some on thrift book sites or from libraries. I know the university that is near me has Domenici's book as that is how I had access to it.

[Colu]

I can recommend this book lots of stunning pictures of fish from Cameroon ATS aquashop does some really good books on South America catfish there bringing out new books on snake heads bristlenose catfish  soon

Edited December 22, 2023 by Colu

[mitchstevens]

On 11/8/2023 at 6:54 PM, Jack Anderson said:

Hi fellow plant nerds, looking for some aquarium book recommendations. My name is Jack, been keeping planted tanks for almost 6 years. I love researching fish and plants on the internet but I’d like to expand to books. I totally get that there is unlimited knowledge on the internet, but I’m a sucker for having a hard physical copy I can look at and feel and interact with. I’ve got Walstad’s book, I have Knott’s book, but I’m really looking for a book that has ton’s of in depth info on aquarium plants, but any book recommendations will do. 
P.S. enjoy this photo of one of my pygmy corys (just ignore the clearly deficient val leaves😂)

I'm looking too

Edited March 13 by mitchstevens

[hellygross]

On 11/8/2023 at 6:54 PM, Jack Anderson said:

Hi fellow plant nerds, looking for some aquarium book recommendations. My name is Jack, been keeping planted tanks for almost 6 years. I love researching fish and plants on the internet but I’d like to expand to books. I totally get that there is unlimited knowledge on the internet, but I’m a sucker for having a hard physical copy I can look at and feel and interact with. I’ve got Walstad’s book, I have Knott’s book, but I’m really looking for a book that has ton’s of in depth info on aquarium plants, but any book recommendations will do. 
P.S. enjoy this photo of one of my pygmy corys (just ignore the clearly deficient val leaves😂)


There are many books on the Internet. But a great option is "Ecology of the Planted Aquarium" by Diane Walstad. I was once writing an essay outline, I found https://papersowl.com/blog/essay-outline for this. I listed all the books there, I don’t even remember them all anymore. This book summarizes the ecological aspects of aquarium plants and their interactions with fish. Many of my classmates liked it after reading it.

I recommend the book "The Complete Aquarium Plant Handbook" by David Wilder.

Edited March 28 by hellygross

[johnnyxxl]

I think this is a new edition of one I have Dr. Axelrod's Mini-Atlas of Freshwater Aquarium Fishes https://a.co/d/5ZYBPAq if so it's a great resource 

[Rube_Goldfish]

I liked the "Mini Encyclopedia of Aquarium Plants" by Peter Hiscock when I was first getting started, though it's been a while since I've read it.