Paludariums? Anyone built or have one?

They simulate a bog or marginal area of a stream or pond. I've seen them in zoos before, but never really considered building one till now.

The wife and I went to the Charleston Aquarium for a birthday party for one of the grands. They have a couple of them set up for snakes and lizards. I have had saltwater and freshwater tanks before and I find these intriguing. I dragged my 45 gallon tank out of storage thinking about building one. Since y'all seem to know everything I figured one of you may have built one.

if I lived in wa or co I would be way ahead of you on the hydroponics

I did some hydroponics vegetables a bunch of years ago. Fun to tinker with, but easier to just put them in dirt.

'Hydroponic veggies'. Riiight.

Yes, I have built one out of a 55gal tank. Takes a little planning and some patience during the building process to give silicone time to fully cure, but it can be absolutely beautiful and not really any more work to maintain than a regular fish tank if designed well.

I bought food grade (has to be food grade in order to not poison the fish) black silicone and covered the areas that were going to have stuff attached, like the back wall and part of the sides, like in your example above. If you cover too much area you can always scrape it back with a sharp razor blade type window decal remover, just be careful of the corners so you don't disturb the original seal.

Then I attached lava rock and slate to make a background for the underwater part, and little pieces of slate to make a shelf for the cork bark to sit on above the water line. That way the cork could be replaced if it got too funky as it was not permanently attached, just resting on the little shelf. I positioned one of my filters to flow over the cork bark to make a small low flow water fall, but of course this does not circulate the water anywhere enough for proper tank filtration, so a second pump was there to keep the water from stagnating in sections of the tank.

I used real plants and therefore had to use UV spectrum bulbs, and they will have to be changed out regularly or they will lose their effectiveness and the plants will die off, adding to the nitrogen levels in the tank.

I even made a little island out of cork and secured a small pine tree sapling (about 1.5" tall) to it with the roots hanging down in the water underneath, and it would float all over the tank and the fish loved to come up and peck at it and shove it around. I also used pvc gutter corners from the hardware store covered in silicone and aquarium gravel to make tunnels that my pictus cats LOVED to guard and hang out in.

All in all it was incredibly awesome and I wish I had some pictures handy to post of it, but I got out of fish about 4-5 years ago.

I like this idea even better than a regular aquarium!

Thanks ECM. I might even start a build thread on it. My sons are pretty excited to get started on it, so it should be a project for us to do together.

Never done a paludarium but I used to have three planted fish tanks. Lots of work but also very rewarding once setup right. I was at the point of injecting Co2 into the water to support the plant load and making my own enriched substrate.

And if you're careful you can even keep shrimp!

That's beautiful Dave.

I did find the article I wrote about the island part but it doesn't show the whole tank unfortunately.

You should totally do it Toyman, you and your son will get a lot of enjoyment out of it I found that laying the tank on it's back side while I was setting the background in place made it a lot easier and it stayed put until the silicone had cured. If you want to see the fish get worked up into a piranha like feeding frenzy, set a container of water outside and allow mosquitos to breed in it. THen, use an eyedropper to harvest the little squiggly guys before they get to the point where they can fly and collect them in a cup. Take that to your fish tank and use the eyedropper again to drop them into the tank. Once the fish know what's going on they will really freak out over those. My fish would almost fight over them, they must be as good as bacon. You don't have to worry about your fish missing some and them hatching in your house, it will never make it that far, even if it gets down to the gravel without being eaten right away, because they have to come to the surface for air and the fish will be all over it then.

Enjoy!

Very cool. Thanks guys and gals.

It's definitely worth the time and effort. It also is a great teaching tool. I wouldn't hesitate to do another tank if I wasn't trying to build a new race car.

I don't want one of these, but I am absolutely fascinated by reading about this! I never heard of them before.

And...ECM never ceases to amaze me.

DaveEstey wrote: And if you're careful you can even keep shrimp!

I somehow managed to get ghost shrimp to breed in my community 55gal tank.
I don't know how the little ones survive with the pleco and angel fish.

I'm convinced angel fish are all retards. I think baby shrimp are small enough to not be worthy of noticing.

I had a pair of angel fish that would polish off Neons at an alarming rate. Luckily they were 99 cents each, so I didn't mind so much dropping 10 in the tank and watching the "hunt".

DaveEstey wrote: I'm convinced angel fish are all retards. I think baby shrimp are small enough to not be worthy of noticing. I had a pair of angel fish that would polish off Neons at an alarming rate. Luckily they were 99 cents each, so I didn't mind so much dropping 10 in the tank and watching the "hunt".

Its more interesting to watch the pirhana hunt.....I had 3 for a long time in a murky planted tank.......they'd herd the feeder fish to thier deaths.

Oh please include a Hellbender. They are so cute!

I was just thinking about getting back into fish, and this thread popped up.

Now I'm debating going in another direction.

The project is started. My 13yo lost interest in about 20 minutes, but the 9yo is having a blast.

The curved plastic is to separate the water from the land. It will be siliconed in place. The white plastic grid is to keep the dirt off the bottom of the tank so it doesn't get water logged. The 3/4 pvc standing in the back is so I can draw the excess water off the land side.

The log on the right is out of the woods behind my house. The part that will be in the water will be epoxy coated to keep it from staining the water and screwing with the pH. I'm not sure if it will be staying. My plan at the moment is to hide the pump, wiring and filters behind it. That is subject to change. I'm kind of making this up as I go.

We still have a long way to go, but it should be fun.

I would see if the local fish store has a piece of driftwood you can use, it will last much longer and won't leach tannins or other chemicals into the water. It looks good, I can't wait to see how it progresses!

In reply to EastCoastMojo:

I checked into that the other day, they wanted $40 for a small stick.

A little reading on the internets found that as long as you coat whatever is going to be in the water with epoxy it's safe to use. Still, it's a little big and most dead trees don't stand upright. I might have to put the boat over and go look for something a little more suitable. At $40 a piece I might have to see if the shop want's to buy some.

Yeah, driftwood isn't cheap. I looked through all my crap this afternoon to see if I had any to offer but I must have gotten rid of it already. I had probably 8-10 big pieces from various builds.

Watching this with interest.....I've been toying with putting a terrarium/aquarium on the desk @ work.

Forty bucks for a piece of driftwood??? Guess I need to head down to the river where I grew up and grab a few tons.

I'll list it in the classifieds and give you folks a Helluva deal on it!!!