Cold Saltwater Aquarium DIY project

This is a short video of my DIY approx. 2300 liter cold saltwater aquarium.

The tank is fed continuously with water from the fjord and has been up and running since early September.

The glass was not as clean as one might wish when I shot this, but at least you get an impression of how it looks. I'm not too good a filmmaker, so the camera work is shoddy at best.

Sorry about that.

Made this primarily for the people who have followed my DIY project since March this year, but I figured others might also enjoy it.

Marine fauna is Norwegian. Water temperature ranges between 4 degrees in winter and 16-19 degrees in summer.


Video was shot in November 09.

Enjoy.

(Music is "An Ending (Ascent) " by Brian Eno)

Category:

Pets & Animals

Tags:

• Cold Saltwater Aquarium
• DIY
• FishTank

[84305430]

how did you get that rock in the back of your tank, I'm assuming its real.

[bjornlunde73]

@84305430 Hi, sorry for the late reply. The rock, is not real, but made out of leca blocks which I have worked to look like rock. If you look at my homepage. there are some photos of the (rather labor intensive but very low cost) process of making it. It's in Norwegian, but google translate is your friend, if you ignore the more obvious translation errors..

Regards,

Bjorn

[DiZzYNatiOn]

not cold water, you would have shown how the water was chilled if you did it yourself

[bjornlunde73]

@DiZzYNatiOn

Yes, well, I don't really nead a chiller as I am pumping water directly from the fjord. I don't quite understand your comment, but I can assure you that the water, at least in the winter, is pretty cold without any chiller. Last winter I measured 3 degrees centigrade (37.4 degrees Fahrenheit). Anyway, chiller or heater for that matter, is not really feasible, because the water is changed with a rate of about 2000 liters per hour.

Bjorn

[bjornlunde73]

Thank you :)

Cold saltwater aquariums are, sadly, a bit underrated, since most saltwater aquariums are tropical reef tanks. But cold / temperate tanks have their own kind of beauty and if you are collecting local fauna that just makes it more interesting.

B.

[wndebu]

Harmony



[TheHobdenMarina]

wow this is really cool! about as natural as it gets! good job

[bjornlunde73]

@mozfan2436 I guess coldwater aquariums are on the rise, so perhaps in the future there will be a broader range of commercial distributors available. It is more convenient to go with a classic tropical setup if one does not want to rely on catching livestock. One other aspect is that the whole terrifying body of aquarium know-how available today is almost exclusively about tropical/reef type setups, so anyone wanting to do something else pretty much have to find things out for themselves.

B.

[unbosch]

I love cold saltwater aquarium's! I have only a very little one with shells but I love this

cautious beauty!

Very nice tank!

[bjornlunde73]

Thanks :)

Yes, it's only Norwegian species. Since I pump water directly from the fjord, it needs to be species that can tolerate temperatures down to 3-4 degrees and which won't spread to the local water system.

I basically run water through the tank, so I don't want to introduce anything that isn't there already.

There are some lobster-like critters in there in fact (Trollhummer) but since they usually only come out after dark they are a bit difficult to capture on film ;)