Up to the Gills in Aquarium Possibilities
When Gordon and Betty Wrubel built a custom saltwater aquarium-cabinet into the staircase of their Newport Beach home, they had no idea how quickly a couple of tropical fish named Taffy and Batman would swim into their hearts.
Betty even cried a few months later when Taffy died. The small creature couldn’t compete for food in the ecological shakedown of the Wrubels’ new miniature ocean. Betty knows that Batman will eventually join Taffy in fish heaven, but for now he’s a pleasure to watch as he relentlessly patrols his 90-gallon home.
Jack and Beth Maurer, the Wrubels’ neighbors across the street, decided that--all things considered--the Wrubels were having way too much fun with the attractive new addition to their home. So Jack, a highly competitive developer by trade, decided to engage in a little neighborly one-upmanship.
He knocked down the wall between his family room and dining room, moved a couple of weight-bearing studs, and rebuilt the wall around a custom-made, 250-gallon, 8-foot-long aquarium. The tank is now the centerpiece of the Maurers’ home. It is also a primary stress-management system for Jack Maurer, who takes great pleasure in servicing the tank and watching his slippery pals glide through life.
Welcome to “Fish Tanks 101”: the interface of home design, pet care, relaxation therapy, ecological awareness and live art. For those who want all of the above, and more, in one handy package, the options are endless.
Fish-minded home decorators are using a variety of cabinets and stands to house fish tanks of all shapes and sizes. The resulting aquariums bring beauty and life to living rooms, entertainment rooms, dens, bedrooms, home offices, bars, corners and otherwise useless spaces in nooks and crannies. There is even a company in Costa Mesa, Aqua Art, that produces a 5-inch-thick, 10-gallon tank that can be framed and hung on the wall like a picture.
The first step in aquarium home design is to decide on a tank location and configuration. “Space is usually the biggest dictating factor,” says Steve Kendrick, manager of Tis Tropical Fish in Fountain Valley. “Once you select the size and shape you want, you can control costs by using stands or standard cabinetry instead of custom cabinetry or build-ins.” You can also save money by selecting from the wide variety of standard tank shapes rather than pay for custom dimensions.
Complete 50-gallon aquariums in simple pine cabinets cost $500 to $700. Installations such as the Wrubels’ or the Maurers’ cost $2,000 to $10,000. Beyond that, the sky’s the limit, according to Kendrick. Tis Tropical delivered a $25,000 tank on a concrete pad to a customer who still plans to spend another $5,000 on filtration and tank decorations, and another several thousand on fish.
Kendrick recommends a minimum size of 50 gallons in a 3- to 4-foot-long rectangular tank. Anything smaller doesn’t look right encased in a cabinet and it doesn’t provide enough room to add fish or more tank decorations later.
Rich Becktell, owner of Aquarium International in Westminster, says rectangular tanks are best. “Odd shapes are harder to filter and clean,” notes Becktell, “so maintenance usually suffers, the tank goes bad and people get discouraged.”
Ah, yes. Maintenance.
Reef Systems, the Chino-based aquarium service that installed both the Wrubels’ and the Maurers’ tanks, also provides maintenance services for $70 to $100 a month. “People have to realize that they’re dealing with animals from the wild,” says Barboza, “and that they’re responsible for taking care of them.”
Aquarium services take care of everything except daily feeding. Reef Systems employees stop by the Wrubels’ home once a week to test the water for waste products and saline content, and wipe the algae off the inside of the tank. They also change 30% to 40% of the tank’s water on a monthly basis, clean the decorations inside and leave notes to let the Wrubels know how individual fish are doing.
Barboza says do-it-yourselfers can expect to spend two to five hours a month on tank maintenance once they learn how to prepare large batches of replacement water at the right salinity and temperature. “We’re happy to tell people how to service their tanks and care for their fish,” says Barboza, “but lots of people would rather pay us to do it.”
Kendrick of Tis Tropical adds that, contrary to popular belief, maintenance is not that much more time-consuming or expensive for saltwater tanks than freshwater tanks. But, saltwater tanks must be serviced religiously because the ecological balance is more critical and more difficult to maintain, and the penalties for system failure are more severe. Kendrick says livestock replacement in 50- to 80-gallon saltwater tanks--especially reef tanks, which include invertebrate life and living coral and fish--can easily cost $800 to $1,500 contrasted with about $150 for freshwater tanks with cured--non-living--decorations.
While many people are attracted to the more colorful fish and the wider variety of life that can be supported in saltwater aquariums, there are drawbacks other than the expense of livestock and the need for tenacious maintenance. Fish in saltwater aquariums, under the best of circumstances, don’t live as long as their freshwater counterparts. Barboza says that in stabilized, properly maintained tanks, the larger saltwater fish live about one to five years, contrasted with three to 10 years for similar-sized freshwater fish.
There is also an ecological issue. Saltwater fish don’t breed in captivity and must be taken from the wild. Many of the fish are caught by impoverished tropical fishermen who squirt potassium cyanide into the coral reef to stun the fish and make them easier to catch. It costs 15% to 20% more to purchase net-caught fish, which tend to be healthier than cyanide-caught ones.
No matter how attractive your aquarium is as furniture, it will not be decorative unless the fish are thriving. Kendrick, Barboza and Becktell agree that poor maintenance, overfeeding and overcrowding are the most common problems in home aquariums.
The number of fish in your tank is determined by the size of the fish and the volume of the tank. Kendrick suggests 1 linear inch of fish per gallon of freshwater, and 1 inch per 2 gallons of saltwater.
For details on how to select the right mix of fish, and the hows and wherefores of introducing new fish into the tank, one strategy is to consult reference books such as Dr. Burgess’s Atlas of Marine Aquarium Fishes.
But good advice also comes from Myron Davey, a Tustin engineer who has been an avid home aquarium buff since 1969. “Go to a bunch of aquarium shops,” says Davey, “until you find someone who knows what he’s talking about, someone who you can count on to be around to help you out when problems come up.”
And speaking of problems, Jack Maurer has one. The Wrubels are planning to build a new house on a lot near the water. According to Betty Wrubel, their plans call for “a huge, built-in, see-through aquarium, maybe as a focal point to the master bedroom.”
Gordon and Betty Wrubel, naturally, hope their new tank will drive Jack and Beth Maurer crazy.
