Starting An Aquarium – Tips For Beginners

Keeping tropical fish and aquariums has become a growing and
fascinating hobby in every country of the world. More and more
people in today’s world of fashion are looking for ways to
better create beauty with different hobbies. Aquariums are
therefore becoming a growing habit and some beginners make the
mistake of jumping into this ‘habit’ without any knowledge of
the fundamentals of fish keeping.

Like any new venture, if you want your fish keeping efforts to
thrive and bring you fulfilment, it is very important that you
take the time to learn the basics of aquarium maintenance and
fish keeping before jumping into that venture. You will find
some of the basic information about aquarium maintenance and
other tips in this article.

To start with, most beginners believe that it is better and
easier to start with a small aquarium than a larger size
aquarium. Interestingly, the opposite is the case here. In most
cases, those medium sized or large size aquariums are better and
easier to maintain for several reasons.

Your small aquarium contains a limited amount of water, unlike
the fish’s natural habitat. It should be realized that the
closer your aquarium is to the natural habitat of the fish you
want to keep, the better their chances of survival and thus your
success. For instance, any form of pollution, say the death of a
fish, is likely to cause more damage faster in a small aquarium,
than in a large aquarium with a greater volume of water. The
volume of water which a medium sized or large aquarium can
contain is a major advantage and it will work for your good,
minimizing the effects of some sorts of mistakes you are bound
to make, as a beginner and creating a better environment for
your fish.

Another mistake beginners to aquariums and fish keeping make is
the speed with which they fill their aquariums with water and
introduce the fish into the water, after all, they’ve been told
the water and aquarium can contain that amount of fish. But you
should realize herethat what you are creating in your aquarium
is a similitude of the aquatic ecosystem i.e the natural habitat
of the fish you are going to keep. It is a nice idea to ask
yourself, therefore, if the fish you are introducing into your
aquarium live alone in their natural habitat? The obvious answer
is NO! These fish live amidst many bacteria, fungi and other
micro-organisms, not to mention the plant life and other water
creatures.

Therefore, it is advisable to allow your water to grow some of
these beneficial co-habitants of water life before you start
introducing your fish into the water. There are several bacteria
that are beneficial to fish and other aquatic life. Your fish
produce a lot of fish waste especially fish poop. This waste
pollutes the water and makes it unhealthy for your fish. The
chief constituent of fish waste is ammonia, which is also
excreted through fish gills. But if you allow the normal
ecosystem to build up in your aquarium, you will have fewer
problems with this waste. Bacteria exists in water that can
convert the ammonia from fish waste into a less harmful compound
called nitrite. Nitrite isn’t completely harmless, but there is
another group of bacteria that can convert nitrite too, to
nitrate, which is far less harmful compared with ammonia and
nitrite.

As a beginner, you must also learn to change the water in your
aquarium regularly. On average, changing 25% of the water weekly
is regarded as normal. But if you are just starting your
aquarium or the quality of water is not satisfactory, a more
frequent but smaller water changing procedure could be followed.