this should be interesting...

for years i have always wondered how small an aquarium can get. i have spent a LOT of time experimenting with tiny tanks, with tiny animals and plants, since i was old enough to fill a jar with water. my smallest sustained aquarium was just four ounces and housed a very small species of seed shrimp and a very small amount of java moss with a little sand at the bottom. i kept it up for about three years before finaly tearing it down. i would never advocate trying to keep a fish in such a small setup, but im always on the lookout for a tiny animal that can thrive in an extremely small amount of water. seamonkeys would be a prime example.

so, what is the smallest tank you have ever set up? my smallest tank with fish today is a five gallon with a sponge filter and a breeding colony of heterandria formosa, with a thick carpet of subwassertang growing at the bottom. a single male could be kept in a true nano tank, as they only reach about half an inch long. in the past i have kept a male and a female of the same species in half a gallon critter keeper with a homemade sponge filter(again with subwassertang), but i ended up moving the fish to the five gallon after a year because i got tired of moving babies out of the tank they were in. i know that the subject of nano tanks is a bit taboo in the aquarium hobby, due in large part to misleading products that are on the market that lead to the death of many fish, but the lessons i have learned by trying to go smaller have made a world of difference with my larger tanks. i attribute most of my success today to lessons learned from working with impossibly small aquariums with impossibly small animals.

so who else has gone tiny? how did it turn out? i would love to hear your stories and thoughts.

-Auban

I kept a betta in a 1-2 guart betta bowl for 3 years.

and a neon tetra for over 2 years in a 1gallon jar I called the neon nano to test things like the substrate.

I also did a series of 1 pint jars to test substrates, planted setups. Part of the test was to use baby feeder guppies (~1/4") some of which lived for over a year showing basically no growth.

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fw leiden since 1979, fo salt since 1979, mixed reef 55g 2002-2009. Strong emphasis on the tank taking care of itself. Balanced with plant life, no water changes, tap water, no filters in FW. Only dosing calcium, alk, mag in marine reef tanks. http://www.aquariumforum.com/f15/my-...ods-26410.html
recent tanks (till 2009) 7 years- 10g FW leiden 7 yrs, 55g mixed reef 7, 2 yrs, 20g FW leiden, 10 g fw leiden , 29g mixed reef, current tank 55g leiden

my smallest is a 5 gallon with a sponge filter with currently no fish in it but its set up

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Current Tanks:
90G,30G,10G,10G,5G,38G,20G

just out of curiosity, did your feeder guppies color up at all? i am starting to suspect that my dwarf livebearers are getting smaller and smaller with every generation, but they are still showing decent color (even though i have to use a magnefying glass to see them properly.)

My smallest is the 1 1/2 gallon tank I have going right now. It's got a betta and a guppy, but lots of live plants and two filters. I spend a lot of my day near it, so it's easy to do whatever work it needs. I honestly think what I have now is more stable than my 25 gallon I had several years ago was, but then again I know more now than I did then.

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Lead me not to temptation...I can make it there myself just fine, thank you

[quote=Kehy;100174... I honestly think what I have now is more stable than my 25 gallon I had several years ago was...[/QUOTE]

i bet the live plants and duel filters has a lot to do with that.

lol, This has actually been my first time experimenting with live plants, and I didn't realize how great they'd be. I've always had dual filters though, and that never hurts anything either.

But mostly I've been trying to not overstock, or at least keep a balance in my tank. I never test the water, but instead I go by the plants and fish, and monitor their health and growth to see if I need to make any changes.

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Lead me not to temptation...I can make it there myself just fine, thank you

they were 1/2 blacks and showed some color

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fw leiden since 1979, fo salt since 1979, mixed reef 55g 2002-2009. Strong emphasis on the tank taking care of itself. Balanced with plant life, no water changes, tap water, no filters in FW. Only dosing calcium, alk, mag in marine reef tanks. http://www.aquariumforum.com/f15/my-...ods-26410.html
recent tanks (till 2009) 7 years- 10g FW leiden 7 yrs, 55g mixed reef 7, 2 yrs, 20g FW leiden, 10 g fw leiden , 29g mixed reef, current tank 55g leiden

I love small tanks, I think they are cool, especially if they have the look of a bigger tank.

something else i have dabbled in is so called closed systems, or more accurately called hermatically sealed systems. an example of these would be the ecospheres that contain a few tiny shrimp and some twigs with algae on them. they are advertised as a perfectly balanced enclosed ecosystem, a perfect tiny representation of earths ecosphere, with the shrimp being able to thrive on the oxygen and food supplied by the algae alone. i find this to be anything but true. while i do find it impressive that someone was able to find an animal that has such low oxygen and food demands as to be able to survive for extended periods of time in a sealed container, i can hardly describe them as thriving. i also find a flaw in the idea that it represents the planet earth. in most of these closed systems, they advocate a photoperiod that allows some algae to grow but not too much. the problem i see is that it is a closed system. without photosynthesis taking place at all times, the oxygen, CO2 levels, and ph are subject to constant wild swings that follow the photoperiod. think about it, when is the sun ever turned off? the trees in your backyard may be using oxygen right now, but on the other side of the planet where the sun is shining, they are producing it. i believe that any hermaticaly closed system should match this in order to mainain an actual balance. im sure any reef keeper knows about revers photosynthesis tanks. this is a perfect example of what im talking about. over the next few years i plan on making a working model, a tank you dont feed, that is populated by its own colonies of food organisms, and at least one type of higher animal. i have spent the past years researching microbiology, ecology, organic chemistry...etc. all in hopes of one day being able to create a system that actualy metabolizes its resources in a working balance. i plan on spending the next year working out the design of the system on paper before i actualy build it. when i do, ill certainly be reporting its progress here.

Well, If you count things without fish,I have various containers,Like the betta cups but smaller)with plants,lol.Seems duckweed is EVERYWHERE!IDK why,I just place small things of water around,and rinse my fingertips in there,when messing with the tanks.I have to rinse my fingers,because the duckweed wont leave me alone.

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http://bountifulbettas.blogspot.com/

"Come to the dark side....we have cookies...and filters/heaters/and water changes!"

when viewed through a microscope, i find those tiny containers with no fish to be some of the most interesting.

I wouldn't quite call them tanks but I have several 1liter (about 1/4 gallon) jars on the windowsill. I put an inch of garden soil in the bottom to plant plants. Lots of plants do really well. Vals for example thrive and grow faster than in my tanks. It started as temporary holding for plants but some of them look so nice I've kept them that way. I added snails on purpose which keep the jars sparkling clean from algae. I throw in a flake of food for them once in a while and take out some when there seem to be too many. They are just bladder snails and rams horns but seem to thrive. Its also teeming with tiny life you can hardly see. If your not into little life you could set up a more sterile one with just plants but for me it's part of the fun and I think it helps to keep the balance too. I have thought about trying shrimp but wouldn't consider fish in such a small container. I have tested the water a couple of times and readings were perfect.

thats really good idea snail... i have used jars of water to root clipings of coleus and things like that, but i never thought about using them to grow aquarium plants... ill have to try it.

I know this is a different website, but there are some really cool tiny aquarium pictures, def worth the look

Fish Tank of March '06 at The Age of Aquariums - Tropical Fish

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50 Bowfront, 2 Acei, 2 Yellow Labs, 1 Orange, 1 Albino, 2 Blue African Cichlids
30 Gal, 3 Fantail Goldfish, 1 Black Ryukin, 1 Common Pleco
20 Gal, Mollies, Platies, Cories, Algae Eaters
15 Gal, Swordtails, Balloon Mollies, Rasboras
10 Gal, 2 Knight Gobies
10 Gal, 2 Bolivian Rams
1.5 Gal, Male Betta

now thats what im talking about! i absolutely love the one made with the bird food bowl. the lightbulb is a neat too. the only question is, how long can one of those tiny tanks be maintained? hmm....

[quote=snail;100303]I wouldn't quite call them tanks but I have several 1liter (about 1/4 gallon) jars on the windowsill. I put an inch of garden soil in the bottom to plant plants. /QUOTE]

Hmm, now I'm curious. I have a little Snapple bottle that I've been growing algae in (so I can watching pearling) but now I feel inspired to do something more with it. I have really great, sandy soil in my garden, so I'll be experimenting with that. Anything I need to think about if I use soil straight from the garden?

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Lead me not to temptation...I can make it there myself just fine, thank you

only thing i would worry about is hydrogen sulfide. if the garden soil gets too thick and too much organic material goes anoxic, could make a bad brew.

I have used both straight garden soil and mineralized top soil (which is the same soil but goes through a process of soaking and wetting and drying). I've also experimented with combinations of soil, sand and potting soil so far to be honest It doesn't seem to make much difference what the mix is, the plants do great. Usually it's recommended to add a little clay as a source of iron, the soil I have is heavy with clay already so I don't need to. The mineralizing process is supposed to lock in nutrients so may be better long term but I'm not sure it would be worth the bother just for a plant jar. For a tank with fish I recommend the mineralized top soil as it is less likely to form pockets of gas as organics break down, which could be toxic to fish. You can also poke the substrate with a stick to release them. Once the roots get going you shouldn't have any problem though.

Most of the plants I've tried have done well but it I don't think it work for plants that require high CO2 levels. If you like to watch algae beading try marimo balls (no soil required), they are just algae that grows in a ball form and bead like crazy when they get direct sunlight. I like watching them float to the top every day. They are decorative looking so you won't get so many funny looks for staring at a jar of green slime from those who don't understand it's beauty.

I had 1000 liters smallest plastic water tank.