I can't stop watching my fish...

I don't know what it is but I can't stop watching my fish..

Click the pic for the full rez version

Just recently while re-renovating my office I decided to add in an aquarium to sort of give the work area a bit of life to it. Up until now I've just been surrounded by books and book cases above me with books leering down at me saying "hurry up and read me!!" or something like that.

So, along with removing every bookcase in the room and tearing off the bookcase above me on the wall, in goes an aquarium. For any of you that have an aquarium I'm sure you already understand this but it's not easy to have a large aquarium just hanging around. First up is a strong desk to put it on. I managed to get the legs part for free from a friend, which are metal and very strong, there was no top. I ended up cutting up some 3/4 inch plywood into 2 equal size pieces to fit into the corner of my office and match up with not only the depth of the desk, but also the height.

To add onto that, an aquarium is a bit tough to manage but that in itself intrigues me because I like nature and ecology. I got a 29 gallon tank, two types of gravel for it (small and large gravel for the plants), 3 ornaments that you can see in the pic (a log, boat and ruins that has an air stone). Then over the last few days I've been stocking it with a few small fish (3 neon tetras and 3 blackskirt tetras) and live plants. I chose live plants because not only do they look better, but they are much better for the system. Being that it is a closed system, other than when water changes are made, it's tough to maintain safe levels of certain chemicals etc. The live plants will help along with that and to me just seem more natural.

All in all though, I just can't stop watching them play and swim around. I was talking to the guy at Petsmart, where I go to get most of my stuff, and he was mentioning too how theraputic it is to just relax and watch the tank. It's very relaxing and definitely the best addition have made to the office so far (even beats my new 23 inch apple monitor..). So maybe thats it.. I just need to relax a lot :)

If you have the space and a bit of time for the maintenance, I definitely recommend getting an aquarium. If it's your first time though, don't start small because they are actually harder to maintain.

Posted by Graeme at October 30, 2006 05:35 AM