Ha, look at this.
- Thread starter fishhead0103666
- Start date
Ok so I did a little light research and that was about 3-4 years ago and Susan Shelly did a kickstarter and made well over 100k but never delivered and just stole their money then went quiet.... Look at the comments https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/avo/avo-the-self-cleaning-tropical-fish-tank/comments
Meh, it is possible but it’s hard to achieve, requires lots of research, and is expensive. What I’m talking about is the concept of having a tank that has a lot of plants and just enough fish that they take care of the plants and the plants maintain the water parameters. If you want an added level of difficulty then you could have it so that the plants feed the fish also but I doubt there are many people on this site that could achieve that level. Oddball maybe? Chixclub with his degree in biology could I’d reckon has the best chance. Actually, hey
C
Chicxulub
what do you think about the concept and your ability to carry out something like that?
Unconventional approaches like this can work, and there's a gigantic sticky thread with a wonderful write-up by
JK47
on plant filtration, I think in GAD but I'm not sure off the top of my head.The problem you'll run into is entropy however. In a closed system, as is proposed here, there will always be a tendency for the system to fail. We could get utterly pedantic splitting hairs over why and how, but what's the point? lol
At the end of the day, a human will need to manage these microcosms of artificial habitat. Some systems may require far less work, like a 500 gallon tank with plant filtration and a buttload of zebra danios, but it will require human management.
The fully self contained world in a jar concept doesn't really work. Even that famous example where some English bloke (I think) put some seeds on some wet dirt in a jar to create a closed ecosystem still has to add water every couple of decades.
This all sounds great in theory and I’m sure it can be pulled off in a lab or by some hardcore enthusiast with tons of knowledge on the matter. But, for this lady to offer up a 3.5 gallon on Kickstarter and marketing a commercially ready unit as a self cleaning tank...I don’t think so. The minute a kid puts a goldfish in there or a pair of guppies breed, game over. Even a Betta won’t work...overfeed a bit too much and it’s out of balance.
It’s funny you mentioned that thread chix, I’m slowly going Page by page through it myself 
. That world in a jar sounds interesting, I’ll have to do some research on it.
True phree, I think she did it simply to steal the backers money and then not do anything.
. That world in a jar sounds interesting, I’ll have to do some research on it.True phree, I think she did it simply to steal the backers money and then not do anything.
It’s funny you mentioned that thread chix, I’m slowly going Page by page through it myself
True phree, I think she did it simply to steal the backers money and then not do anything.
Yeah I read about that jar a while back...fascinating stuff. As to the lady, I have no idea if she just stole the money, got sick, got overwhelmed, or whatever. For all I know, she had good intentions but just couldn’t get it worked out. Who knows? I just wish the best to all involved and it’ll be fascinating if she pulls off this unit.
My concern was with the feasibility of her idea. I just don’t think it’s possible to do what she set out to on a commercial level. Reminds me of the poor Opae Ula Shrimp that got stuck in those snow globes with a bubble of air and a piece of algae and sold as self sustaining, never need to feed, never need to be cleaned kits. Those shrimp are tough and can survive almost anything but from what I understand, they just slowly starved to death in there...although it sometimes took years to do so.
It took years for them to starve to death? Interesting..... I’m sure that those shrimp could provide some very interesting research results that might be able to be provide some aid to humans.
They don’t call them “supershrimp” for nothing lol. Well maybe “years” is an overstatement but those are some figures I’ve seen stated on the web. Somehow, they survive those little pods from months to years on little to no food. Amazing creatures.
https://www.petshrimp.com/supershrimp-species-information/
http://www.***ubonsai.com/M-L2e.html