Possibility for a 5ish gallon "pond"

[Castro235]

Hey everyone, really bizarre plan in my head, and I have no idea if there is an obscure thread somewhere that might have all the answers I need, so I figured I would ask here.

I would really love to have something like neon tetras, or guppies, or something along those lines in this project, but I know it is a very strange situation, and my only possibility may end up being a betta, or possibly shrimp or something like that.

The actual scenario would be making somewhat of a very small scale pond, so although it would be a small water volume, it would be shallow with alot of surface area, and a large swimming space horizontally.

I plan to set up a really ambitious and probably impossible project in a 20 gallon tank(possibly a large tank if I find one before I start, but the 20 gallon I have seems like a good starting point) and part of the project will be basicaly making a miniature pond in the tank.

It will probably be at least half, and probably no more than 4/5ths of the surface area of the tank, and the pond will be somewhere from 4-7 inches deep, but spanning a large portion of the tanks bottom.

I'm not sure exactly what the gallon volume of the space would be yet, but it when I have that part figured out, probably in the next week or so I can give more specifics, but I figure this would be a good starting point.

The pond would have a decent current, I would have a pump in the back corner, and have the pump return to the other side of the tank into a small mock river, to give it a nice flow, water movement, and I would be including the filtering elements in the river section, basically making the river into a filter for the pond it empties into.

Like I said, I would absolutely love to have either neon tetras, or rosy red minnows, or fancy guppies, or possibly shrimp, or some combination.

I know the water volume would be lower than would be normally required, but I don't know if the over-filtration, and the extra large horizontal swimming area would make it a possibility.

I also don't have any experience with guppies minnows or tetras, so I don't know if one of them would be better for the medium to high current I would be creating.


I would love any help on this, as in my head it seems like it would all work well, but I'm also inexperienced, so I don't know if there are things I'm missing. I figure if there are not suitable fish in my desires for this, I will either do a single betta, or see how some of my ghost shrimp do in it, but as I said(probably too many times by now lol) I would love to have something colorful and in a decent number as neon tetras or fancy guppies to really make this come alive.

 

[Castro235]

Also, as far as tank conditions I would be adding plenty of well seeded lava rock and a few decorations from an established tank so quality should be good, and it would be in the mid 70s for temperature as far as other requirements for the fish.

Thanks!

 

[Matt724]

with that much surface area and that little volume, the temperature fluctuation would likely kill most of your fish.

 

[Castro235]

with that much surface area and that little volume, the temperature fluctuation would likely kill most of your fish.

Even if I had a small submersible heater in there to attempt to maintain the temperature?

Would the surface area really affect the temperature change that drastically? Even at night the 5 gallon in my room only drops a degree or two and it has no heater.

 

[knifegill]

It sounds like something I'd do. Try White Cloud Mountain Minnows. A group of three ought to cover you.

Just for clarification, this will be some sort of tray suspended inside a 20g tank? And there will be some water on the bottom that will get pumped back across this tray?

Or is it like a frog setup? Gravel on one side and a puddle on the other with some guppies, etc.?

 

[Castro235]

It sounds like something I'd do. Try White Cloud Mountain Minnows. A group of three ought to cover you.

Just for clarification, this will be some sort of tray suspended inside a 20g tank? And there will be some water on the bottom that will get pumped back across this tray?

Or is it like a frog setup? Gravel on one side and a puddle on the other with some guppies, etc.?

In honesty it is a completely insane project, so right up my alley.

I plan on having it seperated, it will be on the bottom of the tank, and I will be making some sort of rigid walls around the "pond" section, I figure my best bet will be the thick black liners used for edging around gardens, and siliconing it in place with reinforcements along the way, and i will have a pump in one corner, going through a tube to the other side of the tank into a small "river" that will actually contain the filtration and will be meshed off so the fish won't be able to get into it, but it will be filtering and returning to the pond section.

The actual plan is honestly to do something that has pretty much been proven impossible(from my reading) but I plan on trying it anyway at the risk of spending two years working on it and failing.

I want to create a small bonsai landscape inside of the tank, and have the pond section in there to keep the humidity high inside of the tank, but I will have the pond section and the land sections seperated by the pond walls, so that i can still have the bonsai substrate able to drain properly.

It's probably impossible to do, but I'll be damned if I'm not going to try anyway, I just hate to have a 5ish gallon pond inside of a tank and not have something happily living in it.


Any reason for white clouds specifically? Are they a hardier smaller fish than the tetras or guppies?

 

[knifegill]

Tough as nails.

Sounds totally doable. Who says it can't be done?

Edit: Might be easier in a wide breeder tank.

 

[Oddball]

For neons, you'll need to keep the water above 80F. Preferably around 84F. Not a good setup for such temps since the low volume and wide surface area will result in a large amount of evaporation.
The white clouds would be a better choice, as would gambusia (mosquito fish), Endler's livebearers (most colorful from this selection list), and merry widow livebearers

 

[Castro235]

Tough as nails.

Sounds totally doable. Who says it can't be done?

Edit: Might be easier in a wide breeder tank.

It's the bonsais that are the difficult part, it looks that those bonsai trees people keep indoors are actually supposed to be cultured outside, and that it is all but impossible to successfully keep a bonsai tree healthy indoors for more than about 2 years.

I do definitely think it will be easier in a larger tank, but I need to actually find a larger tank that seems like it would work and be in my budget of roughly dirt broke, but I'm going to look through the used aquariums and try to find something at the lfs near me.

Honestly I'm hoping I can find a 55 gallon, or something close, to that surface area but not even needing to be that tall, that is drilled in the bottom for easy bonsai draining, and even with a cracked front since I want to remove one pane and replace it with a shorter one so it'll be easier to work with the bonsai trees since I'll need to prune their roots and leaves regularly, but even then I only expect maybe up to a 10 or so gallon pond at max.

 

[Castro235]

For neons, you'll need to keep the water above 80F. Preferably around 84F. Not a good setup for such temps since the low volume and wide surface area will result in a large amount of evaporation.
The white clouds would be a better choice, as would gambusia (mosquito fish), Endler's livebearers (most colorful from this selection list), and merry widow livebearers

If I can manage a heater for it, I would actually prefer to be able to have a high evaporation rate since the main aim of the pond area is to keep the humidity inside of the tank high, but I don't know if that might end up too high and make it almost like a hot rainforest.