Aquarium Project Blog

I. Purpose: To monitor an aquatic ecosystem over time through observations and data collection.
II. Materials:

• aquarium
• gravel
• bubbler
• filter
• water
• de-chlorinator
• bacteria supplement
• fish food
• sifter
• under water structures
• measuring cup
• plants
• paper towels
• scrub brush
• sink
• rocks
• light source
• name tag
• marker
• fish

III. Procedure:

1. Pick Tank
2. Put name on tank
3. Remove water from tank
4. Remove gravel from tank
5. sift gravel
6. scrub tank
7. put gravel back into tank
8. place rocks and structures back into tank
9. fill tank with water
10. if water is turbid, re-sift gravel
11. place bubbler into water
12. clean filter
13. put filter into water
14. put dechlorinator into water
15. put bacteria supplement into water
16. wait 48 hours
17. buy fish
18. place fish into aquarium
19. regularly feed fish
20. clean tank when dirty

IV. Data:

A. Qualitative(observation)

1. My fish, Dancing Fin, is very shy.

2. Dancing Fin is still shy, hides behind tree trunk when approached.

3. Dancing Fin seems less shy. He is swimming around more.

4. Dancing Fin does not shy away when tank is approached.

5. Dancing Fin stares at himself in the side of the tank for many minutes at a time.
6. My fish is in love with his reflection.
7. Keith, our new minnow, has become good friends with Dancing Fin.
8. Keith and Dancing fin seem to be going through a rough patch, Keith moved out and now lives on the other side of the tank.
10. Dancing Fin and Keith have settled things and Dancing Fin is now allowing Keith into his log stump.
11. A new minnow appeared out of nowhere. He has been named Major Tom.
12. Major Tom and Keith are great friends who swim around with each other all day. I think Dancing Fin is jealous.
13. I have come to the conclusion that it would have been a good idea to buy at least two swordtails instead of just one.
14. Keith and Major Tom have started to pick on Dancing Fin and have successfully kicked him out of his stump.
15. Dancing Fin showed the minnows who's boss and has retaken the log as his own.
16. Keith has realized the folly of his actions and now acknowledges Dancing Fin as the alpha male of the aquarium.

17. When being fed, the minnows now wait for Dancing fin to eat his fill until they get any food.
18. Major Tom is highly erratic and swims super fast all around the tank. He's a mad man.
19. With the crippling spiral into insanity of Major Tom, Keith and Dancing Fin have become best friends again. Keith acts like nothing happened but we all know. He isn't fooling anyone.
20. Dancing Fin likes to sit under the filter because he's a daredevil who likes to live on the wild side of life.

B. Quantitative(Water Quality)

Aquacheck: 0 Chlorine

                   0 Chlorine Free

                   250 ppm hardness

                   120 Alkilinity

                   8.4 pH

Ammonia levels at beginning: 1.00ppm( No Fish)

                                             0.25ppm(Fish)

                                             0.00ppm(After adding bacteria)

                                             0.00ppm

Nitrite Levels: 0.00ppm

                      0.00ppm

V. Conclusion Questions

1. The parameters for ammonia are for it to be at .25 ppm or else you cannot get a fish because it will die.
 The parameters for nitrite are 0ppm. If it is at .75ppm it can cause stress to the fish.
The parameters for nitrate are below 200ppm. Nitrate is the least harmful nitrogen to fish.
The parameters for the temperature are between 72-80 degrees Fahrenheit because that is the most comfortable temperature range for fish.
The parameters fore pH are 6-8. If it is higher or lower the fish cannot survive.
All the water my fish will be in is conductive due to the minerals inside of the water.
Dissolved oxygen parameters are that there needs to be enough oxygen in the tank for the fish to survive. To keep the dissolved oxygen high we put bubblers in the water.
Water hardness affects the fish's ability to balance internal fluids with external fluids. Our water is very hard.
Alkalinity indicates the overall amount of pH stabilizing compounds found in the water.With out enough alkalinity, an accurate reading of pH cannot be obtained.
Chlorine is toxic to fish and causes them to die very quickly. It is important to keep an extremely low chlorine count, preferably zero.

2.

The nitrogen cycle is when fish waste lets off ammonia,which is toxic to fish. Then nitrosanomus turns the ammonia into nitrite, which is slightly less toxic to fish. Next, Nitrospyra turns nitrite into nitrate which is not very harmful to fish.The nitrogen cycle applies to the sustainability of my aquarium because if it did not function properly, the ammonia levels in the aquarium would get too high and kill the fish.


3. Over time, my water quality has drastically improved. At the beginning, my ammonia levels were extremely high and prevented me from obtaining a fish.However, after changing the water a couple times and adding dechlorinator and bacteria, my water finally reached 0ppm ammonia and allowed me to get a fish. Even with good ammonia levels, my problems did not go away. Since i did not have a filter my tank got dirty pretty fast. After changing the water again, and getting a working filter, my water levels have been stable ever since.
4. The oxygen/carbon-dioxide cycle is important to the aquatic ecosystem because it keeps the oxygen levels in the water high enough to support animal life. The oxygen/carbon-dioxide cycle works by plants using the sun and carbon dioxide to produce oxygen during the day, raising its levels. Then, at night, the oxygen levels fall due to the plants inability to carry out photosynthesis and the fish using all the oxygen as they breathe. The balance is restored the next day though when the sun comes out and the plants can photosynthesize again.

5. I faced many problems when trying to get my aquarium stable. The major problem being that, without a filter, the ammonia content in my tank would get to .25 after a couple of days which would require me to clean the tank. After obtaining a filter, however, my ammonia levels have remained at 0ppm.

6. I learned quite a few educational concepts throughout the course of this project. How sensitive fish are to pH, what dissolved oxygen is and how to get it into water, what chlorine does to fish, how ammonia affects fish and how to assess water quality.

7.The most interesting thing that happened during this project was my fish getting into a fight with one of the minnows. It's all good now though because we broke it up. The worst thing that happened was not having a filter for the longest time because the water got really dirty.The weirdest thing that happened the appearance of a new minnow in my tank. We have no idea how it got there.

8. My favorite part of this project was designing the layout of the aquarium and picking the fish. Before this class I didn't know that you had so many choices of fish to choose from. But now that I've had an aquarium in this class, it makes me want to get one at my house too.

9. Advice I would give to next years students would be to get more than one fish because it makes everything a whole lot more fun. I would also tell them not to get a turtle because those are a lot of work. If i could do anything to make this project better it would be to take out the blog aspect.