Ms. Julie's Caterpillar Room Aquarium

Store Owner Pondon 2 Gallon imageMs. Julie has been asked many times about the aquarium that she keeps in her room. The tank was put together with one goal — make it as easy as possible to maintain. Inspired by Diana Walstad's technique for creating a self-sustaining aquarium, we carefully chose animals with little bioload and plants to create a balanced tank, reduce the time required to keep it clean for the animals, and make it interesting to look at.

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Most of the same items we used are on this list. There are a few things that are needed:

  1. A fish tank
  2. Live aquarium plants: Java Moss, Java Fern varieties, and Repens varieties are all good choices and available at big box pet stores. The plants will use the ammonia and nitrates in the water to grow and help keep the water clean.
  3. Clean-up crew: Nerite Snails, Amano Shrimp, Red Cherry Shrimp, Golden Back Shrimp, Blue Velvet Shrimp, or any other Neocaridina variety will eat any algae or leftover fish food to keep the water and glass clean.
  4. Filtration: While not part of the Walstad method, a sponge filter will provide additional aeration and filtration to the tank.

You can have more and a greater variety of animals in a bigger tank, but here is the recommended setup to create a tank like Ms. Julie's:

  • 1x Amano Shrimp
  • 1x Horned Nerite Snail
  • 6x Neocaridina Shrimp — Red Cherry Shrimp, Yellow Golden Back Shrimp, Blue Velvet Shrimp, or a combination of the three
  • 1–2x Male Key Lime Endlers
  • Plain organic top soil
  • Aqua Natural Galaxy (dark colored) and/or Sugar White (light colored) Sand — in Ms. Julie's tank, we used both to create light and dark areas
  • Aquarium plants
  • Non-aquarium plants absorb ammonia and nitrates through the roots. Pothos works great, as do semi-aquatic plants with roots submerged but the rest of the plant above water.
  • Sponge filter
  • Small pieces of driftwood

There are a lot of great videos on YouTube by aquascapers. Some of our favorites for inspiration are: