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Asian river "biotope" with crazy flow

Q

Quo Vadis

Gambusia
MFK Member
I put biotope in quotation marks because obviously Asia is a huge continent, but I want to set up a river tank with a few Asian fish that would not overlap in nature, but that I think would do well together. I was thinking of doing Hillstream loaches of some kind, Stiphoden gobies, and possibly some White Clouds.

I will probably do the setup in a 20g long, and I want to use this to get really, really strong flow, in combination with a sponge filter. I know the Hillstream loaches can handle that kind of flow (supposedly it is 800gph), but will it be ok for the White Clouds and the gobies? I used to use this one in a 38g (so that tank was taller and 6 inches longer) SW tank and it was fine. I can arrange the rocks to that they create areas of less current. That should fine, right?

I'd like the tank to be kind of like this one except I would use a few bigger rocks to block some of the current in some places. It'd be cool to try to spawn the Hillstream loaches, since extremely high current seems to be a needed part of the equation.
 
Here is another tank that I find inspiring.

IMG6593.jpg
 
Sounds really interesting. I'd like to see this come together, although I really can't see a White Cloud in such high current. Keep us posted! :D
 
i like the idea, tried some thing like this a while back, hardest part was getting the flow to go all in one direction and not swirling about like a toilet flushing. i ended up putting pvc pipe on bottom of tank, running down the length with a 90 degree bend at each end power head on one end and sponge on the other, then coverd it over with gravel.
 
For some reason people think streams flow in a single direction. Not true! I spent a good part of my youth trout fishing and I can tell you there are eddies and back currents all along any river. Don`t get hung up on trying to get all of the water going in a single direction, it doe``nt work that way in nature.
 
yes i know this. but not many fish live in eddies all there lives, also with the tank set up i was talking about will create eddies when you put rocks and such like in
 
dan518, My comment was not aimed at you so much as anyone doing a stream type tank. The idea that somehow your tank is`nt functioning correctly without uni-directional flow has been stated by others and I thought it needed to be addressed, for the benefit the community at large.

My 55 gallon has the typical manifold with two powerheads at one end (rated at 300 and 420 gph respectively) and a whisper 60 at the sponge end. My six reticulated loaches spend most of their time at the sponge end with a sort of swirling current. They have no problem negotiating the output end and graze there at will, sometimes directly in the flow of the higher output p.h.
 
Yeah I have seen the design for those type of stream sponge filters on loaches.com. I may try it, but I am thinking both for this tank and my native darters tank of just doing air pump powered sponge filter and this high flow water circulator/wave maker. I think if you arrange yours rocks into a riffle type set up that will help it flow more like a stream as well.

Anyone else want to weigh about whether they think White clouds can handle the higher current?
 
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