Flooded forest in the El Tuparro National Park, Rio Orinoco

My aquarium represents a tributary of the Rio Orinoco during the dry season. For a long time I have been planning to keep Paracheirodon axelrodi but this time comes to 2021, when I set-up this aquarium with a lot of research. In this aquarium I keep 2 species of fish because this project started as a test and continued to develop. In the future I want to set-up a bigger biotope with more species.

So when I started to do this biotope, I have used for the base layer some clay in a very thin height and then put on it white sand to reach the max height of the substrate.

After this I put some driftwood and some leaves. With this setup I ran the aquarium for 2-3 months. In the beginning I used tap water and as the water changes coming I mix with RO water in inceasing ratios until i reach the 80/20 proportion.

I wanted to make the hardscape versatile. The background and sides are “suggestsing” to the fishes this is the safe place. The ground has various heights cause of the leaf litter and algae.