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Rio Olho d’água, the tributary of Rio da Prata

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Brazil, Mato Grosso do Sul

When I accidentally saw a photo of Rio Olho d’Água taken by Tai Strietman on Facebook, I was deeply touched by the underwater landscape. An idea came up, I want to make a biotope aquarium to restore the habitat to give my fish a perfect home.

Submitted by
Nan Li
Approved by
Heiko Blessin & Nathan K. Lujan
GPS
-21.4352036, -56.4314423
Geographical region
South America
Drainage Basin
Rio da Prata
River catchment
Rio Olho d'água
Water body type
River
Water body name
Rio Olho d'água
Water body part
Water body course
Source
Water body: tributary of
River
Tributary name
Rio da Prata

Videos above and below water

Water Chemistry

Water information

Water type
Fresh water
Water color
Clear water
Water transparency
High
Concentration of sediments
Water temperature
°C
Water flow/curent
Slow

Chemical parameters

pH
7.4
Conductivity
GH
KH
Dissolved Oxygen

Aquarium information

Aquarium description

Set-up date
April, 2020
Aquarium decoration

All the elements used in my aquarium, including branches and fallen leaves, were derived from natural collection. I chose white fine sand as the substrates and put some limestones inside which are consistent with the habitat to maintain the similar water quality. I used big branches to build the skeleton and placed some small branches and leaves on the top.

Aquarium equipment

Kessil Tuna Sun 360x 90w LED, Spectrum 6,000K to 9,000K
EHEIM 600 classic external filter (1000 L/H)

Fish care

Sunlight shines into the aquarium from the gap between the upper layer branches and leaves and onto the algae on the ground. There are a lot of shelters in the aquarium for fish to hide and enough open space for fish to play. As time goes by, the leaves and roots will slowly rot and disappear after a few months, which is a microcosm of the ecological cycle of nature.

Characidae:

  • Hyphessobrycon eques 6
  • Hyphessobrycon herbertaxelrodi 4
  • Aphyocharax rathbuni 4
Plant care
Water care

Change 1/4 water once a week.

Dimensions

Length
60 cm
Depth
60 cm
High
60 cm
Volume
216 L

Substrate in aquarium

Sand
White
Pebble/Gravel
no
Stone
no
Stone form
Silt/Mud
no
Leaves
Many
Driftwood
Many
Submerged terrestrial vegetation
No

Bibliography

Sitography

→ YouTube-Tai Stietman
→ General information about Olho d'água
→ Weather of Mato Grosso do Sul

Comment by the expert

Heiko Blessin: The set up of the tank is quite nice and looks really like the natural biotope. But you need to make it more beautiful. Check the rules for aquascapers: a central main point of interest and asymmetric set up. Then your tank becomes a real eye catcher!

Nathan K. Lujan: I would have liked to have seen a bit more variety of fiches to illustrate the variety of ecological niches in a habitat like this, such as hatchetfish, catfishes, and cichlids. Even some knifefishes would really like a habitat such as this and would help represent the diversity of the fish community. For visual support, I think it is better to have more overview video and fewer zoomed -in shots, which make it hard to get an overall idea of what the tank looks like.