thE TINT

the art and science of botanical method aquarium keeping.

  • common. in an uncommon way?

    Periodically, I receive “I would love to hear your thoughts about this…” kind of emails from our readers/listeners, and almost all of them are really good! Sometimes, they touch on some ideas which really get me riled up. (maybe that’s the intent, lol?) Here’s one that has come up a few times lately: There is some perception…

  • back to nature. literally.

    Welcome back to “The Tint.” An exploration of my lifetime obsession with creating and managing botanical method aquariums. An exploration of unique aquarium approaches which place ecology first, where the aesthetics are a “byproduct” of the methodology that we embrace. The Tint is my “stream of consciousness” look into ideas, techniques, and musings about how…

  • It’s raining life in the “urban igapo”

    I’ve always been fascinated by environments which transform from dry, terrestrial ones to lush aquatic ones during the course of the year. I remember as a kid visiting a little depression in a field near my home , which, every spring, with the rains would turn into a little pond, complete with frogs, Fairy Shrimp,…

  • THE “FUNGAL FILTER”-FREE FOR THE TAKING…

    You saw the title. What exactly am I talking about here?  Today, I want to talk a bit about our gooey friends, the fungi- for just a few minutes. Despite their off-putting appearance to some, they may be among the most beautiful, elegant, and useful organisms we encounter in the aquatic world. Why do I…

  • TRANSIENCE, EMBRACING THE EPHEMERAL…AND AN APPRECIATION FOR “WABI-SABI.”

    I recently had one of those hardcore fish discussions with an old friend who is as much a philosopher as he is an aquarist..Real “Obi-Wan Kenobi”, “Aquascaping Jedi”-type. He had this amazing viewpoint on all things aquarium. It was a fun talk. We all know a hobbyist or two like him, huh? Inspiring, interesting…intelligent. And…

  • STREAMING ALONG…

    Okay, in order to really appreciate some aquatic environments that we like to replicate in our aquariums, we have to take a “deep dive” into them. And the insights we gain by straying outside of “conventional aquarium hobby literature” are manifold. Let’s explore a habitat where many aquarium fishes come from in Nature. A habitat…

  • OAK SPRINGS ETERNAL.

    I’m easing back into sharing my love of botanical method aquariums after a years-long detour, an abandoning of the retail sale of botanicals, and a diversion back into reef aquariums. It was fun to take a bit of a break, but the call of tinted water, decay, and fungal growths is just too hard to…