thE TINT

the art and science of botanical method aquarium keeping.

  • ADAPTING…

    Anyone who’s kept tropical fishes for any appreciable length of time does stuff that, while maybe not intentional, doesn’t exactly fit the commonly accepted “best practices” of aquarium keeping. Stuff that perhaps doesn’t provide the fishes under your care with stable, comfortable environmental conditions.  Maybe you slacked off on water exchanges for a protracted period…

  • THE MOLLY MYSTIQUE.

    Ever get an idea in your head that you just can’t let go of? Well, that’s me, when it comes to brackish aquariums. As you know, I’ve been playing with our interpretation of the brackish, botanical-method aquarium for years now, and it’s still obsessing me. Something about this “semi-salty” habitat and the fishes which reside…

  • A REMARKABLE PARALELL?

    Being a lover of aquarium technique, culture, and trends, it’s hard to imagine me NOT trying almost every technique that’s out there to keep aquariums. Over a lifetime in the hobby and industry, I’ll admit that I have played with a lot of ideas over the years. And without sounding really fucking old, I’ve been around long enough to…

  • THE BOTANICAL METHOD, EVOLVING OVER TIME…

    I make it no secret that the botanical method aquarium is unlike almost any other approach to aquarium keeping currently practiced. Not better. Not the “coolest” (well, possibly…)- just different. To parse all of the many reasons why this approach is so different could literally take years… Although aesthetics are not the primary reason I…

  • WE SET THE STAGE…NATURE DOES THE REST!

    There is amazing beauty and life to be found in what seems to be disorder and decay in aquatic systems. Yeah, decay and breakdown- processes which we have talked about extensively on these pages. It’s a fantastic, dynamic process, one in which we set the stage to let Nature do Her job. Need an example…

  • ABOVE AND BELOW THE FLOODED FORESTS. A CALL FOR US TO GO FURTHER AS AQUARISTS!

    I have written and discussed the flooded forests of South America many times here in “The Tint”, and they are among the most compelling habitats we have encountered during our search for interesting ones to replicate in aquariums.  South American forests and “swamp forests”are seasonally inundated with freshwater. These forests are perhaps Nature’s finest example of the interaction…

  • ECOLOGY FIRST.

    One of the cool things about being an aquarium hobbyists is that, if you want, you can take an almost unlimited number of directions and approaches- many completely different, and achieving entirely different things. This hit home the other day when I was “playing hobbyist” with my reef aquarium. Before I ever started Tannin, and…

  • THE ART OF EDITING.

    As hobbyists, we love “tweaking”, modifying, and changing stuff. Sometimes, we do this on a big-scale (like, tearing down our aquascape and starting over). Other times, it’s about making smaller, incremental changes to our tanks. Incremental steps are important in just about any aquarium; however, they’re almost a given with the botanical-method aquariums we love and work…

  • DOWN AND DIRTY.

    “Some sediment and sand meet in a river, and…” Okay, weird opening, but it’s time to talk a bit more about the idea of “sedimented substrates” again. Hobbyists are starting to play around with them in botanical method aquariums, featuring them on social media, and before a whole generation of hobbyists gets the impression that these are…

  • KILLIFISHES AND THE TERRESTRIAL CONNECTION…

    Annual killifishes are beyond fascinating for me. Not only is their life cycle amazing, the fact that they are so intimately tied into their environment more than almost any fishes we’ve worked with in the hobby is an amazing ‘unlock” for so many things we want to do as hobbyists. These fishes are commonly found…