Impressive huge tank with small (stunted?) discus

[DiscusBR]

Just found this Youtube video:

[Willie]

Also an extremely odd biotope, since the natural condition of discus is dirt and roots. I have a meeting in the Gran Canaria in June. If I can find this tank, I'll report up on it.

Willie

[brewmaster15]

Interesting find Mauro. Very odd tank. Looks like someone bought a ton of 2 -3 inch domestics and dumped them into it. It cant have been running long with those guys in it.

Willie I hope you can find it there.Id like more info on it.

al

[Willie]

At the beginning of the summer, this was an interesting post about this odd aquarium in the Canary Islands. Coincidentally, I was going there for a technical conference and promised to check it out. Of course, life got in the way and I lost track of this. Fortunately, Al found the original thread for me. So here are my pictures from there - six months late.

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The Canary Islands is actually situated off the coast of Africa. It's a former Spanish colony that has become part of Spain. There are several islands in the chain, the biggest ones being the Gran Canaria and Tenerife. My visit this time was to the Gran Canaria. It's your basic island paradise, with sunny days, beaches, etc. It's not Maui, but it's not shabby either.

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The dollar is strong against the Euro so the Canary Islands are an extraordinary bargain today. It may have the cheapest and freshest seafood in the world. Everything is caught that day and simply prepared, mostly lightly fried. Unlike the professionals and semi-pros, I use an iPhone for photography. So no need to apologize for these awful pictures!

[Willie]

I got to the conference a day early and was determined to find this aquarium. That's not that much to see on the island and finding it was no problem.

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It cost 25 Euros for admissions (~$30). I had a colleague with me that day (lower right in the picture) and I felt obliged to pay his way in to see this. So I've invested $60 to find discus!

[Willie]

It is a very odd aquarium. Most aquariums in the US and abroad emulate zoos and museums, in so far as the collections represent natural settings and are often used for research purposes. This one was like a very rich person's personal fish room.

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There were plenty of fish exhibits, but the displays were rather showy and fish were mostly aquarium strains. Nothing natural about this school of piranhas.

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I don't think you'll see anything like this in nature.

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The moray eels were cool.

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[Willie]

I've strung you along long enough. There was this discus tank. What strikes you about this?

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Yup. Discus in nature look nothing like this. These are all aquarium strains. Equally poor picture of a fantasy discus biotope.

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So this is pretty much what $60 got me.

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[Willie]

One cool thing was the sand displays. People spend all day carving these out. If you take a picture, they ask for a tip.

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Everyday, they go back and carve more details into these displays.

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What started as a woman lying in the sand on the first day got pretty surrealistic by day four.

Hope you enjoyed it, Willie

[Paul Sabucchi]

Agreed the sand sculptures seem more worthy of the expense than the aquariun

[Filip]

Thanks for the cool walk around Grand Cannaria Willie .
Sand sculptures look cool . Looking at my mobile phone I first thought that there are actual people on a huge Pharaoh structure .
Tanks in that public aqaurium and especially that discus mega tank looked very poor and misconcepted .Such a terrible waste of tank water .

[pastry]

Ugghhh... I dream of having an aquarium in that size. However I would either have a wild strain in there or domestic screens that were very close to a wild strain. I would also have shallow portions. Last, believe it or not, I would not have those pants in there.

And I just have to say this, how in the hell is there a tank that big yet The discus are that small? As much as I would love to say that it is such a waste, which still kind of is, at least since most likely it is a public Aquarium then it just exposes discus to more people of whom some may join the addiction after seeing them there. We all know that they should be much bigger but even stunted mixed domestic fish still knock the shoes off of people who have never really seen them.

[Paul Sabucchi]

Just shows it is not how big it is (the tank of course) but what you do with it that matters!

[pastry]

Just shows it is not how big it is (the tank of course) but what you do with it that matters!

Can't catch my breath and bowing down to you at the same time!

[Filip]

Just shows it is not how big it is (the tank of course) but what you do with it that matters!

Nice point Paul

[snxtif]

Just shows it is not how big it is (the tank of course) but what you do with it that matters!

That's what HE said

Fully agreed tho lol