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Making your aquarium attractive!

Imagine a fish tank that has nothing but fish in it! Boring, to say the least! To make your aquarium attractive, you need to accessorise it.

There are all sorts of ornaments on offer in the market today. First, you need to take into account the size of your tank and the kind of effect you wish to create.

Of course, the most important consideration would be the type of fish you wish to breed in your tank. The ornamentation of a tank is more for people than for the fish.

In fact, certain species don't like such ornaments because they seem to get in their way. But some fish would be lost without some place to 'get away'.

Others need some place to call 'home', while a few need something to play around, surprising as that may seem. If you have both small and large fish in your tank, the smaller ones would appreciate something to protect them from being preyed upon.

Select what best suits your requirements from the local pet store or an exclusive fish store. On display, you will find traditional accessories like ships and castles.

You could choose seaweed and other branched greenery or imitations of these in various materials. You could pick up shimmery stones of varied hue or pretty baubles to embellish your fish tank. Select these to suit your pocket.

When you choose ornaments for you aquarium, keep in mind what the fish you would like to raise are partial to. Get some books and read up on their preferences. Certain fish are more sensitive and even a few accessories may traumatise them.

Goldfish make excellent pets as they don't need much care and they don't seem to mind what's in the tank with them.

Therefore, you can go wild and do what appeals to you. Small fish don't seem to mind either. So it's entirely up to you on how you 'do up' the tank for small fish.

If you make your aquarium especially attractive, it could become a conversation piece. Use accessories that simulate their natural habitat.

That will certainly keep the fish happy! You, your children and your friends can spend hours enjoying the antics of the fish. Create your own ornaments or stick with the conventional. The outcome should give you and the fish pleasure.


Flower of the week: Popular, fun to grow Pansies

Pansies are one of the earliest flowering plants. They include almost all colors of the rainbow including black, and many bi-colors. There are so many combinations of these profuse bloomers that it is almost as if there are not any two that are alike!

Pansies are grown from seeds. They like full to partial sun. Pansies can be directly seeded into your flower garden or seeded indoors for transplanting later.

Sow seeds early in the season and cover lightly with 1/8" soil. Water thoroughly once. They germinate slowly.

Pansies prefer cool to warm climates, and wilt a bit in mid-summer heat. In warmer areas, we recommend partial shade. They tolerate a variety of soils.

Add a general purpose fertilizer when planting them, then once a month after that.

Once your Pansies are established, they should grow well, even if left unattended.

Soil should be moist, but not wet. Water them during dry periods, once or twice per week. Keep them well weeded. Pansies are popular, easy, and fun to grow. Fill an area or entire bed with Pansies for a striking spring effect! They also are great in windowsills and containers.


Garden Guide: Plants for a garden pond

A garden pond should not simply be a container with water. Taken in its totality, it includes plants in the water and outside it along the perimeter, ornaments like lanterns, figurines and rocks, other 'decorations' like unusually shaped logs or a small fountain, and of course aquatic creatures. So, let your imagination run wild.

A layer of soil at the bottom of the pond is beneficial, to provide a medium for aquatic plants to grow and for organisms that help keep the water clean.

The disadvantage is that fish sometimes tend to disturb the mud and so the water becomes turbid. You can learn from the aquarist here, by covering the bottom layer of mud with a layer of coarse sand.

Then place a small sheet of polythene over the sand when filling water and remove it when the water is sufficient.

The alternative to soil at the bottom is to have plants in containers. This is quite advantageous firstly as it restricts overgrowth and secondly when it comes to clean-up time, all you have to do is remove the containers, instead of having to tediously remove all the soil.

Just ensure that containers do not have sharp edges which can damage the polythene. Polythene bags are convenient containers.

Plants like Elodea, Cabomba, Valisneria, Aponogeton (Kekatiya) are fully submersed types that can be grown in containers. In addition, the group of plants called sedges can grow in the water, with their leaves sticking out of it.

Examples of this are Cyperus species (Pan in Sinhala). Acorus (Wada kaha) and Lasia (kohila) are other possibilities. Familiar plants like the Manels and Olus are best planted in containers, quite literally to contain them.

It is quite decorative to have a small log or branch sticking out of the water (however, this can serve as a perch for a hungry kingfisher eying your goldfish!)

The branch should be a 'seasoned' one which will not rot and pollute the water. You can pick some out of rivers and lakes when you are next out in the country.

The perimeter of the pond is literally an artist's canvas with unlimited possibilities. Choose your plants according to the location, whether it is in the sun or in the shade.

Ferns and foliage plants like Begonia, Calatheas etc will do well in the shade while flowering plants like Impatiens, Ixora, Catharanthus (Mini Mal), Plumbago, Marigolds etc will thrive in the sun. Chinese lanterns, gnomes, cement storks, stumps and logs all add to the overall effect if placed appropriately.

You can also train Bromeliads onto the logs to give height to the overall planting. A garden light hidden among the plants will make your pond an all-day attraction.

Overdoing the perimeter planting is a common mistake. Often, the pond gets hidden and the plants take centre stage. Ideally, the pond should be visible from a distance.

One landscaping plan is to have a centre-piece or focal-plant at the furthest point of the pond. This can be a flowering shrub like Tabernaemontana (Sinhala: Wathu sudda) or Brunfelsia ('Yesterday-today-tomorrow') or a foliage shrub like Pisonia (Letta kochchi) or small-leaved Ficus.

Keep the height down to 1-1.5 m and allow lateral branching. Then plant shorter plants on either side of the centre piece up to about 3/4ths of the perimeter, leaving the rest vacant or with the lining stones only.

The subject of fish is a detailed one and cannot be dealt with in depth. Suffice it to say that the smaller ones, like guppies and similar live bearers are the easiest to maintain and are quite colourful.

Even a few goldfish are OK, but if you want to get into Koi territory, be prepared for problems like cloudiness and dead fish.

Koi require more space and maybe some water filtration, though even this requirement can be eliminated by proper stocking and prudent feeding.

Maintaining clarity of the water is not difficult under our conditions. There is an initial tendency for cloudiness, due to a minor algal bloom, but this will settle down after a few days.

Do not make the mistake of changing the water every time it turns cloudy. Use of various pumps, filters and aerators is a recent trend, probably due to promotion by vendors of aquarium gadgetry.

In my experience, it has never been necessary to have any of these gadgets in shallow ponds up to 30 cm deep. If you like the sound of flowing water (who doesn't?) a re-circulating pump is inexpensive, but ensure that adequate safeguards are taken in electrical installation.

Place a garden bench next to the pond and read your favourite books - get a book on water gardens and ponds and read more details on suitable plants for your pond.

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