Keeping a Freshwater Aquarium
Nearly everyone has seen an aquarium in their lifetime. At a friend’s house, a restaurant, a party, a local business looking to stand out… many people love to keep aquariums, and you can find them nearly everywhere.
The word ‘aquarium’ actually comes from the Latin words ‘Aqua’ meaning water (Shocked? Yeah, neither are we) and ‘rium’ meaning place or building.
Basically, it’s a water building!
There are literally thousands of different types of aquariums that you can purchase right now, and the detailing that you can add is not just extensive – it’s borderline ridiculous.
You can choose from a simple fish bowl that can be found in many homes, to a detailed and advanced ecosystem of filtered water, numerous fish and live plants climbing the extra-strength plastic.
The History of the Aquarium
Aquariums date back to the 1850′s.
Even the Sumerians had a way of keeping their fish – they had ponds to keep wild fish in until they were made into dinner.
Goldfish and Koi fish were being bred as far back as 2,000 years ago in China, and during the Song dynasty goldfish were kept in ceramic bowls.
The history of aquariums is old and detailed!
Even in ancient Egyptian art, we can see a type of aquarium – fish were kept in rectangular temple pools, something unique and interesting, and not what most people would think of when they think of an aquarium in history.
Keeping fish as a hobby really picked up after the First World War (Middle to late 1800′s).
While you could see aquariums at museums and more, modern lighting and filtration allowed people to care for fish in their home.
As fish keeping became more popular in modern culture, companies rushed to come up with unique and interesting things to put into tanks.
They searched for more efficient ways to keep fish healthy and their water clean.
Today we have a large range of aquarium accessories.
You can choose from thousands of different accessories to make your tank set up unique, interesting and fun.
One of the most impressive aquariums is in Japan – the Osaka aquarium holds 5,400 cubic meters of volume, and it actually contains over 580 species!
