Thank You Key West Aquarium!

Okay,

I'm not sure if I am being authentic or sarcastic (or authentically sarcastic) with my show of appreciation to the Key West Aquarium. My family visited the aquarium three years ago during a Key West port of call stop on a little family cruise. My son fell in love with the aquarium for one main reason - they have a touch tank. This is not just any touch tank - it is a doozy. It is large enough for a meandering group of tourists to gather around and has a short wall surrounding it enabling even very little visitors a close up look and feel of its inhabitants. There are starfish to pick up and hold in the palm of your hand. Horseshoe crabs to turn over and examine (and if you place the tip of your finger in the center of their underside you'll get a little tickle from the hairlike projections that surround their mouth). Sea cucumbers that squirt water after you lift them (yes, it does look like they are peeing and yes, it is funny as heck to kids). 

Since that first visit we have been back to the aquarium twice during visits to Key West (sans the cruise line). Each visit further enthused my son about the touch tank and we decided that maybe, just maybe we could create a little version of it at home (far be it for us to squelch the interests of our budding marine biologist)!

Well, as you can imagine - we did not know what we were getting into. Let me first explain that the most experience my husband or I have had with keeping fish were simple little goldfish (read freshwater) tanks. Apparently, maintaining a saltwater tank is a whole other world.

To start, though, we needed something to house our little touch tank in. This couldn't be a typical fish tank as it had to be low enough so that we could bend over and touch the animals in our touch tank without knocking over 40 gallons of water into our patio. That led to the second requirement, it had to be a container that could be placed under cover, in our back patio. It had to be large enough to provide ample room for the sea life and yet had to be of a size that fit into the corner that provided shade and was near the outlet.

Well, it became my conclusion (after pricing some pre-made touch tanks) that maintaining a saltwater tank is a hobby for those with large amounts of disposable income - a part of the community we do not belong to. So...my husband (I'm so lucky) discovered a wonderful solution - why not use a large, plastic outdoor fountain? The size was right (holds 40 gallons of water), the height was right (easy to reach over), the price was right (enough said on this point), and the round shape and color looked much more appealing than the pre-made touch tanks. Ta da!  

Take a peek at our tank. 

After the tank itself was set we had to begin readying it to hold some creatures of the sea. For this we needed some experts, preferably people with the time to talk us through the process (this left out some of the big box retailers). We were fortunate enough to have a small, family-owned fish store that moved in down the street.

They loaded our arms with:

• a bag of sand (packed in natural seawater)
• a saltwater pump able to handle a 40-gallon tank
• filters for the pump
• a couple "living rocks" ("living" because of the many micro and macro organisms who make their home on the rock)
• a bag of salt specially designed for saltwater tanks
• a water testing kit
• various chemicals to adjust the ph and ammonia levels in the water

We then were instructed to fill our tank with saltwater (tap water with the salt mixed in as per the salt package directions) and then empty the bag of sand into the water. The water had to sit for a couple of days while the pump helped filter out any undesirable elements and to allow time for the sand "dust" to settle and clear out of the water. We were then ready to move onto the exciting part - the recipients of our respectful touching - the sea life!