Am I over thinking this?

[Miami Reef]

Here’s my aquascape. The tank is a FOWLR and I believe since we don’t have corals, we need to make the rocks look interesting to the eye.

I am upset about 2 things regarding my aquascape:

1. It looks 2 dimensional (2D). Very flat which makes it boring. Fish can only swim in a straight line instead of making twists and turns.

2. There’s not nearly enough caves and open spaces between the rocks…Rocks too bulky.

Even my LFS said by himself that the rockscape could be improved. Am I just overthinking this?

 

[gbroadbridge]

Seeing as it's already running I'd leave it be (others may disagree)

There is plenty of room for arches between the rocks and even on top of them.

Buy a super size turkey baster to blast off the detritus as I dont see much flow around the rocks

Don't stress.

 

[Miami Reef]

Seeing as it's already running I'd leave it be (others may disagree)

There is plenty of room for arches between the rocks and even on top of them.

Buy a super size turkey baster to blast off the detritus as I dont see much flow around the rocks

Don't stress.

Thank you!!!

 

[gbroadbridge]

Thank you!!!

You're very welcome.

Buy a box of caribsea Life Rock arches and all your concerns are over. Just make sure they dont swapout some arches with flat rocks as some LFS have done.

Also make sure you glue/cement them properly, if an arch collapses it may kill more than a fish.

 

[Dbichler]

You’re right very 2d I would raise the height of either pile you have now at least 1/3 higher than the other and try to make more open spaces between all your rocks fish line hiding spaces and it looks more natural that way. I don’t ever glue any rock down so I can change it easily. This is my 210 currently.

 

[Tamberav]

I would say that both sides just match too much.

I would vote some Tonga branch would add a new interesting dimension. Just difficult to find.

 

[Cell]

It looks like two similar piles of rocks. I'd do some rearranging or additions to vary things up a bit.

 

[Rmckoy]

I’ve always went for the stacked rocks piled making holes and arches . But this requires rocks of different sizes and shapes
IMO it almost looks more natural ?

it will fill in with time with corals or new pieces of unique rock .

 

[Rmckoy]

For example : mind the dirty glass today is cleaning day .

 

[J1a]

How about having low/minimal rocks to show off the fishes more?

From this


To this


Somehow there is enough places for all these fishes to hide at night.

 

[Miami Reef]

I’m really liking this scape from the internet. I can make these “boulders” that can alternate how close they are to the glass. Some of them will be closer to the front, some will be further, some will be diagonal, some will be flat. They can vary in height and I won’t need to glue anything.

It can take me about 1-2 hours to do it.

 

[SVC_117]

I think it looks nice!