Hate it hate it hate it.

[HBtank]

Anyway, I like mimicking natural aquascapes with shelves and branches used to avoid the classic “wall/pile” of rocks. Shelves and caves are needed for fish. Branches for corals in negative/open space. Regardless I am not a fan of minimalist rock use, my tanks will always have a good amount.

 

[Rick's Reviews]

Last comments lol.
I built an aquarium that suited me, it's doing great btw.
I could upgrade it to buying and filling with corals or fish that would need 24/7 care, along with loss and unstable parimiters.
I could build another aquarium that needs more care.

For me, my aquriam provides the most pleasure, and easy maintenance.
I built my aquriam around me and I love it

 

[Nate Chalk]

Shallow?! What do you guys class as deep then?
I always thought deep was anything 18” or more, shallow was anything 17 inch or less


Well normal tanks are 24 inches deep I think

 

[maroun.c]

Takes time for corals to grow to a Size that will fill in a minimalistic scape in the meantime fish have to put up with it. People will say my fush are fine with it. I don't believe they are and are suffering unnecessary stress in the meantime. IMO these minimalistic reefscapes are poor for the fish. Tried it binned it pretty quickly, so unnatural.

This.
It’s really unnatural until the coral grows in (This can tank 2-4 years for coral to fill out at this extent). The fish just won’t feel secure either, you need that extra cave support and rock heavier scape to help them feel secure.
Plus, rocks aren’t that ugly… I mean, why do we expect photos of the coral to not display rockwork or the uglies? Look at this, these tanks don’t look too bad. The rockwork just adds a much more natural look, you probably don’t want it totally hidden. But also, both of these scapes still hold the swim room that minimalistic scapes do just not as little hiding spots.

To clarify I'm not saying go super minimalistic. Again if scape does please @atoll then definitely go with it. I don't criticise others work normally and this is meant as a constructive critique.
@atoll scape looks unnatural to me and has more rocks than I'd go with and at same time less hiding places. It doesnt offer a creative positioning of islands to create depth or a 3 D effect and it doesn't facilitate much coral positioning areas to have front to back and up to down coral placement. I also love to see more flat rocks for chalices abd othwr encrusting corals. It also lacks space for coral growth and open fish swimming space.
As for the comment that coral growth takes 2 years and that fish were stressed. If u look closely under left island of my tank there is enough hiding spots , also I wouldn't fully stock fish faster than 2 years, I'm still adding fish 10 years after tank was started. If its really a concern add a few pipes in the back that u can remove later but that's rather extreme I feel. Notice I have some sensitive fish in there that didn't stress at all achilles is the best example as well as many wrasses and anthias that I had years back when tank was still new and which did great ....
Here's scapes I had in my older tanks which I believe lack creativity and weren't a success.

Here's the scape, rt island was later changed

And here's how the tank matured , wouldn't really call it minimalistic anymore.

 

[acropora4u]

Mine. 60” x 36” x 24” tall

 

[I.AM.MR.MIKE]

I have a hard time setting up rock. I keep trying to figure out what the posted rock scape is spelling? It just needs some neon lights to outline the rock now-not... I like the old piled up look myself.

 

[kevgib67]

Definitely not my cup of tea but agree once it is filled out with coral my opinion might change. I like the natural look and have never used anything other than live rock ( and never will). Even my clowns are the plain ocellaris because that is what you would see on a reef, though the designer clowns are gorgeous. That being said if everyone liked the same scape, corals and fish this forum would be boring. Just do what makes you happy.

 

[Roatan Reef]

It’s very unnatural looking. As mentioned, you just don’t see arches like that in nature. One way to kind of keep the arches but make them look more natural is not connecting them (ie have a piece sort of jut out but not connect to anything). If it were my tank, I’d make 2-3 bommies (piles of rock) with lots of holes and areas for fish to hide). As you get corals, the empty sandbed areas will fill out, and you can add little islands here and there. But the NSA arch look just doesn’t look natural or provide places for fish to hide, which is very important for fish to feel comfortable and exhibit natural behaviors.

Welllllllll...akshuallllyy...

In Bonaire, when you travel to the National Park...Washington Slagbaii National Park.... there are many spots to stop off at and Snorkel. One of Said spots actually has Rock Arches you can Snorkel and swim under.

Granted, I've snorkeled all around the Caribbean, and its the only place I've ever seen it...but they do exist in Nature.

 

[MaxTremors]

Welllllllll...akshuallllyy...

In Bonaire, when you travel to the National Park...Washington Slagbaii National Park.... there are many spots to stop off at and Snorkel. One of Said spots actually has Rock Arches you can Snorkel and swim under.

Granted, I've snorkeled all around the Caribbean, and its the only place I've ever seen it...but they do exist in Nature.

I’ve seen a couple snorkeling too, but never seen a straight line of arch after arch, and certainly not at the scale they are in an aquarium.

 

[Paul B]

I think this is when my tank looked the most natural. This picture is probably 25 years old and I still have that fireclown on the far left.

I have dove in many places for 50 years and this is what I came up with. I have not been able to replicate it in my tank now because we have more corals to use now and we all want more.

I like Atolls aquascape as I like mine which is the most important thing.

 

[Smoke-Town]

I like nsa style and classic rock stacking... I have plenty of aesthetic issues with the OP scape that i wont go into, many of the artistic issues have already been noted by others.
I currently have both styles of aquascape. Yes, the classic stacked live rock does look more natural... but I really like both for different reasons. I like having more room for cryptic fish and the ability to redesign the aquscape at will, those are points for the classic rock stacks... but I love the sculpture aspect of creating impossible structures which the nsa allows... for people who are not artists, I can see them having zero interest in the design of an nsa... but us artists really do appreciate that next level of creativity that nsa offers.

Husbandry and dedicating thought into personal spaces for the fish is much more important when building for nsa though. And often a young nsa will need extra rocks for hiding spaces until the reef is more mature with coral, then you slowly remove extra rocks if need be as the reef grows in.

Here are a couple pics of 2 of our tanks with different styles.

As for the people who keep saying there are no arches or crazy gravity defying designs in a natural reef... I disagree. People are spending too much time thinking about the million year old live rocks at the base of the reef. What you have to remember is that in a real coral reef... thousands of fish will live at the top of the reef inside a 10ft long, 4 ft tall acro colony with branches as thick as your arm. There is nothing more "NSA" then that. Where do you think tonga branches come from? So I would say that an NSA is an aquascape mimicking the top of a natural reef whereas the rock piles more closely resemble the bottom and middle of the reef... here are a few random coral reef images of natural NSA aquascapes.

 

[BaliReefBox]

'in my opinion' it looks to 'full' to begin with, it's very heavy set, you look at aquarium and all you see is 'aquascape', rocks and shadows? I'm unsure but there maybe a fish in there?, I would also consider cleaning of aquriam and flow to help, altough these raised arches/ caves provide hiding spots these are generally the deadspot of most aquriam's for waste.
And To be honest you don't want fish to hide in the day.

I would reduce/remove (pictures higlated in red) this from your aquascape (to me it looks too much)

I think you dont like dogs..on th left are 2 dogs sitting and he right has a dog standing...woof woof

 

[RichReef]

It's his tank. If that's what he likes then good for him. It's not for me but who am I?

It is almost impossible to judge a scape until it grows out because if you select the right kinds of coral it can turn out to be great.

I also don't get the hiding place thing. Why are your fish hiding? My fish don't hide. The fish I selected that are rock and sand dwellers have places to make HOMES. Not hide. You don't need a hiding spot for every fish. Yes they hide in nature but there aren't sharks and predators in our tanks. At least not on purpose. The fish figure this out. The same way they figure out what a feeding tube means. What a net in the tank means. They get comfortable. My fish are in your face all the time. No one hides. Why are your fish hiding? Why don't they feel safe? Are they hiding from tank mates? If so that is poor live stock selection.

When I did my scape it was all about coral placement and homes for a select few fish and an anemone. A few people bashed it a little but I am very pleased with the results so far and the fish are happy, fat, and very active. Constantly out in the open.

IMO the most important thing when you scape is flow.

I have a fair amount of coral and still have about 10 more places to add more. I can't wait for my next trip to PEA.

 

[atoll]

Lots of hiding places dosent mean fish are hiding all the time in my tank. Most aren't at all but they know the hiding places are there just in case that mean old shark happens to come by. The only fish I don't see so much of are my assessors which naturally hang around in caves etc but they do come out. Esp when I feed the tank which is often.

 

[Sleeping Giant]

I like doing rock Pike's with caves built in the piles. I'm not a fan of the minimalist versions

 

[Anemone_Fanatic]

I'm pretty sure that most of our fish would like it if we just filled the tanks to the brim with rubble. Fish like to hide, and they need lots of heavily textured rocks placed together in order to do that. Even tangs and angels will use caves frequently if provided. The only exceptions are clownfish and sand-dwelling wrasses. Anything else wants to have the opportunity to disappear within the rock if they are spooked or sleeping. I will always make rock piles and ledges when aquascaping a tank. Once corals are grown in, the rockwork doesn't matter as much, but we generally put fish in before that can happen.