The (New) Marine Aquarium Reference Volume II

Part I. The Marine Environment: An aquarist’s perspective

Section 1. The Chemical Environment

Volume II: The Physical and Biological Environment

Part I. The Marine Environment: An aquarist’s perspective

Section 2. The Physical Environment

Section 3. The Biological Environment

Volume III: Elements of Marine Aquarium Systems; Techniques and Technology

Part II Marine Aquarium Systems: Techniques and Technology

Section 4. Elements of Marine Aquarium Systems

Volume IV: Marine Aquarium Systems; Foods and Feeding

Part II. Marine Aquarium Systems: Techniques and Technology

Section 5. Marine Aquarium Systems

Section 6. Foods and Feeding of Marine Invertebrates

Volume V: Marine Invertebrates, The Organization of Life in the Sea

Part III. Marine Invertebrates: The Organization of Life in the Sea

Section 7. Classification and Development of Life

Section 8. A Concise Guide to the Phyla

Dedication

Most authors include a dedication. It’s a good way to acknowledge and pay respect to people who are important to the author. Books are usually dedicated to family, friends, supporters, mentors, heroes, or pioneers. There are many people in these categories to whom I would love to dedicate this book. Instead, however, I want to dedicate the book to a group of people who are not only important to me, but to all marine aquarists.

This book was written as a source of information for those that enjoy the challenge and satisfaction of keeping marine aquarium systems. That fascinating but sometimes troubled path is often smoothed by those that begin and maintain marine aquarium societies. Great effort is put into organization and planning; long nights of sweat and tears are spent building a newsletter, managing funds and auctions, putting on a hobbyists convention (big job) umpiring important and unimportant arguments—all to encourage, aid, and spread the enjoyment of the marine aquarium hobby. This is frequently a labor of love with little reward. I am happy to dedicate this book to the spark plugs—those individuals that have started and/or served as officers and have given freely of time, effort, money, and love in aquarium societies all over the world.

Acknowledgments

Professional and amateur aquarists and aquatic scientists, too numerous to mention, have contributed to this book through extensive conversations and correspondence. Many books and articles by professionals and amateurs have likewise contributed to the information presented in this reference. This book, however, is the product of a very small publishing company, and much of the credit for the production of the book belongs to my wife Barbara Battjes Moe. We shared the tasks of layout, design, editing, and production. This book is truly a joint effort. It was developed and designed through use of modern computer and desktop publishing technology, with a great deal of help from Scott Moe. Andrea Moe contributed some of the drawings in Chapter 8. Charles Delbeek, and others, provided helpful editorial comments included in the second and third printings.

The Marine Aquarium Reference has been revised and updated for the fourth printing, January 1992, especially the section on marine reef aquariums, to keep up with the rapid advances and technical developments in the art and science of keeping marine aquariums. A number of readers have suggested improvements and most of these have been included. My thanks to all who have taken the time to correspond.

Volume II. The Physical and Biological Environment

Table of Contents

Introduction to the Print Edition

Introduction to the Ebook Volumes

Part I. The Marine Environment: An Aquarist’s Perspective

Section 2, The Physical Environment

Chapter 1. Light

Chapter 2. Refraction of Light

Chapter 3. The Electromagnetic Spectrum

Chapter 4. Light Intensity

Chapter 5. Light Energy

Chapter 6. Photosynthetically Active Radiation (PAR)

Chapter 7. Photosynthetically Useable Radiation (PUR)

Chapter 8. Light in the Aquarium

Chapter 9. Photoperiod and Variation of Light Intensity

Chapter 10. Temperature

Chapter 11. Water Flow and Turbulence

Chapter 12. Depth

Chapter 13. Substratum

Chapter 14. Suspended Particulate Matter

Chapter 15. Detritus

Section 3. The Biological Environment

Chapter 16. Concepts and Definitions

Chapter 17. Primary Productivity

Chapter 18 Natural Cycles

Chapter 19. Carbon Cycle

Chapter 20. Oxygen Cycle

Chapter 21. Nitrogen Cycle

Chapter 22. Phosphorus Cycle

Chapter 23. Silicon Cycle

Chapter 24. Bacteria

Chapter 25. Marine Plants

Chapter 26. Green Algae, Chlorophyta

Chapter 27. Red Algae, Rhodophyta

Chapter 28. Brown Algae, Phaeophyta

Chapter 29. Marine Animals

References

Author’s Note: The (New) Marine Aquarium Reference, as was the original version, is intended as a reference work, a compilation of facts and ideas that will be helpful to aquarists and aqua-culturists concerned with various projects and problems. Being that, readers may find some repetition in various sections in an effort to make each topic as individually independent and informative as possible. Also, since the (N)MAR is presented in five independent, but contiguous, volumes that cover different subject matter; the front matter consisting of the Introduction to the Print Edition, the Introduction the E-book Volumes, the Introductions to Parts I, II, and III (where applicable), and the complete References are included in each e-book volume. This would be a horrendous waste of paper for a print book, but this repetition allows each e-book volume to be independent. Thus the reader can disregard these sections at will.

Introduction to the Print Edition

First of all, something to think about... Is keeping a marine aquarium morally right? Is it ethically correct? You may think it strange that such questions are brought up in a book about how to keep marine plants and animals, or even that such questions are worthy of consideration at all. Times are changing, however. Thinking people are now very concerned about how our activities impact the environment. As citizens of the Earth, we are becoming more and more aware that the world does not belong to humanity, that we share this planet with all life, and that our quality of life, even our survival, depends on the survival of natural ecosystems. With the ability to change the ecosystem comes the responsibility to preserve it. I think there is hope for humanity. In the last three decades we have seen the development of a general understanding of the fragile nature of our world. T shirts and bumper stickers that say Save the Whales and No Forests—No Reefs—No People and Extinction is Forever are pricking our collective conscience. In many instances, we are moving in the right direction. We have become aware that the sea is not a garbage dump; that its web of life is delicate and must be studied, understood, and carefully managed if we are to live in harmony with the mother of life, our oceans.

We who delight in the life under the sea and try to maintain a little bit of ocean bottom in our homes have been particularly troubled. It has come to our attention that the methods used to collect these fascinating creatures are, in some instances, very harmful to fish, invertebrates, and the coral reefs where many of them live. Coral reefs are delicate, slow growing ecosystems and are particularly vulnerable to the results of human activity in the sea and on nearby land areas. Coral reefs require our special concern. Maintaining a successful marine aquarium, however, is a rich and colorful thread in the fabric of our lives. We learn a great deal and gain much enjoyment and satisfaction from this hobby. We also spread knowledge and concern for life in the sea to those around us and this may well be the greatest legacy of our hobby. It is very important that we conduct our hobby with the greatest concern for the environment that is the subject of our interest.

The extremes of environmental rights and wrongs are easy to determine. It is very wrong to destroy a coral reef with dynamite to collect a few stunned angelfish and wrong to use cyanide and other methods that kill far more aquarium fish then they capture in good health. It is wrong to kill whales threatened with extinction, wrong to pollute with toxic waste. On the other hand, use of fish, shrimp, and lobsters for food is right if the fishing is so managed that the populations are not destroyed and the ecosystems are not damaged. It is right to use fish and invertebrates in scientific research to learn about the nature of these animals and the effects our activities have upon the environment. However, as with birds and mammals, marine organisms are an aesthetic as well as a sustaining resource and this is where some conflict of opinion lies.

Fisheries for food fish such as grouper and lobster and fisheries for marine aquarium fish such as angelfish and starfish are both legitimate fisheries. It is not right to allow fishing for food and sport and prevent commercial collection of marine life for aquariums. Both provide employment and satisfy human needs. Stocks of angelfish and other aquarium suitable species that sustain commercial fisheries should be protected and managed when necessary, just as other fisheries.

Different cultures often have different ideas on the proper use of animal populations. One culture may not think it ethical, proper or right to use, marine angelfish, whales and dolphins, or even dogs and cats as exploitable animal populations. Other cultures may consider them as valuable food and industrial resources. Part of being human is the dominion over, and the use of, the mineral, vegetable, and animal resources of the Earth. We do not always agree on how these resources should be used, but rational people are in agreement that the natural ecosystems and the productivity of earth and ocean must be protected and preserved. We are now trying hard to learn to cooperate with each other, to understand each other’s point of view, and to use these resources in a responsible and proper manner.

Life in the sea is short and seldom sweet. Relatively few individual organisms survive to become reproductive adults and most of those that do seldom live more than a year or two. In nature, survival of the individual is rarely significant. It is the survival of the species that counts. An individual shrimp may be quickly inhaled by a grouper, scooped up in a shrimp net and frozen for market, or carefully collected and maintained in an aquarium for a few months. Whatever the fate of the individual animal and whatever, if any, human use is made of it, the loss of the animal to the environment is one thing, and the meaning of its death in human terms is something else.

Take a quiet beach, a gentle breeze, a setting sun, and two 10 year old boys. One of these kids is catching fiddler crabs on the beach and carefully putting them on a fish hook to catch a flounder for the family cook out. The other is catching fiddler crabs, pulling their legs off, and gleefully watching them try to run down the beach on two legs. Then he pulls off the claw and slowly cuts the crab in half with its own claw. One of these kids is right and one is very wrong, and few of us have any problem determining which is which. As far as the fiddler crabs are concerned, however, attitude and intent is not a