I'd say the only ingredients you can buy from an aquarium shop that are
suitable for making a freshwater microcosm are gravel and (maybe)
aquatic plants. The typical fauna you find there (fish, snails, shrimp,
etc) tend to require too much O2/food and generate too much waste
material to survive long in a small sealed container, no matter what
species of plant or algae you try to balance them with. If you want to
make a saltwater ecosphere, on the other hand, then you could also try
using brine shrimp and live marine algae cultures, both of which are
available at the better aquarium shops. You could also consider getting
your ingredients from the local pond, which are of course, free. Pond
water contains algae (which absorbs CO2, generates O2, consumes waste
material, provides food source) and many kinds of tiny arthropods and
worms which can survive well on minute amounts of O2 and food, and
produce very little waste output, so they easily balance each other out
and can survive for several months inside a small container.

- Logic316



homemadebiospheres@yahoogroups.com wrote:
> There is 1 message in this issue.
>
> Topics in this digest:
>
> 1. inquiry from the press
> From: soupmanbrown
>
>
> Message
> ________________________________________________________________________
>
> 1. inquiry from the press
> Posted by: "soupmanbrown" mjb2000@... soupmanbrown
> Date: Mon Oct 30, 2006 8:16 pm (PST)
>
> Greetings all,
>
> I'm excited to discover this group's existence. I'm a writer doing a
> magazine piece about a closed ecological systems ("microcosms"), and
> naturally I'm going to include a recipe for one in my piece.
>
> I've been experimenting making sealed freshwater microcosms for the
> last few months. I started with the recipe in this paper --
> http://janepoynter.com/documents/TheABSspaceflightresults.pdf -- but
> I've been trying to modify it so that the reader can do it solely with
> stuff they can get at the aquarium store... no special "biological
> supply houses" required.
>
> Anyway, I will go through this group's archives, but I'd be especially
> interested in talking to anyone who has made dozens of these things
> and watched their progress over not just months but years. What are
> your tips? successes? failures? What's the point of all this? I
> would love to know.
>
> I can be reached either through this forum or via email at mjb2000 AT
> gmail.com . Naturally, I'm on a deadline. :(
>
> Cheers,
>
> Martin John Brown
> http://martinjohnbrown.net
>
>
>
>
>
>
>