> what are you talking about? you can do plenty with aquarium supplies,
> including guppies. i have some pictures of the ones i had and plenty of
> posts regarding ones i did.
>
1) What's the longest time you've had a guppy survive inside a
completely sealed bottle?
2) How big was the bottle?
> the guppy ones died because of a sudden heat
> wave that struck, and i couldn't move the bottles from window sill cuz of
> work (mmm....boiled guppy),
Store-bought ecospheres, for instance, do not need to be kept in direct
sunlight. In fact, the instructions accompanying mine specially warn
against doing that due to the problem of excessive heat, which you have
obviously experienced. Sufficient photosynthesis should be able to occur
in a microcosm using nothing more than ordinary room light. If not, then
then it simply isn't balanced properly. A homemade microcosm should be
just as robust and no more demanding in terms of solar energy than a
commercially-made ecosphere, I say.
> the snails in there lack calcium so their shells are clear
> and no doubt super-frail, but they have no predators to worry about.
Sure, snails can work in a biosphere, if they're small enough and the
right species. But the kind they sell in aquarium shops are just way too
large, produce too much waste, and consume too many resources to survive
long in a small container (and are not exactly ideal for any size
container). Those snails (apple snails, ramshorns, etc) have a habit of
reproducing like crazy and gobbling up all the plant matter.

- Logic316