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BOOK REVIEW
Tanganyika Cichlids in their natural habitat, 3rd Edition by Ad Konings
The latest fishkeeping products, tried and tested. ON TEST
NEWA More freshwater aquarium Nathan Hill checks out a classy-looking nano tank that’s received a lot of interest in the PFK building...
I
’ve seen a few of these while out and about now, and despite initially wanting to write them off as ‘just’ another nano tank, I’ll concede that the NEWA designs have mileage. NEWA is an Italian company, which explains the slight emphasis on looks over a classic box-and-hood aquarium. The NEWA model I have to play with is the NMO 50, which is actually just shy of 50 l/11 gal capacity (45 l/10 gal when filled), with dimensions of 35 x 36 x 35cm/14 x 14.2 x 14in. As tabletop aquaria go, it’s in that nice ‘big enough for tiny fish, while small enough to not impose itself’ place. As a fascinating aside, when I set the thing up in the studio for photos, it had a huge amount of interest from people passing by, asking if they might be able to have it when I was finished.
What’s in the box?
The ‘50’ model only comes in fresh, though smaller designs have a marine option, which also incorporates a protein skimmer. For the basic freshwater models, the filter involves an up-and-over trickle design incorporated into the curved hood. A coarse(ish) biological foam goes in, followed by a fine mesh/carbon pouch insert. The pump sits in the underside of the lid, with a pipe and strainer jutting down into the water, and sends the water at 300 lph through a concealed route up to the filter chamber, where it percolates through the
PHOTOGRAPHY: JACQUES PORTAL
Verdict
media and drips back down into the aquarium. It’s a basic design, and you might want a couple of bendy brushes on standby for the occasional clean, but otherwise it’s well thought out. There’s even an emergency overflow facility for if the filter starts to clog. An adjustable heaterstat is included (100W) which has a dedicated insert/holder in the lid. Slip it through (there’s a little bit of fiddle with cables and plugs during this stage) and you’re good to go. Both heater and pump strainer are relegated to the far corner of the tank, making them simple to conceal with well placed decor, while an included trim to conceal cables on the outside of the tank completes the smart appearance. Lighting is surprisingly punchy, delivered by a string of 18 white and six blue LEDs that follow the frontal curve of the semi-lid, and I imagine that many plants could do well underneath them. There’s also a superbly cut cover glass that follows the shape of the lid.
Neat and tidy The pump strainer and heater are tucked away at the back while the cables are kept tidy inside the trim.
Concealed filter The trickle filter is incorporated into the hood.
4/ 5
I was tempted to keep this for tiny Boraras, but I relented and gave it to a colleague. Now I’m actually thinking about buying one, so hopefully that says something about how impressed I was. For bonus points, the packaging doesn’t have goldfish on it, which is very refreshing. Ease of use: 4/5 Features: 4/5 Value for money: 3/5 Overall score: 4/5 Price: NEWA More 50 Tropical Aquarium, RRP £220. More info: www.newa.it/en
The heaterstat has its own dedicated holder in the lid.
The filter is a basic design with a coarse foam and a fine mesh/carbon pouch on top. PRACTICAL FISHKEEPING
Cover glass The cover glass follows the shape of the lid and is surprisingly stable.
The LED lighting should be bright enough for plants. www.practicalfishkeeping.co.uk
Ad Konings is a regular PFK contributor (and a personal favourite) on the cichlids of East Africa, and especially so on those from the lithe, abyssal Lake Tanganyika. Konings has spent much of his life living by, diving in, and studying the lake, and there’s likely no better authority on its fishes. At 408 pages, the hardcover bound work builds on previous volumes, making it possibly the most comprehensive Tanganyikan fish book ever. The format is easy to follow, comprised of a mix of continuously running copy, interspersed with detailed images of any fish being mentioned. If you’re after an instructional book, with step-by-step guides to setting up Tanganyikan tanks, or pages of preamble and technical data on the equipment and chemistry required to make your own set-ups, this isn’t it. Konings’ book is so much more than that. The mainstay of the work reads as a guided tour of the regions of the lake, from the rocky habitats where waves crash, down to the deep recesses and with everything in between. Within each region, Konings systematically works through any genera of fish found there, covering such areas as phylogeny, distribution, feeding and spawning behaviour, geographical variants, and any associated trivia. Periodically a fish will be presented in the context of an annotated map, with photographic examples of each variant placed at a particular point. From this perspective, the identification of regional morphs becomes simple. The book is non-instructional in tone, but the depth and clarity with which Konings writes leaves nothing to the imagination, and herein is the strength of it. As a commentary on the exact wilderness conditions of Tanganyikan fish, along with the contextual information of behaviour, any aquarist can soon comb through for the essential data that need incorporating into a successful tank. Furthermore, as Konings has taken pictures of
fish from such a wealth of well documented locations, the book is a somewhat authoritative catalogue of colour morphs according to geography. Also noteworthy is the volume of information Konings has gained from personal observation. The fish that he has watched in the wild have displayed a myriad of traits — breeding, predation, defence and so on — that have likely never played out in aquaria before. For the aquarist trying to fathom the quirks in their Tanganyikan fish, if the answers aren’t here, then they might not be anywhere. Best of all, despite Konings’ inherently academic background, the book is written in accessible prose with a total non-reliance on jargon. Whatever level of fishkeeping you’re at, you’ll be able to read and learn from this edition. NATHAN HILL
Verdict Comprehensive yet accessible, well illustrated, easy to digest, occasionally surprising and always engaging. The marriage of Konings’ writing to his archive of pictures makes this a book that anyone serious about Tanganyikan fish should have access to. Price: £49.99 ISBN: 978-1932892-18-5 More info: www. cichlidpress.co.uk
Konings is a top expert in his field, but he’s kept his book easy to read and jargon-free.