Who wants to help me chose the inhabitants of my shark tank???

[madman33]

Anyways im looking for warm water sharks that wont eat each other lol but it doesnt matter if they eat fish cause there wont be any in the tank. Anyways shouldnt have to worry too much about size the dimensions r 20ffet tall by 20 feet deep by 75 feet long for a grand total of 224,415 gallons. Anyways all im looking for is a list of good canidates in ur mind and then ill look throuh those run em by some ppl and then start the major research i DO NOT need help with any of the equipment or any of that stuff i have professional help with all of it... anyways thanx for the ideas in advance

 

[dual45s]

Well, first of all I suggest you hire me to do the scuba necessary cleaning/photography...
But seriously, this sounds like the coolest tank I've heard of for non-commercial use. I guess a question people are going to ask is how aggressive a shark(s) are you looking for. Reef sharks (Black Tips, White Tips, Grey) generally get to 9' at the biggest and are probably your best bet for a "real" shark look/availability. Leopard sharks might be too coldwater for what you want, but are a unique (and beautiful IMO) addition. I'd love to see any pictures of this beauty when you get it going, and best of luck. There are a few guys on here that are WAY more versed in keeping sharks in a home aquarium than I, specifically Reqiuem (who's also looking to give some Bonnetheads to a worthy tank). I was just a marine bio major before going with art.

 

[psusocr1]

hey mad long time no see!
IMO i would love a wpbbegong as your bottom dweller, smoothhounds stay fairy small and are very active as they are requim sharks and i would love in a tank like that to mimic the rockwork on a reef and get alot of reef sharks
personally i always wanted a tank around 2000 gallons and i would do alot of banded cats.. big ones though i love them evan though they dont swim around alot full grown they look AWESOME
another option is bonnetheads,,,if i were to have a tank in the 200 thousand gallon ranfge i would do a tank liek requim's with a few bonnetheads in there BTW he is selling a few pups as well!

 

[jdrex]

You could probably do a variety of different sharks in a tank that size. I personally like the black tip sharks. Not as large as others but definitely able to adapt to the home aquaria.

 

[shlovell16]

Sorry I don't know anything about Sharks but, 25,000 Gallons!!!!!!
My lord where are you going to have this built? Is it for a museum or something?

 

[sebae09]

Your options are endless.

 

[ophiura]

If this is an actual tank...and I have worked with tanks this size so :thinking: But anyway, I would reconsider the dimensions. For larger sharks, 20feet is not particularly wide at all, and 20feet unecessarily deep.

 

[maeistero]

i agree on the depth. the shark tank i work with is big enough that we have to dive it to clean. the sharks and rays don't eat that well unless the food reaches the bottom. therefore most of our other aggressive fish get it all unless we dump enough. we don't spot feed them as there's too much cleaning to be done and too many sharks; otherwise there would be some nitrogen diving problems with extended time. a 4-6ft shark is plenty impressive. someone is going to have to dive a tank of your size and it'll be expensive with them in there. imo...
consider how many biologists are willing to dive with big sharks on a regular basis while feeding. then consider if they can come up for air as many big tanks have pretty enclosed tops. the people i've met in this hobby are definitely dedicated and it does take some guts.

 

[madman33]

No worries about having ppl diving in it...i live out side of Las vegas and have become good friends with acouple of knowledgable people...the first owns his own shop and he introduced me to the second which is the man who manages all of Mandalay bays aquariums here in Vegas. And in return for him helping me with all of this(finding all the equipment ect) he can come whenever he wants and dive in the tank and clean up alittle while he is in there(Hey i asked him what i owed him for all of this and he said a life time pass to dive in the tank and to keep paying for the pass he'll do some matience etc..) Also i too am a certified diver and have dove with sharks acouple times with sharks in the wild but nothing bigger than some small blacktips so i will have to get up my confidense and study how the sharks react to different things b4 i go plugning in lol. Ophiura to explain why i was thinking 20 feet deep....i am currently having a new house built because we just moved out here acouple of monthes ago from Colorado and i thought it would be cool to have a tank as the back wall of the house so thats what i am doing. I have also not ordered the custom aquarium yet so i can make changes to the depth of the tank if you beleave it is neccesary which i am begining to think it is because the manger of mandalay bay had suggested earlier to make it wider. If i do make it wider though i will probably just cut it down to about 10 15 feet tall so you can just see it on the first floor of the house and to cut down on the costs of the beast lol. Ophiura what would you recomend the depth of the tank to be for medium to large sharks? Manny(the manger) recomended that i make the dimensions 10 high by 50 deep by 75 long Which is actually proly what i will end up going with. I just listed the other because i couldnt decide between the two sizes. And also yes i could just ask manny about all of this but he has done sooo much for me already i would prefer not to bother him any more than i need to. Also i <3 Hammerheads & Bonnets(technically the same thing i guess lol) Also Dual once i finish it you are welcome to come out and see it dive in it if you want to but u have to pay ur way here lol.

 

[shlovell16]

Wow Madman....in your home, that sounds nothing short of amazing!

 

[emmitt2]

Is the tank going to be indoors? How do you deal with what i assume is hundreds of gallons of evaporation a day inside the house?
Not to be rude hopefully but if you dont mind me asking do you have an approximate cost for the tank? Having recently priced custom tanks literally exactly 1000x smaller , my mind is spinning trying to imagine what a tank that size must cost :scared:

 

[ophiura]

I too wonder as the shark tank at the facility I worked at was about 200,000g (pushing it) and had an entire large building associated with it to house the biotowers, huge skimmers, pumps (all computerized of course), several thousand gallon mixing tanks, RO units, etc.
The tank to house larger species of sharks should be wider than 20feet, as mentioned, and can be much shallower...10 to 15 feet is certainly suitable.

 

[dual45s]

Well Emmitt, I'm guessing that the tanks you were looking at are glass/acrylic on all sides. I'm going to go out on a limb and guess that the majority of Madman's tank will be sturdily opaque and vastly cheaper than 2 sheets of acrylic 50'x10'x18" and 2 of 75'x10'x18". I can't even begin to imagine how much it would cost, how it would be moved, positioned, etc. It just boggles the mind. Especially for a home aquarium I would guess that this monster would be (absolute minimum) 80% concrete with a single viewing window. Even that window would be PAINFULLY expensive and difficult to work with. Just to put this thing in perspective an Olympic-sized swimming pool holds 253,125 gallons.
Well Madman, if I'm ever in Vegas, I'll absolutely take you up on that. UNLESS you toss in barracudas with your sharks. I had an...incident with one in the Bahamas and am a little gun-shy.

 

[psusocr1]

MAD,
did you win the lottery and not tell me?
this tank would easily cost around a half a million (IF you know people!!!) and maintenence and everythign else inclusing eqiptment etc. etc. ..evan salt! rock, lighting etc your lookin WAY over a million bucks!
plus at least 200-300K a year to maintain it! (that may be an underestimate as well!)

 

[ophiura]

A million just to start....

 

[dieselndix]

will someone wake me when this dream is over.... ***)

 

[madman33]

Originally Posted by ophiura
A million just to start....
lets just say yup lmao i dont know the exact price of it yet since i havent sent in the order yet but yes it is going to be very costly to build and maintain. And yes there is going to be only one side that is acrylic. And for positioning ther r going to be 2 cranes that will lower one side in at a time and then assymble and seal it. As for evap yes there will be lots of it but above the tank will be a seal off room that will keep in in there and cut down on it hopefully and hopefully the paint in ther rest of the house wont start to peal lol. Ophiura u are exactly right about needing a giant space for all of the filters and things...thses are going to be placed in the basement of the house which will be extended so that its not just under the house but also in the back yard under the driveway etc... I will have 2 2,000 gallon mixing tanks along with 3 commecial size ro units that will fill up 2 sepreate 1,000 gallon freshwater tanks. Have also decided on the shallower but wider size and am sending out the order 4 it tomarrow. No worries Dual45s no barracudas for me...had a bad expierience with one when i was a kid. Psusocr no worries abotu salt etc...i already told u i got coneections with manny lol hes gettin me salt all that kind of wtuff...of course i have to pay for it but hey its at one heck of a discont lol As for rock there r going to be 3 concrete stuctures built that i will later cover with lr. As for the time frame...house wont be completed for at least a year and im hoping to have water in it and alll the pumps etc functioning in about 1.5 years then depending on how smothly things go ill add aslt after that and then the lr and hopefully i will be able to start to stock it in about 2.5 years but im guessing my likely 3 years to start stocking it unfortuantley but it all dpends how quick things go...Anyways ill send pics as i go.(also dual45s we got plenty of extra rooms and ur rent could be aquarium matenence lol If u have any questions about anything else fell free to ask...

 

[madman33]

btw sorry for the horrible typing lol ive been super busy with work lately plus the new 2 month old twins plus all this this new house and aquarium stuff equals one exausted me lol

 

[sebae09]

What kind of job do you have to afford all this? im 17 and i just want to know what i need to look into career wise lol. congrats on your twins

 

[madman33]

Hey thanx...me and my wife are lucky and have two great paying jobs and her rich parents just passed away a few monthes ago so this is sort of a tribute/memorial for them too. But yeah anyways im a Aeronautical engineer who specializes in the design of wings(if u do become an aeronautical engineer specialize in wings as there are very few people who do and therfore get a better paying job and indemand more so people will compete for you) and my wife is an anatheisiologist(sp??? lol im tired) who works in the ER department sp she gets good pay working there but as a trade off for better pay sometimes she has bad hours but sometimes not....but yeah she wanted to do something special for her parents since we were building a new house and i suggested this and i dont know how but amazingly she said ok lol.