The school is making waves this week as the highly anticipated arrival of the Next Wave 60 aquarium has sparked a tidal wave of excitement among students. In week 2, the aquarium found its new home in the heart of the school, igniting a renewed interest in aquatic life…

Students Blog

Week 2

Our fish tank has arrived!!! We were very excited about it and started to unpack the tank with the help of Sir. The tank is a TMC Next Wave 60… And it came with lots of interesting things that we had no idea what they were good for. The first thing we assembled was the pump which circulates the water around the tank and the filter bit. There were black sponges and everyone had fun squishing those. Then we found a transparent plastic “bottle”.

Sir said that it was called a protein skimmer. He explained that it helps to remove the waste from the water by creating a protein foam, so the bacteria will have an easier job cleaning up the rest. The skimmer was connected to a small airpump which would create bubbles. We washed all the equipment and rinsed the aquarium. Now it was ready to be filled up! Sir told us that we need to use a special marine salt mix, adding exactly 35g to every litre of water. We worked in teams, some measuring the correct amount of salt on lab scales while others added the water using jugs.

After adding the salt the mixing team made sure that the salt disappeared (as Sir said it’s fully dissolved) and then we poured it into the aquarium. When the tank was full a heater was added. Marine tanks need a temperature around 25^oC, that’s why we needed a heater. We were told that nobody must put their hands into the water when the heater is turned on and that before we do anything we must switch the heater and the pump off. When it was all ready we turned the lights on and programmed it on Miss Hubbard’s phone. There was nothing in the water, but the aquarium still looked very cool!