While many may assume that keeping a salt water aquarium, or any aquarium for that matter, is a relatively new hobby, all are sadly mistaken. Keeping ornamental fish and other sea creatures for pleasure dates back to ancient Roman times. Granted they weren’t very good at keeping their specimens alive, they did pioneer the practice. The Romans like to put sea anemones in jars full of salt water to decorate an areas. Sadly, the anemones didn’t thrive and died soon after. These ancient fish keepers did have more luck with keeping eels, however. Some archaeological documents suggest that these eels sometimes lived in excess of 60 years! The ancient Babylonians have records describing treasure troves of exotic fish dating back to 500 BCE.
Of, course, when most people think of ancient fish keeping, their minds automatically turn to the ancient Asian countries. This is with very good reason, as the ancient Chinese mastered the art of keeping and breeding fish early on in history. Keeping fish in ponds was first documented in 960 AD during the Sung Dynasty. Keeping fish was seen as a sign of wealth, so early on the most affluent in the Chinese society would go out (or have their servants go) to the many rivers and streams in the area and bring in massive carp. They’d then place these carp in a pond for beautification. Later they would begin to breed these fish, resulting in many of the goldfish breeds in the world today. Several years later this practice spilled over into Japan, who is now the world’s leading exporter of goldfish.
Salt water aquariums as we think of them actually didn’t come around until approximately 1950. It was at this time that scientists developed flake food, making aquariums accessible to the masses. Before this time aquariums had mostly been owned by scientists who were aware of how to properly feed fish.
All of this information is pretty interesting, huh! If you have anything to add, or would like to ask some questions, please do so today by posting a comment!