DIY Hamburg Matten filter

By far the best filter for a shrimp breeding tank or a fish breeding tank. This is merely an overview:

 

Built a huge one of those in a 4ft Malawi tank I had years ago. Works well, but also has it's issues.

1. Very difficult to prevent fish squeezing in, i.e. difficult to get a good seal all around between glass and filter sponge
2. Initally the filter sponge is nice and rigid, over time it becomes soft and wobbly and starts to collapses, especially when doing water changes. Ideally it needs some type of frame to support it. Once it has collapsed it's impossible to get back into place without pulling the whole thing out, and starting afresh.

The above was particularly bad due to the 120 cm length of the sponge. In a smaller tank, perhpas only 45 cm it would be much more rigid and easy to manage. The filters biological action was superb for the time it worked properly.

 

I have shrimp and Kuhli loaches in my tank and I made a rather simple DIY protecting them from getting sucked into the filter:

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I just bought one of those big green fish nets cut the material out and tied it to the inlet of my HOB. I only need to clean it once a week which is not hard.

 

Haven't had any issues iamdieter. I'm using 30ppm foam which is 5cm thick so it supports itself without bracing. My longest length is currently 30 to 40 cm, so I don't have any bends.

Swagasaurus: you have a mixed tank there and it's most probably on display hence you won't run something like this. Shrimp fry are 0.5mm when born and thus no netting will stop them from going into the filters.

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