Dream homes for fish? New aquatic store helps design underwater worlds - Tennessean

Do your fish need to relax — perhaps a bit of therapy? Or maybe you need a hobby with the same benefits.

Dive into the world of aquascaping at Fishtales, Springfield's new specialty aquatic store that specializes in aquascaping and freshwater tropical fish.

"Once you get into it, it gets really addictive," Fishtales owner Christy Pierson said. "It almost becomes a little bit of a therapy because it's so relaxing, calming and it is creative."

But what is aquascaping?

It's the art of aesthetically arranging natural elements in an aquarium such as aquatic plants, rocks and stones, driftwood and substrates like sand and soil — like tending to an underwater garden.

"You're creating a miniature landscape, you're creating mountains, you're creating pathways, you're creating a forest… you're creating a little miniature landscape where the fish are almost like birds or butterflies flying through your landscape," Pierson said. "It's different, unique, creative; I just love it."

The idea to open an aquatic store bred from Pierson's love for fish and aquarium design.

She chose Springfield as the base of her operations, partly because there's nothing like it nearby.

"We have to go pretty far down into Nashville to get to a good fish store," she said, noting Nashville's well-known aquatic, pond and reptile facility, The Aquatic Critter.

Fishtales has a variety of aquariums and natural décor such as driftwood, rocks and aquatic plants that can help bring your vision to life.

Top of the line filtration, lights, chemicals and food are in stock as well — and not to mention fish.

Though they mostly carry betta fish, nano fish and other small species are available from California and Florida.

Smaller, schooling fish were specifically chosen for the store due to their compatibility with aquascaping, Pierson said. But African Cichlids can be found in the store as well, thanks to their popularity.

"We felt it would be nice for fish enthusiasts to have a place where they could get everything, they needed to keep their fish happy and healthy in one convenient location. We want shopping at Fishtales to be an experience the whole family can enjoy," written on tnfishtales.com/about.

Feeling inspired yet? Not sure where to start?

The store has a design room dedicated to creating, stylizing and bringing underwater scenes to life.

"We want to be able to tell a story through your aquarium," Pierson said.

The Design Dojo allows customers to bring their creations to life in the store, located at 1019 Bradley Drive Suite 3, eliminating the guesswork and trial and error at home.

"We have a design desk where you can measure out your aquarium, pick out your rocks and driftwood (all of which are in the design room)… pick our what you like, play around with it and design your own aquascape," she said, adding that the design room's relaxing music and overall calming atmosphere allows customers to tap into their creativity," she said.

"It's a nice place to go and get creative and build your tank before you get home with it."

For more information or to contact Fishtales, visit tnfishtales.com/.

Katie Nixon can be reached at knixon@gannett.com.