It's true Kissy, I did do that. And I think you're the only one that's figured out that I'm a girl. Haha. Yeah, I have a bunch of bottles in my tank. The problem with just emptying it and then putting the cap back on is that 1. it will float and 2. you lose the volume of the bottle as swimming space. What I did is rather more complicated than that. Here's a pic of my tank. I'll also attach one in case it doesn't load.
What I ended up doing (after a lot of trial and error):
1. Pick which bottles you want in the tank. Ones with the labels printed on the actual bottle (like Corona) are easier than ones with paper labels glued on. I have some of both.
2. At first I had some of the bottles in the tank with just the tops open, figuring that either the fish wouldn't swim into them with such a small hole open, or that they'd be figure out how to get back out if they did. Both of these assumptions were wrong. After having to literally pour my platies out of wine bottles a couple times I decided to try a different approach. So, I decided to cut the top and/or bottom off of every bottle, so that there's plenty of room. This also allows the bottles to double as caves and hiding spaces. Again, after trial and error, here's how I did it. First, prep something like a small trash can by filling it with ice cold water, it can even have some actual ice floating in it. Hold the bottle flat on a table and prop a glass cutter on something like a pile of books so that it hits at the right height. Coat the glass cutter with vegetable oil and score the bottle all the way around. Then, fairly quickly so the cut doesn't have time to heal, take a length of 100% cotton cord and soak it in kerosene. That's right, kerosene. Wrap the cord around the bottle at the same place as the cut. Then, holding the bottle at the end away from the cut, preferably wearing gloves, light the string on fire. As the string burns, it will stress the glass at the place you've scored it and you will actually hear it crack. Once the string has stopped burning, plunge that end of the bottle into the bucket of ice water, this should finish the fracturing process. If it doesn't completely come off, you can gently tap it either against the edge of the trash can or with the other end of the glass cutter.
3. Once you cut all the bottles the way you want (use some for practice, it takes a few to get the hang of it), coat the jagged edges with silicone. You can also coat the labels with silicon, although it's nearly impossible to get it completely coated to the point where it won't eventually form air bubbles. I have some with bubbles in my tanks and they seem to be ok, but I wish they weren't like that. I also have a couple where I took the label off, laminated it and then attached it back to the bottle.
4. When the silicone dries you can rinse the bottles in really hot water and then you're ready to decorate.
Sorry this was a really long answer. Let me know if you have any other questions. I've also thought about putting some glass gels from theatre strip lights in there, but I'm not positive if they're colored with lead, so I've held off on that. Anyone know how prevalent coloring glass with lead, etc. is? Or should they be safe? They look something like this:
but I have access to red, blue, green and amber. I think it would be a cool addition to the tank, maybe suspended from the canopy and floating to give the tank some decoration up higher.
