My hubby has a copper figurine of a scorpian and was wondering if it was safe.
There are water conditioners meant to take care of copper. However, it would be much better and cheaper not to put the copper figurine in the tank in the first place. Put it on a shelf instead.
Copper might interfere with the filter or pH of the water. I wouldn't suggest keeping it there. If he really likes the figure you might be able to coat it with a fish safe resin that wont leach into the water.
copper is toxic for all living things in high doses. a copper figurine in a fish tank will leak copper into the water.
Copper will definitely limit the fish you can have. It will kill snails. When pennies were real copper it was the recommendation of fish hobbyist to drop the new plants in a bucket with lots of pennies to kill all the snails. Some fish like Otocinclus are sensitive to it. Copper can replace iron in the blood and there it does a poorer job of moving oxygen. Crayfish will definitely die. Shrimp will also die. Harder fish in ponds such as goldfish have had huge bronze pieces in with them for year in Japan. It seems ot have done very little harm to those fish. So my answer is a qualified YES.
