Need help with setup "PLEASE"

[angelfreak]

Hello evereyone,

After the new year we would like to setup our first salt water tank and you guessed it we dont have a clue. We are going to use a 29gal. tank Dimensions are 30x12x18. Now were do I start. Rock I guess? What do I need for lights? How about equipment? Livestock? Were do I get the stuff I need? Does anyone have "stuff" that I need to help me get started? Were are the best deals? Please tell me everything you know (tips, tricks and Ideas). I'll post pics of progress as we create this new world.

Thanks
Scott & Jen

[kennyman]

what you need to do is figure out what kind of livestock you want to end up with and then set a budget that will get you there.

do you want to spend a few hundred and have a few SW fish? (fowlr)

Double that to have some corals?(soft corals & fish)

trick it out for SPS and drop a grand or more?(those pretty acropora)

A great site to browse stuff and learn about what you can put in a SW is http://www.liveaquaria.com/product/scateg.cfm?pCatId=526

Oh and keep in mind fish load in SW is about 1/4 that of FW 

[angelfreak]

Thanks Kennyman,

What I would like to do is get it up and running (obviously as cheap as possible) and build on it over time. Is that possible? I understand that there are some things that I need right off the bat and thats no problem. Perhaps someone could give me a list of must haves to get this tank running with quantities and sizes to accomidate a tank this size. Sand? whats the best? how much do I need? Flow? how much do I need? Rock I know lol. Lighting? Can I start with less and add more? I would like to go with T5's

As for what we would like to have in it; well a Clown is a must, a Firefish Gobby perhaps as well but not really looking to have a lot of fish. we like the inverts like Banded Coral Shrimp etc. Only interested in haveing one each of perhaps a few different kind of inverts. Any suggestions as to how many or what species would I be able to keep together? As for SPS, Yes but I dont have to jump right in to this do I? Types will depend on lighting, so without going extreme on lighting what can I grow?

Any suggestions are greatly appreciated

Thanks
Scott & Jen

[kennyman]

I can make suggestions based on the two simple SW tanks I have had if you'd like. I'm sure that many other people can also add there experiences on a simple first time setup as well.

~You need 20-30 lb of Liverock. It can go anywhere between $4/lb-$10/lb depending on where it comes from. Different parts of the world export rock of different density, shape and composition. Look at all the rock around town before deciding what you like.

~Powerhead. I would recommend Seio's over Maxijets. Way more flow for the wattage . It's what I run in my similar sized tank. Some people like the Hydor's as well. (800-1000) gph total flow

~20lb of fine reefsand (don't bother with livesand)
~A 100W heater
~A hydrometer for measuring salinity
~A bag of Instant Ocean
~A dual fluorescent strip you can put one daylight and one actinic. The actinic makes some of the fish colour fluoresce and will give you that Under the water feeling.
~Freshwater nitrite test kit is fine for cycling your reef.


-Setup your Sandbed, water, heater and powerhead. let that run for a week with the light off.
-go buy the rock from whatever source you choose: BA's, Marinescape, Az's, Redbelly, Ray or the classifieds. Drain out enough water to build your rock feature and then add the water back in.
-monitor nitrite.
-once nitrite has disappeared do 10%-20% waterchange and add a cleanup crew of snails and hermit crabs.
-once the tank has stabilized and adapted to the bioload of cleanup crew you can add fish.


You can keep some simple soft corals with a minimal two tube light. Stuff like mushrooms, solitary polyps and yellow polyps. But you will need to jump up to 100W-200W of light to keep med light corals.

[Zoe]

You should plan on having corals - even if just soft corals which require less lighting. IMO, there's no point in having a SW tank without having corals (Just look up

"zoanthid" on google pics, and you'll see what I mean!)
You can, however, start with less lighting and build up. IMO it's really worth it do to it that way, because you'll end up spending more in the long run, but if you start with just

fish and rock, but no corals, then you need too much in the ways of lighting.

Ok, so, lighting:
Your main choices are:
Power Compact lighting - a decent choice. get's a little warm, but is readily availabe and reasonable priced.  Should be fine for soft corals
T5s - these are long fluorescent tubes but they are HO or VHO (Very High Output).  They are fairly expensive, but produce no heat, and you can keep most corals - soft AND

hard corals.
Metal Halides - usually hairly expensive, but if you wait and look for deals, you can find  them at the same price as "new" power compacts. But new, a 175-250 Watt fixture will

cost you 250-350$.  They produce a lot of heat, but the lighting effect is great, and you can keep anything.
If you get fish only, and maybe a few of the lowest light corals, you can just use a dual fluorescent light, and use one bulb and one actinic bulb.

Live rock:
You will want to get at least 30 lbs of live rock, which costs 4 to 8 dollars per pound at most places.  Pat (redbelly) sells homemade live rock, which is at the lower end of the

price spectrum, and you could with about 1/2 the DIY rock, and 1/2 regular rock.  It looks different at first, but eventually you'll get other algaes on your rock, and it will all

blend in nicely.  There are many different "locales" of rock, like fiji, tonga, etc etc.  However, it's all pretty much the same difference.  Rock that is branchy or "fingery" will go

further, because a large rock weighs less, and because there is more rock surface for the organisms, bacteria, and algae to grow and thrive.  You will see cured/uncured rock.

The curing process is allowing any dieoff to occur on the rock (after bring it out of the ocean, there will be some dieoff), and allowing new organisms to grow.  Regardless, your

tank will go through a minor curing process just from moving from one tank to the other and being exposed to air.  So you can get uncured rock if you want to - it's cheaper.  It

will take longer to cure than rock that was previously cured.  It can take a couple days to a couple weeks (or in extreme cases... a month or two)
Uncured rock will stink, fyi.

Water:
You shouldn't use plain tap water. Some people do with no problems, but tap water does contain stuff like phosphates that can cause algae.  You can guy a Reverse Osmosis

filter that goes straight into your plumbing. You can get a system for 100-200$.
You can also just use Culligan water from Shoppers Drug Mart. It's 5$ for a 5 gallons jug.
Don't use Spring water or anything.

Salt:
FYI, always pre-mix your salt water. I have a rubbermaid with salted water and a powerhead always going on for water changes... and one with regular water and a powerhead

for top-offs. If you want to see why it's important to give your salt mix a day to circulate, put your finger in water, then dip it in the reef salt. Your finger will get hot, because

that stuff is corrosive at first.
Anyway, any commercial salt mix is fine. I use Instant Ocean and haven't had any problems with it.

Hydrometer:
At Big Al's, you can get a swing arm hydrometer for $20, that can be very innacurate, gets very dirty, and can lose accuracy over time.
Or you can go to e-bay and for $40, get a refractometer.  I've used both and will never, ever look back. Refractometers are very accurate, easy to use and read, easy to calibrate,

and well worth the extra expense.

Sand:
You can get live sand for 4-5$ per pound, but you can also get "dead" sand like Aragonite for 1$ per pound or so, depending on where you go. 2mm-4mm grain is ideal, as it is

small enough to be siftable by creatures, and large enough that burrowing creatures can do so. However, smaller or larger grain is fine, too.  The live rock will seed the live

sand.

Test kit:
Invest in a good, complete test kit.  You will need it during the cycling process and often thereafter to test your levels.

Filtration:
Your live rock and sand will be your primary filtration.  Some people use an Aqua Clear HOB filter (one of the largest sizes), and modify it to put some live rock rubble and

macro algaes in it instead of the filter media.  This will help increase filtration, and the algaes will help with your water quality (and will also help combat nuissance algaes).

Protein skimmer:
Skimming removes disolved oragnics in the water (easily recognized by the "film" that you sometimes see).  Skimming is always better than not skimming, but you do not need

a protein skimmer in your size tank.  Just do weekly water changes, don't overfeed or overstock, and you'll be fine.

Powerheads / water movement:
When you put your rocks together, keep in mind that water circulation in all areas is necessary, or you'll get a buildup of crud in those areas.  In your tank, you'll want at least two power heads like an MJ 1200 and an MJ900.

That's all I can think of right now

[angelfreak]

Thanks for the help thus far,

Any sugestions on the size of a cleaning crew and its contents?

[Zoe]

Start with:

About 10 hermits
About 10 cerith snails
About 10 astrea snails...

And see how it goes.

[kennyman]

A deep sandbed can help with stabilizing your tank and eliminating Nitrate as well as provide a home for burrowning creatures. But it requires critters like the Cerith Zoe mentioned to maintain it. The amount and grade of sand I had mentioned earlier would not give you a deep bed and would not require much in the way of sandsifters.

You can use anywhere between 0 and 4". Bare bottom -> thin fine covering -> DSB. Each method requires some different considerations.

Oh and if you can find them, add Nerite snails to the mix. They are my favorite with respet to diatom and cyano eating.

[Zoe]

Oh and if you can find them, add Nerite snails to the mix. They are my favorite with respet to diatom and cyano eating.

Damn!! I should get some of those for my cyano!

[Julie]

The nerites I have from carib munch on cyano a bit.

[angelfreak]

Hi all,

Well, looking around the house at the tanks I have I'm thinking do I really need another planted tank? And a 77gal. to boot? My 55gal. is looking great and I dont need to pay that much attention to it, the fishes are happy and I still have a bit of room for new plants. I have my African tank, nice size and no maintenance, Perfect lol. So what is missing? SALT. Originally I was thinking to go small, hoping for less work, maintenance etc. Not likely the case though. So I'm thinking why not 77gal. Salt? Will it be much more work? Initially for sure, but long term? If it takes me a little bit longer to get it set up so what. Cant be any different than watching plants grow right? I think I have pretty much talked myself and Jen(most important) into going for it. Let me know your views. Good idea, bad idea?

Thanks
Scott & Jen

[kennyman]

You kind of have a fixed cost per gallon with SW. But you could use something like Texas-holey-rock to build a reef base and place some legit live rock on it to seed it. You would probably want to keep equipment in a sump with a bigger tank and you need an overflow to keep the surface clean anyway.

I have seen some really nice fish only Sw systems too. Some of the more exotic fish are not reef safe and become the show piece themselves. Just something to concider 

[sniggir]

I have to agree with kennymen,it alldepends on what you want if you are more interested in fish than go fish only there are tons of cool fish out there that are not fish safe... just do your research!

[groupie02]

... there are tons of cool fish out there that are not fish safe...

is that really what you wanted to type? 

I agree that some fish don't mix well with others but I think 'reef safe' would be a better fit with this thread.

[sniggir]

yes you are correct, I did mean reef safe...lol  .....

[angelfreak]

Hi all, I restarted this thread here;

http://ovas.ca/index.php?topic=24363.0

Scott