saltwater/reef aquarists....

[JOS3]

my wife set up her 36 gallon (bowfront) saltwater tank about 6 weeks ago. she eventually wants to establish a semi-reef system. currently there are 3 clownfish (2 percula, 1 ocellaris) and 6 lbs of live rock with crushed coral for substrate. flitration consists of a penguin 170 and an undergravel with two powerheads (201).

she would like to get rid of the undergravel, leave the powerheads and add a better filter. she has been researching various types of filtration like the wet/dry system and canister filters, but has not been able to get a conclusive response. she is aware of the protein skimmer and lighting requirements, but cannot decide on a cost effective filtration. we do not want to build our own wet/dry, but purchasing one would be rather expensive, not to mention the size of them.

anyone have any suggestions?


here are some blurry pics of the fish. they move too much to get a good pic of them, but at least you can see the color differences. btw, the plants are just a filler for now until we add more rock (about 20-25lbs more) and anemones. any feedback would be appreciated.

pic 1 - ocellaris on top; percula on the bottom
pic 2 - black percula

 

[Sain't]

good to see another reefer on the board

Check out reefcentral.com and nano-reef.com if you haven't already. They're my two favorite forums.

The level of filtration you need is dictated by your bioload. If you're planning on keeping a lot of fish and feeding the tank a lot, I'd say get a good protein skimmer. But if you only have 3 clowns in a 36 gallon, you might be able to get away with just liverock. Liverock filters the water biologically and does a pretty good job. Oh, and make sure to do water changes. 10 to 20% of the water volume weekly or bi-weekly. And you should be all set.

Oh, and get rid of the undergravel filter.

 

[Protege5Gurly]

Live Rock and a GOOD protein skimmer is all you really ever need

Pe@ce

 

[JOS3]

thanks for the input (2thumbs)

my wife was already planning on getting a good protein skimmer. she just wasnt sure how powerful of a filter she would need since most places told her to go with the wet/dry. after going to some pet stores and reading a little, i think is just going to keep her penguin 170. that, in combination with the live rock should be sufficient enough.

and dont worry, as i said earlier, the undergravel and plants will be coming out as soon as she gets the skimmer and gets some more live rock.

any other fish owners on here? we also have a 55g freshwater aquarium.

 

[Sain't]

Here's my tank.

 

[JOS3]

Sain't, thats an awesome tank (2thumbs) is that a metal halide fixture above the tank?

does anyone have any suggestions on salinity becasue we were told to keep it at 1.021 to control parasites.

update: we pulled out the undergravel filter, added the Red Sea prizm skimmer to go along with the 36lbs of live rock. we also got a new light; a corallife 10,000K daylight lamp.

we have also gradually added a strawberry basslet, a blue devil, and a mandarinfish. once the tank becomes more established, we plan on adding anemones and coral.

here are some new pics.

 

[bigass_ricer]

Salt water tanks are just amazing, but I have had trouble with keeping fresh water fish alove so I don't think a salt water is for me. I sure appreciate them when I see them though.

 

[Protege5Gurly]

Good luck with the Mandarin (goby right?) --- they only eat pods and will most likely wipe them out in a week or so and starve to death unless you specifically buy pods to seed the tank every few weeks

Pe@ce

 

[JOS3]

actully, the mandarin is NOT a goby despite the fact that many people confuse them for gobies and blennies. they are actually in the dragonet family. i am aware that they eat copapods from the live rock, but they also eat live brine shrimp. we have had him for 2 weeks and seems to be eating them and doing well thus far. hopefully he will continue to stay healthy. thanks for the feedback.

 

[Protege5Gurly]

Yea I know they are dragonets ... but they are usually tagged under the gobies so I went with it. You got lucky, most wont eat other foods.

Pe@ce

 

[Nutari]

Heh.. I tried setting up a salt water tank.. with my extra 10 gallon .. didnt work out.. all the fish died. of course, I only read one book on how to set one up..

I now have two fresh water tanks.. one 30 gallon, and the 10.


(cricket) <---- just using that cause its new...

 

[JOS3]

update: we got rid of our 55 gallon freshwater tank and moved the 36 gallon saltwater into the 55g tank. since my last post we've also added some friends. we now have:

1 ocellaris clown
1 percula clown
1 mandarin fish
1 strawberry basslet
1 lemonpeel angel
1 blue devil damsel
1 sally lightfoot crab
2 mexican turbo snails (running @ 6psi )
1 candy shrimp
3 dwarf blue-legged hermit crabs

note: we had to get rid of our black percula clown because he became rather aggressive with the other clownfish and tried to feed one of them to his anemone. he also bit my wifes hand. he was a mean bastard.

i will post night time pics later

 

[JOS3]

heres an updated pic, a few new friends and many dollars later (thumb)

 

[vindication]

looks cool. sans fish, how much did you spend on this? If you dont mind, could list a breakdown of prices(more or less). I can get most everything from the tank to fish to other things from Petland cause I have a friend who is a manager there.

 

[daedalus]

this is a neat post... i've allways wanted to setup a saltwater tank but never really knew much about how to do it and what was required. The coral is sooooo pretty!

 

[JOS3]

this is my wifes hobby. i enjoy it and kind-of help her out, but its hers. i dont know an exact dollar amount, but i can tell you that it is a very expensive hobby. i do know we've spent thousands on this tank.

 

[JOS3]

this is a neat post... i've allways wanted to setup a saltwater tank but never really knew much about how to do it and what was required. The coral is sooooo pretty!

we just got the coral last weekend. (thumb)

 

[vindication]

this is my wifes hobby. i enjoy it and kind-of help her out, but its hers. i dont know an exact dollar amount, but i can tell you that it is a very expensive hobby. i do know we've spent thousands on this tank.

damn, screw that s*** for now. Maybe when I got more spending money.

 

[mastema]

ive gotta 60gal. freshwater tank with a monster oscar thats been around for about 7 years now.........when he kicks it im goin salt water.

 

[igdrasil]

My cousin also likes this stuff. He really digs it, I remember when he went to Tonga, i think is an island very close to Australia...to get some specimens that are mostly found there. Some are in his house, some of them he mailed back to his place and sold them.