Does anyone here have one? let me know if you do. I wanna talk about em
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Does anyone here have one? let me know if you do. I wanna talk about em
Sorry man just freshwater......they said the saltwater took a ton of work! lol good luck with your though
Negative...........
Take a look on the net for forums having to do with saltwater aquatics. I'm 100% positive you'll find one in a sec. and you can get all your info there.
Good luck, man.
This pinhead is really getting on my nerves....all I meant was that I did not have a saltwater tank. I did freshwater because it was about 1/4 the work of a saltwater tank. I will however admit that a saltwater tank has beautiful fishs available....freshwater is just so so... Anyway good luck with your tank
I had a 75g saltwater tank for about 5 years. It started out as just fish but after a while I couldn't resist and went full blown reef. I had a brown tang, a pair of mated percula clowns,flame angel, cleaner shrimp, crabs, and tons of hard & soft corals. It was my pride and joy and I absolutely loved the thing. It took a lot of work though and shortly after my daughter was born I decided I simply didn't have the time to deal with it anymore. It broke my heart but I had to sell it off. When my daughter's a bit older I might start up a new tank but that's a while off.
There's also the money issue with a saltwater tank. Especially if you want to go reef. Just the lights I had on my tank, similar to pot grow lights, cost over $500.00. When I eventually start up another tank I'm figuring start up costs of around $2k and that's not including fish or anything.
Do you already have a tank Smokey or are you looking to start one. If you do have one I'd love to see some pics.
Well Smokey,I do not have a saltwater tank,but iI did manage a fish department for few years.I was in charge of roughly 60 saltwater tanks.If you ask me it just as e-z to run a saltwatewr as freshwater.The only real diferrance is cost,dont get me wrong there is a lil more effort to get a saltwter tank up and running(cycled).Once its cycled it is genraly the same as freshwater.Right now I have a 35gal African cichlid tank,cant afford the reef like I want.
p.s.
I started a thread a while ago show us your tanks & no one would post any pics of thier tanks so if you do have one please post pic
I have a reef aquarium. They are a super bitch to set up but like umeg said, once cycled and running they are less work. Still more than a fresh water IMO, but not as bad as ppl make them. I think About.com has a good section on saltwater set-ups if you can filter through all the BS and advertising.
Im looking to start one. My cousin has one and i love it. He said he spends 10-30 minutes on it each day. His friend gave him a fish that had a disease and he didnt know it so when he put it in his tank it killed like $500 worth of fish and coral. The only reason why i may not get one is only because its soooo expensive. Oh ya and there are aquarium message boards just like this one. Fengzi, tell me a little bit more about your tank and the stuff you had to do on a daily basis to keep the fish healthy. Thanks
Oh ya if i get a tank it will prob be like a 90 gallon and i want to put a huge reef in it with exotic reef safe fish.
Hope you have some cash cause it is expesive,I am talking a couple G's
Here's a few pics of my tank taken over a several year period.
I had the tank pretty well automated so a lot of the daily tasks like water replacement were taken care of. I probably put 30 or so minutes a day doing things like feeding, cleaning off the front glass, random water quality tests, etc. I'd have to give the skimmer a cleaning every 4-5 days. Every two weeks I'd do a 20% water change which would take an hour or two.
I figured out that all together I was spending about 30hrs a month on the tank. Not an overwhelming amount of time for sure. At least not until my daughter was born. Once she came finding a spare hour to deal witht he tank, not to mention 30, was tough. Even so I probably would have kept it if not for the fact that we moved to a new house and moving one of these things is a seriously fucked thing t have to do.
I would be proud to call that my tank.Did you use Marshal Island live rock,or maybe Fiji.
Does not matter cause you have a tallent & love for what you did with that reef.
i have seen alot of reef's in my time and yours is one of the healtiest,give youself big pat on back.
God damn, that is a nice fucken tank! In the second picture, if you zoom in, at the top there is a huge crab. That think is gnarly lookin like a spider.
That is an absoutely beautiful tank.....I wish that I had the patience and the knowledge to keep a like that. When I got my tank I knew the guy at the aquarium store...he just said that saltwater was a lot more work and he know I was looking for low maintence. My life right now doesnt give me much free time. Im happy with my lil tank...I should post a pic. Nothing compared to yours...lol but I was lucky enough to find actual PLASTIC CANNABIS plants at the fish store. Everyone who looks at it ....stares...cocks their heads and says...oh my god are you growing hydro?????? At this point I would like to smack them but they are young....lol Gonna take a pic now
Hers my 35g cichlid tank
Thanks for the compliments guys. My tank was a lot of work but it really was a labor of love. One really cool thing about reef tanks is that things just appear from out of nowhere. They come in on the live rock and you might not notice them for months. Of course not everything is good but that's a different story.
To answer your question Unmeg, I had a mix of different types of live rock, Figi, Tonga, Marshall, Vanuatu, etc. The tank started out as a fish only tank and I gradually turned it into a reef, adding a piece of rock here and there, upgrading equipment, etc. For anyone thinking about setting up a tank, DON'T DO IT THIS WAY.
If you're going to go reef do it right from the start. The bit by bit approach that I took causes all kinds of problems. It will work but it's never quite perfect. The other advice I'd give in setting up a reef tank is do not try to save money and buy cheap equipment. I learned this the hard way. Reef tanks are expensive and there's no way around it. Sure that $100 protien skimmer looks like it would be as good as the $400 one but it won't be. What will happen is that you'll end up spending $500 in the long run. $100 for the first one and then $400 for the good one when you find the cheap one is a piece of shit. Oh yeah, order you're equipment on-line. Never buy from a local fish/pet store (Sorry Unmeg) I found prices online to be 30-60% cheaper. Marinedepot.com and championlighting.com are two good companies I've worked with.
A great message board for reef tanks is www.reefcentral.com One cool thing they have is the tank of the month. Anyone interested in reef tanks should check these out. They are absolutely gorgeous and put my tank to shame.
good advice
Hey Fengzi, what would you recomend, a glass or acrylic tank? I want glass it looks nicer and it doesnt scratch as easily.
glass holds up better but harder to drill for filtration
acrylic does scractch e-z,I scrachted a 500 gal saltwater tank at my store.Spent the next 2 weeks with kids pointing at me as i buffed it out."look at the funny fish kids,oh he's a big one".
Anyway the tank I have now is the best IMO,it's got a glass front & acrylic everywhere else.
Yep, definitely go glass, especially if you're setting up a reef. All that live rock doesn't go well with acrylic. My tank was acrylic (a free hand me down from my parents) and had tons of scratches. You can buff them out but it's a pain, especially when it's got fish inside. If/When I get another tank it will definitely be glass with pre-drilled overflows.
I went to my local saltwater store and looked at nice all glass aquariums. I found a 65 gallon with a nice stand and canopy all for $318 brand new. I think i will spend somewhere around $1700 just getting the tank started. I cant fucken wait to get it. I plan on gettin blazed and just workin on my fish tank as a newhobby.
b-4 you buy tank you should realy think bout your fitration.filtration is 10x more important than tank.Is the tank pre drilled or are you stuck with a hanging filter(evan a nice hanging wet/dry not gonna be enogh)what kind of lights are you gonna use flour or HID,s either way you have to have the right lights,dont think you are gonna get away with just cheap flors(blue attinic run ya 45 bucks p lus you need a 50/50 bulb 40 bucks )at the least.not trying to shoot ya down just want to make sure you KNOW WHAT YOU ARE GETTING YOURSELF INTO.I hope you have done lots of homework,qietion for what is the proper salt leval (dissolved salt in water)?
If you have the money to spend make sure you have someone that knows whats up,dont listen to guy selling ya tank.
Yep, I agree with unmeg, don't listen to the guy selling you the tank. From what I've seen there are two types. 1-The ones who don't know shit but try to convince you they do. And 2-The ones who do know what they're doing but will still fill your head with shit to make a sale.
If you're going to set up a reef invest in a few good books. The Reef Aquarium Vol. 1 and 2 (Delbeck and Sprung) and Aquarium Corals (Borneman) are good choices. They'll give you a ton of info.
One other thing, I see you mentioned the tank you're interested in having a stand and a canopy. Unless the canopy is custom made for a reef tank it will probably be worthless. Lights for reef tanks put out a ton of heat (think pot grow lights) so you'll need a canopy that allows the lights to be at least 3-4" (more if your using metal halides) over the water and you'll need some ventelation like computer fans. Otherwise you'll have problems keeping your tank cool enough.
Hey Fengzi,Have you seen the new halogen lights?
as far as hood you are right,salt has a may of working into every crevious and expanding.Most canopy's are pressed wood bad for saly water.
The books Fengzi mentioned are great books & you should pick 1 up cause we are just tapping what you need to know.
I'm sure we all will answer any ?'s you mite have,but what about the ?'s you dont know to ask?
My cousin who has a tank and knows alot about aquariums works at the store im talking about. He is showin me the kind of stuff to get. Hes not trying to make sales he just trying to get me good equipment. Ill have to check about the canopy. Im not getting metal halides due to the price. Im getting PC florecent which i was told can grow some types of reefs. I got the book Saltwater Aquariums for Dummies which seems to be a good guide. Ill have to check into those other books also.
Glad to see you have some help & are not just jumping into this.
i have seen lots of people jump in to a reef set up and just be disapointed when the fail.Yea they lihgts will work but try to get 3or 4 tubes,ya know cover the canopy.you dont have to buy them all at once just work them into the design.look forward to hear bout your experiance & good luck McPot..peace
If i get 4 tubes of CP florecent will i be able to grow alota reef? Some one told me you need metal halides to grow coral.
yea if you get 4 you will be able to grow plenty,just try to replace bulbs evey 6 months if you can.Are you talking bout compacts or tubes b-4 i make any more suggestions,lol
zoozanthellae,Do You know anything about this?
If not need to,if so what do you know?
Im talkin about tubes. Now that i think about it if i buy the 65 gal tank, i will blow alot of money of course so i may only buy like a 30 gallon and that will save me money on some of the equipment i figure. The other thing though is that the smaller the tank, the more frequent the water quality can change. So in other words bigger tanks are better for beginners. Man i need some help figuring all this shit out.
I have only freshwater...seems only one type of fish wont die DAMN IT!!! Why do these fish keep dying? I clean the fucking tank every other day and have everything that it needs! I even feed my fish food to make them horny! Now we have like 6 babys :D BUT every other fish besides the ones I have die! My poor little guppies...R.I.P little squiky!!!! :(
thread of the century
I dont know why they die. Ive never owened any fish tank but i think i may get a saltwater soon.
I had pc (power compacts) flourescents lighting my tank and they did ok. They're two skinny tubes joined at one end. This is what you're talking about, right? There was 4 of them for a total just under 400watts. Soft corals will do fine under pc's and, despite what many folks will say, you can grow hard corals under pc's. They won't grow as big or as colorful, however, and you have to put them pretty high up in the rocks. Since this is going to be your first tank I would't recomend hard corals anyway, they're just too touchy. There are tons of awesome soft corals too so it's not like your tank will be lacking without the hard ones.
As far as tank size goes, the bigger the better. Like you mentioned, the water quality can change more quickly in a smaller tank. Actually, it's not so much a quality issue as it is a stability issue. Salinity, temp, ph, etc, all change more quickly in a smaller tank. The water around a typical tropical coral reef somewhere like Figi is incredibly stable so that's what the corals and fish in those areas like.
Another thing about a bigger tank is that you'll be able to have a heavier bio-load. In other words more fish. Plus you'll have more variety of fish to choose from. Rememember, the ocean is a big place and not all of these fish want to be put in a little tank. Also, some fish never leave a small area and are perfectly happy in a small tank. The problem is that these fish are usually pretty territorial and will beat the shit out of any thing that comes into its territory. So, more space eqauls more territories.
What's your budget for the tank? I think before you mentioning $1700. I'd think you should be ok with this for a 65g. I was doing some calculations on what I'd spend on my next potental tank and I was figuring about $3K but that was for a 150g complete setup for hard corals.
So you're saying that you have one type that lives and anything else you put int he tank dies? Could be that the ones that are living are killing the ones that die. Not all fish play well together. Also, you say you clean the tank every other day. Are you using tap water and, if so, do you treat it? Could be all that nice "clean" water is killing your fish.Quote:
Originally Posted by Lily420
yea stay big on tank size,you can allways make your own wet/dry filter.Get A couple different books to compare design's,its realy not that complicated and could be cheaper & better in long run.Between Fengzi & I plus your cousin you should have no trouble with this.
Lily do you have pic? & dont change water so much needs to build up its own enzymes to be healthy tank.really need more info to help ya.peace
naw, these fish r community fish, and i do all that shit! Only one guppie stayed alive for 8 months...then its scales were falling off so i killed it. :(Quote:
Originally Posted by Fengzi
I dont plan on putting alota corals in for maybe like the first year. I want to have alot of live rock and different types of live rock combined. For my first few fish i will get more hardy fishes that are better for the begginer. Zoos are considerd soft coral right? I want to put in one of those because they are so nice lookin. I wich i had more money so i could buy like a 100gal tank with kickass equipment and livestock.
Dude i wish i had an aquarium right now!
I finaly got a saltwater tank. I bought an all glass 65 gallon aquarium that came with a stand and a canopy made of oak. I also got a Berlin classic protein skimmer and a mag drvie 7 pump. I got all of this for $550 because my cousin got me a 25% discount for verything. Saturday I am going back to get everything else i need to get started.
Does anybody know if a berlin classic protein skimmer is a good skimmer? I didnt get the one that hangs on the side.
Where do i get 65 gallons of purified water. Do i have to buy 65 water jugs?