120 Gallon Saltwater Tank Questions

Ok so I went to Petsmart today to see if they sold 120 gallon tanks. I talked to the manager and he said they do but they sold it earlier this week and that he will be getting another one in this tuesday. I asked him how much they are and he said he thinks they sell for $250 or $300 which beats petco's price by a lot. Now all I have to do is wait until Tuesday...


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Did you mention dimensions or just tank size? The ones around here that carry 100+ tanks usually carry the Tetra 60x18x30 120 instead of the 48x24x24 120.
 
just to give you an idea i just spent $150 on my 30 gallon and i got a discount on the live rock and fish so a 120 is going to be alot i would love to turn my 150 into a salt but i wouldnt be able to afford that right now maybe start smaller or lay out the cash good luck!
 
Khemul said:
Did you mention dimensions or just tank size? The ones around here that carry 100+ tanks usually carry the Tetra 60x18x30 120 instead of the 48x24x24 120.
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I asked the guy at Petsmart what the dimensions are but he did not know. I know you can special order 48X24X24 tanks at Petco. I think Petsmart carries something like 72X18X21 which I believe is 125 gallons. If this is the case, then that is going to be a problem because my stand is for a 48X24X24 120 gallon tank.


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Good improvement over the coralife but the pumps on the standard reef octos are not that well regarded. These are about $80 more but they are really great skimmers.

http://www.tbaquatics.com/vertex-in-180-internal-protein-skimmer-814.html

http://www.tbaquatics.com/swc-xtreme-160-cone-protein-skimmer-865.html

The super reef octopus (might get by with the 1000 but the 2000 for sure) are a bit more than those but the bubble blaster pumps are really very good. Not trying to break your bank but there is nothing worse than buying equipment twice. Again, you do not need the skimmer right away.
 
greech said:
Good improvement over the coralife but the pumps on the standard reef octos are not that well regarded. These are about $80 more but they are really great skimmers.

http://www.tbaquatics.com/vertex-in-180-internal-protein-skimmer-814.html

http://www.tbaquatics.com/swc-xtreme-160-cone-protein-skimmer-865.html

The super reef octopus (might get by with the 1000 but the 2000 for sure) are a bit more than those but the bubble blaster pumps are really very good. Not trying to break your bank but there is nothing worse than buying equipment twice. Again, you do not need the skimmer right away.
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Ok thank you. So to cycle the tank I know I need the dry rock and some live rock. I also need the sump and the sand too right? And do I need the lighting to promote coralline algae? Any other equipment i need for cycling? Thanks


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All you need to cycle is rock (live, dry or both), flow (pumps/powerheads) and a heater to keep temp stable. If you want to have sand in your tank I would suggest adding it at the same time. If you have a cool LFS, ask them for a fish bag full of sand from one of their tanks to help introduce some diversity. Also, just want to make sure you know the reef octopus you asked about and the skimmers I linked are in-sump skimmers so your tank will require a sump/refugium in order to use one. Ideally you have your infrastructure in place from the start so yes, I would go ahead and install the sump. You could also throw some chaeto or other macro algae in the sump to further establish some diversity and also combat some initial phosphates.
 
greech said:
All you need to cycle is rock (live, dry or both), flow (pumps/powerheads) and a heater to keep temp stable. If you want to have sand in your tank I would suggest adding it at the same time. If you have a cool LFS, ask them for a fish bag full of sand from one of their tanks to help introduce some diversity. Also, just want to make sure you know the reef octopus you asked about and the skimmers I linked are in-sump skimmers so your tank will require a sump/refugium in order to use one. Ideally you have your infrastructure in place from the start so yes, I would go ahead and install the sump. You could also throw some chaeto or other macro algae in the sump to further establish some diversity and also combat some initial phosphates.
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Ok thank you. And do I need to have live rock to seed the dry rock? I'm assuming I do but I don't have any good LFS's and my local petsmart is all freshwater...and yes I know that I need a sump and Refugium for the skimmer. I should have mentioned that I was going with a sump for filtration


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You need live rock to seed dry rock but not to cycle it. The bacteria you are trying to grow on dry rock will populate on its own once a food source (ammonia) is introduced to the tank and the tank cycles via that food source. Having a few lbs of LR will (1) help speed the process because some bacteria will already be present on the LR and (2) you will (assuming its good quality LR) introduce organisms that you would not have with dry rock alone. Pods (copepods, amphipods, isopods) micro stars, feather dusters, etc are just some of the beneficial things you gain by using LR (of course there are other ways to introduce those as well but LR is a great way to do it. However, LR does provide the opportunity for some bad things to be introduced (aptasia, bad isopods (not common), colonial hydroids, etc.) IMO/IME, having the diveristy that LR provides in your system is invaluable to the health and grwoth of your system and outways any potential risk for bad hitchhikers. Another way to help intoduce diverisity is by adding some macro algae and/or some sand from an established system, although you won't "seed" as much bacteria verus using a few lbs of good quality LR. Or you can buy "packages" which contain pods, stars and the like but those are typically expensive. There are a number of places to get good LR online or if you have a Petco around you they now sell Walt Smith maricultured figi rock.
 
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