Yep another one for ya.....Suggestions?

F

Firestarter

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Jun 28, 2005
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LOOOONG time FW guy making the conversion to SW. You can thank my fiance for that.....who wants "more color and more interesting tanks other than jungle green" as she refers to it. She enjoys the tanks, but has always been fascinated by marine. Im guilty of it too, and have finally got a really good excuse to make the transition. Since moving I tore down a number of my tanks and scaled back. Im trying to take a quality over quantity approach to the hobby, and really just have a few tanks I can really enjoy rather than fuss over.

Im a long standing aquacaper (see live plant guy) and am familiar with WPG, and trace elements and nutrients, so I figure making the transition to SW shouldn't be totally foreign.

Here's what I have so far. 60 gallon that Im building a stand for. Since its going in the living room Im building custom oak stand and canopy for it. Id like have some nice looking heartier fish and maybe a few pieces of mushroom rock. No crazy leather corals, or bubble corals, just a few unique looking purple or turquoise pieces of mushroom rock, a dwarf angel(s) Coral Beauty, or Flame something like that. Royal Gramma, maybe a purple or yellow tang, clean up crew and call it a day. Obviously nothing over the top. Just enough to get going seriously but not enough to be a SW trial by fire.

Ive got a canister filter that I had for it originally an planned on using to help circulate water. That plus a few strategically placed ocelating powerheads. Now can I run the canister with say bio-balls, place some cultivated live rock, run a skimmer and that be enough? Or do I need a wet dry? Id rather not if I can help it because the tank is glass. Compare that to the fishload with and without it and see where I land is what Im after.

Suggestions for fish? Are my ideas that far off?

Im assuming PCs, but what wattage and spectrum? Or could I do 4 50/50 T8 or T12s?

Anything else Im missing? I appreciate any comments both good and bad as Im still in my research and planning stages.
 
Wow, there seem to be a lot of us folks heading over to this side of the hobby after getting into planted tanks... I recently converted one of my planted tanks into a 14g nano-reef (read: trial by fire, lol), and SwimFins is in the process of doing the same - I believe her tank is a 29g.
Keep in mind I'm VERY new here, but I'm not sure you even need the canister. From what I've read they can turn into nitrate factories, but if the tank is basically FOWLR maybe keeping NO3 levels low or non-existant isn't as crucial as with reef tanks. I wonder if you could run the canister for circulation, with LR inside, that way there are no sponges to trap detritus and raise NO3 but you'd still get the benefit of biological filtration?
1lb of LR per gallon with PHs, a good skimmer and maybe a refugium (got a spare 10g or 20g tank lying around from when you 'downsized'?) might be all you need.
I've been told that mushrooms are okay under PC lighting, not sure about NO fluorescents. If you want to pick up a PC fixture, I highly recommend the 'dual' Satellite/Orbit (basically the same) fixtures from www.current-usa.com, I really like the separate controls for each bulb and the moon light. They come with bulbs meant for marine tanks: 1 10 000K/6700K 'daylight' bulb and 1 420nm/480nm 'dual actinic' bulb.
I'm no expert on the fish you mentioned, but TMK tangs need a great deal of space to feel comfortable, and 60g probably isn't a large enough tank.
HTH
 
Read read read. Alot of my question have been answered by googling the reef sites.
No canister necessary as Blinky suggests. You can use it for circulation, put some aragonite in it and run it like a buffer maybe. The liverock idea sounds good, but I'm thinking its kind of dark inside a canister to support live rock? (My eheim canister is dark green and not much light gets in it.) But I guess it depends on your canister. You'll need stronger circulation than a trickle filter provides, at any rate.

I am running an aqua clear 200 on my 29g with aragonite in the bottom of it, and a powerhead for circulation. (I might try to grow a bit of mangrove in there eventually as a nitrate reducer) Your liverock is essentially the filter. A refugium or sump is a good idea on a 55g a tank. On a smaller tank, water changes are one way to keep nitrates down. But as I discovered, distilled/RO water is expensive, so a home type R/O tap water purification system might be a good investment.
Lots of pc lighting to choose from, it just depends on what you eventually want to keep. :)
 
So run the canister empty? My biggest concern is filteration. :duh: I know Ill get plenty of circulation, just not sure if Im going to be housing enough bacteria. Thats why I thought I should possibly add bioballs. No sponges to trap material, just fill it that way for added surface area.

And what about fish load? I don't want to overstock it and run into problems with NO3 over the long haul. Im trying to get a feel for balancing the inhabitants with my rock and filteration rather than trial and error.
 
I would push for enough live rock (~1.5 lbs/gallon) and no medium in the canister. That will give you plenty of biofiltration. The skimmer will help a lot in terms of aeration and removing dissolved organics to keep water quality high.

Mushrooms are wonderfully adaptable. I am growing some under NO fluorescent right now, and am regularly giving away progeny. On the other hand, you may as well go with PC or T5 HO. They are commonly available and more efficient in terms of output per watt. For mushrooms, or even some soft corals, 200 watts or so will be good.

I agree with Blinky that a tang may be a bit much for a 60.
 
Ok cool...Ive been reading that a Tang might have issues, so instead I may do some clowns.

What about keeping multiple dwarf angels?

Can I keep say a Flame, Coral Beauty, Potters etc without problems? Ive not read much on aggression/territorial concerns with them so...?

The liverock, that I add after the tank has cycled?

And what about stocking. Where do you start? Any suggestions on order what before what? I figured the mushrooms Id wait till the tank was well established before slowly introducing them. I know to take my sweet ole' time acclimating things and making very slow changes to introductions but just not sure if there is any fish order that I should look into.

I really appreciate the help!
 
Firestarter said:
The liverock, that I add after the tank has cycled?
Click to expand...
I cycled with live rock - I think if you add the rock when your cycle finishes, it would start things all over again.
The LR is full of nitrifying bacteria, but there is also die-off, so it's a source of ammonia at the same time. I'd put the rock in your tank and start to monitor levels - if it's uncured, you'll probably see a whopper of an ammonia spike and a long cycle, if it's partially or fully cured the cycle will be shorter/less intense but there will still be spikes.
 
Blinky said:
I cycled with live rock - I think if you add the rock when your cycle finishes, it would start things all over again.
The LR is full of nitrifying bacteria, but there is also die-off, so it's a source of ammonia at the same time.
Click to expand...

Thats what Im afraid of...a big die off. It almost seems counter productive to pay for it, use it only to have it end up as a source for ammonia.

Why would this restart the cycle? As long as their is a sufficient sources to keep the bacteria alive, why would the tank recycle?

Im just trying to avoid this major die off. LR is not cheap and I hate to see so much of it go to "waste" for lack of a better term.

I figured Id use cooked shrimp as I read about before and then once levels have stablilized start introducing a source of waste in the form of fish or other inhabitant, and start introducing live rock. This the wrong approach?
:huh:
 
My LFS told me that to add the live rock right away is beneficial to the cycle and will also seed the substrate. If the rock is well cured (ask how long they've had it), it shouldn't be problem. My rock was three weeks cured when I bougt it. I noticed no amonia spike, only a nitrite spike >0.6 fot a few days and that is now in the acceptable range 0.1 on my test kit. I never saw an amonia spike. I think the rock was probably cured by the time I received it. Even if the rock is uncured, you can cure it in your tank which takes longer, but I'd rather have very stable water quallity before adding livestock. Also, you can stack your rock and make sure its stable, glue with aquarium epoxy, or just stack, without danger to the fishies.
 
You need the live rock to grow the bacteria for the nitrogen cycle. Instead of another biological media, the live rock IS the media. If you have die-off on your LR, yes it will create ammonia, but that will kick-start the cycle. If you want really minimal die-off, get your live rock somewhere very local, or keep it immersed while you bring it hom; but obviously it would have to already be cured. The raw shrimp can start the cycle, but it's safer to use the rock itself. Besides, it's fascinating watching what comes out of the rock over the weeks you're letting it settle; you'll find yourself staring at the tank for hours w/a magnifying glass and a flashlight.... :p:
 
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