3gal Nano build...

[Evilbass]

Good evening everyone!

I figured I would start a little Q/A thread along with some build notes I am doing.

First things first... I recently put together a 30g tank with my girlfriend Lynn. We're in the process of doing a slow build, while we're all finished cycling. We're getting ready to add 2 fish today, along with the yellow Watchmen we have in there now.

Anyhow, I have cleaned out my smaller 3 gallon today as I am going to start over and make it a coral only tank. I have been bugging the crap out of Carey via PM, so I figured, I'd get the entire group involved with this one!

I have a TOM Aquarium Deco Kit - 3gal Aquarium Kit with a Biowheel upgrade that I changed out the day i bought the kit. It came with an 18 watt 50/50 bulb that features a 7400K on one half and 14000K true actinic on the other.

I know there is a calculation for wattage per gallon so this would give me 6 watts per gallon which should be more then enough. So, what I'm planning is to get some active sand, between 3 - 5lbs of live rock, and some water and allow it to cycle for a few weeks, while of course running the regular tests.

Now the round of Questions:

1) I'm looking to go with soft corals, with some nice color... anyone have any suggestions for such a small area?

2) I am not planning on adding fish to this build, maybe just a small Cleaning Crew, with a shrimp and a couple snails. Would this be a problem? I'm not wanting to add fix, because I don't want to have too much of a bio-load on the tank, if any at all!

3) will the coral survive with out any inhabitants?

4) Is there anything I should worry about, with no bio-load in the tank???


Thanks for the help! )

 

[armyman16]

I can answer 2 or 3 of your 4 questions!
1) mushrooms are always pretty or are you talking about SPS?

2) I don't think their would be any problem, except maybe running out of things to eat?
I know hermits eat waste and stuff and whatever food is left on the sand, but not sure what all else. I'm not a complete expert but I like helping haha so I figure I'd give you an idea

3) yes, as far as I know the corals will be great without having any fish swimming around to stress them out

 

[armyman16]

An the fourth question I can't help you on sorry, I have no idea...I don't think it would be but I'm not even 20% sure haha good luck though!
An I will follow along with your build

 

[Evilbass]

Great!!! I'm going to start cycling today or tomorrow after I pick up up sand and live rock!!!

 

[armyman16]

Haha cool! It won't cost very much to start off! Haha

 

[Evilbass]

So I started the 3 gal last night...

cleaned it all out on Friday night, let it sit out in the sun for 2 days to allow any bacteria or anything left to die off. Last night I added about 2 - 2.5 inches of Fiji Pink sand/substrate. added 5 lbs of Purple live rock (donated from a friend). Got ride of the original "TOMS" filter and threw in the Biowheel that I had left from another project. I had the modify the lid a bit, to fit the Biowheel, so now it fits nice and snug!

Here are some Pics.

 

[Evilbass]

The lamp that is in the image is my 13w emergency lamp. I am waiting for the replacement Toms 18w 50/50 bulb since this one apparently was burned out.

But now we're all set. I'm going to continue to run tests on it for the next 2 weeks before I start adding any coral. add a clean up crew after a week or so, then we'll go from there... I'll start posted test results as they come in....

 

[Evilbass]

I received the new 50/50 lamp last night, and hooked up up to the tank, so its 100x brighter then the temp lamp, but I'm keeping it off as I'm still cycling the tank. I will post some picture tonight of the 3g with the new lamp, after i top off the water.

 

[Crystal A]

What do you palm on putting in the micro tank?

 

[Evilbass]

just coral... im actually thinking about that still... not sure what exactly, but it will be coral only...

any suggestions??!?!?!

 

[Crystal A]

Glad to hear just coral! As far as small coral I don't know. I think some mushrooms and ployps would be a good start.

 

[Evilbass]

well this used to be a fowlr, I have a O.C. and YWM with a tiger pistol... it was great! lasted about a year, then we upgraded to my 30 gallon!

So this go around, I wanted to get like a nice colorful Coral or something cool to just show off! maybe have a cleaner shrimp or some mini cuc in there.