Brand New 10 gallon Tank

[Gawang]

I'm making my first adventure into saltwater at college. Hopefully it won't be a misadventure. I've dealt with freshwater for several years now, but I know a lot of that does not transfer over to saltwater. Right now the setup is a Aqueon 30 rated for 200gph and 30-40 gallons. Currently I'm cycling in live rock (7lb) and live sand (10lb).

After finishing out cycling the rock, what sort of fish might you recommend and invertebrate "crew" for the tank. As well, where might I want to hold the pH at. Right now it's at 8.2, but I know from experience that is relatively unstable once fish are added and ammonia spikes.

 

[obscurereef]

Sounds awesome...Would definitely want to see pics! I recommend getting 2 chromis (they are a grouping fish, but some people just get one). They are cheap, hardy, peaceful, and reef-safe. Same goes for clownfish usually except they can be more expensive which makes it hard when you've paid $20 for a fish that dies . And I highly recommend not getting a damselfish as they are very aggressive and will pick on any of the newcomers (+they are nearly impossible to catch)! Blue and scarlet hermits are "less agressive" than red legged hermits because red ones will steal snails shells and maybe even eat them and apparently that's not really the case for the others. Nassarius are great for cleaning the top 1" of the sand and cerith snails are nice to have also. It's amazing how much stuff these guys clean up! (make sure to add CUC when there's something that..well needs to be cleaned up! Don't want to be adding extra food just for them). Ideal pH is 8.2-8.4 so yours is great.

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Of course it's good to add your fish/inverts when there's <5 nitrate, but I added my chromis and clownfish and CUC with a nitrate reading of 20. Good luck!

 

[Gawang]

Thanks for all the advice. The LFS near my college has tank bred ocellaris clowns at a relatively cheap price. I was thinking a pair for the tank plus the inverts. How many inverts of each species would you recommend for such a small tank?

 

[Nu-Nu the eel]

A pair of clowns is too much for a 10 gallon... Sorry

 

[Gawang]

A pair of clowns is too much for a 10 gallon... Sorry

I was thinking the same. Thanks for the clarification.