I DID IT !!

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Hara

Aquarium Advice Addict
Joined
Aug 28, 2002
Messages
7,224
Location
Louisiana
ok, you guys talked me into it. The 150 is now officially a saltwater tank.

I dont know what I am gonna say to my BGK :(

Anyway, I am quite excited and looking forward to the process. It is sanded, watered, filters running with dead shrimp happily decaying.
Will keep you posted on the progress and my decisions on its inhabitants.
 
Yippie!! :onfire: :multi: :onfire:

I seriously doubt your gonna regret your decision in a few months. In fact many people find saltwater an addiction.

Its great to hear your going the fishless method of cycling your tank. What are your general plans for the tank?

Can we get photos. I know there wont be much to look at but its fun to see the progress of a tank.
 
hmmm, things are not wanting to upload tonight. anyway, we have decided on lighting, I realize it is not the best, but I feel that it is going to be adequate for now. We will be going with 6, 110 watt VHO bulbs.

I have gotten 2 pieces of live rock, will be adding a couple pieces each week for awhile. Would eventually like to have a reef setup, but I realize that will take much time. I have to drive 1.5 hours each way to get to the store that has the decent LR. The LFS sells what they think is LR but looks more like unattractive base rock in comparison to what I just got.

Lighting parts should be in Thursday and will hopefully be able to assemble the lighting this weekend.

Someone told me that I should not have any media filtration....what exactly is he referring to?

Thanks for the help again.
 
He means that a sand bed of sufficient depth (like yours is) and LR will provide enough surface area to house more nitrifying bacteria than you will ever need. The addition of additional bio media will not help but hinder the DSB's (deep sand bed) and LR's ability to denitrify, leading to a build up of nitrate. Mechanical filtration (sponge, floss, etc.) will remove zooplankton and 'pods from the water column and will trap detritus rather than allowing it to fall to the bottom where it can be processed into harmless material by the fauna of the sand bed.
Side note: if you don't have an abundance of said fauna, you need to get some and keep it fed so they multiply. The few pieces of LR you have may not have enough worms to form a "seed" population in your DSB. "Feed" your tank some flake or frozen food every few days to give the micro critters something to eat and they will multiply for you. If you don't see worm trails in your sand by the end of the month (or two), consider getting a detrivore kit to suppliment the sand fauna.
Good luck, it looks great so far!

Mark
 
So then, what you are telling me is that I just wasted money on the 2 fluvals? Or can I use them without the floss as added filtration?
(If you dont tell me the right answer, I will be forced to go buy another tank to use them in and my husband will kill us both :!: )
 
wasted your money on the flouvals? No I dont think so. You can always take the filter media out of them and use them as water circulation pumps. This is what I did with my eheim filter that I had on my 45 gal FOWLR tank. I just recnetly moved this filter and replaced the media and now its on the 29 gal freshwater tank.

Your probably gonna need/want more water current in there than what the two flouvals produce anyway.
 
You can use the canister filters as water circulation only as Aaron suggested. In the event you want to use some chemical media to remove phosphate or want to polish with some activated carbon, you can use the canister for that.
But the bottom line is you didn't need to buy them in the first place IMO.

Mark
 
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